Kiwiblog

THIS WEEK ON BACK BENCHES: Watch Wallace Chapman, Damian Christie, the Back Benches Panel and special guests discuss the week’s hottest topics!

STOP PENALISING THE PUFF?: ACT Leader Don Brash has suggested its time for cannabis to be decriminalised. Saying the current law made crims of some 400,000 kiwis who were harming no one except themselves. Is he right? Is it time to stop punishing the pot smoker? Is marijuana harmful? Some call it the slippery slope. Are we wasting money by chasing down the average joint smoker? And should we be spending our time and effort on harder drugs? Or does decriminalisation just give permission for people to break the law?

LAW & ORDER: Crime stats show Maori are disproportionately represented in prison—although they represent only 12.5% of the population, half of all prisoners are Maori. How do we turn this statistic around? Will a Maori-led approach be the most effective? And what will that look like? How do we prevent crime? And once crime has been committed how do we rehabilitate? Do we need to re-think our laws over crime & punishment?

Join us for a night of LIVE pub politics from the Backbencher Pub: Wednesday, 28th of September. Our Panel: Labour MP Shane Jones, Mana Party Leader Hone Harawira and National MP Simon Bridges.

THIS WEEK ON BACK BENCHES: Watch Wallace Chapman, Damian Christie, the Back Benches Panel and special guests discuss the week’s hottest topics!

ETS—ENVIRONMENTAL TRADING SLOW-DOWN?: The new Caygill review of the ETS puts agriculture equal to other industries but will the Government be letting farmers off the hook? The review panel says we should stay on track to bring agriculture into the ETS scheme by 2015 but Climate Change Minister Nick Smith said that farmers would only be included if there were “practical technologies…available to enable farmers to reduce their emissions,” and if other countries reduced their emissions, too. So what does this mean for our ETS? Does Nick Smith have a point? Is it fair to omit those responsible for nearly half of our emissions? Does tiny New Zealand need to be leading the world on bringing farmers into the ETS if the trading partners won’t follow suit? Is not putting farmers in the ETS–just another form of a Government handout?

HAVING IT ALL? This week we mark Woman’s suffrage. It’s been 118 years since women secured the right to vote but are they any better off? Can women have it all? Pay equality? Jobs and families? Or does suffrage also mean sacrifice? Does the Government need to do more to close the gap between men & women?

Join us for a night of LIVE pub politics from the Backbencher Pub: Wednesday, 21st of September. Our Panel: Green Party MP Keith Locke, Labour MP Annette King and National MP John Hayes.

THIS WEEK ON BACK BENCHES: Watch Wallace Chapman, Damian Christie, the Back Benches Panel and special guests discuss the week’s hottest topics!

ON THE TRAIN TO NOWHERE: Was the opening night of the Rugby World Cup marred by public transport problems? At least 2,000 people missed the opening ceremony due to train delays. Does that warrant compensation? Do we need more trains? Is the failure due to anti-train bias? And what about the riders who kept pushing the emergency stop buttons? Can this be cleared up before the end of the cup? And do we really need to look at how we get around town?

ARE WE SAFER? This week the world commemorates the 10th anniversary of 9/11. The terror attacks may have been on American soil but the reverberations spread far wider. 9/11 saw law changes in New Zealand, changes in aviation, changes the way we see each other. Ten years on—are we any safer? And if you were to look ahead ten years—where will we be?

Join us for a night of LIVE pub politics from the Backbencher Pub: Wednesday, 14th of September. Our Panel: Green Party Co-Leader Metiria Turei, Labour MP Phil Twyford and National MP David Bennett.

THIS WEEK ON BACK BENCHES: Watch Wallace Chapman, Damian Christie, the Back Benches Panel and special guests discuss the week’s hottest topics!

SCHOOL FOR SCOUNDRELS: More and more small children are being kicked out of school for bad behaviour…reaching an all new high. Why is this becoming such a problem? Some are blaming it on the parents, some on exposure to drugs and alcohol, some say food & environment are to blame. What can be done to make sure the troubled kids get an education? How do we make sure well-behaved children aren’t being held back? What about teachers—are teachers becoming more than teachers? What role do the teachers and the schools have to play? And where does learning fit in on all of this? And for those teachers who don’t perform well—should they get paid less?

CLEAN RIVERS: The Green Party wants to clean up our rivers and streams. No surprise there. The Government wants to clear up our waterways too but the Greens say they don’t go far enough. Do we need national water standards? Limits of amount of water used? Can we limit the amount of pollution going into our rivers & streams? Should we be charging for water used in irrigation and commercial use? Is this a job for our new EPA? Is charging for irrigation fair to our agriculture industry? Should we all be doing our part any pay for the water we use?

