Kiwiblog

Grant Robertson often goes on and on about the need for a neutral public service. He gets all pious at minor issues such as funding of purchase advisors. So it is interesting to see him make such a partisan attack on the new Director-General of Health:

Tony’s new man says fewer doctors and nurses ok

Grant knows the Minister does not appoint the Director-General – the SSC does. But he is already trying to undermine Dr Kevin Woods.

After reportedly failing to convince 19 people who were shoulder tapped for the job

Then we have what can only be called a blatant lie. This makes Dr Woods appointment sounds like a desperate appointment of someone unqualified. In fact Dr Woods currently runs a health system 25% bigger than New Zealand’s.

I dont know much about Dr Woods yet, but first impressions are not great.  According to the Dom Post he oversaw the axing of 1500 nursing positions during his tenure in Scotland.

The Director-General of Health doesn’t decide funding levels – Governments and Health Boards do.

In NZ 600 new Police have been or are being recruited. This is not due to a decision by the Police Commissioner – it was the decision of the Govt to provide funding for additional officers.

Grant then quotes the Dom Post:

At the time, he was asked by a Government committee whether it was possible to still provide quality health services with “significantly fewer” doctors and nurses. “Yes, we believe we can,” Dr Woods said.

and Grant comments:

Oh dear. A transfer of Dr Woods idea to New Zealand would have disastrous consequences.

Now it is Dr Woods’ idea, as if Dr Woods is actively this for New Zealand.

His answer to a Government committee was in relation to a specific health service and a specific set of facts. There are most certainly scenerios where one can say “Yes we can provide quality health services” with fewer doctors or nurses. This may be due to investment in technology or a reduction in bureaucracy which allows medical professionals to spend more time with patients, and less time on paperwork.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’d be nervous if the Government was saying we want fewer doctors and nurses – as I believe the current health system is stretched when it comes to medical professionals. In fact the Government has been reducing the number of bureaucrats, so that more money can go on doctors and nurses – a move which incidentally Grant and Labour has strongly opposed.

It is a shame Grant is taking cheap shots at the new Director-General before he has even started the job.

The word in Wellington is that the previous CE, Stephen McKernan left because he  could not work with Tony Ryall and Murray Horn at the National Health Board as they shut him out while pursuing their agenda of cuts

When Grant says the word in Wellington, it means this is the line he pushes in Wellington. Stephen McKernan has denied this allegation incidentially.

It seems possible that they may have now found a willing accomplice.

And another undermining of Dr Woods, before he even starts.

Now Grant is not the only opposition politician to do this. Helen Clark (ironically) attacked Mark Prebble’s appointment to DPMC in the 1990s, and I am sure some Nats have done so.

But Grant does go on very earnestly about public sector neutrality.  His blogged comments suggest he is a case of do as I say, not do as I do.

Kapi-Mana News reports:

Whitireia Independent Students’ Association is in danger of being liquidated after one of its members appointed himself “liquidation acting president” to fast-track his own high court injunction.

Part-time student Graham McCready sought an injunction last month to shut down the organisation following allegations of fraud against former WISA president Loretta Ryder and vice president Tai Te Karu. An audit last month discovered more than $1 million in cash and assets missing from the association’s books.

WISA and Whitireia Community Polytechnic discredited Mr McCready’s moves because he was found guilty of tax fraud in 2008 and sentenced to six months’ home detention, but that case has since been appealed.

Mr McCready last week applied to New Zealand Incorporated Societies, via a petition signed by 15 students, and gained the authority to terminate the lease on WISA’s offices at Whitireia, close its bank accounts, cut telephone services and file a tax return claiming the association owed Inland Revenue $336,189.

Throughout the week WISA executive committee members were unable to access accounts to pay urgent expenses and have not received mail, because it had been collected by Mr McCready.

Acting student president Tim Manu says the association has become the victim of an imposter.

“I just don’t take him seriously. He’s going about [fixing the associations financial problems] in a destructive and malicious way. Those are not the qualities students want in a president. I don’t appreciate the fact he’s impersonating my role [as acting president] and I’ll make sure he’s held to account for that.”

Mr McCready, a retired accountant, insists he is using his “God-given talents” to help the students’ association.

