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July 30, 2020 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 30 July 2020

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Andrew Little needn’t have worried about his hate speech laws not getting passed because apparently we now have the likes of the Medical Council of New Zealand carrying out extrajudicial show trials for racist facebook comments: https://www.stuff.co.nz/taranaki-daily-news/news/122280110/nurse-gets-struck-off-for-racist-comments-in-first-hearing-of-its-kind–then-walks-out-during-karakia

This article honestly looks like it was written by The Onion. I would like to know if this woman (as foolish and unpleasant as she may well be) has any legal comeback for her career being destroyed here.
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July 30, 2020 8:00am
- KevO'Brien
  
  Dew acknowledged mana whenua for their “very special contribution” to the hearing, saying it was important for the tribunal to be part of restoring mana for Māori.
  This is going far too far. The comments reported may have been a reasonably founded from observation.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:19am
  - alex Masterley
    
    Maria Dew QC is obviously looking for appointment to the High Court Bench.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:28am
    - KevO'Brien
      
      To the trash can, more like.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:17am
  - mark15
    
    “It’s thousands of years of injustices, it’s tears of joy.”
    It’s racial supremacy.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:02am
    - Phronesis
      
      It’s not often you see an admission that they were committing injustices against each other for a thousand years before the white man showed up. I thought the noble savages had all been living in eternal peace and harmony before colonialism…
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:34am
  - Classic Liberal
    
    Forced to attend karakia. How is that religious freedom? I’m an atheist and don’t want to be forced to attend any prayers to keep a job. I politely do attend, but being *forced to* is not on!
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:50am
    - Loddenthinks
      
      Well to be fair the karakia was after she lost the job, and doubtless both a sop to the part-maoris in attendance and a chance to twist the knife.
      
      I’m sure the struck-off nurse will see the error of her ways, make a grovelling public apology, attend cultural awareness and safety treatment and counselling for 18 months, and learn the language.
      
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      July 30, 2020 4:51pm
      - artemisia
        
        If the now ex nurse chooses to pack the bags and the family and leave New Zealand who could blame her?
        
        Alternatively she could stick out the two years, do the required training along with any other training on offer, get relicensed and then pack the bags ….
        
        I reckon there might be some ex MPs with names splashed across the local media that might well and lucratively contemplate the same.
        
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        July 30, 2020 5:09pm
- Naths
  
  The “pendulum” is swinging way too far off balance when people that are offended by someone’s views (be they opinion or fact or a mix of both) are celebrating destroying someone’s career and they are also deemed as an “oppressor” (as if they were someone from the 1800’s oppressing Maori with force and death etc).
  
  The pendulum needs to swing back and frankly less radical interpretations of cultural awareness is required in the heath sector (and other sectors like education and justice etc).
  
  We always look to our politicians to “fix” this … but I feel it is time for those within the system to speak out, I’m thinking that’s fair-minded Maori leaders and those with authority (and no doubt many Maori are not pleased with these radical interpretations but like everyone else no doubt they fear to speak out in case they are ostracised)!
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:29am
  - The Proper Ghandi
    
    So taking a knee for the national anthem and burning the American flag – both of which show utter contempt if not outright hostility for a nation and its people – are lauded as acts of defiance and standing up for one’s culture, yet walking out on a karakia is the exact opposite?
    
    It seems that posting a descriptive statement of a group’s behaviour (which we all know is very, very likely true from our own experiences) is racist. There are plenty of instances of Europeans being derided as a group (after all, we are all born “racist”), yet I don’t see anyone being censured for that.
    
    I predict that many idiots like Maria Drew QC (who I believe is white) will one day find themselves on the end of this type of action. She will do or say something that “offends” someone as being “racist” and she may find herself being struck off. And I will laugh.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:11am
    - Nickc2
      
      Well, I guess I have to ask, what the F is a karakia? Does it have any standing in law? If not what the F has it to do with Maria Drew QC or is this just a bitch or witch hunt?
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:41am
      - The Proper Ghandi
        
        I think it’s a small commuter vehicle, with an engine capacity of about 1840 cc. No reverse gear though, just one directional, and no brakes.
        
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        July 30, 2020 10:14am
      - Nickc2
        
        @ Ghandi 1014AM
        
        Thanks, sounds like something the Greens inflict upon us peasants. Is it on special at the Warehouse?
        
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        July 30, 2020 10:41am
  - MT_Tinman
    
    less radical interpretations of cultural awareness
    
    F@$k “cultural awareness”!
    
    Call it what it is; RACISM.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:13am
- slightlyrighty
  
  I wonder if any effort was made to find the source of her position. I do hear anecdotal position regarding non Maori having to work longer hours when Maori leave for cultural reasons.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:31am
  - Exclamation Mark
    
    I doubt it but this $55,000 kangaroo court could be viewed as evidence that she had a point.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:39am
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    I have seen reports from service providers where significant numbers of staff have taken between 20 and 60 days paid leave per year to attend tangis and cultural events. This is in addition to their annual and sick leave entitlements.
    
    They are also dedicated staff who do a good job.
    
    Tricky.
    
    They are quite likely modelling good lifestyle behaviours and choices in their communities by attending cultural events. For them nursing may well not be something that only happens at work.
    
    However, to those staff who have to pick up longer or extra shifts to cover the gaps, I am sure it feels bloody unfair.
    
    I do not support punishing people or destroying their livelihoods or careers for wrong-think.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:42am
    - Engelbert Humperdink
      
      I do support punishing and sanctioning people for being AWOL – and taking up to two fully paid months of the year to celebrate your tribes’ lives is being absent without leave. Each of us belongs to a tribe we would like to support in dark times but we also know we People of Relative Pallor can’t just walk off the job and still expect to get paid…
      
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      July 30, 2020 8:57am
    - Classic Liberal
      
      Thanks for the balanced view, Nigel. I used to feel bloody annoyed at smokers: they definitely took far more short breaks per day, adding up to a significant difference in hours worked per year.
      
      And if you have ever worked with an orthodox Muslim they might also have been allowed to work fewer hours or take extra time off during Ramadan.
      
      But what about people who suffer from some illness or disability – sometimes get more paid time off than the rest of us.
      
      Tricky, as you say.
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:59am
  - Engelbert Humperdink
    
    Fortunately (phew) there is not some racist deposit of extra money for the longer hours – just have to cover their duties while they are away and then at the end of shift, work longer for no pay to keep up with the documentation that didn’t have time for during the day.
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:30pm
- Phronesis
  
  Yes it reads like some sort of show trial in a post revolution socialist utopia….
  
  It’s not the MCNZ though, they deal with Dr’s. It was the Nursing Council and the Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal. The muppet journalist just rang the wrong organisation and they commented anyway.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:38am
  - rockape
    
    Is it a coincidence that 5 out of 6 members on the Board of the nurses council are Maori. Hardly a representative number for the few Maori nurses in the proffession,
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:26am
    - Nickc2
      
      How did they get there? Were they elected or were they appointed. If the latter, by whom? If their union has anything to do with it, IMHO, its rigged by them for them and to the disadvantage of anyone who isn’t Maori. Am I right?
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:32am
    - Maxx
      
      Sounds like they need a diversity quota. I assume there is also a gender imbalance? Quota! Disability imbalance? Quota!
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:36am
      - rockape
        
        No Gender is OK as its a mainly female occupation.
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:14pm
- The Housekeeper
  
  Sorry Mod pushed Report instead of Reply, please disregard.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:49am
- Jules99
  
  $8K is a lot of money for someone without a job to find. I doubt she’ll pay it. Is there some sort of jurisdiction where they can force her? She won’t be nursing again.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:53am
- The Housekeeper
  
  I felt sick when I read this morning. How far we have fallen? Kangaroo courts run by idiots. No mention of whether her fb comments were true, doesn’t seem to matter anymore. Is she a good nurse? Doesn’t matter. What on earth are they doing praying in court?
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:57am
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    Its a tribunal , literally a Kangaroo Court.
    
    These lesser Courts are stuffed with interfering busybodies.
    
    There are some days you have to wonder if it wasn’t a shame that Belgium or even France hadn’t annexed New Zealand, instead of the long-suffering Poms.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:14am
  - igm
    
    NZ the way Ardern and her sycophants want it.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:15am
  - Phronesis
    
    The implication is that mere truth is irrelevant. She had said these things, and caused great harm, how dare she defend herself by claiming that her statements were true. What does that have to do with anything?
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:18am
    - Loddenthinks
      
      Methinks the moddies doth protest too much!
      
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      July 30, 2020 4:53pm
  - Sacha
    
    I think I would have walked out too. I am well retired now, but the department I worked in would not hire Maori nurses at the time because they were not particular enough in their practice, did not follow protocols diligently, and were often off on family business, all of which put extra stress on the staff of an already busy and over worked unit.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:50am
    - igm
      
      Would like to know the percentage of Maori nurses in he profession
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:13am
      - mark15
        
        I would like to know the percentage of maori in the percentage of maori nurses in the profession.
        
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        July 30, 2020 11:43am
      - Loddenthinks
        
        Zero. It’s zero percent, the same as the percentage of maoris in the world. None, not one. There’s a few hundred thousand part-maori floating around, many of the enterprising ones in Australia or further afield, doing better for their friends and families without the burden of victimhood and “colonialism” holding them back.
        
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        July 30, 2020 4:55pm
- Im Right
  
  And what about the comment ‘been oppressed for thousands of years’
  What?
  Maori came to NZ approx 1200 yrs ago and settlers about 250yrs ago, where is the ‘thousands’ coming from…..being oppressed by fellow Maori tribes?
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:10am
  - yossarian
    
    I read somewhere that the Treaty of Waitangi actually abolished Maori slavery. Damn that horrible oppressing document!!!
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:52am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    There is no evidence that humans were in NZ 1000 years ago.
    Our earliest sites of occupation date from around 1300-1350.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:37am
    - UrbanNeocolonialist
      
      So Maori arrived just 700 years back, after the time ‘Braveheart’ was set, Europeans first visited 350 years back. The reality of the much lauded Maori history of NZ is pretty underwhelming.
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:41am
    - mark15
      
      Not true.
      Poukawa dig was evidence of pre maori occupation.
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:44am
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        Not at all..
        
        The Antiquity of Man at Lake Poukawa, New Zealand
        https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03036758.1979.10419412
        
        https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03036758.1978.10429381?needAccess=true
        
        Both these papers illustrate the unreasonableness of an earlier occupation of this site.
        
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        July 30, 2020 1:52pm
- The Proper Ghandi
  
  Exactly how is she “unpleasant”? She may be “foolish” given that we live in a country where the minority are the anointed untouchables who cannot do wrong by definition, but telling the truth and then choosing to exercise her right not be to subjected to an alien culture’s song routine is not unpleasant.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:31am
  - Exclamation Mark
    
    She *might* be nice as pie for all I know but in my experience people who are silly enough to put this sort of thing on social media tend to have a bit of a disagreeable streak to them, hence I said “…unpleasant as she may well be”.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:00am
igm

And he gets bail . . . Why?
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/122292192/man-appears-in-court-accused-of-using-ambulance-equipment-to-attack-staff
Words bloody fail me!
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July 30, 2020 8:03am
- Tricati
  
  Don’t forget the government shelved legislation to increase the penalties for these arseholes so they could push through allowing prisoners to vote.
  Absolute pricks.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:36am
- Sir Cullen's Sidekick
  
  Wait unil Golritz issues a statement in defence of the rights of this guy and Marama brings up human rights.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:50am
alloytoo

Irritating adverts.

NZ transport is currently running an advert encouraging people to check the the star rating of a vehicle before you buy it.

One of the adverts has a vehicle modified inside to “represent” what would have to a 1 Star vehicle in a crash.

Aside from the fact that the deformation is very unrealistic, the car they are using for this stunt is a Nissan Pulsar (B17 class) which is indeed 5 star rated.

This is the sort of scare mongering government agencies do when they run out of problems to fix.
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July 30, 2020 8:06am
- pdm
  
  Where do I find the star rating for my rather tatty 1992 Mitsubishi Lancer which runs like a charm?
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:10am
  - slightlyrighty
    
    That’s a 1 star rating based on http://www.rightcar.govt.nz.
    
    I would hate to be in that should a boy racer pile into you.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:34am
    - MT_Tinman
      
      Amazing how so many of us survived before airbags and seatbelts.
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:15am
      - Lance
        
        No MT_Tinman, we all died a horrible death.
        And you try the young people today that…… and they won’t believe you
        
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        July 30, 2020 10:48am
      - Captain Mainwaring
        
        Yes it is. 40 years ago the road toll was more than double what it is now, the population was half and the roads were even worse.
        
