Kiwiblog

The Herald seems appalled that Ministers addressed an SST conference:

It is a feather in any group’s cap when not only the Prime Minister but the Justice Minister and the Police Minister queue up to address it.

A stamp of importance is conferred and the credibility of its viewpoint is enhanced.

So it was yesterday when John Key, Simon Power and Judith Collins spoke to a Sensible Sentencing Trust conference on victims’ rights in Parliament’s Banquet Hall.

All emphasised, quite reasonably, that the trust represents an important voice. But they also gave every impression of wishing to heed its policies.

Never mind that many of these are too extreme and too outmoded to find their way into any coherent justice reform package.

So what is this important voice the SST represents? Are they a group of lobbyists? Are they a group of academics? Are they a group of public sector funded staffers? Are they a group of politicians?

They are none of those. The vast majority are mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters and children of murder victims.

What many people, including editorial writers, don’t get is there are two sides to the Trust.

Most people see the trust as purely Garth McVicar and his hard-line advocacy on law and order issues. I don’t agree with everything Garth advocates, but I do think NZ is better off for his advocacy – he has provided a voice for victims of crime, who are largely treated as as distractions by the justice system.

But why do so many families of serious crime support the Trust and participate, including new victims such as the Elliotts? Is it simply because they get so angry about what has happened, that they look them up on the web, and send off an application?

What many do not realise is that Garth, and others from the SST, are often there supporting the families of murder victims within days. And if you speak to some of those families, and ask them who was the biggest comfort to them in their darkest hours, their answer will often be the SST. It will not be the legion of taxpayer funded agencies, but the voluntary self funded SST.

The taxpayer funded agencies send in professional counsellors etc. The SST sends in the only people who can truly understand what the family of a murder victim is going through – other families of murder victims. And that support is so invaluable, that is why they in turn get involved with the SST, and make themselves available to future families of victims.

So I am glad that the Prime Minister, Justice Minister and Police Minister all addressed the SST Conference. regardless of what you think of their political advocacy, they deserve those attendances on the basis of the incredible support work they do with victims alone.

And with the other MP on leave, the Herald reports:

Te Atatu MP Chris Carter yesterday confirmed he intended seeing out his current term of office and was not looking elsewhere for work.

Labour Party sources have been reported as saying Mr Carter, who is on two months’ sick leave from Parliament after being outed as the writer of an anonymous letter undermining his leader Phil Goff last month, had indicated he planned to resign, triggering a byelection.

The sources also claimed Mr Carter had approached the Labour Party for help in finding another job.

It is such a lovely all encompassing term – “Labour Party sources”.

Yesterday, Mr Carter denied both claims.

“At this point in time I’m happy to continue being the MP for Te Atatu and I will be working hard for my constituents” he told TVNZ News as he left an Auckland gym.

I am glad Chris has managed to drag himself off his sickbed.

Mr Carter also said he had not approached Labour or anybody else about a job.

One of Mr Carter’s supporters yesterday told the Herald regular exercise was part of his efforts to regain his health.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. I hope they managed to say that with a straight face.

I actually think Heather did the right thing, in returning early to Parliament. Staying away for a full fortnight would have just meant the publicity around her return would have been delayed.

And on Campbell Live, she basically said the right things about putting the past behind, wanting to work with Rodney, and move on together as part of a team.

ACT should accept these intentions in good faith, in my opinion.

If Heather wishes to remain an ACT MP, which she clearly does, then she has the right to do so. Any attempt to push her out (and I am not suggesting such a thing is planned) would just keep the bad publicity going.

Having said that, Heather may find the next 14 months pretty hard. Going from a Minister with 10 staff to a backbencher with one secretary is a hard adjustment, combined with the fact that previously you actually determined policy, signed off spending etc, and then as a backbencher your main parliamentary job is select committees.

Most MPs tolerate being a backbencher, because of the potential to be a Minister one day. I can’t see any way Heather is going to end up being a Minister again. In fact I can’t see anyway that Heather will be an MP after the next election, because the remaining party members (and ultimately the Board) are highly unlikely to give her a winnable list place.

So while I think it is a good thing Heather has returned from leave, and is wanting to get on with the job – she may find it is a pretty unappealing time.

Tv3 have a live blog of proceedings at Whale Oil’s trial. Well not quite live, as Judge Harvey has placed a ten minute delay on tweeting and reporting, in case evidence has to be suppressed.

Judge Harvey is probably the Judge who is the most knowledgeable on Internet issues. I’m not sure if he volunteered for the trial, or was given it as punishment

Some extracts:

Judge Harvey describes Whale Oil’s blogs as like a shotgun blast, it hits the person and then other people he doesn’t want to hit.

Heh, not a bad analogy.

Mr Slater is sitting at the back of the courtroom; wearing his usual white long-sleeve shirt with dark blue sleeves. He is bearded, arms folded and watching the trial unfold with apparent nonchalance. He writes the occasional note on his hands but remains impassive.

Heh. I look forward to seeing the TV.

Ms Murray asks him about articles he posted about the Olympian. He says he wrote an article about celebrity name suppression and said he published some pictures to go with the article for ‘interests sake’. He says they were ‘interesting pictures’ and says people have had guesses at what they meant. He says ‘they could mean anything’. It was one image that contained four images. He says he doesn’t believe the Olympian should have name suppression because he is a ‘violent criminal’. He says he understood that no one was able to publish his name, age or occupation. He says he did not mention his occupation nor his age nor his name. He says he quoted from the NZ Herald and put up a random image – ‘you can take it anyway you want’.

The court judgement will be very interesting.