“They can deny it all they want, but it’s happening. I’m going to have it shut down and start a new one … I have decided I will run for student president of the new students’ association.”

And under the current law, students will still be forced to join.

No matter how dysfunctional, how incompetent, a student association is – students are generally forced to join them.

The current law is a farce, and we only have it because Labour gain such immense benefits from compulsory membership.

National has a once in a generation opportunity to give students actual choice, and allow them to make up their own minds whether or not they join a student association. The process should be simply – when you enrol, you get told how much it costs to join the student association (or associations), what services they provide and you tick a box if you wish to join and pay.

If National fails to pass a law which gives students free choice, then they will be the ones to blame for all the future abuses of compulosry associations. The status quo is quite simply unacceptable.

Phil Quinn blogs:

Embattled Mana nominee Kris Faafoi has taken to Radio Australia to press his case.  Radio Australia.

Is this poor guy getting the worst political advice since someone told Napoleon to invade Russia in winter?

First, they are in such a rush to shunt him into Mana, his backers have appointed his replacement in the Labour leader’s office before he has even won the nomination.  Next, they send him to a [meet] the candidate’s Q&A forum ill-prepared and underwhelming.  Now the global PR strategy:  ”Here’s an idea, Kris:  the locals in Mana think you’re a fly-by-nighter and a carpetbagger — do as many interviews with foreign broadcasters as you can!”

I have given a lot of poorly conceived advice to politicians over the years, but — by and large — I was intoxicated at the time.  What is their excuse?

Quinn’s post has me trying to think of what was the worst advice I ever gave while intoxicated? Sadly, I can’t recall

The Dom Post reports:

Wellington will have free access to high-speed wireless internet on the waterfront from December.

And the city council hopes to make free wi-fi a permanent fixture in the central business district in time for next year’s Rugby World Cup.

From December, anyone with an internet-capable smart phone, iPad or laptop computer will be able to connect free of charge between Queens Wharf and Te Papa within range of a waterfront server in the NZX building.

The initiative is the brainchild of Trade Me and is being paid for by the online auction company, in association with the council.

Great.

Wellington Mayor Kerry Prendergast said moves were already under way to expand the free wi-fi initiative to the city centre – subject to costs associated with the project. If successful, Wellington would be among the world’s first cities to offer residents and visitors free downtown wi-fi access.

The council was calling for expressions of interest to provide the service permanently around the Golden Mile.

A council graphic shows the proposed coverage stretches from Westpac Stadium to the Embassy end of Courtenay Place.

Positively Wellington Tourism chief executive David Perks said the initiative would make it easier for visitors to make the most of the city and tell others about it.

“Being able to access free wi-fi on the waterfront will mean our visitors can not only freely access information about where to go and what to do in the city, they can post photos of the picturesque harbour, public art and other attractions to their friends, families and digital networks throughout the world.”

I would not under-estimate how much extra tourism one could attract by promoting Wellington as a free wi-fi city. A huge number of travellers now travel with a laptop or 3G phone even.

The cost of wireless in hotels is outrageous at $30 or so a day.

Cafenet (run by Citylink) used to be superb value. I recall in the 1990s how great it was to get 80 MB of data for just $20. Sadly Cafenet are still charging the same rice in 2010, despite the costs of bandwith being less than 1/10th what they were in the 1990s. They have gone from cheapest to most expensive.

A nice story in the Herald:

We’ve watched her dancing for charity and caring for the sick on television, and now actress Miriama Smith is getting her hands dirty to help out earthquake-hit Canterbury. …

The 34-year-old insists it is not a publicity stunt, but a way to repay a city that has been good to her. She spent three months in Christchurch last year filming “and I felt really close to the communities here”.

A very cool thing to do.

Smith tried to contact authorities in Christchurch about how she could help best, but found the city officials in “lockdown mode”. She got on a plane anyway, and when she arrived on Sunday morning, she had a contact for organiser Sam Johnson, who had been rallying students on Facebook to help in the earthquake recovery.

Mr Johnson picked her up at the airport and she was soon on her way to Kaiapoi, a severely damaged township just north of Christchurch.

