Kiwiblog

Heh I am now using the coin operated Internet. Yes the Tokyo hotel has no Internet in rooms, but a loungle where you can plug your laptop into a machine and by inserting 100 yen every ten minutes you get broadband.

I shouldn’t blog about this as I may give Telecom some ideas

Might not be much blogging for a couple of days as I fly out at 7.00 am to Vancouver via Auckland and Tokyo. I’ll be out of NZ for 13 days.

I’m in Vancouver for one of the thrice-per-year meetings of ICANN. It will be a fascinating meeting, being the first one since the attempt to transfer some of its functions to a UN type body was defeated.

Apart from the normal business of discussing policies and operations, the NZ contingent will also be promoting the next meeting of ICANN which is in March 2006, as it is in Wellington. It’s a pretty huge task hosting a meeting of up to 1,000 people over a week, especially as within that week there are in fact 20+ seperate sub-meetings.

Winston has asked everyone to give him “a second chance” as Foreign Minister before criticising his performance.

I have a number of reactions to the plea. The first is what sort of second chances has Peters given the scores of NZers he has defamed over the years with false accusations?

The second is that Peters is not some novice MP or Minister. He entered Parliament 27 years ago and has been Deputy Prime Minister.

The third, which is more important, is that Peters doesn’t get that it isn’t about his personal ability to do the job, it is about the bizarre unworkable arrangements him and Clark have agreed to.

Peters is not going to be a disaster in the job. He actually was a pretty decent Treasurer until he went back to old habits and started destabilizing the Government. He is quite capable of following a brief.

The issue is opportunity cost. Peters will be able to shake hands, say nice words, read out position statements, and that is a small part of the job. But what he will not be able to do is actually make deals which advantage NZ.

He can’t even agree with the Prime Minister or Deputy PM on what NZ’s most important foreign policy goal is. They say it is free trade and he says it is improving the relationship with the US. Clark refuses to even accept there is a problem.

It is worth recalling that we have still never had the truth told over why this deal was necessary. The media have somehow allowed Clark and Peters get away with insisting that each other made the demand. No success in getting their accounts reconciled.

Labour had a majority on confidence and supply. A Labour/Prog minority Government would have had 60 votes in favour with Greens and United Future giving confidence and supply. Even if Maori Party voted against the Opposition only would have had 54 votes and NZ First seven votes abstaining would have meant 60-54 majorities for confidence and supply. It is a fiction that this situation was forced.

Today we have another example of the problem. The Commonwealth has said it is angry that the WTO is not moving towards freer trade faster. However our Foreign Minister does not support free trade at all. So how seriously do we think other countries will have taken him on this issue, and how well do you think he would have advocated it?

Finally isn’t it somewhat patronising that after every meeting the PM is asked to rate how well the Foreign Minister has done? I mean if you have to even ask, you have problems. And let’s be honest she is hardly going to ever say that he isn’t doing well, so what is the point of asking?

One of the few charities I never say no to is Women’s Refuge. They generally do a great job in helping families who need protection and a secure place which is violence free. They really make a difference.

Today is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. An appropriate day to donate to Women’s Refuge if you can. One can donate $20 to 0900 REFUGE OR $3 by texting REFUGE to 883 or online.

Hat Tip: No Right Turn

Bill Quick of Daily Pundit has a tape recording of a call to CNN complaining about the X placed over Vice-President Cheney during an interview.

The CNN employee (now fired to be fair to them) replied that placing the X was international as a sign of free speech, and that Bush and Cheney should stop lying.

Oh dear, not a good look. Yes, there is no bias Virginia.

And before the local moonbats wind themselves up to say that CNN should get a medal for telling the truth, they may wish to consider the wider issue of media bias.

I don’t imagine they would be happy if when Helen Clark appeared on TV they showed a big X over her face, and when someone complained to TVNZ, they were told it was because she lied over paintergate/speeding etc. It would be equally outraegous.

Hat Tip: Silent Running

I’m being interviewed on Radio Live at around 3.20 pm on Internet Regulation and Governance, for anyone interested.

They’re at 98.7 FM in Wgtn and 100.6 FM in Akl. One can also listen over the Internet though their website.

The radio host is a guy called Steven Joyce. His name is somewhat familiar for some reason!

Speaker Wilson has already rejected Rodney Hide’s request to refer Benson-Pope to the Privileges Committee in some circular reasoning.

On 7 June she rejected a referral saying there was no evidence of a question of privilege. She said however “I am, of course, prepared to look at any material which may be put before me in the future in regard to this matter.”

But now there is considerable new material with the Police report, she says “The matter of which you complain (an alleged misleading of the House on 12 May 2005) was raised at the time and was dealt with by me then”

So if you raise an issue at the earliest opportunity it gets ruled out for lack of evidence. If one decided not to raise the issue until say the Police report had been published, it would then be ruled out for not raising it at the earliest opportunity.