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        July 30, 2020 11:26am
  - Sir Cullen's Sidekick
    
    It is -5. But if you buy electric cars sold by toxic Greens, the safety rating increases to +15
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:51am
- Benedict Yu
  
  We would all love 2020 model cars with 9 air bags.
  
  Back in the real world in 2017 the average age of New Zealand cars was 14.4 years. Of course that means that a very large number were much older. Extrapolating, the average value of a New Zealand car is about $5000.
  
  The barrier to buying a late model 5 star car for most New Zealanders is not lack of awareness. It is an affordability issue. Simple as that. When I visit Australia the cars on the road are newer than in New Zealand. When I visit Switzerland and Germany they are unrecognisable from the New Zealand fleet.
  
  If the current government is reelected, expect a full scale assault on car owners. It is all about ideology. Odious people.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:35am
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    Yup. Poor people drive the car they can afford, not the car some university educated eco-fascist who lives in Te Aro demands that they should drive.
    
    Most people with actual lives, kids and jobs need transport to get to work and participate in society/community. They do not have a spare $45-$70k down the back of the sofa to buy a PHEV.
    
    The over-educated who choose to have no kids and live in leafy inner-city apartments simply have no conception of how others really live. No, Mrs Fatialofa cannot take the kids to school, drop aunty off to the doctors and get to her shift by bicycle or public transport.
    
    Even Auckland, after all the CRL/buslanes/bikelanes crap has forecast that after all the investment – if it all works out as best it possibly can, in 2045 82% of trips in Auckland will be by private motorvehicle.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:47am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      My experience with cycle way advocates and greens in general is that they are terrible with emperics and with science generally. We have people like JAG effectively forcing horrible transport choices on Wellington. I know Wellington has geographic challenges, but globally, smart people deal with such challenges in planning infrastructure. Wellington is well on the way to becoming paralysed and a costly tram from the railway station to Courtney place aint going to achieve anything.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:17am
      - Classic Liberal
        
        Extremely ageist and sexist, the greens: elderly people and women dropping kids of and doing the shopping can’t use bicycles, let alone on Wellington hills!
        
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        July 30, 2020 11:27am
      - Paulus
        
        JAG will be back in September and will continue her crusades against the Cars with a new mandate it will be worse.
        
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        July 30, 2020 1:31pm
    - Benedict Yu
      
      “The over-educated who choose to have no kids and live in leafy inner-city apartments simply have no conception of how others really live. ”
      
      Yes it is notable that Nissan electric cars are all over the show at the New World Car park in Thorndon. (The diesel BMW SUV for the road trips is back in the Kelburn garage. The EV is just for shopping. – No I am not kidding I have met this couple.) In contrast when I was in Northland last week, I saw exactly zero EVs.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:20am
      - alloytoo
        
        What happens to these EVS when they hit 10 years old and their battery begins to fail?
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:19pm
      - Jack5
        
        Alloytoo: does this apply to hybrid vehicles as well?
        
        Do they have a 10-year life limit?
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:45pm
      - [email protected]
        
        That’s amazing that you saw no EV’s in Northland. Whangarei has one of the highest level of EV ownership. The very first fast charger in New Zealand was put in at Whangarei. That was back in 2014.
        
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        July 30, 2020 1:31pm
    - alloytoo
      
      Most cars produced by the major manufacturers since 2000 are very safe for the occupants and that level of safety hasn’t changed significantly for a while because manufacturers have been concentrating on making them “safer” for pedestrians.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:27am
  - Random T Person
    
    My 13 year old X5 has 9 airbags, so there 😉
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:04am
    - Engelbert Humperdink
      
      When I take a passenger, my 20 year old V8 ute has 2 front gasbags, so there 🙂 🙂
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:32pm
    - hullkiwi
      
      Yes, but that is built to European requirements, I can assure you the airbags in a 2005 Nissan leave a lot to be desired.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:39pm
  - MT_Tinman
    
    The barrier to buying a late model 5 star car for most New Zealanders is not lack of awareness. It is an affordability issue.
    
    A couple of months ago I purchased a 20 month old, 5 seat car for less that 18K – from a Toyota dealer.
    
    How can cost be a barrier with prices like that?
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:19am
    - Tall Man
      
      Are you supporting a couple of kids, a stay at home wife to raise your children and a mortgage?
      
      Some are doing it tough and $18,000 is probably 4 times what they can actually allocate to a car.
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:53am
      - MT_Tinman
        
        Are you supporting a couple of kids, a stay at home wife to raise your children and a mortgage?
        
        Been there, done that and had a safe enough car that we all survived.
        
        If an almost new car costs so little a slightly older but still safe car will also cost comparatively little – to the point where that car will cost less in $$$ terms than mine did when the family was young.
        
        Of course I didn’t have a Jag or a Beemer.
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:06pm
    - Benedict Yu
      
      Whether cost is a “barrier” or not does not matter. The preferences expressed in the market have resulted in a fleet average age of 15 years and an average value of about $5,000. Extrapolating, that means there are maybe a half million cars on the road aged 20 years with a resale value of $1,000 to $2,000. That is the fleet that New Zealanders have purchased.
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:58am
  - Aunty
    
    But, Benedict, we are a wealthy first-world country!!??? How can this possibly be, an aging dated car fleet in paradise?
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:39am
    - UrbanNeocolonialist
      
      First time I went to France and Italy in 90’s i was struck by vast number of shit-box clapped out old dented and rusty cars on road. NZ is relatively good by comparison.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:01pm
      - Aunty
        
        You must have gone to the poor parts. But really, a comparison to the conditions on the ground there 25 to 30 years ago?? Out of date, much??
        
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        July 30, 2020 2:24pm
- thetiedarch
  
  Don’t you mean ‘Waka Kotahi’?
  
  That’s the current name that the industry is being instructed to use.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:24am
  - alphabeatrium
    
    Sigh. Can’t we just translate NZTA directly into Maori rather than inventing an entirely new name? Translating Waka Kotahi into English renders something like “United Vehicle”—and that’s the most charitable rendering I can figure out. “Canoe Together” would be another…
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:56am
    - igm
      
      Why bother?
      
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      July 30, 2020 1:07pm
      - alphabeatrium
        
        Well, it’s an official language. I guess our state institutions deserve bilingual names as you would find in any country that claims official bi- or multi-lingualism. I was in Québec this time last year and every state institution had bilingual names. This is important to the Quebecois who are very fond of their language and really rather resent dropping back to English (as I discovered of a rather rude receptionist when my French failed me). However these labels were all direct translations; they wouldn’t tolerate anything less. However in NZ, we seem to be embarking not on bi-lingual naming but actual dual-naming (or, increasingly, only labelling in Maori—an absurdity when 3-4% speak Maori, and all of those equally well in English). Don Brash made this point as the Govenor of the RBNZ when it got its second name (Te Pūtea Matua). Not an awful translation: Pūtea (sum of money, bag) and Matua (as a modifier: the first or primary). However it might be read to imply that the RBNZ is the “source of all wealth” which, as Brash said, is not what the RBNZ is. Maori has a relatively limited voabulary, compared to modern English, making these translations difficult. That’s evident in the loaded use of “waka” to mean everything from an actual waka, to a car, to transport in general. Most languages that are doing well are capable of inventing or borrowing new words to cope with new concepts, but shortly following the era of the early Christian missionaries to these isles (lots of Christian concepts and even biblical placenames have adequate Maori translations), we seem to have just abandoned the idea of expanding the Maori lexicon to cope with 21st century concepts.
        
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        July 30, 2020 2:54pm
    - septic skeptic
      
      Why not give it an English name for English usage and a Maori name for Maori usage? This hybrid English/Maori pidgin is ridiculous.
      
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      July 30, 2020 2:59pm
      - Jack5
        
        Careful, Septic Skeptic, or dogmatic Steve Todd will post that you are the only one in the ~~blog, country, world,~~ universe who has this view on NZ Pidgin.
        
        On this, Todd’s way out of synch with most New Zealanders.
        
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        July 30, 2020 8:54pm
- RightFirstTime
  
  NZ transport? Surely you mean Waka Kotahi? I notice that Milford Sound now has a Maori name added to it. One country, one people…….
  
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  July 30, 2020 3:01pm
RW Capitalist

Labour’s “Let’s Keep Moving”

6 fold increase in emergency housing spend.
PLEASE……lets stop, enough already.
It’s not just what they haven’t done, it’s pretty much everything they have done so far.
The promise of more disaster, if they get another chance.
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July 30, 2020 8:06am
- artemisia
  
  First time ever Reserve Bank reports lending to first home buyers is greater than lending for rentals. If rental pool shrinks there will be increased demand for taxpayer subsidised emergency and social housing.
  
  Good for landlords though – less risk as than ideal tenants not on the offer list. Also increased rents, partly to pay for increased compliance and upgrade costs that tenants are paying for of course.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:15am
- hullkiwi
  
  This is true. However, Jacqui Dean has made a dog’s dinner of it in her media interviews. Her failure instead of studying her brief, she has been trying to wing it in interviews and been found wanting. Dean is a perfect example of what I’ve been complaining about for weeks. Which is a lack of people in NZ, in leadership with true visionary and strategic leadership. Most of our politicians may have gone to Wellington to “make a difference”, but once elected they didn’t have the skills or the experience to “make a difference” and worse still because they need a “job” to do they are given areas of responsibility ways outside their comfort zone/areas of knowledge or experience.
  
  Hence this morning many have witnessed or heard the shambles that is Jacqui Dean talking about respective records in housing. Truly embarrassing when it should have been an open goal.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:32am
  - RW Capitalist
    
    So…when did what people say…become more important than what they DO?
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:48am
    - sooty
      
      When Twyford was elected!
      Billshit beats his brains!
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:19am
  - BAM
    
    What an idiot, what’s with these South Island candidates? they’re hopeless.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:31am
    - Paulus
      
      You mean Megan Woods and Poto Williams – both appalling South Island Candidates !
      
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      July 30, 2020 1:35pm
  - Flossie
    
    hullkiwi – totally agree. The interview was a display of out and out stupidity from the mp no question there!
    I would like to know how many on waiting lists for state housing are families and what the average number of kids is per family. Always seeing all the tragic stories and it’s those with 5, 6, or more, kids. I don’t presume to dictate the size of anyone’s family but for heavens sake if you can’t afford to take care of them, don’t have so many and expect taxpayers to fill the financial gaps.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:12am
    - hullkiwi
      
      Flossie, she was bad. You touch on a matter that is way bigger than a response on here can do justice.
      
      Basically, it comes down to self responsibility and the social contracts we have between each other and between ourselves and the govt. The notion of the social contract is based on what we can each do to support a civil society and what we expect of a govt we elect and pay for.
      Underpinning everything is that for our contribution of fair day’s effort we receive a fair wage.
      
      If the above is functioning, then society for all of us functions.
      
      But then you get the section of society that believes someone else should always pay for their “lifestyle” (or the broken society). To discuss such matters, is not a matter of being “unkind” to those less fortunate than ourselves, but it is question the fact that we have moved from a society which provides social security to those who have fallen on hard times and need a help up, to a society that provides social welfare as a right to support lifestyle choices.
      
      Self responsibility is gone, if we are continually supporting the town bike and her family that she has never had capacity to care for. A generalization I know, but all to come in a welfare dependent society.
      
      I might add, it is not helped by govts who aid and abet employers who see it as a right to pay wages/salaries that do not reflect the dignity of work, and expect the govt to top up the income with a variety of welfare payments/transfers. All the while adding strength to the mantra a low wage/high cost economy.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:32pm
- Simon
  
  “Let’s Keep Moving”
  
  Lets keep the Wuhan virus porn moving more like.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:49am
  - Unity
    
    I like Labour’s slogan ‘Let’s Keep Moving’ because I can visualise them keeping moving and going over the cliff. Please don’t stop, Labour!! Oh, my thought processes!!
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:11pm
    - Captain Mainwaring
      
      You mean like lemmings following the Pied Piper.
      
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      July 30, 2020 1:56pm
- Paulus
  
  Labour, assisted by the Greens , which they will need, will be able to do whatever they want after the election subject to what the Greens want.
  Cindy will still be Queen with Marama as Princess.
  Looks very likely scenario now.
  