I found this very amusing. Sam seems to have morphed from just being the Facebook student co-ordinator,to the overall volunteer labour force co-ordinator – all without an office, a salary or a title.

It does show that our most valuable assets are not buildings, or money, but people.

The Herald reports:

Manukau Mayor Len Brown has plans for Margaret Thatcher’s notorious poll tax if he is elected Super City mayor, says his main rival, John Banks.

The Auckland City Mayor has pounced on comments Mr Brown has made while discussing options to fund local government, including changes to the rating system, such as an income-related city tax.

These include comments from Mr Brown to the Takapuna Residents Association two weeks ago and a 2007 statement where he said it was “time to seriously consider replacing rates with a city tax”.

Mr Brown is now running at a fast speed from his own comments.

Mr Banks claimed a poll tax, which blighted the last days of Lady Thatcher’s time in power in Britain, would unfairly hurt low-income people who Mr Brown said he represented, and leave them shouldering the major burden. High earners were able to minimise their income, Mr Banks said.

I commented about this on NewstalkZB. The ones who would be hit hardest by such a tax (whether a flat poll tax or an  income tax) are state house tenants. They currently pay no rates at all, and their rent is set as a proportion of income, so doesn’t reflect the costs of rates (unlike private tenants).

So Brown’s musings, would in fact hit hardest state house tenants – normally the poorest people in society. Perhaps he thinks he has their votes sewn up, and is going for the North Shore votes!

“I have never advocated a poll tax. I have said we should be open to other options of funding council services rather than always increasing rates,” he said.

How about just keeping spending under control?

AFP reports:

US software giant Microsoft has expressed concern over a report that anti-software piracy laws were being used to stifle dissent in Russia and announced steps to try to halt the practice.

The Microsoft statement followed a report in The New York Times that the Russian authorities had used piracy charges concerning Microsoft software to confiscate computers and harass non-governmental organisations (NGOs).

“As general counsel for Microsoft, it was not the type of story that felt good to read,” Microsoft senior vice president and general counsel Brad Smith said in a blog post.

“Whatever the circumstances of the particular cases the New York Times described, we want to be clear that we unequivocally abhor any attempt to leverage intellectual property rights to stifle political advocacy or pursue improper personal gain,” Smith said.

“We are moving swiftly to seek to remove any incentive or ability to engage in such behaviour,” he said.

I’m pleased to see Microsoft take a strong stand on this issue. I spoke to a Microsoft regional conference in Singapore earlier this year, and one of my criticisms/suggestions was that they don’t seem to show much interest in issues around the Internet, in contrast to Google.

Smith said Microsoft had internal teams around the world looking at the issues and was seeking advice from human rights advocates.

Microsoft also plans to retain an international law firm not involved in anti-piracy work to conduct an independent investigation and provide advice on new measures the Redmond, Washington-based company should take, he said.

In the meantime, “to prevent non-government organisations from falling victim to nefarious actions taken in the guise of anti-piracy enforcement, Microsoft will create a new unilateral software license for NGOs that will ensure they have free, legal copies of our products,” Smith said.

“We’re creating in Russia a new NGO Legal Assistance Program focused specifically on helping NGOs document to the authorities that this new software license proves that they have legal software,” he said.

Great. That’s a superb response.

Smith said Microsoft seeks to “reduce the piracy and counterfeiting of software” but wants to “do this in a manner that respects fundamental human rights.”

“Piracy is a very real problem,” he said. “But none of this should create a pretext for the inappropriate pursuit of NGOs, newspapers, or other participants in civil society.”

Again, really pleased to see Microsoft take an appropriately balanced view.

The Herald reports:

Act’s law and order spokesman, MP David Garrett, was convicted of assault in 2002 in Tonga, he confirmed last night.

Mr Garrett, who led the party’s “three strikes” policy on tougher sentencing for serious violent offences, has not publicly disclosed his conviction.

But Act leader Rodney Hide said Mr Garrett had disclosed it to him before he joined the Act list at No 5 for the 2008 election.

It was the right thing, to disclose it to the party. The issue is whether it should have been disclosed publicly.

Mr Garrett issued a statement giving his version of events after TV3′s Campbell Live last night revealed the conviction.

