Kiwiblog

Georgina Stylianou at Stuff reports:

Youth suicide rates will peak over the next two to four years because of “shockingly high youth unemployment rates”, a Christchurch MP says.

Progressive MP Jim Anderton said high suicide rates followed high unemployment “as sure as night follows day”.

In which case it is abhorrent that Jim Anderton won’t back restoring the youth minimum wage at a lower rate than the adult minimum wage.

If Jim really thinks the high youth unemployment will lead to more deaths, then he should have no compunction in voting for a measure which will stop young inexperienced job seekers from being priced out of the labour market.

Ele at Homepaddock has picked up on this:

Green’s Kevin Hague, say they’re going to test Smith when the new Parliament is sworn in after the November general election.

Ele points out that this means that the Greens are expecting Lockwood to still be Speaker after the election, which means of course they are expecting National to command a majority in Parliament.

So not even the Greens think Labour will win.

Coming up this weekend

Sean is away (school holidays) so Rachel Smalley is filling in.

1. Duncan live in Washington and fresh from the PM’s meeting with President Obama. Duncan will also have a full report on the debt/spending crisis in Washington and background the alleged Israeli spy incident.
2. Don Brash with Rachel on what ACT wants from National
3. Natasha’s Smith’s investigation into political  lobbying and conflicts of interest.
4. Retired Defence Secretary and Head of the PM’s Department, Gerald Hensley, on the implications of Key’s visit to Washington.

The panel is Pattrick
Smellier (BusinessWire) and Simon Wilson (Metro)

The latest update from iPredict update is out.

Commentary:

There is an expectation that the OCR will increase earlier than previously indicated after the release of inflation data this week, according to the latest snapshot from New Zealand’s prediction market, iPredict. Consequently, there is an increased likelihood that mortgage rates will reach at least 6.00% before the end of the year. Unemployment is expected to continue to improve from the current rate of 6.6% and GDP growth forecasts have also improved marginally. In politics, New Zealand First has again reached MMP’s 5% threshold, although its hold on this is tenuous, with the market indicating only a 22% probability that Winston Peters will return to Parliament. Taking into account New Zealand First’s current share of the party vote, John Key is still strongly favoured to remain Prime Minister, and would be able to govern with the support of the Act Party and one of the UnitedFuture or Maori parties.

The Dom Post reports:

Wellington web start-up Xero has announced plans to spend A$1.5 million ($1.9 million) buying an online payroll company. …

Xero chief executive Rod perDrury says Australian-based Paycycle is one of a number of companies providing payroll software that integrates with the Xero software and half of Paycycle’s customers already use Xero.

“Feedback from our Australian partners and customers is that we need to provide a fully integrated Payroll within Xero to win Australia,” says Mr Drury.

That would be great. I use Xero for both my business and personal accounting, but still use MYOB for our payroll. If Xero can integrate a quality payroll package into their system, I’ll be very very happy – both as a customer and a shareholder.

My favourite new feature I have discovered in Xero is that if I code an expense in Xero Personal as a business expense (ie paid for a work expense on my credit card), then it automatically creates a draft expense reimbursement claim for that expense in Xero Business. So no more manually entering in my expense claims. Yay.

Just seen this old story:

It could be the scrap of the century. Former Wanganui mayor Michael Laws will face Whanganui Maori activist Ken Mair in the boxing ring later this year.  …

Mr Laws, now a councillor, and Mr Mair, Maori Party co-vice president, will box to raise money for earthquake-stricken Christchurch on December 3, the Wanganui Chronicle reported.

Good on them for boxing for charity, but what a terrible dilemma. Who the hell do you support to win?

I guess in the end, I should look on it like I did the Iran-Iraq war – you just want it to go on for ever, with maximum causalities.

So here’s hoping it goes the full 15 rounds!

Whale Oil blogs:

I am writ­ing to lay an offi­ical com­plaint about the brochure the Labour Party has recently sent to elec­tors in West Auck­land. I have attached a scan overleaf.

(Image 1, Image 2)

It was dis­trib­uted on 20 July 2011 in and around the Hen­der­son, Auck­land area.

It does not have an autho­ri­sa­tion state­ment, which I believe is a legal require­ment for any elec­tion advertising.

The Labour party also under­took to dis­con­tinue to send out these types of brochures in a press release of 9 July shortly after the Elec­toral Com­mis­sion referred another brochure to the Police for pros­e­cu­tion. Their spokesman, Grant Robert­son said:

So on 9 July Labour said they’ll stop using unauthorised election advertisements, yet on 20 July they were caught doing exactly that again.

My column at nzherald.co.nz is on what we have seen of John Key’s weaknesses and strengths in dealing with the Mossad story.

John Hartevelt at Stuff reported:

Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said most concern was around the Debt Management Office.

Staff there were recorded on the register as having accepted at least 165 gifts since July last year. The staff count there is 24.