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  July 30, 2020 11:19am
Tony Stuart

A superb valedictory statement from Sarah Dowie last night:

https://ondemand.parliament.nz/parliament-tv-on-demand/?itemId=214931

Two questions; was Jami-Lee Ross in the House to hear himself described, accurately, as a predator? And will Tova O’Brien and her Newshub political team reflect on the role they played in enabling Ross, whilst throwing people like Sarah Dowie to the wolves?
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July 30, 2020 8:06am
- sooty
  
  It’s a shame she did not name names!
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:25am
  - Tony Stuart
    
    She didn’t need to. It was Newshub that was reporting everything Ross said as factual, and demonising anyone who criticised him.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:28am
    - alloytoo
      
      Newhub continues to tarnish their brand with stories about 14 year old’s and milk moustaches.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:29am
    - oldgolfer
      
      First lesson in journalism should be to never trust anyone with a grudge.
      Tova may learn that one day.
      
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      July 30, 2020 10:42am
      - Tall Man
        
        tova has a grudge that’s for sure.
        
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        July 30, 2020 11:24am
- Prince
  
  No, and no.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:29am
- the deity formerly known as nigel6888
  
  Can anyone really imagine hyenas like the Press Gallery reflecting on their own behaviour?
  
  Its like a cross between Mean Girls and Animal Farm, with a bunch of chubby adolescents all ducking, diving, clawing and shagging their way to be first with the gossip and innuendo.
  
  And for what? A moments titillation?
  
  Or just so they can stay on the Island for another round?
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:32am
  - Engelbert Humperdink
    
    Presstitutes gonna keep whoring themselves out for the sweet-tasting greasy lucre. It’s who they are, it’s what they do.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:59am
  - The Proper Ghandi
    
    It’s more like Lord of the Flies, with Cindy as the fly-blown pigs head, and the spectre of the racist, bigoted, nationalist white male as “the beast.”
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:52am
  - Southtop2
    
    NZ Broadcasting School web address is about the only thing the media has correct: https://nzbs.com/
    NZ BS ……………lots of BS 🙂
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:30pm
- Simon
  
  Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
  Jami-Lee Ross National party insider spilling the beans on CCP vast influence over the National Party is more interesting.
  
  But you run this predator bull shit.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:51am
  - Happychappy
    
    Simon if you had a brain it would be lonely, JLR was supposed to release that yesterday so why haven’t the media published the no show.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:05am
  - KevO'Brien
    
    …and you’re a liabore predator.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:21am
- Ruahine
  
  JL Ross was accurately described as a predator in Parliament but Sarah Dowie you were very foolish.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:33am
  - Tony Stuart
    
    Yes, she was, and has admitted as much. Ross was obviously a very convincing liar as he drew her in, then chewed her up and spat her out.
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:23am
- Paulus
  
  O’Brien regrets nothing, until one day she does not get the job interview she wants.
  She is unreliable and indiscreet, but thinks she is clever.
  
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  July 30, 2020 11:21am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  Would have been more fun if she had used parliamentary privilege to name names.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:05pm
- Jack5
  
  Sorry to see Sarah Dowie leave Parliament. Her farewell speech was brave and excellent. She is a person of mettle.
  
  Sarah’s successor as Invercargill National candidate, Penny Simmonds, is also first rate. Penny heads the Southern Institute of Technology, and had it humming financial with local money kicking while most other polytechnics stagnated.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:14pm
- lofty
  
  I agree Tony, I watched and listened to this just 10 minutes ago, as I snatch a bit of me time, from the office.
  I do not know, nor have I ever met Sarah, and yet I found myself proud of her and her stand.
  She was foolish and fell into a trap so many have before her, but she has the guts to own the incident, and learn from it.
  I wish her well in her future life.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:34pm
artemisia

Useful post on polls from Prof Thomas Lumley at StatsChat. How polls work, margin of error, weighting, rogue polls and Epsom. Gathered previous posts together, some are getting on a bit. Still good though.

https://www.statschat.org.nz/2020/07/29/the-statchat-guide-to-polls/
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July 30, 2020 8:07am
Maggie Pie

Honestly, there are times my partner acts just like any other misogynistic A-hole.
Last night he comes down stairs, wanders into the TV room and asks…. ‘How much longer will dinner be?”
I say, “Shush!! I’m watching Sarah Dowie’s Validictory speech”
He looks up at the screen and sez, “Hmmm. Nice tits”
🙁
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July 30, 2020 8:11am
- Daphne Whitethigh
  
  Please stop. This adds nothing.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:30am
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Couldn’t agree with you more Daph.
    There are times i just wish I’d listened to my mum.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:42am
- burt
  
  He’s not wrong.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:41am
- Tony Stuart
  
  Your partner’s name isn’t Jami-Lee, is it?
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:42am
- cmm
  
  Woman: “You must get in touch with your feelings and express yourself more. How can I understand you if you won’t say what’s on your mind?”
  Man: “Nice tits.”
  Woman:”Grrr. Mysogynistic arsehole”
  Man makes silent gesture of confusion and retreats back to silence.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:43am
  - The Proper Ghandi
    
    We may wish it was otherwise, but tits and ass have effectively always ruled the world. It wasn’t simply Helen’s face that launched a thousand ships.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:24am
    - RalphT
      
      What’s Helen Clarke got to do with it?…
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:53am
      - alloytoo
        
        Nothing, he’s not referring to Helen Clarke, he’s referring to “the” Helen.
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:30pm
      - Engelbert Humperdink
        
        When Helen Clarke turned up in Athens, the Greeks all fled to Troy. And then they had to find something to do, nek minnit, Trojan Horse, destruction of Troy, Rome start-up, carnage, Carthage, Londinium, Magna Carta, income tax, AIDs and WuFlu. It’s all her fault don’t you see!!
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:36pm
    - hilaryt
      
      It’s a continuum…The PM is admired at least as much for her youth and looks as anything else, no? T&A is just further along this spectrum…
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:05pm
  - Random T Person
    
    Father utters first words in over 7 years, asks where measuring tape is.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:43am
  - Classic Liberal
    
    Not as if women don’t notice a good looking man. Nice tall figure, nice abs, nice shape etc. A certain hypocrisy to not admit that.
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:37am
    - The Proper Ghandi
      
      Some deny our biological urges. Some accept and embrace them. I know who the sane group is.
      
      Who doesn’t like noticing an attractive woman checking them out? And while it has become taboo to say so, women don’t need to wear yoga pants at the gym, they don’t need to do their makeup just so before they go out, they don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars on a hairstyle, and they don’t need to wear a low-cut top that emphasises their pert breasts. And yet they do. But it’s all very innocent and non-sexual, and is done simply to show-up the other ladies, isn’t it …
      
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      July 30, 2020 1:24pm
Benedict Yu

https://i.stuff.co.nz/taranaki-daily-news/news/122280110/nurse-gets-struck-off-for-racist-comments-in-first-hearing-of-its-kind–then-walks-out-during-karakia

I find this disturbing. I do not agree with the nurse’s views. But she is entitled to express them without losing her career. What worries me is the thin edge of the wedge effect.

She said “Maori nurses are untrustworthy, are lazy and eat too much”. Plus other stuff. Gross generalisation, sure.

Now imagine if a nurse posted “In my experience Maori nurses are more likely than nurses of other ethnicities to eat too much and not pull their weight.” I have no idea whether that is correct, but if you were an experienced nurse it could be an informed opinion, although in practice it would be impossible to demonstrate with any evidence. Would expressing such an opinion cost a nurse their career?

It is too funny that part of the headline is that she walked out before the karakia had finished. Seriously? What did they expect?

And by the way her disciplinary hearing cost $56,000! I’d love to see a breakdown of the costs.
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July 30, 2020 8:13am
- sooty
  
  Get off the grass!
  You will never see how deep the trough is!
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:27am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Reading between the lines, much of the costs were probably attributable to transport and accommodation costs for the Maori participants in the inquisition. I think she was stupid for posting the comments. But I bet that hearing was a real piece of work.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:39am
    - fernglas
      
      That and paying for a QC to prosecute her. A nurse gets paid in a week what a QC charges for an hour. That is grossly over-egging the pudding.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:00am
    - Swifty
      
      I wonder who meets the costs of the HPDT?
      
      If it’s privately funded they can do what they like, but if the public meet the bulk of the costs I question the appropriateness of spiritual incantations and prayers in functions such as these.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:00am
      - artemisia
        
        Swifty, that ship has well and truly sailed in the public sector, and slinking in to the private sector as well.
        
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        July 30, 2020 9:11am
      - KevO'Brien
        
        Maori karakia invoking Maori spirits-demonic.
        
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        July 30, 2020 9:25am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        “I question the appropriateness of spiritual incantations and prayers in functions such as these.”
        
        That horse has long bolted. Such prayers are now conducted at the conclusion of most ‘formal’ staff meetings in all state sector organisations, and in some small meetings with external private sector invites – I have experienced it. And these are not ‘Maori’ organisations (where it would be totally expected and respected.) These are Maori prayers being conducted by a crowd with few, and in many cases, no Maori in attendance.
        
        I simply have no interest in learning and immersing myself in Maori culture. I would respect that culture in the appropriate setting (just like I expect white people to respect Chinese culture in the right setting.) Effectively forcing people to acquire Maori language and culture (and lets not kid ourselves – that is happening) is odious.
        
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        July 30, 2020 9:29am
      - alloytoo
        
        MSM says don’t attend.
        
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        July 30, 2020 9:34am
- MCos
  
  Saying your workmates are ‘untrustworthy etc’ in a forum such as that because they are Māori is reprehensible.
  I don’t know how many she’s talking about, but if she has problems with certain individuals I would have thought there would be someone in a senior position she could approach with her allegations.
  What does ‘untrustworthy’ mean? Stealing the petty cash? Fudging timesheets? Incorrect medical processes? Taking sickies when they’re not crook?
  I’d be right pissed off if I was a conscientious worker who happened to be Māori and was suddenly branded as a slacker.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:40am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    I agree with you. People say dumb things every day. People have said to me “I hate Chinese people” (Saying I am Taiwanese just makes things confusing).
    
    The question is should she lose her career over posting stupid comments? And where do you draw the line?
    
    If she posted “I have been a nurse for 30 years. In my experience, Maori nurses are less likely than nurses of other ethnicities to pull their weight, and they take too many days off?” Does she get sacked for that?
    
    What if she had said “Chinese nurses are useless. They should not get work visas.” Sacked for that?
    
    Do you get my point? I don’t want prayer uttering star chambers drawing these lines.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:20am
    - Biscuit
      
      Agreed, Benedict.
      
      What gets up my goat is people who use ‘Asian’ as a term.
      
      Wikipedia says that, as a continent, Asia has 4.5 billion inhabitants, some 59.69% of the world’s population of 7.5 billion.
      
      But…
      
      ‘Asia’ includes such diverse and disparate ethnicities as Arabs, Indians, Malays, and Chinese/Japanese/(and, yep, Taiwanese) and to bundle them all into one generic ‘Asian’ is, frankly, absurd.
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:05am
      - Jack5
        
        Europe doesn’t appear to be a distinct continent from Asia if you look at it on the map either.
        
        The concept of “race” is flaky, and useful mainly for nationalism.
        
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        July 30, 2020 11:21am
      - Unity
        
        I may be wrong but I think the term ‘Asian’ is used for people like Malays, Chinese, Japanese and Taiwanese, Koreans (determined mainly by their slanted eyes) because Europeans often have trouble discerning exactly which country these people come from. I think it is much easier to identify which ones are Arabs and Indians.
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:20pm
    - Classic Liberal
      
      Why waste a well trained nurse? Do we have plenty to spare?
      
      I agree that posting generalised racial statements online is not wise. But whether actually racist should depend on how true the statement was (eg I’ve read often enough that my race has a lower iq than some others. Haven’t sued anyone for it.)
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:46am
    - Jack5
      
      Taiwanese, eh, Benedict?
      
      Great technology nation. Its brains are behind much of the tech industry in “Mainland” China.
      
      I think specifically of Taiwanese owned Foxconn Technology Group, or Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd, the giant that makes Apple’s iPhones.
      
      The world’s third biggest technology company by revenue, Foxconn has 1.3 million employees in several countries, including half a million in its factories in Shenzhen, “Mainland” China.
      
      On a small scale, I like products from Asus. Like so many other desktop and laptop computer products, it hails ultimately from Taiwan.
      
      Meanwhile, have Taiwanese found a possible lead on a traditional medicine that might combat diseases like Wuhan flu?
      
      The link that follows is to a Taiwanese lead that an ancient Chinese herbal medicine may combat viruses (Academia Sinica is the famous Chinese institute that moved from the “Mainland” to Taiwan after the Communist takeover. It is now responsible directly to Taiwan’s Presidential Office):
      
      https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2020/07/30/2003740819
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:37pm
  - The Proper Ghandi
    
    “Saying your workmates are ‘untrustworthy etc’ in a forum such as that because they are Māori is reprehensible.”
    