Mr Garrett, who worked as a lawyer in Tonga, said he was attacked outside a bar in Nuku’alofa by Dr Mapa Puloka, head of psychiatry at the local hospital.

Campbell Live claimed the altercation was over Dr Puloka’s former wife.

Mr Garrett said his own jaw had been broken in two places after he was attacked from behind.

He had returned to Middlemore in Auckland for treatment and then laid a complaint with the Tonga police. After Dr Puloka was charged with assault, he in turn laid a complaint of assault against Mr Garrett.

Mr Garrett denied the assault and produced two witnesses, the bar’s bouncers, at the trial but was convicted and fined $10.

He had immediately lodged an appeal and has yet to be given a reason as to why it has been delayed.

Dr Puloka was fined $100.

The fact Puloka’s fine was ten times greater than Garrett’s suggests he was the aggressor.

Many MPs have minor convictions but Mr Garrett’s non-disclosure is more relevant because crime is the primary focus of his parliamentary career.

If it was any other MP, then there would be little interest in a $10 fine. conviction. But considering the strong stand David has taken on law & order, it would have been wiser to reveal the conviction (and his side of the story) early on.

But that is the only criticism I would make. I don’t think it undermines the stance David has taken on law & order issues, and his commitment to tougher sentences.

The Herald reports:

The Government has won support from its political rivals for emergency earthquake relief legislation that will bypass existing laws to speed up rebuilding in Canterbury.

Prime Minister John Key said yesterday that the quake – with a repair bill expected to be more than $4 billion – was New Zealand’s most costly natural disaster.

The Canterbury Earthquake Response and Recovery Bill, expected to be passed in Parliament today, would help recovery efforts.

It would allow ministers to use “orders in council” to bypass the normal parliamentary process and overrule or relax existing legislation – including local body bylaws – to speed up rebuilding efforts.

“The bill is recognition that legislation such as the Building, Local Government and Resource Management Acts are not designed for the special circumstances Canterbury faces.”

I think few would disagree that the normal resource consent process is inappropriate for recovery from a Christchurch. You can’t have people waiting months and years to be able to do repairs etc.

Labour leader Phil Goff said his party would support it “so the people of Canterbury can get on with rebuilding their region”.

Well done Labour.

The new law will also establish a Recovery Commission made up of the mayors of Christchurch, Waimakariri and Selwyn, three Government appointees and an independent chairperson.

Mr Brownlee said the commission would ensure that rebuilding efforts, particularly for sewage and waste infrastructure, were co-ordinated and done in conjunction with the Government.

Seems sensible.

This suggest to me that one needs Mayors who are good team players, and can work well with others to achieve progress.

I was on RNZ’s Panel yesterday and former Christchurch Mayor Garry Moore joined us for a discussion on Christchurch. I asked Garry what sort of leadership Christchurch needs going forward, if one looks at two models of leadership, being:

• The team leader – someone good at working with others, bringing the best out of a team.
• The “my way of the highway” leader, where a strong leader says do it my way.

Garry said that Christchurch needs a Mayor who can be collaborative and work with others. I’ll leave it to readers to work out who they think fits better into each category.

This week I’ll be attending and live-blogging from NZCS’s 50^th Anniversary Conference in Rotorua. The conference is intended to be a celebration of 50 years of ICT across the sector, not just of NZCS. I find it amazing NZCS is 50 years old – one tends to think of the computer age being the dawn of the PC in the early 1980s, but of course they were around a couple of decades before that – just a lot bigger!

I must say, it’s hard to think of a better line-up of speakers. As well as high profile people like Sam Morgan, Ian Taylor and Rod Drury, there’s also a huge range of experts covering pretty much every area of computing and IT plus a BarCamp on Saturday.

The focus of the conference is on Innovation. From their website:

We as individuals, as organisations and as a country must take action, harness our creative energy and ‘no limits’ spirit to propel New Zealand forward as a leader in the digital economy, and dramatically improve our productivity. Kiwi ingenuity is needed today more than ever.

And we must celebrate what the last 50 years have brought up, and learn from them whilst looking forward to  the future.

I’m led to believe there are still some tickets left if you get in quick. Should be an excellent event, and hope to see a lot of people I know there.