Just returned from the Wellington Club where myself and around eight journalists had lunch with Daniel Pipes, who has authored more than a dozen books on the Middle East or Islam. The Israeli Ambassador kindly hosted the lunch.

Daniel spoke on five broad topics, and we had a lively Q+A. I’ll go through them, off memory.

Iraq & Afghanistan

Pipes was very pessimistic for both countries, and said that the aim of transforming the countries into modern democratic states has and will fail. Worse, he believes they won’t even achieve the status of “a decent place to live”.

What makes his view of significance, if he was a supporter of the invasions of both countries. So he is saying, that the US has failed and will fail.

I asked whether the US were too ambitious trying to turn Iraq into a post-war Germany or Japan, and whether they would have been better to basically shoot Saddam, and the next ten in the line of succession, tell No 11 that he is now in charge, that he should leave the Kurds alone, and bring in some elections and basically pull out, leaving the infrastructure, the Baath party, the army etc intact.

Pipes basically agreed, and said that has been his long held position – that the US should have found a strongman, who was more palatable than Saddam, and left him in charge. It would not have achieved a secular liberal democracy, but it might achieve the country becoming a semi-decent place to live.

US Policy

Pipes made a strong case that in terms of foreign policy, there is very little difference between Bush and Obama. Obama at one stage had more troops in Iraq and Afghanistan than under Bush. Also Obama has approved 50 attacks from unmanned drones, compared to 38 under the entire Bush presidency.

Obama’s outreach to Islamic states, with his Cairo speech did result in a more favourable impression of the US at the time. But a year later, the views of the US in the Islamic world have shrunk back to what they were under Bush.

Iran

Pipes thinks there is no doubt Iran is developing nuclear weapon – and that in fact it is a logical thing for Iran to do, as it makes you a military power, but in a far cheaper fashion than an increase in conventional forces.

He decried both the Bush and Obama strategy on Iran on the basis he has yet to work out what either of them is.

Pipes believes the threat of a nuclear armed Iran, under its current leadership, is so dangerous, that a military strike will be necessary.

I actually pushed back against this, on the basis that most Iranians want to get rid of their President, and an attack on their nuclear facilities is the one thing which will make his popularity soar, and guarantee the hardliners keep control for at least a generation.

Pipes said that he does think that Iran is the one country where the Islamic leadership is under real threat, and if left alone they are likely to be removed from power in the future. However he still regards the danger in the interim of an Islamic Iran with nuclear weapons to be so great, that he still thinks a strike is needed – but accepts the consequences will be a massive increase in terrorism etc.

Israel & Palestine

Pipes is a pessimist on a diplomatic solution. He asserts that you only have diplomatic solutions after the war is over, not as a way to stop a war. Until one side “wins” diplomacy will not work.

His preferred course of action is to try and increase the proportion of Palestinians who accept Israel has a right to exist from 20% to over 50%. He says only when a majority of Palestinians accept they will not succeed with their desire to destroy Israel, will a diplomatic solution have any chance of working.

Islam and Europe

Pipes says the growing Islamic population in Europe is partly due to the indigenous populations not producing enough children to maintain population, and partly the desire of people in Islamic countries to move to places with a better standard of living.

He says that there are three possible paths ahead:

1. Europe muddles through with peaceful co-existence. He says that he sees no evidence at all that this is the likely scenario.
2. Over time Europe becomes more “Islamised” with Islam as the dominant religion in Europe, and wide-spread sharia law – even some Islamic states in Europe.
3. A massive back-lash from the indigenous Europeans, with neo-fascist and even fascist parties gaining support across the Europe.

A vigorous discussion on this topic. Canada was held up as one of the few Western countries which has managed Muslim immigration, which has not been radical Islamists. I suggested that NZ has also been successful at having Muslim immigrants, with almost no radicalisation here.

Pipes suggestion for keeping it that way, is that one should not discriminate against Muslims who wish to migrate here, but that one should absolutely discriminate against Islamists.

He said many people do not get the difference between Islam/Muslims and Islamism/Islamists. He says Islam is a religion like Judaism, Christianity etc. Islamism is a political belief like communism, zionism, fascism.

Was a very interesting 90 minute lunch and discussion, even if somewhat depressing in terms of the outlook for key conflicts, and for Europe. Barry Soper commented that it made him glad to live in New Zealand – for which I have to agree.

NZPA report:

Labour chief press secretary and former ONE News reporter Kris Faafoi has confirmed he will stand for selection for the Mana seat north of Wellington.

Faafoi said he would immediately quit his role if selected – nominations close on September 9 with selection on the 18th.

Kris is the favourite to win the nomination, and become the MP for Mana. He’s a nice guy, who will not alienate anyone.

Danyl M make the point:

On the other hand, it seems like an awful lot of Labour’s new intake are professional political operatives who became MPs after working as staffers in the leaders office. When you’re trying to be a broad, community based social democratic party representing a wide variety of New Zealanders I think you need to cast the net a little wider than the end of the hallway when you’re looking for new talent.

A fair point.

The selection is not a dead cert. As I have said before, I think Josie Pagani i very talented, and she could well gain grassroots support. But where head office has such a powerful say, it is hard to see them turning down the Leader’s chief press secretary.

If Kris gets selected, it will be interesting to see who replaces him in his press secretary role.

Stuff reports:

Liquor companies lobbied the Government furiously in the weeks before a reform package was announced.

They pressed Justice Minister Simon Power with claims he was being served up biased and flawed recommendations by the Law Commission.

Documents obtained under the Official Information Act show a procession of companies and industry groups wrote directly to Mr Power, but he insists they had no influence over his recommendations to the Cabinet.