    It wasn’t BECAUSE they were Maori that they were untrustworthy etc. It is that they were untrustworthy etc. AND they happened to be Maori. These are two totally distinct propositions.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:40am
  - Tall Man
    
    I didn’t know you could read her entire comments.
    
    Where did you find them or are you assuming that the media reported them in their entirety……….
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:43am
  - Jack5
    
    Comments afterwards of the person who laid the complaint, Cherene Neilson-Hornblow, included:
    
    “I’m just overwhelmed, I’m so pleased.
    
    “It’s thousands of years of injustices, it’s tears of joy.”
    
    Thousands of years?
    
    Presumably it’s whites she’s accusing of persecuting Maori right back to the pre-Polynesian days of hill tribes in Taiwan.
    
    The complainant’s surname, Neilson-Hornblow, impresses, but it has connotations of C.S.Forester frigates rather than fleets of canoes.
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:14am
- Tall Man
  
  In our area we have a number of medical practices.
  
  Without exception, the nurses are fat. Not wide, not well fed but fat.
  
  I chat with the doctors about it and I can assure you that their work habits are average at best.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:46am
- Hapuku
  
  Can you imagine what it would be like to have to work with this nurse if you were Maori? Knowing that she had this opinion of you because of the colour of your skin?
  
  Or if you were Maori and one of her patients?
  
  Having two nurses in my immediate family they are fully aware that many Maori find our health system alienating to deal with which is why there is a big emphasis on bi-culturalism.
  
  Another thing as well, a nurse that makes those sort of comments on a public forum must be stupid and who wants to have a stupid nurse looking after you?
  
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  July 30, 2020 4:56pm
  - Nickc2
    
    I would much prefer to have an honest nurse who is prepared to speak her mind than a thieving corrupt work shy politically appointed one who’s skills are racially recognised in lieu of internationally recognised acceptance standards.
    
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    July 30, 2020 7:26pm
Yvette

It is widely believed that Winston horse traded support for the gas-oil exploration ban for Green support of his paranoiac wake-jumping legislation.

Now Winston Peters attacks ‘unstable, untrustworthy’ Greens for supporting waka-jumping repeal and we still have the gas-oil exploration ban.

We also still have Jami-Lee Ross as an Independent Member because Winston’s fucking stupid law does not apply to Electorate Members, rather List Members only, and because the National Party whip informed Speaker Mallard of Ross’s status change, not the Leader, as required by Winston’s fucking stupid law.

It is a pity about the oil and gas.

Ardern used the ban as an emotional crutch on her first big visit to Europe, and virtue signalled our ban on gas and methane to Macron, leaving the French wondering Merde, de quoi diable parle-t-elle? – because they have to import 95% of their methane, and we could have been selling it to them from a cleaner source.

Yes, it is a pity about the oil and gas.
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July 30, 2020 8:16am
- Tony Stuart
  
  It is indeed a pity about oil and gas. Pretty much as soon as the Government announced its intention to ban future exploration, the O&G industry started pulling investment in Taranaki.
  
  There are vast reserves of oil and gas still in the ground, not just in Taranaki, and if ever New Zealand needed to find further prosperity, it is now. Thankfully an incoming National government will overturn Ardern’s foolish, ideological “captain’s call”.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:33am
  - artemisia
    
    Not just oil and gas in the ground. Also coal, iron sands, rock phosphate and rare earth minerals. Think of the jobs and the revenue.
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:43am
  - Yvette
    
    Tony – Agreed regarding the gas and oil, but “Captain’s Call” implies a degree of impulse, does it not?
    But when you look at the placard photos of what is akin to a Nazi rally, young people in Labour “uniform”, past heroes to idealise, Ardern’s photo on the ‘petition’ postcard publicity – it was far more deliberate than a “Captain’s Call”
    
    photos https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/news/national/ardern-appearance-surprises-greenpeace-petitioners/
    
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    July 30, 2020 8:46am
    - Tony Stuart
      
      It WAS an impulsive decision Yvette. Ardern walked out of a meeting with a visiting politician to receive a petition from protestors. Within a few weeks, she announced the oil and gas exploration ban, without any official advice supporting it. Subsequently, when legislation was in front of Parliament, MBIE provided official advice cautioning the Government as to the cost impact of its decision.
      
      https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2018/09/govt-oil-and-gas-drilling-ban-could-cost-nz-8-billion-over-23-years-mbie.html
      
      This was a wholly political decision by the PM, not supported by evidence. Elections are wholly political too, and the public has a chance in September to tell the PM what it thinks about her ideology.
      
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      July 30, 2020 9:01am
      - gorse
        
        Won’t happen Tony. Call me a glass half empty sort of a guy, but I think we’ve got her for another three years. She will totally wreck NZ then.
        
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        July 30, 2020 4:34pm
  - Benedict Yu
    
    “It is indeed a pity about oil and gas. ”
    
    Yeah it is more than a pity. It is the most stupid damaging decision I can recall, certainly in New Zealand. And the main reason is because it is effectively irreversible. The oil explorers aint coming back, no matter what a future government does. Because the NEXT Green/Labour government will reverse it back again.
    
    Greenhouse emmissions are caused by the consumption of fossil fuels. Not by their production (there are small ‘fugitive’ emissions in production but put those aside.)
    
    The captains call will have ZERO impact on global emissions. It is much more likely that emissions will increase. In 2040 giant LNG tankers will be travelling to New Zealand to deliver gas. (The Australian politicians and gas majors must think New Zealand politicians are truly insane.)
    
    Further, the captain’s call will (at the margin) increase environmental risks because production will shift from New Zealand to locations with lower environmental standards.
    
    So the captians call costs tens of billions of dollars, and wrecks a region, and INCREASES greenhouse emissions. I mean, seriously, that takes some doing. And to my disgust I have never seen a journalist write a serious piece on this stupidity or question the PM on it.
    
    To their credit, NZIER did analyse the costs ($30 billion by 2050).
    
    https://nzier.org.nz/publication/economic-impact-of-ending-new-oil-and-gas-exploration-permits-outside-onshore-taranaki
    
    The Minister of Energy simply said “I disagree”. Reminds me of the Soviet Minister for Nuclear Energy who in that great TV show “Chernobyl’ said that he disagreed with the scientist’s assessment that millions of people would die unless they acted. The Minister’s only experience was running a shoe factory.
    
    That decision was a full scale tragedy for New Zealand. That lost $30 billion of GDP to 2050 would have come in damn handy in paying off the COVID debt we now have.
    
    I don’t know how these politicians sleep at night.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:47am
    - Engelbert Humperdink
      
      I think they sleep quite well, having stuffed their bellies, had an illicit shag, gotten drunk w/subsidy from Bellamy’s, and nodded off in front of the tongue-bathing evening news.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:39pm
    - NoCash
      
      Very soundly is my guess… as they think they saved the planet, just like Cindy thinks she saved the lives of 85,000 kiwis.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:55pm
    - Paulus
      
      But ain’t she still wonnerful ?
      
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      July 30, 2020 1:44pm
    - gorse
      
      I don’t know how the “captain” sleeps at night.
      
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      July 30, 2020 4:32pm
- Justitia
  
  Yes Yvette, this could be Winston’s penultimate humiliation, the Greens’ reneging on the dead rat they swallowed to obtain the destruction of Taranaki’s oil and gas industry: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/300069404/dead-rat-spit-back-up-green-party-vote-to-repeal-waka-jumping-law-with-national-infuriating-winston-peters
  
  Hopefully his ultimate humiliation will come on 19 September when NZ First have their sorry, shabby arses kicked with less than 2 percent of the vote.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:36am
- Benedict Yu
  
  “We also still have Jami-Lee Ross as an Independent Member because Winston’s fucking stupid law does not apply to Electorate Members, rather List Members only, and because the National Party whip informed Speaker Mallard of Ross’s status change, not the Leader, as required by Winston’s fucking stupid law.”
  
  That is not correct. The law applies to ALL members of Parliament.
  
  http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1993/0087/latest/whole.html#LMS110149
  
  IIRC the reason that JLR is still there is because National took a conscious decision to not apply the law to him.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:34am
  - septic skeptic
    
    Yep. I think the waka jump law is OK. I reckon I can name at least three times as many rat bags that could have been removed as you could find principled MPs victimised by their own party.
    In JLRs case, both he and national could have given the electorate the say on whether he continued in parliament.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:51am
    - Tall Man
      
      It is designed to keep the power in “what’s in it for wynston” ‘s pocket.
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:21am
    - alloytoo
      
      National adopted a principled approach.
      
      Ross said he would resign and contest a byelection……then I think his bank manager had a word…..and he reneged.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:34pm
  - Yvette
    
    Benedict, “The law applies to ALL members of Parliament.”
    
    A list member is replaced by another list member.
    Far as I can see, an electorate member leaving triggers a by-election, which another party can win, so a Party can loose such a seat. I stand to be corrected, of course.
    
    That JLR left National was advised to the Speaker via National Party whip, under Standing Orders, so the “Integrity” Law was not involved, but could have been if either of its two avenues (member or leader) of advice to the Speaker was followed.
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:53am
oldpark

Too cute and too Political by half . Yes Control “Freak Extraordinaire Auntie Cindy Ardern ” and her running mates Green/ NZ First Parties have put the boot into NZs land based Taxpayers in the Quarantine Fiasco ..
Seems anyone arriving from overseas with appropriate documents will get a free pass on arriving into NZ with no charges for 14 day Hotel Quarantine holiday to hopefully catch up with friends and relatives . .” Be Kind” is the theme here .
Yet “Be Kind” in this instance does not apply for land Based NZs Taxpayers wanting to go overseas to also catch up with friends and relatives . Seems they will be hit or charged $3100 at the NZ border when they return probably with an ATM machine in full sight . Their crime for the temerity and gall for wanting to catch up with friends and family overseas. Seems Human Rights and Civil Liberties for NZs present taxpayers is not as important as the off shore based NZs . That is the creed and spin of NZs Gang of Three . LABOUR /GREENS/NZ FIRST .They should be ashamed of themselves . Seems OVERSEAS votes are much more important than the Human Rights and Civil Liberties for NZS and are just pawns that get wheeled out by Politicians when it suits .
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July 30, 2020 8:31am
- burt
  
  It’s punishment for spending holiday dollars offshore – no more no less.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:43am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Why house the incomers in expensive hotels?
  Surely by now some decent barracks could have been erected for quarantine purposes.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:49am
  - Engelbert Humperdink
    
    Frankly, considering people are not imprisoned upon the return to the border (after all if they were imprisoned they should Have been arrested, charged and convicted first) I believe we can meet the requirements of quarantine by fitting returnees with an ankle bracelet and then sending people to quarantine at their homes.
    
    Cahill’s Mob can be called out to enforce the She-Communist’s wet dream legislative tyranny when someone watching a monitor with an eagle eye spots the bracelet were out wandering off the reservation. After all that’s what we do with actual criminals and we are all led to believe it works…
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:03am
    - UrbanNeocolonialist
      
      Home quarantine, even if adhered to, doesn’t solve the issue of visitors.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:13pm
      - Engelbert Humperdink
        
        Foreign visitors can be quarantined by the tour group that sponsors them. Whether they put them in their own homes or pay for hotels is NMP.
        
        We could go a step further, if you remember seeing that movie “Wedlock” with the late great Rutger Hauer… It need not have quite such an explosive finale, perhaps just an injection of sufficient diazepam to keep the miscreants in one place while the Cahillites descend upon them in their taxpayer-funded SWAT-SUVs.
        
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        July 30, 2020 12:42pm
  - fernglas
    
    Great. This stupid country mindlessly follows the path of economic self-destruction for no discernible benefit and citizens get incarcerated in prison camps if they choose to come home. What seems to be missing from this debate is a recognition that it a New Zealander’s right to return, but a government’s decision to incarcerate them on return. The government should pay for that decision so that the rights and wrongs of it can be considered by the taxpayer. All they are doing at the moment is evading accountability by out-sourcing responsibility
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:05am
  - IC5000
    
    Because living in barracks accommodation may encourage the spread of covid due to communal style living.
    
    I though you were some kind of scientist so wouldn’t this be obvious to someone of your intelligence?
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:57pm
    - Batman
      
      And also we don’t have spare barracks just lying around waiting for an emergency
      
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      July 30, 2020 1:02pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        @batman
        we don’t have spare barracks just lying around
        Which is why I wrote…
        Surely by now some decent barracks could have been erected
        
        Crikey, if the Health Dept could erect quarantine Barracks on Somes (Matiu) Island in a matter of a few weeks in 1919, you’d think we could manage similar a century later.
        
        https://www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recreation/places-to-go/wellington-kapiti/places/matiu-somes-island/historic-matiu-somes-island/human-quarantine-station/
        
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        July 30, 2020 1:31pm
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      You must be unfamiliar with the meaning of the word barracks.
      