The equivalent is say that I walk down a street with a new Ipod and video-phone device. And Miss Ten mugs me and steals my Ipod off me. I go to the Police and they say she denies it, so they don’t charge her.

Then a few months later it emerges a CCTV camera captured the theft on film, and I take it along to the Police. They then say “Sorry we have already investigated this case, and we can’t re-investigate it”.

It’s somewhat of a farce, isn’t it?

The Government has been told TVNZ faces possible extinction if it does not move to a digital platform.

Hmmn I am sure TVNZ in fact had plans to do just that. Almost certain they did. So why haven’t they?

Oh that’s right – because the Government refused to allow them!!

Governments often make very bad owners as they look at the short-term piolitics, not the long-term strategy.

Dr Cullen claims that one is disadvanataged by getting a refund of your voluntary loan repayment as one still will pay interest on it until 1 April.

This is true but fails to note it is a trivial amount compared to what you can make. 4 months interest at 7% on $15,000 is $350.

However Mr Banfield may have that $15,000 for a long time to earn money off. We don’t know how much his total loan balance is, but let’s assume he had paid off his entire loan, and that he earns $51,000 a year.

His compulsory repaymenys would be around $300 a month. It would take 50 months to pay back the loan now. If he gets 6% gross interest which is 4% net interest then on average he will get $1,250 which is a gain of $900. Not bad cash for nothing.

This is the worst case scenario. If for example Banfield had another $15,000 owing on his loan and only earns $40,000 a year then he would have full benefit of the $15,000 for around seven years and partial benefit for a further seven years. Yep sure he would have pay rises in that time, but for simplicity sake if he did earn $40,000 he would gain around $6,000 in interest over time.

Benson-Pope doesn’t do himself any favours by telling such obvious porkies, as the one below. It doesn’t exactly add to his credibility over the wider abuse issue.

This particular issue is trivial, but the lie is blatant. Benson-Pope says the reason he chose to have lunch with John Cleese rather than turn up to Parliament is because he “did not realise a question from Mrs Collins about the effect poor childhood experiences had later in life would develop into questions about the allegations”

This frankly is a lie. No-one is that stupid or naive, and he shows his total contempt for others by such a bald-faced lie.

Let me explain a bit about how Ministerial office prepare for questions. When they get a copy of the questions, shortly after 10.30 am, staff and officials go to work preparing answers for any possible situation. Ministers know that innocuous questions are always designed to go somewhere to attack them or the Government, and the fun challenge is working out what the angle is. Normally not hard – you look at recent media stories and OIA or PQ releases and it is obvious.

Now even Martha the part-time tea lady could work out that the day after the Police report into Benson-Pope having hit a student in the face was the real issue behind the question by Judith Collins about poor childhood experiences. The possibility the Minister did not work it out is zero. Less than zero. Way less than zero.

Now it’s a small issue compared to the abuse allegations. But it shows a Minister who simply tells lies without compunction. And hence when you consider the wider allegations, then why the hell should one believe him there because sure as hell if someone will tell a lie about a small issue, you won’t get the truth on a big issue!

He could have even won sympathy if he had told the truth and said given a choice between lunch with John Cleese and seeing MPs wave tennis balls around the chamber, he thinks he made the call anyone else would make. But instead he lied.

A new Government reports there may be as many as 15,000 leaky homes.

Remember this is the issue in which the Prime Minister denied there was much of a problem, and attacked the NZ Herald for scare-mongering about it and “banging on”.

They even have the international rules for drinking games, and the specific rules for games such as “I Never“.

Oh I was very very ill the last time I played that.

For the hard core politicos like me who are following the UK Tory Leadership election, a great resource is this blog dedicated to covering the election.

They do reports from each of the 11 hustings meetings. One from Frimley is here, and also a new one from London. You even get the details of the Q&As.

Cameron still looks favourite to win. The contest has been relatively good natured, which is sensible as presumably the loser will want to be in the shadow cabinet of the winner.

The Goodness charts how Nicky Watson has gone from dating the owener of the Warriors, to a senior executive to a 19 year old rookie player, and wonders if the 14 year old ballboy should get prepared

Jessica and Nick split.

So who will be No 2?

UPDATE: Very ironic that just a few hours earlier the headlines were that Simpson is pregnant, and that this will save her marriage!

The latest Southpark episode was on Stan joining the Church of Scientology, and being deemed to be the reincarnation of founder L Ron Hubbard.

The hilarious part though was involving Tom Cruise. Stan told Tim he didn’t think Tom was that great an actor so Tom cried and went into Stan’s closet to hide.

Most of the episode was then taken up with dozens of different people urging Tom Cruise to come out of the closet. It was just hilarious. The polar opposite of subtle.