Join us for a night of LIVE pub politics from the Backbencher Pub: Wednesday, 24^th of August. Our Panel: ACT MP Sir Roger Douglas, Green Party MP Sue Kedgley, Labour MP Chris Hipkins and National MP Aaron Gilmore.

 

THIS WEEK ON BACK BENCHES: Watch Wallace Chapman, Damian Christie, the Back Benches Panel and special guests discuss the week’s hottest topics!

REFORMS, REFORMS, REFORMS: National has pledged an overhaul of the welfare system and they’re starting with young people.  But are the solutions proposed by the Government the best way to stop people from becoming life-time beneficiaries? Is about more training? Or job creation? Is stopping 16 & 17 year olds from buying (illegally) alcohol
& cigarettes the right move? Why not make it harder for adults to use their benefit checks to buy their booze & cigs? Is a payment card the right move or is it just another form of food stamps? ACT says the moves don’t go far enough without introducing youth wages?

Join us for a night of LIVE pub politics from the Backbencher Pub: Wednesday, 17^th of August. Our Panel: Green Party MP Dr. Kennedy Graham, Labour MP Carmel Sepuloni, and National MP Michael Woodhouse.

There was a good crowd at the Backbencher last night for the unveilign of the new puppets. John and Bill were cast as the Blue Baron and Snoopy. Was very disturbing as John kept ticking Bill’s stomach (the puppet that is).

Also had Pita Sharples in a waka, and Roger Douglas as Rodney Hide’s puppet master.

John Key joked that he could have done with the machine gun in the plane at around 8 am yesterday. Bill joked about wanting to know about which National MPs had been seen in the Backbencher after Boycie revealed this is where Clark, Wilson and co plotted against Mike Moore.

And as the Dom Post reports, Rodney said:

“The great thing about having Roger Douglas in our caucus is that you get plenty of advice,” Mr Hide said last night.

“The advice is never contradictory because it hasn’t changed in 20 years.”

Afterwards around 60 of us went upstairs to hear about Obama’s first 100 days from a visiting US expert. Thanks to the US Embassy and State Department for helping make it happen. People seemed to enjoy it, and we had a good turnout of MPs.

After that we had Backbenches which was fun also. A good Wednesday night.

Tonight at the Back Bencher from 9 pm. The panel is:

1. ACT MP Roger Douglas
2. Green co-leader Metiria Turei
3. Labour Deputy Leader Annette King
4. National Junior Government Whip Chris Tremain

Topics are:

1. MP expenses
2. The Budget
3. Cell Phone Ban in Cars

On Backbenches tonight:

• Jeanette Fitzsimons, Greens
• David Garrett, ACT
• Charles Chauvel, Labour
• Louise Upston, National

Starts at 9 pm, best to be there by 8.30 pm at the Backbencher to view live. Should be fun.

I won’t make it as I have too much work on, but for those in Wellington who can attend, the panelists tonight are:

• Rodney Hide (ACT)
• Metira Turei (Greens)
• David Bennett (National)
• Darren Hughes (Labour)

Topics are the Jobs Summit, youth violence and KiwiRail.

Starts around 9 pm at the Backbencher.

That was a long but fun evening. We had a pretty good crowd at the Wellington blogger drinks with around 30 people there. The drinks then morphed into Back Benches which had on Simon Bridges, Grant Robertson, Metira Turei and John Boscawen. All four were strong performers in my opinion. The new MPs have given Back Benchers a renewed lease of life.

There would be close to 100 people in the bar for Back Benches. Many of the new younger MPs in attendance, and you know its a really nice environment to socalise across the political boundaries. The inhouse parliamentary bar isn;t heavily patronised, so Back Benches may end up becoming the de facto weekly gathering for MPs, journalists and groupies

A few of us heading to Hummingbird after the Backbencher closed and I got home around 2 am, so that was a nice nine hours on the turps.

Further to the the two stories yesterday from lifetime Labour voters who will not vote Labour this time due to Labour’s condoning of Peters’, I had an interesting encounter at the Backbencher last night, after Back Benches.

A gentleman came over to me and asked if I was David Farrar. He was in his 50s I would say. When I responded that I was he said he wanted to tell me something but put it in context.

He told me how he hates the National Party and would never vote for them. In fact his exact words were “I would rather take out a knife, cut off my cock and stuff it down my throat than vote for National”. He also went on to say he does not agree with any of my political views, which he finds repugnant. In fact he joked (I hope he was joking) that if I was crossing a road and he was in a car, he would speed up.

After having got that out of the way, he then went on to say how disgusted he is with Labour over Winston Peters (and ironically Winston was in the room as he had turned up to watch Back Benches), that their tolerance and implicit condoning of his activities verges on corruption, and how they need to be thrown out of office for a couple of terms.