      You can have a group of buildings or one building with separate compartments…. exactly how the motels and hotels taking our quarantine arrivals are organised….
      It just doesn’t have to be at a $400/night standard.
      
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      July 30, 2020 1:09pm
      - IC5000
        
        > You must be unfamiliar with the meaning of the word barracks.
        
        No. I come from a family with a military background and I have visited barracks before. As I passed through army selection I was contemplating an extended stay so yes I am familiar with barracks.
        
        The hotels are already there with literally no tourist around so it would be a complete waste of money to construct barracks.
        
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        July 30, 2020 2:09pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        Barracks -a group of buildings used to house a specific group of people, such as labourers or prisoners, in austere conditions.
        
        https://www.google.com/search?q=barracks+meaning&oq=barracks&aqs=chrome.1.69i59j0l2j46j0l3j69i60.5966j1j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
        
        It wouldn’t be too difficult to design a set of buildings that satisfied basic quarantine purposes.
        
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        July 30, 2020 3:47pm
      - IC5000
        
        1. Actually the govnt can already take over any business it wants to under legislation.
        
        2. The hotel industry has a huge vacancy rate and the govnt can negotiate a lower rate using its purchasing power.
        
        3. People in quarantine have committed no crime, they may be elderly or have small children. Why would any with any empathy want to confine them in quickly constructed prefabs during winter?
        
        Why would you want to cause discomfort and stress on people who have done nothing to you when the whole exercise will cost the govnt even more money?
        
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        July 30, 2020 4:18pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        Why would you want to cause discomfort and stress on people who have done nothing to you when the whole exercise will cost the govnt even more money?
        
        Now what makes you think I would want to cause discomfort to anyone?
        
        Don’t you realise that there are rules in NZ to cover standards of accommodation?
        
        But stress… I think quite a few folks are already stressing about having to pay an extra $3000 for a couple of weeks quarantine.
        
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        July 30, 2020 6:33pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        p.s. ..
        
        did you read what I originally wrote?..
        
        Doesn’t the term “decent barracks” convey a little more than a freezing, communal prefab?
        
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        July 30, 2020 6:39pm
    - IC5000
      
      I just checked out the cost of the Copthorne Auckland on Anzac Drive. Looks like a decent three star hotel. Prices on google seem to be around $130 throughout August and September. Certainly a far cry from your claims of $400 a night.
      
      I don’t even know why you bothering arguing this point when you’re clearly wrong. Maybe its time to stop being so pigheaded and look at their situation with some compassion instead of being punitive about it.
      
      Maybe the idea of these barracks being used to house the homeless after the covid pandemic will put you off the idea if compassion is such a turnoff.
      
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      July 30, 2020 8:20pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        I don’t even know why you bothering arguing this point when you’re clearly wrong. Maybe its time to stop being so pigheaded
        
        Oh hell, why didn’t you say so in the first place?
        
        Then I wouldn’t have wasted my time trying to correct your incomprehension.
        
        If you just want to abuse me, don’t be shy, I’m pretty used to it on this blog.
        
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        July 30, 2020 8:36pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        @IC5000
        Spinoff checked out prices at the Quarantine hotels a couple of weeks ago….
        https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/19-07-2020/the-ultimate-guide-to-new-zealand-quarantine-and-managed-isolation-hotels/
        
        Quite a few of the 5-star hotels have room rates higher than $400/night.
        
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        July 30, 2020 8:49pm
      - IC5000
        
        > If you just want to abuse me, don’t be shy, I’m pretty used to it on this blog.
        
        Yeah, I’ve seen you use this excuse before when your opinions are subject to scrutiny. No PP from me.
        
        There is a simple solution to treating innocent people decently. That is to use cheaper hotels rather than housing them in barracks. Is this something that has occurred to you? Has it also occurred to you that these are not criminals but your fellow citizens and should not be subject to mistreatment by the state simply to save a few dollars?
        
        Now I know where the saying ‘As cold as charity’ comes from.
        
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        July 30, 2020 9:17pm
- oldpark
  
  Also is was comforting to know after listening to Peter Williams on Magic Talk at 9.00am that the tens and tens of Muslims arriving in NZ for the sentencing of the Australian Tarrant by way of video after pleading guilty . Yes the arrivals will be granted all free Airline tickets free Hotels free Food no Quarantine charges whatsover .As Peter says .NZs having to go overseas for sick relatives or burials will not get the same type of “Be Kind”.When they get back to NZ an ATM MACHINE will be in in clear sight at the entry point for NZs returning from the burial of dead relatives or even many other things that make up the family unit . A sad ,sad expensive return home for distressed NZs. What an indictment of Peters/Ardern /Green Party ratbags .
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:24am
- MCos
  
  Exceptions are made on humanitarian grounds.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:44am
  - Tall Man
    
    Actually they are not. They are being applied at the behest of the courts.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:38am
- Paulus
  
  I have been asked – Does this apply to Maori too ?
  
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  July 30, 2020 1:46pm
  - IC5000
    
    What’s a Maori?
    
    Asking for a friend.
    
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    July 30, 2020 4:19pm
Simon

Commission of Crimes Against Humanity against the Falun Gong and Uyghurs has been proved beyond reasonable doubt by proof of one or more of the following, legally required component acts:

murder;
extermination;
imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law;
torture;
rape or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity;
persecution on racial, national, ethnic, cultural or religious grounds that are universally recognised as impermissible under international law; and
enforced disappearance.
in the course of a widespread and systematic attack or attacks against the Falun Gong and Uyghurs.

https://chinatribunal.com/final-judgment/
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July 30, 2020 8:32am
- Tall Man
  
  I can understand your outrage but do not feel compelled to join you.
  
  I am way more concerned with the concerted attacks on our freedoms here in NZ and would urge you and others to concentrate on the issues we can do something about rather than join “Don” tilting at windmills.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:35am
Paulus

Why is it that the NZME paper this morning fails again to name the person who wrote the biased editorial article (normal bias).
What is he or she afraid of ?
Only $50 million I suppose.
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July 30, 2020 8:36am
- Tony Stuart
  
  Editorials seldom carry the name of the author.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:40am
  - Prince
    
    But lately you can sure they either;
    a) Support their paymasters
    b) Attack the Opposition.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:22am
  - sooty
    
    They are not game.
    Some times you would think that the cleaner would have more clues, than what is written!
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:26am
  - Engelbert Humperdink
    
    Reading a provincial newspaper as I do, editorials actually quite frequently carry the name of the author when their virtue requires extensive signalling throughout the land…
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:34am
  - peterwn
    
    That is a habit from the old days where the editorial reflected the views of the owners of the newspaper (eg the Christchurch Press was founded in part to oppose the Lyttelton railway so a journo could hardly write an editorial supporting it). But then the newspaper unions started to influence the content of newspapers.
    The time has come for journos to put their names to editorials, since they are no longer influenced by the owners of newspapers.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:53am
  - alloytoo
    
    But really this close to the election they should comply with the electoral act and carry an authorising note.
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:37pm
  - Paulus
    
    Why not – what are they afraid of ?
    
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    July 30, 2020 1:48pm
cmm

This year 3000 gonna die in NZ! Just like last year, and the year before that. Worse, it does not just kill people in the last few months of their lives, but knocks 5 to 10 years off their life.

Measured in deaths per million people, that about 600 per million (about 7x worse than CV19). Measured in years of life lost that’s approx 3600 years lost per million (about 80x worse than CV19).

And that happens every year.

Yet it really only gets a bit of lip service from the government.

If the government were really interested in “saving lives” and health they would tackle obesity, especially significant obesity (BMI 40+).

Yet some how we’re cratering the economy and creating a $140bn debt bomb over a silly little disease called CV19 that kills less than 100 per million on average and typically those about to die anyway – so only about 100 years of life lost per million.

By tackling obesity, I don’t mean the pathetic efforts done so far just blaming fizzies and colonialism. I mean a real effort encouraging personal responsibility, exercise and eating more veges etc.

Let’s consider what could happen if we took $1.4bn (just 1% of the $140bn) and put that into a solid effort to combat obesity.

But wait, there’s more…. Over 50% of CV19 deaths are linked to obesity. Tackling obesity would be the best thing to fight CV19 too (not that CV19 really matters in the grand scheme of things).
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July 30, 2020 8:37am
- burt
  
  The key to getting traction on this line of thinking would be to suggest we could have a vaccine for obesity.
  
  The big pharma companies would all go hell out telling us exercise and reduced calorie intake are dangerous and we need to sit at home eating pizza until the vaccine is developed.
  
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  July 30, 2020 8:46am
- JackRabbit
  
  CMM, the simple answer is that to do so would probably be just another seen as just another “racist” slur. You can mention anything, including attacking pakeha but if it is part of a statistic where Maori is overrepresented , its “hate speech”.
  
  Hey Bro, time to get rid of that puku nui.
  
  “the prevalence of obesity among adults differed by ethnicity, with 66.5% of Pacific, 48.2% of Māori, 29.1% of European/Other and 13.8% of Asian adults obese”
  
  https://www.health.govt.nz/nz-health-statistics/health-statistics-and-data-sets/obesity-statistics
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:19am
- Classic Liberal
  
  Cmm, taxpayers shouldn’t pay to ‘tackle’ obesity.
  I’m so sick of this constant whine by various groups that the reason they can’t succeed is bc they’re ’underfunded’. This damaging attitude that people can’t do anything without govt help.
  
  It’s simple enough and a quick internet search will tell anyone: eat fewer calories, exercise more. And if you can’t be bothered, expect to die younger.
  
  The end.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:46pm
  - cmm
    
    Classic
    
    I would agree that there are many things we should not be dabbling, but we are already dabbling so let’s do the right dabbling.
    
    Half-dabbling is worse than no dabbling and is worse than dabbling properly.
    
    If we’re going to fund healthcare for all and clean up people’s healthcare messes then let’s do that properly.
    
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    July 30, 2020 1:25pm
Swifty

A thoroughly recommended and recent doco on Lady Lucan:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZzzcF20-WI

What a sad, sad story.
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July 30, 2020 8:42am
Simon

NZ herald running stories about Americans trying to escape the Wuhan virus and thinking of NZ.

The real story is Americans in failed Dem run cities are attempting to flee and though many move to GOP run states looks like some are thinking of NZ.

What these loser Dem supporters dont understand is NZ’s high cost of living, high taxation and average to piss poor infrastructure. They are a lot better off in GOP run states.
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July 30, 2020 8:43am
- cmm
  
  Yup, while some might be looking at NZ most just don’t have the resources to achieve that. Clicking on a website is hardly a serious commitment.
  
  However hundreds of thousands have already escaped New York, California, Washington State and Oregon moving to more sanely run states.
  
  CV19 is only part of the issue. The increased taxes and reduced services are a bigger issue.
  
  What CV19 has done is make remote working more acceptable and has broken down the need to be in commuting distance of your workplace.
  
  Of course that mostly applies to higher income earners who can work from a laptop and over the internet. Not so easy for forklift drivers.
  
  Places like NY are expecting massive downturns in their tax take partly due to CV19 but more because the major earners (and thus tax payers) have moved elsewhere.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:42am
- Nickc2
  
  Agree! We don’t need more Democrat (Labour/Greens/Maori) thinking people here trying to turn NZ into a likeness of the shit hole they have just departed. We have suffered Julie-Anne Genter long enough to know they don’t have the interests of borne and bred NZers at heart.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:52am
  - cmm
    
    Don’t worry they will never come here.
    
    Look at all the people like Cher who said they’d leave USA if Trump got in.
    
    Did they move to Canada? Nope.
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:36am
    - Nickc2
      
      Agree with your sentiments. However, we should have plans in place to prevent such an occurrence.
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:52am
- Classic Liberal
  
  I don’t know, Styx describes a high tax esp for small businesses, plus housing tax, and endless red tape to start a small business. Though he says Trump has improved some of those, it actually sounds harder than getting a little business going in nz.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:53pm
Simon

Wuhan virus horror porn in MSM is off the charts.