On Monday, Mr Power announced changes that will affect bar hours, off-licence trading, liquor advertising and the purchase age. He declared a moratorium on meeting advocates on either side of the debate after the Law Commission tabled its report on alcohol law reform in April.

I’m sorry, but what is the purpose of this story?

The Minister refused to meet with lobbyists from either side. How could criticise him for that? So the story is about the fact is about that some industry groups wrote him a letter? Even worse, they wrote “directly” to him. Well how else do you write? Should they have sent letters to Mrs Smith of Taihape and asked her to pass them onto the Minister?

But that did not stop more than 150 people writing with concerns about liquor and a further six industry groups or companies sending their views.

As people and groups should. In fact it would be unthinkable for such groups to not write to the Minister with their views.

If there is a proposal to regulate the medical profession, would one expect the Medical Association to not offer its views? Of course not. So why is it newsworthy in this case? Because certain lobby groups are trying to push a theme that the “liquor industry” has too much influence. I can only imagine they wish them to be banned from writing letters.

On May 10, Hospitality Association chief executive Bruce Robertson wrote to Mr Power expressing “real concerns with the interpretation of some of the data … and inconsistencies with the [Law] Commission’s advocacy”.

The Law Commission seemed to have chosen data which supported the advocacy of the public health sector, he wrote. Then, on June 14, Mr Robertson wrote to Mr Power with a full commentary on 146 of the Law Commission’s 153 recommendations.

Bruce would be sacked if he did not offer a commentary on the recommendations. That is his job. Again – why is this a new story?

Where are the stories about how Alcohol Action is funded, and the massive amount of lobbying they have done?

A few weeks back the CTU held up the example of Heather Smith:

Heather Smith was publicised in the union’s “name and shame” campaign after being sacked by Stokes Valley Pharmacy in Hutt Valley.

She had worked there for almost three years, but had to re-apply for her job late last year after the business changed ownership and name, and was sacked a few weeks later.

Now this case concerned me. Because the 90 day grievance free provisions are meant to apply to new employees only, not existing employees. I wasn’t convinced that a change of ownership could change things.

If her job was truly made redundant and she applied for a new job, then that may be a grey area – but if she was carrying on in much the same job then it would not be a true redundancy.

So I checked with the Minister’s office, and was told that the case the CTU had highlighted had gone to court – something not mentioned in the original media reports. This is a good thing, as it looked like the 90 day period had been misused.

And the court has ruled:

The first employment case brought to court under 90-day trial laws has gone in favour of a dismissed employee, prompting the Council of Trade Unions (CTU) to send a warning to employers.

Backed by the CTU, Ms Smith’s case ended up in the Employment Court, which ruled in a decision released today that the new employer had not complied with contractual requirements of the Employment Relations Act relating to the trial period, meaning laws preventing Ms Smith taking a personal grievance case were nullified.

The court also referred to “good faith” expectations and said the employer had not lived up to those in its dismissal of Ms Smith and there were grounds for a personal grievance.

CTU president Helen Kelly said the employer had relied on the law for complete indemnity from standards of decent employment practice, but was found to have breached both good faith requirements and terms in the employment agreement.

This is a good ruling by the court, and I am glad the CTU helped take the case. Unions do often play a valuable role in protecting some workers.

However I believe it was wrong to include this case as one of the 90 day examples, when there was in fact a lawsuit underway arguing it was not covered by the 90 day law. And indeed we have found out that the law is not as wide reaching as the CTU claimed.

The Herald reports:

An internet safety group has backed the Prime Minister’s view that the public reporting of suicide is now virtually beyond control, because young people routinely discuss cases on websites.

John Key said yesterday that Parliament could “explore” the rules on suicide reporting because they were “somewhat defunct these days”.

“The reality is that, particularly with youth suicide, very quickly social networking sites like Facebook and blog sites report that. There’s huge engagement with young people around that information and so I don’t think blocking the media from reporting is achieving an awful lot.”

He said it would make sense to review the rules, but it was important to tread carefully because of the risk of copycat suicides.

The director of NetSafe, Martin Cocker, said Mr Key’s assessment was “bang on”.

I think we underestimate the capacity of kids to cope with information. The Internet has opened up the world to kids, and most of them cope fine with it.

On Twitter the other day I saw someone tweet how they had asked their two year old what she was doing on the computer, and her response was “checking facebook”!.

Mr Key was responding to chief coroner Judge Neil MacLean’s suggestion that reporting restrictions be eased.

He wants to encourage more openness, public debate and responsible media coverage of suicide, in the hope that this might reduce the suicide rate.

Which it hasn’t greatly.

I am annoyed with the National Business Review. In fact more than annoyed – I am angry.

Readers will have seen my links to their 40th birthday competition. People had the chance to win their weight in Veuve Clicquot and the competition was promoted on the basis of popular vote. Many bloggers got in behind Busted Blonde’s entry and she won the popular vote.

After the published deadline had passed, NBR announced that the popular vote winner would not win the competition (which was strongly implied), but that the top ten most popular would go into a pool, and judges would then select their favourite of the top ten.

NBR has the legal right to change the terms and conditions. This is not a debate about legality. They said the winner would be announced within seven hours of the vote closing. They changed this in the final hours to announcing it a week later, allowing judges to decide on someone other than the popular vote winner.

I deplore what NBR has done. They have acted unethically. If they had made clear at the very beginning that the popular vote winner would not count for anything, and all you had to do was be in the top ten – then I (and others) would have acted very differently. They basically conned bloggers and other social media users into promoting their contest for them under false pretences.