Voting to defend Winston was a step too far even for Jim Anderton. And it seems for a growing number of lifeling Labour voters.

Could be fun tonight:

• Ron Mark New Zealand First
• Winnie Laban Labour
• Gordon Copeland Kiwi Party
• Russel Norman from the Greens.

They’ll be talking Privileges Committee, the trade deal with the United States and Fonterra did they tell soon enough.

If you’re in Wellington, come on down to the Backbencher pub between 8 and 8.30pm… (the show starts just after 9pm); otherwise tune into TVNZ 7 (on Freeview) or on-line at tvnzondemand.co.nz

Tonight on Back Benches our panel is Jeanette Fitzsimons co-leader of the Greens, Peter Dunne United Future leader and Charles Chauvell from Labour.

We’ll be talking about the November 8 election date and what the issues will be, Fonterra and the infant formula scandal in China and whether gangs should be outlawed.

We’ll be Peeping and Peering in Steve Maharey’s office and we have Damian Christie’s News Review.

If you’re in Wellington, come on down to the Backbencher pub between 8 and 8.30pm … we’d love to see you … (the show starts just after 9pm); otherwise tune into TVNZ 7 (on Freeview) or on-line at tvnzondemand.co.nz

On Back Benches tonight the panel is

1. Labour’s George Hawkins
2. Jim Anderton from the Progressives
3. Keith Locke from the Greens
4. Judy Turner from United Future.

Topics:

1. Owen Glenn’s evidence before the Privileges Committee and getting a report on what Winston says tonight.
2. Voting … big numbers are enrolling overseas; should it be compulsory
3. The Families Commission should it go or should it stay.

If you’re in Wellington, come on down to the Backbencher pub between 8 and 8.30pm.

This cartoon from the Southland Times sums it up.

The General Debate yesterday saw the most extraordinary “Operation Protect Winston” from Labour and WInston himself. It took 90 minutes for Rodney Hide to make a five minute speech as senior Labour Ministers and Winston did everything they could to stop Rodney from revealing further damning claims of corruption, including alleged lies to a select committee.

Considering how often Winston Peters and Trevor Mallard have made wild accusations under parliamentary privilege, it was galling to see them both work towards stopping Rodney Hide quoting someone who was willing to state their views on camera to TVNZ.

The Dom Post reports Auckland University law professor Bill Hodge expressing concern over how the Government is trying to block Hide from revealing accusations of corruption.

On a related note, it was telling last night when the audience at Back Benches were asked to indicate if they beleive Winston Peters was telling the truth regarding Owen Glenn. Not a single person in the audience indicated they thought Peters was telling the truth.

The Government should be demanding the SFO investigate the allegations or be setting up a Commission of Inquiry into them – not trying to shut MPs down.

Back Benches is, as usual, on tonight on TVNZ7 filmed live at the BackBencher. The MPs tonight are:

1. Steve Maharey, Labour
2. Heather Roy, ACT
3. Russel Norman, Greens
4. Judy Turner, United Future

The topics are:

1. National’s welfare policy (despite no National MP there so I predict Steve and Russel will call it an evil return to the 90s, Heather will call it Labour lite, and Judy will just ask for people to be nicer to each other
2. China and the Olympics
3. Herceptin – should it be funded for a year

The show starts just after 9 pm, so best to be there around 8.30 p.m.

The four MPs tonight are:

1. Paula Bennett (National)
2. Russell Fairbrother (Labour)
3. Dail Jones (NZ First)
4. Gordon Copeland (Kiwi Party)

The topics are

1. Winston Peters and those financial contributions
2. National promising to continue with Working for Families plus a tax cut
3. The flying visit of Condeleezza Rice … we’re an “ally” now … what does that mean?

People wanting to attend in person should head down to the Backbencher pub between 8 and 8.30pm. It is broadcast on TVNZ7 just after 9 pm live.

I won’t be making it myself as a group of us are going to see the Batman movie tonight. I think this will become the highest grossing movie of all time – it has made US$452 million in less than a fortnight already!

Another fun night watching Back Benchers yesterday. Cactus Kate was in town so we settled in early at 5 pm. Highly amusing as she berates the waitress for the lack of decent champagne available in the bar, and the bar owner being at the table next to us.  However the staff redeemed themselves by following the instruction to automatically bring out a new bottle whenever the existing bottle got below 20% full.

We ended up with a very mixed table with Kate (ACT), myself (Nat), Will de Cleene (Greens/ACT), a 9th floor staffer (Labour), a National Radio presenter and an Electoral Commission staffer. Made for a fun night, which once again ended up at Mighty Mighty in Cuba Mall.