Keep the general population scared. Good for Ardern.
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July 30, 2020 8:46am
Swifty

Check out this bloke. Writes off a Britz campervan by recklessly doing a u’ey in front of a truck and now complains about everything under the sun:

https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/122266652/unhappy-campervan-customer-felt-insulted-by-britz-after-serious-crash

What a dick.
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July 30, 2020 8:51am
- the deity formerly known as nigel6888
  
  Unbelievable level of entitlement there – and of course the paper ran it. So he made a mistake, could have killed himself and the logging truck driver. He destroyed the campervan, got given lifts by good people, and is whining about not getting a refund.
  
  How is him creating havoc somehow the campervan company’s fault?
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:22am
  - Engelbert Humperdink
    
    He is clearly unaware of the Streisand effect.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:36am
- cmm
  
  I think Britz should really take a good hard look at the crap safety levels of the vans they provide.
  
  Clearly any vehicle being hired out to people in NZ should be able to withstand being hit by a logging truck and laugh it off.
  
  Never anybody else’s fault. Glad he’s a retired anesthetist. I’m not sure I’d want someone with that level of self-accountability twiddling the knobs for me.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:27am
- sooty
  
  Surprises me that he didn’t get a ticket or two!
  There’s one yellow line there, can’t see who’s side though.
  U turn on a corner in front of a truck. He’s lucky to be still here!
  I wouldn’t hire him nothing!
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:31am
  - cmm
    
    I’m more surprised there wasn’t a mention of a giveallitle page.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:44am
kowtow

A very modern Aotearoa formerly New Zealand version of a Stalinist era show trial.

Right down to the Media Party confirming the heinous nature of the offender who walked out during karakia! As if there could be any doubt of guilt after that.

Not to mention our version of the Re education camp ” She cannot reapply for her practising certificate for two years.
If and when she does she would have to complete a cultural confidence in nursing course …..”
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July 30, 2020 9:04am
- alloytoo
  
  She should have invoked the trigger world “Bullying” made sure it was on the record and then walked out of the “Toxic environment”
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:39pm
Durden

I see that WHO is running self-promoting ads on Al Jazeera. They must know a lot of people hold them and their actions in contempt.

I also note that they seem to be trying to claim a share of NZ’s lucky escape from the Covid pandemic.

The one thing they fail to acknowledge is that NZ’s success lay in its isolation and fundamentally the stopping of incoming travelers bearing unwanted gifts. Something NZ should have done harder and earlier. Something the WHO kept advising against against all the way through, and still do.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=WHO+%22travel+ban%22&t=hk&df=y&ia=web

Dr. Tedros the Chinese stooge and his cronies have contributed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people around the world with this stance on travel bans. Even on masks their advice has been wishy washy. None of their other “expert advice”– social distancing, hand washing, testing and contact tracing is anything other than the most obvious motherhood stuff anyone knows to do during a pandemic. Nothing new, special or profound. And they haven’t done anything useful or effective about advising on treatment options or vaccine development. Apart from casting doubts on potential options with conflicting or often quickly retracted advice.

The WHO is a useless organisation falsely posturing about its achievements in its global coordinator role.
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July 30, 2020 9:07am
JibberJabber

The Great Baroness,

One of the great problems of our age is that we are governed by people who care more about feelings than they do about thoughts and ideas.
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July 30, 2020 9:13am
plc

Stuff had this article up overnight.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/well-good/motivate-me/300064100/its-time-to-stop-living-in-the-past-and-learn-the-art-of-forgiveness

I wondered whether they appreciated the irony, given the cheerleading their site does for the grievance industry.
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July 30, 2020 9:13am
Jimmy White

Eugenie Sage‘s new idea that the Manufacturers and sellers of products will be responsible for their recycling is another example of the Greens and COL not understanding the economy.
The purchasers not the sellers will be the ones who will pay for this ‘recycling”. That is YOU and ME.
Will Local body costs go down NO.
Will the recycling be effective NO.
In some cases the cost of recycling will be more than the original cost of the product. Lets not forget that the Government will also collect their 15% on top of all this.
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July 30, 2020 9:14am
- MT_Tinman
  
  A new tax, this time via manufacturers and aimed at anyone successful enough to afford consumer goods.
  
  Among other things this new tax, as presented by the slime, makes no attempt to differentiate between goods consumed domestically and those exported.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:29am
- James Stephenson
  
  It’s not a new idea and it’s not ES’s either. The EU brought in a directive that made car manufacturers responsible for end-of-life recycling 20 years ago,
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:44am
- chukar
  
  JW
  Tahr and waste.
  This woman is a multi tasking idiot.
  
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  July 30, 2020 9:10pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Candace Owens, DineshD’Souza. Socialism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAxaa41Jf2s
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July 30, 2020 9:18am
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Jacinda never lies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0yDrGfn9vo
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July 30, 2020 9:19am
- herb1
  
  Wasn’t going to watch this as I assumed something on Jacindas lies would be an hour or two , of time I didn’t have.
  pleasantly surprised it was less than 10 minutes and the childish expressions and petulance on display when she’s called ,in parliament, on her lies about understanding GDP, are priceless
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:03am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    She is an expert at dancing on the head of a pin whilst saying nothing
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:46am
Inandout

So the Tehran Tarrant Tourists won’t have to pay for quarantine. More hugs?
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July 30, 2020 9:48am
- cmm
  
  It’s complete bullshit.
  
  I can understand giving people a quarantine free-pass if they’re coming to visit a dying relative with just a few days to live.
  
  But the Tarrant sentencing date was set 7 weeks ahead. That give 2 weeks for quarantine and still leaves 5 weeks for travel, getting your passport together, etc etc
  
  Just bollocks.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:47am
- Flossie
  
  To be completely fair, at this point no-one is paying quarantine costs.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:57pm
Engelbert Humperdink

(Based on and expanded from an idea I read overseas).

Here in New Zealand we urgently need common sense reform of journalism and a much greater scrutiny of journalists’ activities.

Everybody knows that freedom of the press was referring to hand-operated presses, not modern high-speed presses or high-capacity internet bandwidth and radio and television.

Journalists’ freedom to publish must necessarily be constrained under the limitations of the original intent of the founder of the printing press and the government regulations of that day – rather than the excesses now taken for granted and facilitated by what we must all come to recognise and apologise for, as presstitutional colonialism.

All journalists’ articles and columns need to be confined to 10 words or less. High-capacity magazines such as the Women’s Weakly are forever banned; if you can’t make a point in 10 words you shouldn’t be allowed to make your points at all.

Journalists: you will need to apply for permission to publish anything you write or record. There will be a two week cooldown period after you write or record something before you will be granted permission to publish or broadcast it, in case you need to cool off. Yes, we’re looking at you Stuff, Tova, Campbell, Andrea – actually we’re looking at all of you.

All journalists need to be registered, because if the pen is mightier than the sword, then it is at least equivalent in its inherent lethality to a high-capacity assault-clipped nasty boomstick thingy.

Journalists must pay the proper costs of their registration and surveillance and not have their fetishistic practices subsidised by normal people. Unauthorised journalism will see its practitioners arrested, tried, and convicted. New Zealand cannot afford to have scofflaw journalistas inciting hatred against groups they don’t agree with – all journalists must understand that their activities are a privilege, not a right, and behave accordingly.

A range of penalties are appropriate for breaches of the Presstitute Enforcement Activisim Control Enactment (yes, you will be made to follow the PEACE Laws! – who could disagree with that goal?), starting at five years imprisonment and a $50,000 fine for journalism found to be against the inherent rights of everybody else* in New Zealand not to be maligned, slandered, accused, vilified, rubbished or humiliated. *With the obvious exceptions of journalists themselves, and all local and national politicians. You’re welcome.

A yearly fine of $50 million will be imposed on all of the journalists practising in New Zealand for a second offence by any one fact-mangling Che-journo, in accordance with the collective punishment principle enshrined by St Jacinda in March 2019.

3-strikes journalist offenders will be ACostered, Arrested, and Confined to an Airport Novotel for the duration of their life-sentence; during which time they may (partially) expiate their guilt by working as cleaners for virus detainees.

These regulations will be reviewed yearly and become more punitive every 5th November to celebrate PEACE in our time.
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July 30, 2020 9:57am
SmokerGuy

I’ve heard some awkward interviews but this morning’s one with Jacqui Dean on the AM Show is right up there. How can you get the numbers so disastrously wrong? She is not fit to be in that role if she screws up that badly, Judith should remove her. It’s embarrassing we have people like this in an important position.
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July 30, 2020 10:02am
- BAM
  
  It won’t be Judith Collins who loses this election, it will be her colleagues.
  
  That interview though, good god, Housing is such an important portfolio, who gave it to Dean? she has no idea.
  
  Following politics is a very frustrating pastime
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:20am
  - Swifty
    
    It was a dreadful interview.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:34am
    - BAM
      
      Really destroys the strong team narrative, National is trying to promote.
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:07am
      - Tall Man
        
        It dents not destroys.
        
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        July 30, 2020 11:19am
      - septic skeptic
        
        Well, you could certainly assemble a pretty good team from the people National have LOST over the last few years.
        
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        July 30, 2020 2:22pm
  - Bullion
    
    “Strong team”
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:50pm
- Swifty
  
  Got a link by chance?
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:22am
  - Swifty
    
    https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/07/national-housing-spokesperson-jacqui-dean-falsely-claims-they-built-30-000-state-homes-when-last-in-power.html
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:28am
- Tall Man
  
  So again, the media choose to attack and highlight the opposition.
  
  One would assume that the government was perfection personified with no errors or omissions to focus on. We don’t know lucky we are …..
  
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYvMeT2GC14
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:23am
  - Lance
    
    Agree totally.
    If they think it is their duty to humiliate someone that gets their numbers wrong, then so be it.
    But FFS the CoL get a pass for talking utter shit relentlessly on the AM show, especially Willy Jackson.
    No consistency other than bashing National.
    
    I will say it again, all I ask for is consistency, alas it is non-existent
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:58am
  - SmokerGuy
    
    That is true but Labour lock away the numpties from their party and only have a couple of people speaking on everything. How often has Kelvin Davis spoken? They have muzzled him for good reason.
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:43pm
- Tricati
  
  It was a train wreck – She had the opportunity to set the narrative on housing during the election debates and all she did was show how unprepared National are.
  Even if she read off a paper, and had the correct figures, would have at least shown some homework was done and how inept Labour have been.
  I do hope she gets a call from Judith quick smart, and someone can retrieve the situation with a position on the numbers she presented – muppet
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:34am
  - Tall Man
    
    She showed how unprepared she was, not National.
    
    Judith’s problem was giving her the chsnce to amek a fool of herself.
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:00am
  - BAM
    
    Another mess for Judith to have to sort out.
    She’s going to have to front and explain what the real figures are.
    Can we please have more input from head office around candidate selection, especially South Island candidates.
    
    Gilmour
    Barclay
    Dowie
    Walker
    Falloon.
    Pugh
    Dean
    
    Any others I’ve missed?
    Seriously what the hell is going on down there?
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:05am
    - Libertarians are right
      
      To be fair, it’s not just National with dud MPs from down south.
      
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      July 30, 2020 11:41am
    - Lance
      
      Yea, National dumped them when exposed, Labour just keep all their incompetents and nincompoops.
      Hidden in their witless protection
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:48pm
Benedict Yu

I heard Minister Hipkins on the radio last night.
It confirms what I have been commenting here for weeks. There is no COVID exit plan. He was asked directly how long the borders would stay closed. He replied along the lines of “That depends on how long it takes other countries to eradicate the virus like New Zealand has done, and/or a vaccine is discovered and produced.”

The problem with that logic is that neither of those conditions for reopening may ever be met. We could be in our New Zealand prison for many years if this logic is followed. Why is not the media at least asking for the detailed work that must being done on scenarios for an exit plan?
The scenarios could be:
1. Vaccine available in 12 months, rolled out in 24 months
2. Vaccine not available for 5 years
3. Virus becomes endemic in many counties before a vaccine is rolled out. Countries progressively reopen borders and deal with the virus by protecting the elderly.

There are probably other scenarios. Surely we deserve to know what the plan is for any reasonably conceivable scenario?
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July 30, 2020 10:13am
- MT_Tinman
  
  Of course there is no plan.
  
  These dimwits (the current clowns calling themselves “government”) couldn’t build a f@$king railroad or plant some trees.
  
  They certainly have no ability at all to create a plan to get the country out of the shit it now finds itself in.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:34am
  - JackRabbit
    
    There is a 100% certainty that people who create a problem will never solve it so long as they keep doing what they did to create it in the first place.
    
    Socialism wrecked the country, so continued socialism and more intense socialism will not fix it.
    
    However we cannot assume that Cindy, as a committed totalitarian actually wants NZ fixed. Nothing she is doing is helping anyone, including not helping those that she “presumably” wants to help.
    