”The NZDMO are going to golf, they’re getting theatre tickets, they’re getting movie tickets, they’re getting endless lunches and endless dinners and other corporate hospitality,” Norman said.

Whereas the Debt Management Office was tasked with getting debt at the cheapest possible price to the Government, banks were meant to maximise the cost.

”They clearly have a conflict of interest in accepting corporate hospitality from the banks because the banks have a completely opposite interest than the taxpayers in this,” Norman said.

There was no allegation of wrong-doing, but an audit should be carried out to make sure the terms of loans were all above board and had not been affected by corporate favours, he said.

Yes of course, in exchange for a free ticket to World of Wearable Art (around $70), a staffer would have added a percentage point to the $1.1b bond, costing the taxpayer an extra $11 million.

The Greens say the jobs of the banks is to maximise the cost of debt and are oppossed to the Government wanting to minimise it. By that rationale no customer and no supplier should ever be hospitable to each other.

The Greens put on a couple of parties a year to which they invite the media, and even me. Now the job of the Greens is to maximise their party vote and the job of the media is to scrutinise MPs and hold them accountable. So by Green logic it is inappropriate for journalists to attend the Green xmas party.

At a certain level, hospitality can become inappropriate. But worrying about the fact the BNZ took the head of the debt management office to a children’s pantomime is ridiculous. That’s like worrying about who paid for the coffee.

Many of us have had that frustration when the auto-correct function changes a word from what we want to something else. Got sent a link to this page listing the 15 most viewed auto-correct fails. Here’s four of them. The last one had me actually laughing out loud.

I don’t think the others are sold door to door.

I love the mum telling him to call his dad.

Not sure you can talk your way out of that one.

What can you say.

Dame Margaret Bazley is arguably New Zealand’s most respected public servant. She has served Governments of all colours, and been sent in to fix up many a mess whether it be Police culture or Ecan.

Therefore her comments as Chairperson of the Fire Service Commission should be read as remarkable:

“I have worked with many different unions over the past 40 years including the Public Service Association, teachers, nurses and others. Over time they all earned my respect. I have the highest regard for firefighters as individuals and this was reinforced during their response to the Christchurch earthquakes. However, I despair that the NZPFU will ever lift its sights above narrow self interest and play a constructive and responsible role in reaching a fair wage agreement that properly reflects the prevailing circumstances.

The NZPFU has long been one of the more militant unions. The only thing they seem to hate more than capitalism is volunteer firefighters whom they regard as treasonable scum. There is a long history of threats and intimidation.

To have someone like Dame Margaret slam the union in this way, demonstrates how awful the union leadership is.  Their long-serving secretary, Derek Best, was Labour’s Ohariu candidate in 1999.

TVNZ preview

Q+A has an American special to mark John Key’s visit.

Guyon Espiner is in the United States, and will be conducting three interviews.  He will  start by speaking with the Prime Minister on the continuing NZ-USA trade talks, as well as this week’s allegations of Israeli spying in NZ.

Then Guyon will talk with US Congressman Rick Larsen; to get the American perspective on NZ-US relations and trade – are the Americans prepared to relax their agricultural tariffs, will they play hardball on reducing or even eliminating the role of Pharmac?

And finally we get an update on the current situation in US politics with ABC News’ Senior Political Correspondent Jonathan Karl.

Paul Holmes will be moderating the panel live in Auckland and be joined by Dr Jon Johansson and Fran O’Sullivan.

Q+A, 9-10am Sundays on TV ONE.  Repeats at 9.10pm Sundays, 10.10am and 2.10pm Mondays on TVNZ 7

Aah, my photo website is playing up. I hope this loads properly.

This is one of our Australian cousins- the pied shag

Click for larger, higher res image

Something to enjoy the morning coffee with

United Future released yesterday their superannuation policy which allows for a retirement age of between 60 and 70, with the amount you get increasing the longer you leave off claiming it. They also propose making KiwiSaver compulsory.

Their policy is designed to be cost neutral.  what it would mean is the choices for a single recepient might be:

• Age 60 – $249/week
• Age 65 – $339/week
• Age 70 – $546/week

I think the policy is a good step in the right direction. However as it is cost neutral I think it also might not be sustainable over time.

I’ve been a fan of Conservative MP Louise Bagshawe, now known as Louise Mensch.

But in this interview she comes across as a young female Trevor Mallard as she refuses to apologise for getting it totally wrong about Piers Morgan, and just hides behind parliamentary privilege. It’s arrogance and privilege of the wrong sort.

Tracy Watkins reports at Stuff:

At a business breakfast in San Francisco early this morning US time, the pitch to US business continued.

Meanwhile, San Francisco has declared today Prime Minister John Key Day in honour of his visit to the city.

But mayor Ed Lee admitted it didn’t come with a day off – just a proclamation which was presented to Key today.