Quite a few people are upset about this. I’ll link to some of these in a second. Some are calling for boycotts of NBR, cancelled subscriptions etc. I’m not going to go down that path. I doubt NBR cares too much about losing my potential subscription (especially as they kindly provide me with a complimentary copy anyway).

My message to the National Business Review is that you have lost something infinitely more valuable than my subscription. You have lost both my respect and my trust. That is hard to do, and even harder to undo.

Both NBR and Veuve Clicquot  are suffering brand damage from this. Already blog posts are climbing up the ladder in Google page ranks. And it has spread over Twitter, with one of the world’s most famous wine critics contacting Busted Blonde wanting details of what has happened.

Posts on this saga are:

• Cactus Kate on The Great Veuve Clicquot Robbery
• Whale Oil on NBR losing its Veuve
• Keeping Stock declares it a fail for Veuve Clicquot and NBR
• Gonzo declares he will never ever drink Veuve Clicquot again
• Brunette at Roarprawn is sad
• Whale blogs an MP’s facebook comment saying he despises the NBR for their jack up competition
• Cline Heine, one of the most right wing people I know, declares you can not trust the National Business Review.
• And there is already a Facebook group of people declaring they will never drink Veuve Clicquot again.

As I said, I am angry. Not about the fact Busted Blonde did not win. I am angry that I was effectively conned into promoting their competition under false pretences. Now people may say, it is your own fault. They never stated explicitly that the popular vote winner would win – it was only strongly implied. And you are right – it is partly my own fault. I trusted National Business Review to act honourably. I was wrong, and have learnt a lesson.

UPDATE: I note that on Google NZ, a search for “Veuve Clicquot” already has this post higher ranked that the actual NBR competition.

Did you hear that David Bain has finally got a job?

(more…)

Many will have seen the story about the Swedish Police announcing rape charges had been filed against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. The charges have now been dropped.

I am not a conspiracy theorist. In fact I like to mock people who think Bush planned 9/11 etc.

But I have to say that when I heard of the rape charges against Assange, my first reaction was to wonder “How the hell did the NSA manage to arrange that?”

The Dom Post reports:

It has been 27 years since Sir Michael Fowler last donned the mayoral chains – but the octogenarian is back for another tilt at Wellington City Council.

Promising not to be “a nuisance to anybody this time”, the 80-year-old artist and former architect is standing for the city’s Lambton ward.

“Actually, I thought about standing for mayor but my son would not let me. He’s right, of course. I’ve been there, done that and I know what it’s like … But he’s let me have a go as a councillor.”

Sir Michael served on the council for 15 years from 1968 – the last nine as mayor. He was credited by many for modernising central Wellington but criticised by others for overseeing the demolition of many historic buildings.

Sir Michael was one of the outstanding Mayors of Wellington. I am however unsure about how well he would fit in, being just an ordinary Councillor – and 27 years after he left Council.

Being in Lambton Ward, I’m going to have some hard choices. The candidates are:

• John Bishop
• Stephanie Cook
• Adam Cunningham
• Michael Fowler
• Marcus Ganley
• Mark Greening
• Ian McKinnon
• Iona Katherine Mary Pannett
• Kris Price

I’m definitely supporting John Bishop and Ian McKinnon. Stephanie Cook and Iona Pannett are both conscientious Councillors – even through their politics are not mine (they are Green). And a couple of the other challengers are quite decent also. Plus you have Sir Michael.

Back to the Dom Post article:

27 YEARS AGO

Wellington’s mayor was paid $31,200 per year, of which $6000 was tax-free.

Councillors were paid $29 per meeting, to a maximum of $2320 per year.

Average rates bill was $400.

WELLINGTON IN 2010

Wellington’s mayor is paid $153,660 a year and the deputy mayor $107,615.

Councillors are paid between $69,240 and $88,409, depending on their responsibilities.

The rates bill on an average home is around $2000.

Inflation over the 27 years has been 192%. The CPI went from 276 to 1100. If one takes that into account, the increases in real terms per year have been:

• Mayoral Salary – 2.5%
• Rates – 2.6%
• Councillor Salary – 34.1%

This reflects a belief I have long had – that Councillors went from being a part-time role to full-time jobs – and I think this has been a bad thing. I think it was better when Councillors were part-time Governors – like company directors. Instead too many are now professional politicians.

Bob Brockie writes:

But three Californian economists – Andrew Healy, Neil Malhotra and Cecilia Mo – have just shown that completely irrelevant events can swing public voting. They matched up top American college football and basketball results between 1964 and 2009 with results from senate and presidential elections.

The economists found that local wins and losses affected voters’ choice of candidates. More exactly, they found that a win in the 10 days before election day gave the incumbent candidate an extra 1.6 per cent more votes. The effect was most noticeable where sports teams had a big following of fans.

So if the All Blacks continue with this form, John Key will call the election for Saturday 29 October 2011

Of course the PM will not have the election campaign overlap with the Rugby World Cup. I believe the likely date is the last Saturday of November. I suspect that six weeks after a sporting event, any impact on how people vote will be minimal.

Today’s Dom Post editorial:

Earth to teachers: the cupboard is bare. The stopwork meetings called for today and tomorrow by the secondary teachers’ union suggest its executive inhabits a parallel universe.

In case the Post Primary Teachers Association has not noticed, the economy is flagging, businesses are cutting costs and most workers are making do with minimal or no pay increases. Some are grateful to just have jobs. Now is not the time to be demanding 4 per cent wage rises, increased KiwiSaver contributions, a laptop for every teacher and smaller class sizes. Nor is it the time to be downing chalk to vote on strike action.

The Dom Post has summed it up nicely.