    The only thing she is giving any benefit to, if you can even call it that, is massaging her own ego, and soaking up praise and adulation. She is a totalitarian, and well past the point of no return, where she could stop herself.
    
    She, like many totalitarian leaders throughout the past, is totally immersed and controlled by her own unconscious and self ego worship.
    
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    July 30, 2020 2:33pm
  - Engelbert Humperdink
    
    If their brains were equivalent-volume-dynamite and you shoved the COL’s heads up their collective colons and lit their tampon-fuses, the resulting puny explosion would not open their legs far enough apart to check they had any sphincter integrity (BTW, they don’t).
    
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    July 30, 2020 3:57pm
- Te Rauparaha
  
  I am also terrified of the implications for New Zealand and the West unless fear of Covid-19 is booted down the road.
  
  It is now a tool of totalitarianism.
  
  And speaking around, hardly anyone cares. Sheep!
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:40am
  - MCos
    
    So, what would your plan be, apart from the extremely vague ‘boot it down the road’?
    
    Personally my preference would be to maintain the status quo until a vaccine becomes available.
    If a vaccine doesn’t become available we are going to have to decide whether we continue with some permanent version of the status quo or open the borders and see what happens.
    
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    July 30, 2020 12:01pm
    - Engelbert Humperdink
      
      MCos: Remind us all, how long did it take to develop a virus against the human immunodeficiency virus, the cause of AIDS, that arose to prominence in the 80s?
      
      That’s right, we still don’t have one 40 years later… Nor for that matter do we have a reliable vaccine against dengue, we have no vaccine against hepatitis C, we have no effective vaccine against seasonal flu… and so it goes.
      
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      July 30, 2020 12:46pm
      - MCos
        
        You may be spot on. I’m no expert.
        So.
        You’ve shot me down in flames.
        What’s your proposal?
        
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        July 30, 2020 3:46pm
    - Benedict Yu
      
      You do realise that a vaccine for a coronavirus has NEVER been successfully developed?
      
      Further the fastest a vaccine has ever been developed from start to the first day of mass production is 5 years? (the mumps virus).
      
      You seriously think our borders can be closed for several years? Do you have friends, familily, grandchildren, businesses in other countries? You think all that can be cut off for years?
      
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      July 30, 2020 2:30pm
      - MCos
        
        Ditto
        
        BTW
        My wife is Thai with family over there. She can go and come back, some cost, as long as the planes are flying & ThaiAir isn’t right now.
        Note that NZ doesn’t control its own destiny. I can’t go there.
        
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        July 30, 2020 3:47pm
- Antoine
  
  The plan is to close the border and hope for a vaccine. Eventually if there is no vaccine, the plan will change. Its really simple.
  
  A.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:13pm
- JackRabbit
  
  A virus, by definition, is a self replicating nanobot parasite, which cannot and will never have an effective vaccine.
  
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  July 30, 2020 2:44pm
Engelbert Humperdink

I truly do not think we are making a mistake if we assume that the only plan the politicians* have or care about is one that will get them elected at the next election, to continue hoovering up their sweet privileges and income from their taxpayers’-funded trough.

*There are honourable exceptions: I’m increasingly impressed with Mr Seymour for example the more I read what he says and listen to him; but the sad fact is, they are exceptions. The majority of the truffle munches like Wan Kerr Jones, ‘Steroid’ Nash, AWOB (Absent without brains) Davis and Twyfaux and so on, fit the stereotype like the proverbial OJ glove.
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July 30, 2020 10:48am
Te Rauparaha

An anology of the state of the nation played out between a crazy father and his teenage son
Son: Dad. What the hell have you done? Where are you?
Dad: Hello, son. I’m in the shelter.
Son: I’ve just got back from work at the store and they told me that was my last day. They told me YOU rang them and told them to sack me. What are you playing at?
Dad: It’s not safe out there, son. I did it for your own good. Just stay here in the house from now on, preferably in the shelter where it’s safe; it’s a jungle out there, you know.
Son: It’s no worse than the previous neighbourhood we lived in. It’s a lot better than the one grandad used to live in and he still worked. I can take care of myself. I need to get another bloody job now.
Dad: NO! Just do a few odd jobs around the house. Me and mum will take care of your allowance. We’ve got savings. It’ll be less than what you earned but you won’t have to commute.
Son: What, you’re just gonna piss all that hard-earned money down the drain to pay me to do the bloody garden? Anyway, my friends are at work and I want to see them.
Dad: Those awful people? They have questionable views. And you go out places after work with them. I’ve seen your text messages and the GPS tracker.
Son: You’ve been spying on me?! Checking my phone? You’ve no bloody right!
Dad: It’s for your own good, son. Another thing, I think your diet’s pretty bad. I want you to change your eating habits. Your little sister told me she thinks you shouldn’t drink alcohol or eat meat.
Son: That miserable little snitch. She should get a life of her own.
Dad: She’s a good member of this household.
Son: This house is falling to pieces. It needs serious work on it, which it might have got if you hadn’t spent all our money on this stupid shelter from a threat that doesn’t exist. Even great-granddad Bill didn’t have a shelter and he lived during the war.
Dad: Don’t mention that murderer’s name to me! He bombed Dresden.
Son: Of course he did! He was in the bloody RAF during World War Two! Can’t you put things into context?
Dad: Your mother’s from Dresden, you insensitive Englishman! Kneel before her picture in the living room and ask for forgiveness.
Son: You’re English, too, you berk!
Dad: I’ve apologized for it. You have dreadful opinions these days. I’m booking you on a psychological examination with Dr Neilson.
Son: Not Fergus Neilson! He diagnoses everything wrong. And he’s shagging mum behind your back.
Dad: I know, son, but his views are the same as mine and he votes for the right party, therefore he’s a good person.
Son: This place is insane. I’m leaving this lunatic asylum!
Dad: And go where? Everyone is as sensible as us. They all have shelters and have reduced contact with each other and don’t go out on the dangerous streets. You think our house is restrictive? You should see Pedro’s.
Son: I’m going to Sven’s. At least he hasn’t gone completely mental.
Dad: That family are outcasts and they’re not caring people at all. No sympathy or compassion. I hope they die.
Son: And what makes you so bloody virtuous? You get me sacked, you don’t stick up for your self-interests when it comes to mum who’s cheating on you, you let the house deteriorate and put up my rent to pay for your shelter and you want to force me to eat health food.
Dad: But I kneel in front of your mother and say I’m sorry for being English. That shows how good I am. You don’t need to do anything to be good. You just need pointless gestures, son. One day you’ll understand that. Hey! Where are you going? You can’t leave! Son, you are NOT going out dressed like THAT! You don’t even have a mask on!
Son: Oh, piss off!
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July 30, 2020 10:50am
burt

People, it’s 2020 and we’re still arguing over what should and should not be illegal with regard to FGM.

However, this latest legislation might slow down the number of Islamic immigrants wanting to move to NZ.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/122286406/mps-reach-across-the-house-to-ban-female-genital-mutilation
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July 30, 2020 11:34am
- cmm
  
  They say there is no evidence of FGM happening in NZ. If so then this is a storm in a tea cup.
  
  But would we even really know if FGM is going on? Does the law prevent parents from sending their daughters overseas for FGM?
  
  And while they’re up, why not just ban all genital mutilation? Why only FGM?
  
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  July 30, 2020 11:45am
  - burt
    
    All good questions. Another good question would be why do we allow immigrants from countries where it is legal (or tolerated)?
    
    Clearly these people have a mental illness if they think it acceptable to mutilate genitals.
    
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    July 30, 2020 11:51am
    - Albert_Ross
      
      Perhaps they want to come here precisely because they don’t want to be in a country where FGM is allowed?
      
      Anyway, if you are concerned for the health and welfare of the girls at risk from FGM, why do you want them to be forced to stay in countries where their risk of being subjected to mutiliation is far greater than it is here?
      
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      July 30, 2020 3:57pm
      - Engelbert Humperdink
        
        If their own parents won’t stand up for them, that’s their parents’ loss. The trouble is, the parents come to our countries, and then take stand against our system in favour of their genital-mutilating home systems. Stockholm syndrome.
        
        [Mod: yes you’re correct that the Mods will redact the grossly offensive parts]
        
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        July 30, 2020 5:25pm
      - Albert_Ross
        
        What a ludicrous statement. It’s not the parents’ loss if they can’t or won’t resist social pressure to have their daughters mutilated. It’s the girls’ loss.
        
        Do you care about the welfare of those girls or don’t you? If you do, why are you resistant to allowing them to move here where they will be safer? If you don’t, why are you concerned if other people in New Zealand want to mutilate their daughters?
        
        What examples do you have of Muslims “taking a stand against our system”? Wanting the freedom to dress as they wish, marry whom they wish, associate with whom they wish, eat as they wish, vote as they wish and worship as they wish isn’t “against our system”. It is inherent to our system that people are free to make their own choices in these and other matters.
        
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        July 30, 2020 6:49pm
Benedict Yu

Ms Dowie did an excellent valedictory statement.

https://ondemand.parliament.nz/parliament-tv-on-demand/?itemId=214930
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July 30, 2020 11:42am
Nickc2

Which is Australia’s Foreign Minister? No prize for second pick.
https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/07/polka-dots-discuss.html
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July 30, 2020 11:44am
Flossie

See the picture of dear leader front page of the Newshub site? SUCH a smug look!
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July 30, 2020 11:49am
- Nickc2
  
  Flossie, you should have preceded that post with a health warning. I had to rush downstairs for a bucket and only just made it.
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:05pm
- fightingtemeraire
  
  Thank you I was just enjoying my ham sammie for lunch
  
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  July 30, 2020 12:32pm
Maggie Pie

MagicTalk Peter Williams is off on holiday for a couple of weeks from Monday. Banksy will be holding the fort while he’s away. He sooo loves twisting the woke out of shape….its such a hoot! 😀
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July 30, 2020 12:23pm
Swifty

Something to brighten your day:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sech2qZ9PLs
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July 30, 2020 12:49pm
Maggie Pie

Which out of these 2, do you consider to be the MOST nauseating?

Downtick if: JOHN CAMPBELL (TV1)

Uptick if: TOVA O’BRIEN (TV3)
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July 30, 2020 1:08pm
curry4me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joQeIX56k5s
UNWOKE.HR v Cancel Culture.

If you want a new job, put your resume on UNWOKE.HR.
They specialise in finding bosses and workers who are
not ‘woke’. You get to fire free thinkers, not idealogues
who want to further a radical cause.
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July 30, 2020 1:48pm
- Loddenthinks
  
  Fire free thinkers? Or do you mean hire free thinkers?
  
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  July 30, 2020 5:04pm
  - curry4me
    
    Loddenthinks: Doh, fat fingers. I meant hire.
    
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    July 30, 2020 6:11pm
curry4me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voafajSBxvw
BLM Cause Hijacked.

The BLM cause has been hijacked by Islamists, and Marxists.
Their agenda is to cause, or worsen civil unrest. ANTIFA are
culpable too. No Dem politician is likely to condemm this process.
6 1
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July 30, 2020 1:49pm
hullkiwi

Dear all, a casual bet. Canterbury/Christchurch will be the first region to have a regional lockdown soon (remember Dear leader told us it could be possible).

Now an impertinent question. When did the bureaucracy get so politicised that they can give news conferences to the NZ public, standing in the Beehive theater while giving statements that while not lies are not the truth?

I give you the case of the NZ citizen who flew to South Korea last week. Has been tested twice for Covid and given 2 positive results. From the media we learn the person concerned are a Christchurch restaurant the night before they flew out. So, there is a better than even chance that virus is circulating in the Christchurch area, which means it is in the community.
Now taking that logic, is it a case that Bloomfield, Woods and Hipkins have been telling us porkies for the past month?

The simple questions are:
1. How many of the identifed cases in the past 6 weeks, have been identified as a result of community testing of people?; and
2. How many of these identified cases have then been moved to “managed isolation”?

If my suspicion is correct, then all the media conferences from the Beehive for the past 6 weeks have been a tissue of half truths covering a whole raft of lies!!

Is there a National MP smart enough to ask the necessary questions or have Walker and Woodhouse made this a toxic taboo?
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July 30, 2020 1:53pm
- Durden
  
  The bigger issue is that apparently the South Korean has been in NZ since around March 15 on a visitors visa (arrived from US) and does not seem to have traveled anywhere else before heading back home to SKorea. So he picked up Covid from somewhere in NZ. As a visitor, he surely could not have been working (e.g. in the quarantine hotels, with people coming off ships etc) anywhere. Which means infection is from the general community and that means community transmission in NZ is already happening. Where is it ? Where did that come from ? And why didn’t the officials know about it ? And how bad is the Labour Candidate Dr Ayesha Verral approved contact tracing system if they take so long to identify his movements/contacts and still not be successful.
  