It’s Wednesday so it is Back Benches Day. Tonight we have:

• Ron Mark, NZ First
• Judy Turner, United Future
• Sue Moroney, Labour
• Chris Tremain, National

Issues for discussion are the death of Sgt Wootton, closing bars at 3 am in Auckland, banning telemarketers and did NZ First get the money or not.

The show is on TVNZ7 just after 9 am. Those who want to watch live are best to turn up to the Backbencher before 8.30 p.m.

Very amusing at Back Benches last night. The spot quiz prize question was “What is the name of the main Opposition Party in Zimbabwe?”.

Someone at my table said they thought it was MDC but wasn’t sure what MDC stands for. I replied that it is Movement for Democratic Change and then suddenly I hear Wallace Chapman yelling out something along the lines of Bloody Hell David Farrar wins again. I honestly didn’t realise my voice would have carried as I have actually been consciously trying not to become the resident prize grabber.

However the prize was a very cool book of Bromhead cartoons from the 1970s (and so many are still relevant today), so not complaining too much.

Ended up being a fairly long night. Normally I head home by 10 pm afterwards but a few of us ended up staying at the Backbencher until it closed at midnight. Then in the interests of fostering closer National-Greens relations some of us ended up going down to Mighty Mighty in Cuba Mall until they closed around 2.30 a.m. A really fun night – the only sensible way to debate free trade policies is at 1 am after some Black Russians!

Back Benches is on tonight at the Backbencher

The four MPs are:

• Metiria Turei from the Greens
• Heather Roy from ACT
• David Bennett from National
• Hone Harawira from the Maori Party

Topics for discussion are

• kiwi kids and sport
• Zimbabwe … the Prime Minister and the Greens think we should cancel our cricket tour next year
• leaks from within National are they electronic or a mole?

As usual, turn up between 8 pm and 8.30 pm for a 9 pm start, or watch it on TVNZ7.

Tags: Back Benches

Some new MPs tonight. We have:

1. Dail Jones, NZ First
2. Russel Norman, Greens
3. Jill Pettis, Labour
4. Paula Bennett, National

Can someone please please please ask Dail Jones to explain what the close to $100,000 anonymous donation he referred to, turned out to be? NZ First have done a return saying they had no donations over $10,000 so can Dail explain what the large sum of money that unexpectedly turned up in their bank account was?

Topics are the polls, Barack Obama and food.

As usual come along between 8 pm and 8.30 pm for a 9 pm start at the Backbencher on Molesworth Street. Those out of town can see it on TVNZ7.

For those in Wellington the line up tonight is:

1. Sandra Goudie, National
2. Hone Harawira, Maori Party
3. Keith Locke, Greens
4. Louise Wall, Labour

Topics are tax cuts, the Vietnam Vets apology and the power cut.

I won’t be able to make it tonight but those who want to should aim to go down around 8.30 p.m. for a 9 p.m. start.

Back Benches is on tonight live at the Back Bencher.

The MPs are:

1. Sue Kedgeley, Greens
2. Rodney Hide, ACT
3. Chester Borrows, National
4. Charles Chauvel, Labour

And the topics are the budget, tax cuts and leadership. Sounds fun. TVNZ also tells me they have a special mystery guess!

The show starts at 9.00 p.m. but best to be there by 8.30 pm if you want a seat or want to offer yourself to ask a question. It is, of course, at the Backbencher on Molesworth Street.

Went with a couple of mates to Back Benches again last night. Three of the MPs had been on before – Jacqui Dean, Hone Harawira, Sue Bradford and newcomer Doug Woolerton.

Spent quite a bit of time talking about P. Jacqui and Doug pushing a hard line approach on P and gangs. Hone made the point to some applause neither of them would know a gang if one bit them in the arse. I did think Sue Bradford misjudged things by saying that P was a distraction and people should be more concerned about peak oil and global warming. I think that shows a certain disconnect from society.

Very amusing was discussion of Mt Eden prison and Sue and Hone talking about their stays there, or as Hone put it – his bed and breakfast visit.

I did some minor heckling but nothing in comparison to a certain other blogger who really was loud when he wanted to be! I did like (if I can say so) my suggestion that the solution to P should be to set up a P emissions trading scheme for it

The funniest part of the night for me was when chatting to one of the other regulars, who can only be described as a stunningly attractive blond. I introduced her to my friend (Hunting Man), and it was only when he mentioned his job that she pointed out they had actually met a short while ago at a business meeting. Much ribbing followed of Hunting Man for managing to forget such an, umm, unforgettable person.

The show is still good fun.  A few people have mentioned though that it tries to fit too much in and the debates get cut a bit short. I think this is a valid criticism, and if I was looking to change things I would consider getting rid of the pre-recorded segment where they look in an MPs office. The novelty is starting to wear off!