In support of its claims, the PPTA quotes from an OECD report showing that after 15 years a New Zealand secondary teacher’s salary is 17 per cent lower than the OECD average. Strangely it appears to have escaped the union’s notice that the chippies, cleaners, dentists and doctors who will have to fund any pay increase for teachers through their taxes also earn significantly less than their counterparts in countries like Australia, the United States, France and Japan. That is the consequence of living in a country which does not perform as well economically as its peers.

Exactly. What would be interesting is to compare how teachers are paid in NZ compared to the average wage, and what the OECD average is compared to the OECD average wage.

There is a yawning chasm between the best and worst teachers. The Los Angeles Times has just published the results of a major study analysing the performance of individual students in the US’s second largest school district over several years. It shows that the quality of teaching has more to do with student performance than class sizes, socio-economic background or even the thing parents worry most about – the schools they attend. A good teacher can make a huge difference to a pupil’s performance in a single year. A poor teacher, down the hall in the same school, can have an equally big impact in the same period – but in an adverse way.

Hmmn, I think the editorial writer reads my blog

As I have said before, I’d pay the best teachers around $100,000 but the worse teachers under $40,000.

If teacher unions were genuinely focused on improving student performance they would work with the Government to devise a pay system that recognises the abilities of individual teachers.

That will never ever happen – sadly.

It is now 73 seats each as Labor have won a seat back off Andrew Wilkie – a former Green candidate. WIlkie was very likely to back Labor over the coalition anyway, so in one sense doesn’t change the overall dynamic.

However it does help perceptions, with Labor and Coalition now having the same number of seats. The Green MP will back Labor, so Labor can govern with at least two of three three Independents, while the Coalition needs all three.

If the Coalition loses a seat on specials, then Labor will retain power. The most marginal seat is Hasluck, where the current margin to the Coalition is 382 votes. It was 363 on election night so to date they are doing okay on specials.

Incidentally the coalition candidate is Ken Wyatt, who if confirmed will be the first indigenous Australia to be elected to the Federal House. I was staggered when I heard this.

NZ has had indigenous MPs since 1868. We currently have 20 MPs who are of Maori descent. As of 2004, NZ has had 79 Maori MPs (probably now over 90), so hard to comprehend how Australia is just about to have their first indigenous Federal MP.

Bob Katter is a hard fit for a Labor Government. Here is what he said on climate change:

“I mean, if you could imagine 20 or 30 crocodiles up there on the roof, and if all that roof was illumination, and saying that we wouldn’t see anything in this room because of a few croco-roaches up there,” he continued stating that “Are you telling me seriously that the world is going to warm because there’s 400 parts per million of CO2 up there?”

Yes he seriously argued that because crocodiles don’t totally block out all light, then carbon dioxide can’t be keeping heat in.

The other two Independents are more friendly to Labor, and there are reports they may split from Katter.

The Herald reports:

Overstayers are turning themselves in after finding life here to be “unbearable”, says an immigration adviser.

The number of overstayers has been steadily declining since 2004, the Department of Labour says.

It estimates there are 15,760 overstayers in the country, down from 15,880 last October.

This is good. Overstayers undermine those migrants who move here legally. Overstayers should not be able to gain employment or welfare, and should be deported as they are located.

New Zealand takes in tens of thousands of migrants legally, plus 1,000 or so refugees a year. We should support those who follow the correct process, and get rid of those who do not.

The dairy owners are not too happy:

Several changes announced yesterday included a law that will clarify that dairies and convenience stores cannot be off-licences, therefore cannot sell alcohol.

Ashok Darji, who owns Ash’s Wine and Lotto Superette in Mission Bay, says the move unfairly targets and punishes dairies.

“It basically contradicts. People who want to get a lot of cheap alcohol will go to the supermarket. And a little superette – that’s mostly a customer coming home from work and just wants to pick up a bottle of wine.

“It’s not really our core business, but it’s more a convenience thing. They’re not coming here to buy a dozen beers, they’re going to supermarkets, so why [punish] us?”

Mr Darji has been selling wine at his superette for more than 10 years.

He said during that time, he had never had any problems regarding his selling alcohol, and was upset that he – with many others around the country – would be punished.

It would be interesting to see some solid research on how much alcohol is sold where, to try and ascertain if dairies are a problem.

In this story, my dreams come true. Labour is campaigning for the entire Palmer report to be adopted:

Labour leader Phil Goff said he wanted the commission’s full set of recommendations, including an increase in alcohol excise and tougher rules on advertising.

A vote for Labour means a vote for a 50% increase in alcohol excise tax, a ban on Tui billboards, sports teams losing tens of millions of dollars in sponsorship, outlawing the Speights Southern Men ads, a compulsory one way policy at 2 am, and making it an offence for a 19 year old to have a glass of wine in a restaurant with their parents.

This story reports on the impact on RTD makers:

Independent Liquor Group has been given a serve in liquor law reforms announced yesterday.

The South Auckland-based firm dominates the market for “Ready To Drink” products popular with the young – the segment most directly affected by the changes.

The company, owned by private equity group Pacific Equity Partners, got sobering news with the Government limiting the maximum alcohol in RTDs to just 5 per cent.

Many RTDs are 7 per cent and above. In particular, Independent’s bourbon and coke brand Woodstock is a market leader in the RTD market. Its alcohol content is 8 per cent.

I’ve never had an RTD myself. From what I can tell, the intent of the package is to make it hard for people to get hammered on RTDs. What we don’t know is whether this means people will stick with RTDs if they are the same strength as beer, or will they move onto hard spirits?

Derek Cheng reports that the Government did not agree to the recommendations to ban Tui billboards:

Tui billboards, alcohol-sponsored music festivals and sexy television advertisements depicting euphoric parties will not be affected by the Government’s alcohol reform package, despite evidence that a crackdown on marketing would reduce youth drinking.