  Today’s general announcement to get tested if you are from South Auckland or Queenstown suggests they have lost control.
  
  And yes they have been less than open and truthful with the team of 5 million.
  
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  July 30, 2020 4:36pm
  - ex-golfer
    
    There is no evidence he picked up COVID in NZ.
    All his close and casual contacts in NZ have tested negative.
    The theory that is being espoused by the experts is that he picked it up in transit through Singapore.
    
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    July 30, 2020 10:23pm
Flossie

Headline on NZ Herald site… “Kiwis ‘reluctant’ to get tested”
I was at GP this week… no suggestion of a test.
Family at A&E the other night… no suggestion of a test for any of us.
I did go and get tested a couple of months ago but how often is it necessary?
7 1
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July 30, 2020 1:59pm
- burt
  
  As soon as you are starting to not feel frightened to go out in public you should get a test. It’s the only way to keep the “saved 85,000” narrative going until the election.
  
  3 1
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  July 30, 2020 3:36pm
- Tall Man
  
  When you stop “screwing around” you can stop 🙂
  
  3 1
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  July 30, 2020 4:45pm
rangitoto

The strange case of unsolicited seeds from China. Some sort of bio security attack.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jul/28/seeds-mystery-mail-us-china
4 0
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July 30, 2020 2:38pm
- NoCash
  
  I doubt that the CCP is that dumb to think the average American farmers are dumb enough to just plant unsolicited seeds from China.
  
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  July 30, 2020 4:05pm
Jack5

Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Google face America’s politicians to see whether they should be broken up.

“They have too much power,” says the chairman opening the US Congress hearing.

American democracy has always been at war with monopolistic practice, the hearing chairman said in his opening remarks.

The hearing online of the US Congress Judiciary Sub-Committee on Anti-Trust Law via C-Span on the internet:

https://www.c-span.org/video/?474236-1/heads-facebook-amazon-apple-google-testify-antitrust-law
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July 30, 2020 3:25pm
- burt
  
  I guess that anti monopoly thing is the root cause of the anti American attitudes we see in the Labour & the Green party.
  
  4 0
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  July 30, 2020 3:38pm
  - Jack5
    
    Burt, Republican subcommittee member Jim Jordan, in his opening remarks showed he is very hot under the collar about these companies over what he sees as their censorship of voices of the Right.
    
    5 1
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    July 30, 2020 3:51pm
    - Jack5
      
      Over all, the appearance of the four tech titans before the committee was disappointing.
      
      The four, from Google, Facebook, Apple, and Amazon, head companies with a total market capitalisation of nearly $US 5 trillion. The Telegraph points out this is more than the GDP of Japan.
      
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      July 30, 2020 8:40pm
Maggy Wassilieff

A week or so ago, the Media was scoffing at National MPs for using mental health issues as a screen for bad behaviour.

Now Labour MP Clare Curran calls the media out for exacerbating mental health problems of MPs.

You people are not just on the sidelines. You are players, you make yourself players,” Curran said.

She said if political reporters went out and asked people on the street about what they thought they would find that people were “disgusted with the political reporting that is happening in this country.”

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/300070157/labour-mp-clare-curran-worried-a-politician-will-kill-themselves-before-news-media-examines-itself
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July 30, 2020 3:58pm
Engelbert Humperdink

Not part of the current topics, but not irrelevant either: and copied here because it’s timely to know for a food-producing country* like ours (* despite their best farmer-sabotage efforts by The Watermelons and the Coalition of the Corrupt, the Incompetent, the Lying, the Communist, and the Ignorant.)

“Three headline issues are challenging China right now: floods, pestilence, and inventory problems.

Above average rainfall and rising floodwaters are not just threatening to compromise China’s gargantuan Three Gorges Dam; rain and flooding are already disrupting rice, wheat and other crop production in the provinces all along the entire Yangtze River. . .

Overall, the past few months have seen China increase its imports of pork, soybeans, soymeal, wheat, corn, sorghum and prepared/frozen foods from the United States and elsewhere.

China can’t feed itself; it needs the world’s help, especially if its domestic production and inventories are compromised.

It’s too early to gauge the ultimate severity of China’s total food woes, and it’s highly unlikely that the ripple effects of China’s food issues will cascade through the global food chain, but right now Chinese leadership has food security as a top concern.”
6 0
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July 30, 2020 4:01pm
Durden

Its only OK if Commissioner Mike Bush brown noses for he PM and her fisherman boyfriend.

Because when it is someone else — “When approached, a police spokeswoman said police “cannot respond to queries which seek to establish whether a specific individual or organisation is, or has been, under police investigation”.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12351555
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July 30, 2020 4:24pm
- Tall Man
  
  Also, is it possible to access the conviction record of someone? How about the number of times they have been able to “assist police” with their enquiries?
  
  2 1
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  July 30, 2020 4:42pm
- Engelbert Humperdink
  
  “Hypocrisy is the saliva with which the authorities bathe themselves”.
  
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  July 30, 2020 5:27pm
surfing

It’s official, my rates went up 14.7% with no change in property valuation… however, 37% of ratepayers are now paying less in rates.

Pisses me off, why should some people pay less ????

Gets worse though, sounds like my rates will likely increase between 10-20% next year too.

My rates have almost doubled in 4 years. Sure, my property value is increasing but so is everyone elses!
4 0
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July 30, 2020 4:28pm
- Tall Man
  
  Tax is love. Obviously you’re getting more love than the rest of us ….. shut up and be happy 😉
  
  8 1
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  July 30, 2020 4:43pm
  - Engelbert Humperdink
    
    But usually we get kissed before we get f*****d.
    
    3 1
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    July 30, 2020 7:43pm
- [email protected]
  
  Your rates don’t have to increase because your property values has risen unless your property value rose more than others.
  
  The councils need rates to fund their operation but unless the council is doing more, there is no need for rates increases beyond the cost of inflation.
  
  Perhaps your council is trying to do too much or wasting your rates money on pet projects.
  
  I would complain and see if the council adjusts your rates down
  
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  July 31, 2020 7:56am
Durden

“But Quilter said she would not criticise the Ministry of Health because, “lives have been saved as a result of their actions on the broader COVID-19 front”.

Michael Heron QC, who led the investigation, said it was “not optimal” that the information wasn’t password protected, but he acknowledged the pressure it was under. ”

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/07/covid-19-data-breach-probe-hamish-walker-admits-leaking-over-pressure-of-being-labelled-a-racist.html

Total rubbish. These people were tasked with investigating the Covid patient data leak. Not to make excuses for the guilty parties.

Shouldn’t they should stick to facts?
6 1
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July 30, 2020 4:41pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

He made a stupid logo and put it on a hat. Actually he borrowed it from Reagan. Sure ‘Keep America Great’ works but not like this.
MAGA, how and why it works. ‘Let’s keep moving’ sounds like a laxative.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMu7mqDgL8c
2 2
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July 30, 2020 5:27pm
Engelbert Humperdink

Woke in a Wig: Reality TV.
3 0
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July 30, 2020 5:27pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Fuckwits of the future. This will make your head hurt.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moWe3rk7LzQ
2 2
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July 30, 2020 5:41pm
- surfing
  
  This cannot be true.
  
  I could understand if they were whining about the rich/poor gap — that makes sense at least.
  
  But, sensory overload? Incorrect use of pronouns? These people are crazy.
  
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  July 30, 2020 5:52pm
Durden

UN Secretary-General Guttierez planning the UN take over of the world using Green buzz words from Agenda 30 (something which Apparently Jacinda has signed up NZ to without any of us knowing).

And he is going to use debt and the money that is going to be printed by government worldwide to restart economies.

He is being totally open about this in this article and accompanying video. You can’t say you have not been warned.
https://www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/statement/2020-07-28/secretary-generals-video-message-for-the-launch-of-the-policy-brief-entitled-covid-19-urban-world%E2%80%9D-scroll-down-for-french-version
3 1
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July 30, 2020 5:42pm
gorse

Labour’s election to lose. I cannot understand why so many people have switched from voting National to Labour. ACT have pinched a few, but most must have gone to Labour. The “saviour” has them sucked in.
6 0
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July 30, 2020 6:11pm
- BAM
  
  Because, apart from Collins the whole party has been a complete train wreck.
  
  Swapping leaders multiple times, people having nervous breakdowns, people throwing their toys out of the cot and stomping off, people doing dumb shit, peeople doing really really dumb shit
  
  And you wonder why voters may have switched to Labour.
  
  5 1
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  July 30, 2020 7:39pm
  - fernglas
    
    Don’t panic. Two more polls like the last two and National will be able to rule alone.
    
    2 0
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    July 30, 2020 9:21pm
Aunty

The coronavirus outbreak in Melbourne is starting to look quite grim. As I advised Kiwibloggers some weeks ago, (to much anger, shouting and finger-pointing for my efforts too I might add – fear does funny things to people) the death toll in Melbourne would start to climb, and sadly, just as I predicted it would, that has started to happen.

There were 723 new cases diagnosed today and 13 deaths recorded. The death toll is worse than I thought it would be. I was predicting around 25 deaths or so by the end of the month, but since this present relapse, the number of deaths is more than doubled that. And sadly the death toll will continue to climb from here. Who knows what it will be by the end of August? 200, 300 if the current outbreak cannot be contained?

The economic consequences of this escape of the virus at the border, and on the wider Australian economy, will be dire. How long will Victoria’s lockdown be? Six weeks, eight weeks, three months? Who knows…….
6 1
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July 30, 2020 6:13pm
- Engelbert Humperdink
  
  This is not to make light of the individual tragedy that a death defines; but if you look at the profile of the deceased, these are the elderly and those with comorbidities, in other words precisely the demographics that the usual seasonal flu kills yearly. Unless and until the authorities both here and in other countries start to publish the total morbidity from flulike illness and compare that with the annual known mortality and morbidity from the seasonal flu, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that we are being consistently lied to about the lethality of this specific viral infection, Especially but not only compared to the death toll from the lockdowns, crashing economies, business failures, unemployment, and all of the accompanying effects of ignorant control- freak politicians and tunnel-visioned public health smurfs.
  
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  July 30, 2020 7:46pm
Tom Barker

Tonight’s Colmar-Brunton poll calls for urgent and imaginative action by National to pre-empt an electoral wipeout. Bring Back Boag!
2 7
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July 30, 2020 6:24pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

If I pretend your mask works, will you pretend I’m wearing one??
3 4
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July 30, 2020 6:28pm
- cha
  
  Says the clown who boosted a video of a woman who thinks people screw demons in their sleep and alien DNA is in use in medical practices today.
  
  [Deleted – Mod.]
  
  5 3
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  July 30, 2020 6:36pm
barnacle bill

Blimey, not a mention about the Poll taken by TV One tonight on the six o’clock News.

Oh well, it must have been just another rogue poll.
4 4
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July 30, 2020 7:23pm
Kabull

Tony Heller is on the button again. The panic about Arctic sea ice disappearing has been shown to be nonsense. As he says, Al Gore will need to wait another Summer to sea an ice-free Arctic!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaV9PL6cLeo
5 0
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July 30, 2020 7:50pm
Brian McDonald

I don’t think WP understands that attacking his coalition partners is not helpful.
1 1
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July 30, 2020 8:20pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I’m sure WP has figured out that his coalition buddies are looking forward to the day when they are no longer hitched together.
  
  5 0
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  July 30, 2020 8:40pm
  - Brian McDonald
    
    Possibly has, but driving the wedge deeper isn’t helping NZF who look like they’re gone.
    I wonder if Judith is thinking about grabbing back the ACT vote. She’s going for the middle which is not working, so why not go further right? She is looking like a caretaker leader as time wears on, the best of a poor choice. Solidfying the right could change that.
    An interesting election ahead, will JC work out that she can’t “out Jacinda, Jacinda.” Does she think on her feet or simply follow the trails she already knows.
    
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    July 30, 2020 9:02pm
- ex-golfer
  
  Wait until he changes tack and starts saying a vote for Winston First is a vote to keep the Government honest.
  
  Fortunately I think he is too far gone for people to fall for that crap again and Labour won’t think they need him anyway.
  
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  July 30, 2020 10:17pm
Isobar

Act on 4.8% and goldsmith on the cusp of being out of parliament on these results unless he wins Epsom. What to do?
4 1
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July 30, 2020 8:31pm

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