I have to say I had no idea how wacky Scientology really is. Southpark showed secret beliefs of an alien called Xenu and aliens being frozen and dumped in volcanos so their souls could be brainwashed and confuse future generations of human beings, seventy million years later. They kept flashing on the screen “This is what Scientologists actually believe”.

A great episode.

Further to yesterday, my thoughts are:

1) The Police made the right decision not to prosecute

It is hard to disagree that given the combination of time lapsed and relatively low level of the alleged offending, that a prosecution would not serve the public interest. Worth noting however that a 20 year time lapse does not stop prosecutions for more serious crimes.

2) The Police are inconsistent

The Police prosecution of Shane Ardern over Myrtle the Tractor was a huge mistake. They persisted with this stupid prosecution until even the Judge basically said Piss off, and stop wasting my time with such a trivial matter. Kiwi Pundit highlights a trend in inconsistencies.

3) The Police do take inappropriate information into account

First of all, it simply is not the case that Ministers are treated no differently to anyone else. Senior Police are very very aware that charging a Minister (or MP) with a crime punishable by over two years jail will mean that Minister (or MP) will be automatically expelled from Parliament if found guilty, no matter what actual sentence is given.

In this particular case, the Police reference to the Minister’s high profile probably being why the matter surfaced the way it did is inappropriate, considering the Police were convinced the allegations were correct.

4) Benson-Pope refutes the Police findings

The Police have said they believe the allegations are correct and did happen. Benson-Pope in his press release says he still does not accept the allegations have substance, because the allegations were not made at the time.

While what Benson-Pope is nowhere near as serious as say sexual abuse, his general line of defence does not hold up in sexual abuse or rape cases, and nor should it here.

Benson-Pope also distorts the Police findings by saying the Police has found the allegations warrant no further action. He fails to acknowledge he did anything at all wrong, and that the Police did find they believe he broke the law.

Even the PM sort of apologised for Paintergate in that she acknowledge what happened and said she won’t do it again. Benson-Pope is showing a nasty side by continuing to deny this. Perhaps he should ask to be charged so he can test his denials in court?

5) The PM’s response is somewhat inappropriate

The PM is quoted in the NZ Herald as saying she welcomed the decision. She should not welcome the fact that the Police have said a Minister of the Crown did the things his former pupils accuse him of.

Having said that, I don’t regard Benson-Pope’s behaviour 22 years ago as grounds for dismissal from his Ministerial roles, now he no longer has education. As Rodney Hide said months ago though, Benson-Pope could never again be credible as Schools Minister. This has probably also killed off his chances of succeeding Clark.

6) Wilson should refer Benson-Pope to the Privileges Committee

If rumour is correct, no less than 19 former pupils have testified that the behaviour Benson-Pope denied (or refuted) in Parliament, did actually happen. If that does not qualify for a referral to the Privileges Committee, I don’t know what could. The release of the full Police report will aid any decision making by the Speaker.

The Privileges Committee has 13 members on it, with the composition being:

National 4
Labour 4
United 1
Maori 1 (Hone Harawira – they do have a sense of humour)
ACT 1
NZ First 1
Green 1

Labour has only 4 out of 13 MPs, so Wilson will be under massive pressure from Labour not to refer the issue, knowing if they find he lied to Parliament, he might have to resign as an MP and trigger a by-election.

But if Wilson does not refer it, her credibility with the Opposition, and the public, could be seriously dented.

The Press political editor Colin Espiner is blogging from his flight to Malta for CHOGM, in an entry called “Hunt the Winston”.

Somewhat strange – NZPA reports the Government has won its first confidence vote 67 to 50 which has the Greens voting in favour and the Maori Party abstaining.

Yet the Greens had previously said they would abstain on confidence issues, after Labour shafted them in negotiations by making Winston and Peter Ministers, but not the Greens.

So why did the Greens vote in favour after indicating they would abstain?

John Tamihere has managed to get elected back onto the board of the Waipareira Trust.

This seems to be motivated by revenge on some current trustees, and I suspect that the Trust is in for many years of infighting, which almost inevitably will undermine any good work it does.

Maybe JT should be looking forwards not backwards?

Okay if you are a student or graduate with a student loan and you have made any voluntary repayments at all in the last six months, send off a request TODAY to the IRD to get the money back.

The kind people in National have highlighted the loophole that one can ask for a refund of any voluntary repayments receipted within the last six months. And with interest free loans, one can make money by getting IRD to hand the money back, and sticking it in an interest bearing bank account.

As the transcript of the House below shows Dr Cullen was totally unaware of this, but may act to close it down soon. So act quick. After all the Government campaigned on the interest free loans policy so they want you to benefit from it.

Dr Don Brash: Is the Minister aware that section 56 of the Student Loan Scheme Act 1992 permits student loan borrowers who have made voluntary repayments to request a refund of those repayments, up to 6 months after the Inland Revenue Department issues receipts for them; if so, does he think the Government