If you do want Tui billboards banned, Labour is promising to do so.

Having said that I don’t think the current ASA self-regulatory model is effective. There needs to be a sanction for ads which breach the code beyond no longer displaying the ad. I think there needs to be actual penalties for advertisements that breach the code.

The Auckland Mayoral contenders support the 4 am closing.

The NZ Herald editorial says the package is a solid start:

Anything less than a full-scale embrace of the Law Commission’s 153 recommendations on reducing the harm caused by alcohol was always going to lead to accusations of Government tinkering and timidity.

But the plans announced yesterday amount to a reasonably practical and coherent response to the problems that have arisen from two decades of liberal liquor laws.

Sensibly, the temptation to return to a time when access to liquor was strictly constrained, but drinking habits were in many ways worse, has been resisted. Instead, there is to be a targeted assault on the excesses encouraged by the current regime.

Vernon Small reports those who wanted more:

The Salvation Army, Alcohol Action and the Drug Foundation said the Government should have raised excise on alcohol to make drinking more expensive – a key recommendation from the Law Commission, which reviewed all the alcohol laws.

The Drug Foundation said it was “deeply disappointed that two vital areas of reform have been ignored: the proliferation of cheap booze and the intense marketing, advertising and promotion of liquor”. …

Professor Jennie Connor, head of preventive and social medicine at Otago University, said the changes would make no substantial difference to the heavy drinking culture, or to the scale of harm caused. They were a small step in the right direction, but were like “fighting a bushfire with a couple of garden hoses for the next 20 years. The Government has seriously misread public concern about heavy drinking and needs to rethink its policies”.

If Professor Cooper thinks the public were demanding a 50% increase in alcohol excise tax, she is seriously wrong.

John Hartevelt reports another critic:

The director of Christchurch’s National Addiction Centre, Professor Doug Sellman, said the Government was wrong to see alcohol abuse as essentially a youth problem.

Research found that 92 per cent of New Zealand’s heavy drinkers were 20 years and over, and 70 per cent were 25 and over.

“Aiming measures primarily at youth while avoiding anything substantial that would reduce heavy drinking among adults is scapegoating young people for the country’s heavy drinking culture and fails to address the main issue,” he said.

The Government had avoided the big policy decisions, such as increasing prices and restricting advertising, and ended up with a package that was “like treating cancer with a couple of aspirin”.

So does that mean banning Tui billboards would be like chemotherapy?

The Press reports Bob Parker supports the package:

Liquor-law reforms will enable Christchurch communities to “write their own futures”, Mayor Bob Parker says.

The Government yesterday announced a package of alcohol measures.

The reforms feature a proposal allowing communities to decide their own “alcohol plan”, including the concentration, location, and opening hours of liquor outlets.

Parker said he felt “very positive” about the proposed reforms.

“We’ve been waiting for something like this for a long time.”

Finally The Press editorial says they are a step in the right direction but a lost opportunity:

The package of Government policies to reduce problem drinking is a step in the right direction but it is still a relatively modest step.

While the measures it will introduce are welcome, in several areas, including the adult drink-driving limit and the price of alcohol, the Government has resisted calls for more decisive action. …

Overall, therefore, although the Government package will assist in the battle against excessive drinking, it also represents a lost opportunity to make more serious progress in our society’s goal of ending the binge drinking culture.

Have been in the lockup for the Government’s response to the Law Commission report on alcohol. It is one of the largest cabinet papers on record, with a huge 202 recommendations. The Minister has obviously spent a lot of time going through the issues.

The zealots have already slammed the report because the Government did not implement everything the Law Commission recommended. I say thank God for that. The previous Labour Government commissioned that report, from a body headed up by a former Labour Prime Minister.  Why on earth a National Government would be expected to do everything they say, I don’t know.

We have elections in this country to decide policies, and I am glad the Government has not gone down the total nanny state path. In some areas they have gone done that path, but nowhere near as bad as it could have been.

If Labour want to campaign at the next election to ban Tui billboards, outlaw alcohol sponsorship of sports, hike the alcohol excise tax by 50%, make it a crime for a 19 year old to have a glass of wine with his/her parents in a restaurant and force bars to have a one way policy at 2 am, then that would make my day. The alcohol zealots should encourage Labour to promise that, and then the people can decide at the election.

So what is in the Government’s proposals.

