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May 1, 2025 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 01 May 2025

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peterwn

Wellington Mayoralty – Will Cash be the Kingmaker
https://www.thepost.co.nz/a/nz-news/360670857/wellington-mayoralty-will-cash-be-kingmaker

As for the matter of cash – nothing said about the significant non-cash Union resources – staff and vehicles that will be diverted to Andrew’s campaign meaning that Union members will receive diminished services for their dues during the campaign. This is a good opportunity for bosses to deal with festering issues knowing that the employee would not get due assistance from the union.

The Post article also blandly stated that Andrew Little was the ‘favourite’ with nothing to support this. Seems the journo with management support was interviewing his keyboard. I thought a poll indicated Tory was not the favourite, implying that she was a bigger liability then Andrew Little.

So as far as I can see the Post is trying to puff Andrew Little up in a similar manner that it puffed up Tory for the previous election.
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May 1, 2025 8:02am
- Chris2
  
  Andrew Little is actually a loser whenever he stands for election – he could never win an Electorate seat in 12 years in Parliament and recognised himself that he was a loser in giving up the Labour Party leadership weeks out from a General Election. And more recently, resigning from Parliament when his time at the trough was over. So its a mystery why the media would portray a proven loser as a “favourite”
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:08am
  - RoboRob
    
    Tori isn’t standing and local body politics is all about name recognition. People know his name and not those of the other candidates. Couple that with the fact he has Labour and now Green support in the most left wing city in the country and I think its fair to say hes the current favourite.
    
    Plenty of people on the left still love JA and even Chippy, remember its about the feelz not the policy or results. People aren’t going to care that Little is a long term failure at everything he has touched, apparently including professional Laywering too.
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:10am
    - pdm
      
      According to Stuff `Angry Andy’ has given Tori the bums rush.
      
      He does not want her as Deputy Mayor.
      
      You have to win first to be in a position to make those decisions Andrew Little – has no one told him that yet.
      https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360671973/my-home-has-been-wellington-andrew-little-says-he-loyal-capital-city
      
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      May 1, 2025 9:49am
      - Eastlander
        
        He’s had to deny it because Whanau was too stupid not to blurt out the actual plan. Much good it will do as he’s already failed to distance himself from Whanau.
        
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        May 1, 2025 10:05am
      - Ghost
        
        It was an interesting article. Little complaining contracts for the golden mile should be left for him. Claiming govts don’t make big decisions 3 months before an election. No you just leave unfunded policies, appoint commisoners instead making temporary appointments so a new govt could pick who they want
        
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        May 1, 2025 10:14am
  - peterwn
    
    Trying to think what his achievements were. He would have achieved various things for his workers when working for his union, bur did not achieve decent health and safety at Pike River. He achieved a gain for unions by abolishing key performance indicators for emergency room waits, surgery carried out etc, but then everything went to pot human nature being what it is. He ‘reformed’ health from the way Helen Clark had it, but made it worse.
    So when Wellingtonians think that things could not get any worse under Mayor Tory, they will surely get worse under Andrew Little if Mayor.
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:23am
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      He was min of Health that completely changed the health system during a pandemic. that’s all you need to know about his abilities.
      
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      May 1, 2025 9:26am
    - mandk
      
      You need to give him credit for spending a $1.96 bn mental health budget and not being able to say what outcomes resulted.
      
      That’s one hell of an achievement.
      
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      May 1, 2025 9:31am
      - AitchW
        
        What a colossal failure. If anyone in the real world spent even a hundredth of that for no result they’d be sacked so fast their feet wouldn’t touch the floor.
        How the people of Wellington can be so monumentally stupid as to put him in charge of their city is beyond belief. But then, they did elect Whanau..
        A much bigger question is how can a minister spend the thick end of 2 billion for no results and face no consequences.
        
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        May 1, 2025 9:46am
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Yes, he turned a safe Labour seat in New Plymouth into a 10000 majority for Nats in 6 years
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:24am
    - Colville
      
      So Wellington might get someone competent next time around then?? 🙂
      
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      May 1, 2025 9:57am
    - sungsamning
      
      Making life safe for National incumbents is his only achievement.
      
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      May 1, 2025 1:48pm
  - Poppax8
    
    If Andrew Little is the answer, what is the question? I am voting for Ray Chung, a man who has a track record of success – not for a failed unionist and Labour hack!
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:02am
    - Ghost
      
      How many politicans does it take to completely screw a city? One, Andrew Little
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:08am
- Hugh Jarse
  
  It would be surprise that journalists would support their old EPMU Leader, once upon a time responsible for the Print & Media workers and which is now E Tu.
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:28am
  - Hugh Jarse
    
    Doh, should have been “no surprise”
    
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    May 1, 2025 8:53am
- Libertarians are right
  
  Wait until they print a photo of him on the front page with a halo again.
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:51am
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  This was a dirty rotten deal by Labour, get Whanau to stand aside to not split the vote, giving all support to Little, Little comes in and immediately gives Whanau the Deputy Mayors job, if she gets DM you know this has been a stich up, the guy on the right just needs to keep point to this prospect and ask if that is fair, or vote Little and get Whanau as Dep.
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:23am
  - imalwaysright
    
    Agreed.
    