Once upon a time Trevor Mallard used to decide policy, have a dozen personal staff, and a thousand or so bureaucrats working for him. He controlled a budget vote of around $10 billion or so.

Now he is reduced to half arsed smears on Red Alert, that get demolished by his own commenters.

Trevor’s post is headlined:

Nat party spinmeister (and Key recruiter) hired fraudster

And in the body:

Buried away to date is the fact that the recruitment agency that failed to check the CV (including the claims he designed the missile guidance systems for the UK’s nukes, bobsleighed at the Olympics inter alia) was Momentum, Headed by Michelle Boag well known to the National Party spin team and responsible for recruiting John Key into the National Party caucus.

smhead points out:

1. Boag doesn’t head Momentum.
2. Boag didn’t work at Momentum at the time Wilce was hired.
3. Wilce was hired during a Labour government.

Michelle only started work for Momentum in September 2008. Wilce was hired in 2005.

How stupid are you to claim someone hired someone, when she didn’t even start there until 30 months or so after the appointment was made? Well actually it isn’t stupid – just malicious.

The Press editorial:

Anderton has been weakened, though, by his insistence until now that he would not quit Parliament if he won the mayoralty. He asserted that he could handle both jobs “standing on his head”. It was an assertion that did not go down well before the earthquake and has now been shown to be horribly overweening. Anderton belatedly recognised this with his announcement yesterday that he would in fact relinquish his parliamentary seat if he became mayor. But the concession was made slowly and reluctantly. He had dithered over it long enough for some voters at least to call into question his judgment and temperament for the job.

I’d forgotten that quote that he could do both jobs standing on his head. Anderton has never suffered from a lack of confidence.

NZPA report:

The State Service Commission will investigate how Stephen Wilce was able to be hired as the Defence Force’s top scientist without his credentials being properly checked and how he was able to obtain top level security clearance.

Prime Minister John Key, who is also the Minister in Charge of the NZ Security Intelligence Service, told Breakfast on TV One that over that weekend he had spoken to State Services Commissioner Iain Rennie who would investigate. …

Mr Key said he was not happy about what had happened.

“Which is why over the weekend I asked Iain Rennie… to conduct an investigation looking firstly at the SIS – so specifically at this issue – but at the wider issue… The bigger worry is actually that this guy had access to top level security and therefore top level information.”

A lot of people are rushing to conclude that the employment consultants must be at fault. I would not rush to judgement there. I’ve employed half a dozen senior staff or CEOs using employment consultants. As the employer, you often do the reference checks yourself, as it can give you a better idea of how the potential employee will work out, any strengths and weaknesses etc.

What will be important is to establish whether any checks were done at all, and if so by whom.

AAP reports:

Sir Richard Branson, the founder of Virgin Blue, has come out strongly against the decision not to allow the airline to enter an alliance with Air New Zealand on trans-Tasman routes.

Sir Richard said he wanted to compete on a level playing field but the competition regulator wasn’t making business easy.

No you didn’t want to compete. You wanted to stop competing with Air NZ – the exact opposite to competing.

Jeffrey Goldberg got invited recently to meet Fidel Castro. Some fascinatign insights from his Part I and Part II articles.

Castro’s message to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, was not so abstract, however. Over the course of this first, five-hour discussion, Castro repeatedly returned to his excoriation of anti-Semitism. He criticized Ahmadinejad for denying the Holocaust and explained why the Iranian government would better serve the cause of peace by acknowledging the “unique” history of anti-Semitism and trying to understand why Israelis fear for their existence.

My goodness. Hopefully the Iranian President is listening.

He began this discussion by describing his own, first encounters with anti-Semitism, as a small boy. “I remember when I was a boy – a long time ago – when I was five or six years old and I lived in the countryside,” he said, “and I remember Good Friday. What was the atmosphere a child breathed? `Be quiet, God is dead.’ God died every year between Thursday and Saturday of Holy Week, and it made a profound impression on everyone. What happened? They would say, `The Jews killed God.’ They blamed the Jews for killing God! Do you realize this?” …