1. More powers for local authorities to set a local alcohol policy which will determine locations for licenses premises, trading hours etc. This is sensible in my opinion as the needs of Wainuiomata (for example) may be very different to Courtenay Place.
2. Tighter criteria for off-licenses so only eligible are retailers where alcohol is 85% of sales or grocery stores where food is 50% of sales, or hotels/taverns – unless there are a lack of premises in the area. Again, no real issues with this.
3. Provision of free drinking water a requirement for premises which sell alcohol for consumption on the premises. At present this is a custom, not a requirement.
4. A maximum trading hours for off-licenses of 7 am to 11 pm. I don’t support this, but am glad they at least changed it from 10 pm to 11 pm. I often am doing supermarket shopping at 10 pm, so will be able to grab a bottle of wine still.
5. Maximum trading hours for on-licenses from 8 am to 4 pm. Again I don’t support this, but it is only an hour earlier than the de facto 5 am close most places have. It isn’t true nothing good happens after 4 am – ironically by that time of the night you are normally on non alcohol drinks sobering up. So forcing a closure at 4 am may in fact make things worse.
6. Rejected the proposed one way policy from 2 am. Thank goodness for that. It would have destroyed Courtenay Place as you wouldn’t be able to have outside drinking areas under such a policy.  It would also have led to all sorts of problems as people can’t catch up with their friends etc.
7. Local authorities can vary the national trading hours (both shorter or longer) if they wish. So Queenstown for example might set a time beyond 4 am. However their decision can be appealed for reasonableness. I think this is good flexibility.
8. Parliament loses it exemption from liquor licensing laws.
9. Split purchase age of 18 for on-license and 20 for off-license. This will be a conscience vote. This is better than a 20/20 age but is quite deeply flawed. As one looks at the details one will still be able to supply alcohol to 18 and 19 year olds (just not sell it directly) so it will create a culture of supplying alcohol to those who can not legally buying it. You will hear more on this point.
10. Ironically 19 year olds will be able to sell alcohol in supermarkets and bottlestores, but not buy it! To be fair, currently a 17 year old can sell alcohol also.
11. Parents can continue to supply alcohol to their own children at home, or in any private setting or at certain licenses premises such as restaurants.
12. Under 18 year olds can not possess or drink alcohol in public, unless with a parent. This will be a $200 infringement.
13. Consent of a parent is needed to supply alcohol to an under 18 year old, and supply without consent can be a $2,000 fine. Long overdue – finally it is an offence to give a 14 year old a bottle of vodka.
14. The adult who supplies alcohol (with consent) to under 18 year olds must do so responsibly and supervise the consumption. Again – long overdue. This is what may have made a difference to the Kings College case.
15. The 50% increase in excise tax is rejected. Yay. I have yet to see a compelling economic analysis that the current excise tax does not cover the external costs of alcohol.
16. A minimum price regime will be considered in a year’s time once they gather data from retailers. I have some sympathy for a minimum price regime, as loss-leading on alcohol isn’t that desirable. It is a better response than an across the board excise tax increase.
17. Will be an offence to promote excessive consumption of alcohol or to advertise in a way that appeals to those under the purchase age. Also can not promote free alcohol or make purchase of alcohol mandatory for other goods and services.
18. The recommendation to have a total ban on all alcohol advertising and sponsorship has been rejected and sent back to Russia. Having said that I do think the current ASA code on alcohol advertising is ineffective and do actually support there being some sort of penalties for advertisements that breach the code. At present the only penalty is the advert gets withdrawn.
19. Makes it an offence with a fine of up to $2,000 to make a false representation of age. So having a fake ID could not be very expensive. Also an offence to lend someone your ID so they appear 20.
20. They have rejected the proposed $200 fine for people who spend the night in the cells detoxing. I like this proposal but the argument against is it would cost more to set up the fine system, than it would bring in, and also it may discourage drunk people from approaching the Police for assistance – which could lead them to more harm.
21. The Ministers of Justice and Health can ban certain products deemed undesirable such as alcoholic milk, or alcoholic iceblocks. I never knew one could get alcoholic milk!
22. RTDs to be a maximum 5% and also a maximum 1.5 standard drinks. This is also a good move, as it was the RTDs that had four or five standard drinks in them which were plastering people. At 1.5 standard drinks they actually become difficult to get too drunk off.

Overall, it could have been a lot worse – some stuff I don’t like, but they have rejected the worst excesses of the zealots. There are a lot of things there that will help – especially banning supply to under 18 year olds without consent or supervision.

I’ll blog more on this over time. But I think Simon Power has done a pretty good job with this one. As I said at the beginning, Labour will make my day if they campaign on implementing the entire Law Commission report.

SUBMISSION OF DAVID FARRAR
TO THE ELECTORAL LEGISLATION SELECT COMMITTEE
ON THE PARLIAMENTARY SERVICE AMENDMENT BILL 2010

About the Submitter

1. This submission is made by David Farrar in a personal capacity. I would like to appear before the Committee to speak to my submission.

Executive Summary

1. I support the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill 2010 as it provides a necessary limitation on what advertisements can be funded by the taxpayer during an election campaign.
2. The history of this issue goes back to the 2005 election, when the Auditor-General found much of the parliamentary spending was illegal and outside the law.
3. Parliament’s response was to legislate an interim definition of what was allowable that was wide – anything that did not explicitly call for votes, money or members was okay.
4. The problem with the interim definition is that it would have allowed a repeat of 2005, when you could have taxpayer funded election pledge cards being paid for by Parliament, just weeks or days before an election.
5. One solution is to adopt a more narrow definition during the entire parliamentary term – banning any publications that promote a political party or MP. The problem with this solution is that in practice it could never work. Almost all parliamentary publications involve a degree of party and MP promotion. One can not easily draw a fine line between parliamentary and political publications. The Opposition should be able to campaign against (for example) the Government’s budget, from their parliamentary budget. Otherwise the Government will be too powerful.
6. The solution adopted in this bill, is to have a wide definition of what is allowable for two years and nine months (approx), and to have a much tighter definition during the three month regulated period.
7. I support this solution, and in fact have publicly urged such a solution since 2006. It doesn’t unduly restrict the operations of Parliament during most of the parliamentary term, but makes the election period fairer by preventing parliamentary parties and incumbent MPs from being able to spend taxpayer money on their advertising materials.
8. The ability to get an advisory opinion from the Electoral Commission as to whether a proposed publication is an election advertisement will, I am sure, be welcomed by MPs and staff of the Parliamentary Service.
9. One issue I would raise is whether s3A(2)((a)(i) and (ii) should also exclude communications that explicitly call on people not to elect a particular person or party vote for a particular party. This would seem desirable to me, as I don’t think (for example) taxpayer funded pamphlets should ever explicitly refer to how people should vote.

In summary I urge the Electoral Legislation Committee to recommend the Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill 2010 be passed.

