What we should be doing

17 comments on “What we should be doing ”

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1. Aj 1

   11 February 2009 at 7:04 pm

   You should also be pointing out that while Key’s party has asked the HSC for a nil wage rise this year, they are already in the salary bracket that will benefit most from the National Party’s changes to the taxation scales.
2. keith 2

   11 February 2009 at 7:32 pm

   another green party energy initiative that would be hugely helpful to NZ is to put solar hot water heating in kiwi’s homes. It would save about a third or more of a householdrs power bill (hundreds of dollars per year), would pay for itself within 5-10 years, would relieve the delapidated transmission network, alleviate the winter shortage of the hydro lakes, create employment, bring about world peace.
   It’s pretty much the single best thing the government could do during this recession and it will never happen because the people who could make this happpen are fucked.
3. mike 3

   11 February 2009 at 7:59 pm

   Thanks for listing the Greens policies from the last election SP

   94% of NZers didn’t vote for them then so now that we are in the shit I’m sure even less people are interested in their warm & fuzzy madness.
4. keith 4

   11 February 2009 at 8:39 pm

   Classic mike post mike, do you get that the only reason you haven’t been banned here is tht the mods love how your posts reflect the ‘right’ as an ideology followed by drooling degenerates? Your posts have some great resonance with the wider right-wing theme; percieved short-term gain which in reality is just shitting in your own nest.
5. Jum 5

   12 February 2009 at 9:27 am

   Electric cars costing $50,000 to $60,000 and now the government says the owners won’t be subject to road user charges.

   Come again! People who spend that sort of money can afford to pay road user charges.

   Once again the rich are favoured by NAct. How does the Maori Party feel about that?
6. Daveski 6

   12 February 2009 at 10:27 am

   Accepting that these are worthwhile strategies, one could rightly question why they weren’t pursued more aggressively by Labour when Labour not only had the opportunity but the economic conditions to boot.

   It’s a little rich to condemn the Nats for failing to do something Labour also failed to do.
7. Pat 7

   12 February 2009 at 11:08 am

   SP wrote: “69 new State houses in six months (= bugger all, the net number of State Houses grew by 500 in the last fiscal year)”

   I am trying to compare apples with apples.

   What do you mean by the “net number” of State houses grew by 500?

   If 69 new State houses are going to be built in 6 months, how many new ones were built last year?
8. Camryn 8

   12 February 2009 at 11:16 am

   I’m a confirmed right-winger, but I agree with many of these items but with different thoughts on implementation:

   Electricity/Insulation: Of course, if home insulation and other energy efficiency initiatives supposedly yield such great savings then there should be sufficient market incentive for them to happen anyway… no need for subsidies for purchases that pay for themselves. Since they aren’t happening, or aren’t happening fast enough, then something must be out of whack in how electricity is priced. I say government should get the price signals right and then focus on assistance to adapt (e.g. low-cost loans etc) rather than straight out subsidy. The targeting will be more accurate. On the ‘smart grid’ side… I agree, government could do a lot to advance smart grid development which in turn does a lot to open up the market to small-scale producers which will give a big boost to solar, efficient new ideas, etc.

   Organics: Agree NZ agriculture needs to target high-margin niches to compensate for distance from market. Organics seem logical given prices, stability and grow of demand, and existing national image (well founded or not). Again, not sure the government actually needs to do anything except enforce costs of externalities such that pricing signals re: fertilizer are accurate. Of course, this type of effect is always hard to build into price, but not impossible and totally worth it.

   Upskilling: Clearly there are public good benefits to a more skilled and productive workforce, but I disagree that government should be an upskilling *provider*. I’d first look at what government disincentives are in place to private sector training/apprenticeships and remove them, and then look at any incentives that can be provided at less than the cost of the increased public good… most likely in the form of tax breaks on the first two years of employment of a first time employee in selected industries (or similar). Should be something easy for the IRD to administer without the need for an additional bureaucracy.
9. insider 9

   12 February 2009 at 1:31 pm

   On a range of comments above

   Camryn – Isn’t a subsidy a price signal or are you saying that power is so cheap that most people don’t think it is worth the cost so power prices should rise artificially? Isn’t cheap power usually a good thing?