He said the Iranian government should understand the consequences of theological anti-Semitism. “This went on for maybe two thousand years,” he said. “I don’t think anyone has been slandered more than the Jews. I would say much more than the Muslims. They have been slandered much more than the Muslims because they are blamed and slandered for everything. No one blames the Muslims for anything.” The Iranian government should understand that the Jews “were expelled from their land, persecuted and mistreated all over the world, as the ones who killed God. In my judgment here’s what happened to them: Reverse selection. What’s reverse selection? Over 2,000 years they were subjected to terrible persecution and then to the pogroms. One might have assumed that they would have disappeared; I think their culture and religion kept them together as a nation.” He continued: “The Jews have lived an existence that is much harder than ours. There is nothing that compares to the Holocaust.” I asked him if he would tell Ahmadinejad what he was telling me. “I am saying this so you can communicate it,” he answered.

I never thought I would be singing the praises of Fidel Castro, but he has it dead right.

I asked him if he believed the Cuban model was still something worth exporting.

“The Cuban model doesn’t even work for us anymore,” he said.

This struck me as the mother of all Emily Litella moments. Did the leader of the Revolution just say, in essence, “Never mind”?

I asked Julia to interpret this stunning statement for me. She said, “He wasn’t rejecting the ideas of the Revolution. I took it to be an acknowledgment that under ‘the Cuban model’ the state has much too big a role in the economic life of the country.”

As China has learnt also. A lesson some MPs on the left could do with learning also.

He asked us, “Would you like to go the aquarium with me to see the dolphin show?”

I wasn’t sure I heard him correctly. (This happened a number of times during my visit). “The dolphin show?”

“The dolphins are very intelligent animals,” Castro said. …

Someone at the table mentioned that the aquarium was closed on Mondays. Fidel said, “It will be open tomorrow.”

And so it was.

Has, being dictator has some advantages!

“Goldberg,” Fidel said, “ask him questions about dolphins.”

“What kind of questions?” I asked.

“You’re a journalist, ask good questions,” he said, and then interrupted himself. “He doesn’t know much about dolphins anyway,” he said, pointing to Garcia. He’s actually a nuclear physicist.”

“You are?” I asked.

“Yes,” Garcia said, somewhat apologetically.

“Why are you running the aquarium?” I asked.

“We put him here to keep him from building nuclear bombs!” Fidel said, and then cracked-up laughing.

My God, a Fidel with a sense of humour, who decries anti-Semitism and admits the Cuban model no longer works. Almost likeable. But then I remember all the political prisoners.

NZPA report:

The estranged parents of slain undercover policeman Don Wilkinson are locked in a bitter dispute over their son’s “slapdash” will and $2 million fortune, according to a story to be published in North and South magazine today.

Mr Wilkinson, who was fatally shot during a night-time police surveillance operation in Mangere in September 2008, left his adoptive father, Ron Wilkinson, all his assets, including a $900,000 property in Helensville, northwest of Auckland, $70,000 in cash, some investments and a six-figure payment from police insurance and superannuation, the magazine as reported by The New Zealand Herald said.

Mr Wilkinson wrote the will in 1985 before going to work in Antarctica.

At the time, his assets were two guitars and a second-hand car.

His mother Bev Lawrie said she was close to her son and he would be horrified that she was left with nothing.

One lesson is to make sure you keep your will up to date.

The Stuff version of the NZPA story misses the key aspect, merely reporting:

Under the Family Protection Act, potential claimants have 12 months after a will is probated to bring a claim.

The Herald version includes:

Lawyers say nothing can be done now. Under the Family Protection Act, potential claimants have 12 months after a will is probated to bring a claim.

But Ms Lawrie said she spent the year after her son’s death trying to survive – mourning him, weathering publicity and dealing with the killer’s arrest.

It is very sad that no one advised Ms Lawrie of the absolute importance of that 12 month deadline, as it sounds like she had an excellent chance of gaining half the estate.

Brian Rudman writes:

Just as you think the Super City elections can’t get any duller, two of the mayoral candidates engage in a shadow cock fight on a stage on the North Shore, then it’s revealed that 87 Indian-sounding voters are registered at two modest-sized Papatoetoe homes.

For all four candidates it’s a potential calamity. Unless those behind this apparent manipulation of the democratic process are unmasked before voting papers go out, a shadow of suspicion hangs over all four.