David Farrar

Marginal Revolution blogs an amazing story from the LA Times:

The Times obtained seven years of math and English test scores from the Los Angeles Unified School District and used the information to estimate the effectiveness of L.A. teachers — something the district could do but has not.

The Times used a statistical approach known as value-added analysis, which rates teachers based on their students’ progress on standardized tests from year to year. Each student’s performance is compared with his or her own in past years, which largely controls for outside influences often blamed for academic failure: poverty, prior learning and other factors….

In coming months, The Times will publish a series of articles and a database analyzing individual teachers’ effectiveness in the nation’s second-largest school district — the first time, experts say, such information has been made public anywhere in the country.

One can almost hear the alarm bells going off in NZEI and PPTA offices around the country. You thought school league tables were bad – how about teacher league tables. And worse of all, ones that take into account outside influences, so that they do measure the impact a teacher has over time.

This graphic is not a mockup with fake names and made up data. These are two real teachers, and their real performance.

After a single year with teachers who ranked in the top 10% in effectiveness, students scored an average of 17 percentile points higher in English and 25 points higher in math than students whose teachers ranked in the bottom 10%. Students often backslid significantly in the classrooms of ineffective teachers, and thousands of students in the study had two or more ineffective teachers in a row.

And consider how fiercely teacher unions fight against performance pay.

The conclusion is one that strikes home:

We cannot simultaneously claim, however, that teachers are vitally important for the future of our children and also that their effectiveness should not be measured.  As systems like this become more common students will benefit enormously and so will teachers. Moreover, I see this as a turning point. Once parents have this kind of information who will allow their child to be in a class with a teacher in the bottom ranks of effectiveness?

Oh my God. Allowing parents to choose what schools their kids go to. When will this lunacy end.

And the from the LA Times article itself:

Contrary to popular belief, the best teachers were not concentrated in schools in the most affluent neighborhoods, nor were the weakest instructors bunched in poor areas. Rather, these teachers were scattered throughout the district. The quality of instruction typically varied far more within a school than between schools.

This has been stressed back home also.

Although many parents fixate on picking the right school for their child, it matters far more which teacher the child gets. Teachers had three times as much influence on students’ academic development as the school they attend. Yet parents have no access to objective information about individual instructors, and they often have little say in which teacher their child gets.

Parents should not get any choice in which school their kids attend, let alone which teachers they have. This is heresy.

Other studies of the district have found that students’ race, wealth, English proficiency or previous achievement level played little role in whether their teacher was effective.

But it is all about the decile they live in!

No one suggests using value-added analysis as the sole measure of a teacher. Many experts recommend that it count for half or less of a teacher’s overall evaluation.

This is key. How you improve performance on such tests is not the only factor that should be taken into account. It is not a perfect measure. But it is still a pretty damn useful one.

On average, Smith’s students slide under his instruction, losing 14 percentile points in math during the school year relative to their peers districtwide, The Times found. Overall, he ranked among the least effective of the district’s elementary school teachers.

Told of The Times’ findings, Smith expressed mild surprise.

“Obviously what I need to do is to look at what I’m doing and take some steps to make sure something changes,” he said.

Isn’t that great? Rather than get defensive and decry the analysis, he is going to re-evaluate his teaching methods.

And also:

Still, Caruso said the numbers were important and, like several other teachers interviewed, wondered why she hadn’t been shown such data before by anyone in the district.

“For better or worse,” she said, “testing and teacher effectiveness are going to be linked.… If my student test scores show I’m an ineffective teacher, I’d like to know what contributes to it. What do I need to do to bring my average up?”

The real scandal is that it took a newspaper to do, what the education profession could not, or would not, do.

The Herald reports:

Act MP Heather Roy said last night she was extremely disappointed to learn her former ministerial adviser Simon Ewing-Jarvie leaked the notes for last week’s caucus meeting to the media.

I’m glad Heather is disappointed. But was she surprised? Who else could it have been?

Mrs Roy said last night: “I do not condone the leaking of documents in any circumstances and was extremely disappointed and angry when I discovered last Friday that Simon Ewing-Jarvie had leaked my notes for last Tuesday’s meeting.

It took until Friday to work it out?

Commenting on innuendo about her friendship with Dr Ewing-Jarvie, Mrs Roy told the Herald in a statement: “I am not and never have had an inappropriate relationship (affair) with Simon Ewing-Jarvie.”

This matches a comment made yesterday on Kiwiblog by someone obviously close to them:

Don’t do yourself a disservice by implicating anything inappropriate in the Roy-Ewing-Jarvie relationship.

The two families have been friends for years – spouses and children included. In fact, you’ll struggle to find two more ‘functional’ family units in the country.

Heather Roy did stay at the Ewing-Jarvie home on Friday night – along with Simon’s wife and daughter! In fact, it occurred because Heather’s husband had called her to tell her not to return home, because its was surrounded by media.

The sad thing for Heather is the leaking of the dossier by Ewing-Jarvie has destroyed her politically. I doubt she would now make the top 20 on the party list, as ranked by members. The feedback I am getting from them is they just want to move on and unite the party.

The time has come for people in ACT to place the party ahead of their egos. Having ACT disappear just makes a Green/Labour Government more likely.

ACT are lucky that voters in Epsom are smart, and they understand the value having ACT in Parliament brings to National. But that is not unconditional – ACT need to look like they can bring in at least three or more MPs, to make it worthwhile to vote tactically. Now they only need to be at 2% or so to get at least three MPs, so they can remain viable after this.

But if the infighting continues, then the beneficiary of it all will be Deputy Prime Minister Russel Norman!