   Jum – no user charges for electric cars was Labour policy. It’s been rolled over. But I agree with you.

   keith – Solar hot water pay back in 5-10 years? Don’t make me laugh. This guy who has one and has logged its performance says it will be 50 years http://www.inthelight.co.nz/techo/solarheating.htm. Branz say 8 to 20 years but many of the systems won’t last that long.
10. Draco T Bastard 10

    12 February 2009 at 1:44 pm

    Energy efficiency.

    What you’re really saying here, even if you didn’t realise it, is that privatising the electricity generation and distribution failed miserably. We should have kept it, have it continue losing money and we would have all been better off.

    Sovereign Wealth Fund.

    Yep, bring ownership back into the community and we’ll be better off than we would ever be while having foreign ownership.
11. bobo 11

    12 February 2009 at 2:03 pm

    Just an idea would be to use some of our ever growing stockpiled NZ wool for housing insulation while the export market is flat ?
12. randal 12

    12 February 2009 at 2:12 pm

    before the election Bubba Hayes from the wairarapa was big on an international airport at masterton and putting a car tunnel through the rimutakas
    why isn’t he pushing these projects now when his party is in power?
13. insider 13

    12 February 2009 at 3:04 pm

    Draco

    The majority of eLectricity generation is state owned, transmission is completely state owned and most of the distribution was never state owned and remains in the hands of the community. So much for having been privatised.

    bobo

    there is wool insulation. I wonder if it degrades more than glass fibre though.
14. IrishBill 14

    12 February 2009 at 3:20 pm

    insider, there is enough private investment in the electricity sector to ensure it cannot be re-regulated or returned to an (extremely efficient and reliable) ECNZ model without spending billions of dollars. Contact energy’s last reported equity alone was $3bn (I suspect it will be less now but a hell of a lot more if it were to be bought back).

    Effectively the deregulation and partial privatisation of the electricity market forces state and community owned players to act as if they were privatised.

    Until a government works up the balls to either procure Contact and the privately owned distributors or alternatively regulates them into a strict ECNZ cooperative model (which would have business and shareholder groups screaming about forced nationalisation and communism no doubt) Bradford’s fiasco will endure.
15. Irascible 15

    12 February 2009 at 3:49 pm

    Don’t forget the auction of Key’s cast as a contibution to the great dribble salvation plan… headline stuff possible here … Ex money speculator NZ PM auctions plaster cast of his broken arm as cash injection for NZ’s foreign aid contribution as Govt considers response to international finance crisis.
16. bobo 16

    12 February 2009 at 5:55 pm

    Insider – I saw wool being used on an episode of Grand designs on tv, it is supposed to be the best insulation there is, I wouldn’t think it degrades ,so long as it doesn’t get wet , (leaky homes..) better for environment unlike fiber glass and foam. Just seems a waste to import or use other products when we have an oversupply of it sitting unsold in warehouses.. New innovative ways of using domestically produced products would help the exporters out in recession times.
17. Camryn 17

    13 February 2009 at 4:43 am

    Insider – A subsidy a not price signal. It’s a price hiding device. I am saying that power is so cheap that most people don’t think it is worth the cost to be more efficient, but I’m not saying power prices should rise artificially… I’m saying they should rise realistically. If the real cost is apparent then whatever efficiency is worthwhile will happen (especially if government then directly assists the poor). If it doesn’t happen, it isn’t worthwhile. Cheap power is indeed usually a good thing, but not if it is artificially so and causes overuse or misuse… are some customers subsidising others due to insufficiently precise pricing mechanisms? Have all externality costs of production been included?

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