I agree, those behind this must be unmasked. If the Police talk to the 87 enrollees, I am sure a number of them will confirm who told them to register at that address, and why.

Have just sent out the August polling newsletter, summarising the polls in NZ, Australia, US, UK and Canada. You can subscribe to the newsletter here.

Has been a lot of issues polls this month – on oil substitutes, Christchurch Mayoralty, liquor sale hours, euthanasia, local election issues, compulsory te reo Maori, the Auckland Council, land sales to foreigners, the drink driving limit, 90 day probation periods, Chris Carter & Phil Goff and the normal business and consumer confidence polls.

Stuff reports:

Christchurch mayoral candidate Jim Anderton will resign his Wigram seat if he wins next month’s election.

Anderton has just announced his new position at a press conference in Christchurch this afternoon.

Anderton has previously insisted he would stay on as an MP if elected Mayor. But he has come under pressure to change his position since the 7.1 magnitude earthquake that devastated the region last Saturday.

“The events of the last nine days have changed circumstances dramatically,” Anderton said.

I would say it exposes how flawed his original decision was.

I hope he does not change his mind after the election – if he wins. Maybe he should resign now, so there can be no doubt!

Anyway it is good that people in Christchurch can vote for whom they want as Mayor, knowing they will get someone who will be  a full time Mayor. The election should be about whether Parker or Anderton will be the better Mayor, not about whether Anderton would cling on to his parliamentary job also.

The SST reports:

POLICE will boost security for the USA’s first pool game in next year’s Rugby World Cup because it falls on the 10th anniversary of alQaeda’s deadly September 11 attacks in 2001.

Cup police operations head Superintendent Grant O’Fee said police had not been involved in the draw but were “aware of the significance of the date”, and might put in place “some different arrangements than we have for normal games”.

The pool game, against Ireland, will be played at New Plymouth’s Stadium Taranaki.

I might give that game a miss.

The Dom Post reports:

Hawke’s Bay millionaire merchant banker Sam Kelt has been convicted of disorderly behaviour after a court heard he performed a “flying kung-fu kick” at a passing car.

And previously:

January 1, 2004: Kelt handcuffed and pepper-sprayed after being pulled over while driving his black Mercedes-Benz from Hastings racecourse. He is charged with assaulting police, resisting arrest, refusing to accompany police and refusing to supply a blood sample. Police claimed he was aggressive. He said he had his hands in his pockets and was being friendly. Police dropped the assault and resisting arrest charges. Kelt was fined $1200 and disqualified from driving for six months. He apologised to police.

July 15, 2006: Shortly after midnight Kelt leaves a Mt Maunganui hotel he and wife Bird were staying in to ask boy racers to stop making noise. Raponi Terangikatukua Wilson, 20, admitted punching Kelt to the ground and was sentenced to 200 hours’ community work and $1000 reparation. Kelt suffered serious injury and, in an unusual move, he was represented by a lawyer, Paul Mabey QC, under the Victims Rights Act, at Wilson’s sentencing. Wilson said he had been minding his own business when Kelt began banging on his bonnet. He took this as a challenge to fight.

December 18, 2008: Kelt is involved in an altercation with the manager of Diva bar in Havelock North after a late-night row between his wife and his PA, Kerryn Jones. Kelt is charged with assault after grabbing the manager by his T-shirt. A police officer said Kelt was drunk and abusive. Kelt said he was sober. He was discharged without conviction in Hastings District Court last June.

Seems to be a pattern here. I wonder if someone who was not a millionaire might be in jail by now for all these offences?

UPDATE: Several people have posted on all the good stuff Sam Kelt has done. That’s all well and good, but it seems very obvious to an outsider that he has an anger problem, and if he doesn’t do something about it he’ll keep ending up in trouble with the law.

NZPA report:

The four Labour candidates competing for candidacy in the Mana by-election have been named and party president Andrew Little is predicting a close contest.

Press secretary and former television reporter Kris Faafoi, Vehicle Testing New Zealand business manager Michael Evans, criminal defence barrister Peter Foster and communications consultant Josie Pagani have been nominated.

A close contest? Personally I’d be putting money on the guy who already has his campaign website address registered, plus who has a replacement for his current job lined up.