That is hilarious – a day proclaimed in Key’s name just because he visited San Francisco.

That sort of thing I would expect from minor obscure cities, such as Boulder, Colorado which probably don’t get a lot of Heads of Governments visiting. But San Francisco? They must hand out naming days several times a week!

In my Stuff By the numbers blog, I look at the latest Roy Morgan poll which paints a closer race.

NZ film Festival e-mailed me:

I came across a film that I think might be the sort of thing Kiwiblog readers would be into.

It’s called Something Ventured, a documentary about the early venture capitalists (including the guy who invented the term), the original men who put their money into Silicon Valley.

It’s different to the sort of business films we normally see in cinemas – it’s a total love letter to capitalism, and not at all afraid to sing the praises of the dudes with the dough.

There’s a nice geek-business crossover. The VCs funded companies like Apple, Atari and Intel. One of the venture capitalists talks about meeting a young Steve Jobs – all scruffy and hairy – wanting funding for his business idea.

Here’s a recent New York Times article on the film:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/08/business/media/08film.html

And here are the screening times, with links to the film info pages:

Screening times in Auckland:

http://www.nzff.co.nz/auckland/film/something-ventured

Saturday 16 July 6.15pm Academy Cinemas
Tuesday 19 July 2.15pm Academy Cinemas
Thursday 21 July 6.30pm SKYCITY Theatre
Sunday 24 July 6.00pm Rialto Cinemas Newmarket

Screening times in Wellington:

http://www.nzff.co.nz/wellington/film/something-ventured

Friday 29 July 8.30pm Te Papa
Saturday 30 July 4.00pm Te Papa
Sunday 31 July 6.00pm Te Papa
Thursday 4 August 4.15pm Te Papa

Sounds like a good film to go and see.

John Pagani blogs:

Give me a break.

“Interesting to be in a party where the leadership decide selections,” David Farrar says of David Parker’s decision to stand in Epsom, as if National’s selection of Paul Goldsmith wasn’t one of the worst leadership stitch-ups in the entirety of MMP.

I mean, he’s just shameless. I blogged when Goldsmith was selected that it made sense. But to then take the mickey and claim it was a local decision is bizarre. Goldsmith has been selected by party command  to throw the seat to former National MP John Banks, whose biography Goldsmith wrote. The locals wanted Bhatnagar.

John’s experience of political parties is limited. In the Alliance Jim Anderton decided everything. On the one occassion the rest of the party wanted a say, Jim stormed off in a huff and killed the party. Then in the Progressives Jim even named the party after him so he had full control.

In Labour, the head office had three votes on a seven person panel, and combined with the unions can decide most selections.

This is why John thinks that in National, the head office decided the Epsom selection. He can’t imagine a party where this is not possible.

In seats with membership under 900, the Regional Chair can have influence as they select some of the 60 delegates. But in a strong seat like Epsom, the 60+ local delegates are selected purely by the members in their branch meetings, and those delegates get 100% of the votes (the Regional Chair has a casting vote but not a deliberative vote).

Party members take their duties seriously as delegates. Unlike Labour where a union can bus in scores of “members” who have never attended a Labour Party meeting in their life, and have never even met the candidates, National has eligibility criteria. You must have been an individual member for at least a year, and more importantly you must have attended a Meet the Candidates meeting to be able to vote at the selection meeting.

On top of the formal MTC meetings, candidates generally will meet every delegate one on one in their house. To win a selection you need to spend weeks getting around all the delegates – some you may even meet two or three times as they question you on your beliefs, your experience, your ambitions.

I accept this is all alien to John, but it is how it works in the seats where National has membership of 900 or more.

Meanwhile NewstalkZB report:

Labour Party frontbencher David Parker’s to take a tilt at Epsom.

The list MP has confirmed he will be taking on National’s Paul Goldsmith and Act’s John Banks at the general election.

Now I am told nominations are still open. Yet the story treats Parker as if he is the confirmed candidate. That is because they know in Labour if the hierarchy support you, you will almost always win – their rules are written that way.

What is more interesting is that Parker is moving from Dunedin to Auckland. His relationship is part of it no doubt, but look at the politics.

If Goff loses, him and Annette will go. Parker and Street could well be the replacements. But Labour could not have a Leader from Dunedin and a Deputy from Nelson. Auckland is their stronghold, and where elections are won.

By moving to Auckland, Parker makes himself a far stronger contender for the leadership.

Also I should note that the blogs were first to say Parker would seek Epsom.

Elizabeth Binning at NZ Herald reports:

Kindergartens have increased fees, put playgrounds on hold and made staff redundant because of Government funding cuts – but many have large sums of money in the bank.

A search of the charities register reveals many kindergarten associations have shown surpluses in their annual returns.

An excellent story, and piece of investigative journalism.

It is of course pure coincidence that on Monday, Whale Oil blogged the bank balances of the major kindergarten associations.