    Does anyone know why it is allowed for main political parliamentary parties to endorse and control mayors and councillors ?
    
    How does that help the ratepayer voter ?
    
    It effectively gives the peoples democratic votes to the party.
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:42am
    - Ehlana
      
      We’re a democracy; I guess there is nothing to stop them. In theory, it means people know the politics of those candidates. And in Andrew Little’s case, his track record.
      
      The politics of other candidates may be less clear.
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:24am
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      Morally it’s pathetic, but that’s the left for you
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:44am
    - Paulus
      
      Left Wing Control is all that matters whether in the Unions, Public Service and Local Government.
      Years ago when Margaret Thatcher was elected she found a thorn problem with the very left wing Greater London Council (GLC) –
      – so she abolished it, but it later became ressurected once Labour got power.
      
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      May 1, 2025 11:04am
  - Yabster
    
    he has declared she won’t be DM.
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:53am
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      Since when? Yesterday he refused to answer waffling something about not thinking about DM yet
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:45am
  - PurplePen
    
    STV voting doesn’t really split voting like MMP or FPP. If Whanau remained as a mayoral candidate in STV left leaning voters would presumably give their 1 and 2 rankings to Little and Whanau in any order. Mind you, if Whanau did run would she have campaigned hard knowing she is unpopular and highly likely to lose anyway. I suspect she went for the only job and income that she stood a chance of getting. As spin she might have come up with a story about ‘standing aside’. All supposition.
    
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    May 1, 2025 11:43am
- Mike
  
  You have some details of ‘Union resources’ that will be ‘diverted’?
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:23am
  - JimBobJoe
    
    Why does anyone need to provide you with detail Michael? Go do your own research… I am sure you will find ample evidence of Union resources esp. time being diverted to campaign for Labour Party members and issues.
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:35am
    - Mike
      
      I’m not the one making the allegation.
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:07am
      - kiwimike
        
        yes you are in reverse.
        It’s your MO.
        It’s why you get gratuitously down-ticked.
        
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        May 1, 2025 10:29am
  - alloytoo
    
    Diverting unions resources would mean spending them on the members for a change.
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:00am
  - RoboRob
    
    Evidence?
    You mean like the regular news stories every three years where the various unions give their staff the ‘day off’ to do community service. They provide their staff with vehicles and they go around assisting people get to polling venues.
    
    The phone calls, by staff, to members to remind them to vote for a specific party because the other party will be bad for them.
    
    Or unions spending their money (resources) on full page attack advertisements against right wing political parties.
    
    But you knew about that right?
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:20am
    - Tom Hunter
      
      Of course he knew. And now he just wasted your commenting time and amused himself – again.
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:44am
    - Ghost
      
      The phone calls never suggest a party to vote for
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:46am
      - RoboRob
        
        When my wife is called they are very clear that a vote for National or Act will be bad for them. They say they can work with Labour.
        
        Its the same thing as telling you who you should vote for.
        
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        May 1, 2025 11:59am
      - Ghost
        
        When I’ve got called it’s to remind me to vote, to ask if I need transport to get to a voting booth. Never has a party been mentioned
        
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        May 1, 2025 12:07pm
      - RoboRob
        
        @Ghost
        
        Different union? My wife is / was with one of the teachers unions.
        
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        May 1, 2025 1:10pm
  - Jethrod
    
    You make a lot of unanswerable questions and a lot of “don’t look at me statements”.
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:44am
    - Mike
      
      I’m just asking peterwn to back up his vague allegation. And even if unspecified unions are using unspecified resources to support a local body candidate, surely that’s just the business of the members.
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:59am
      - RoboRob
        
        Nope its not. The unions argue that getting x party (always Labour) into power is to the benefit of their members. If you are a union member not voting for labour you really dont want your money being used against you.
        
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        May 1, 2025 1:12pm
      - Paulus
        
        But you are sure that the members are fully cogniscant of their Union employeed and paid are doing with the member’s money.
        
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        May 1, 2025 2:38pm
  - peterwn
    
    Easy to find. Like when hoardings go up for an election you see union employees in union owned cars erecting hoardings. Then on election day you see them going house to house with clipboards to get their faithful out to vote.
    
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    May 1, 2025 11:44am
    - Mike
      
      Anecdata.
      
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      May 1, 2025 12:56pm
      - RoboRob
        
        I see you haven’t replied to my evidence. A bit Inconvenient?
        
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        May 1, 2025 1:13pm
      - Mike
        
        What evidence?
        
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        May 1, 2025 1:56pm
      - RoboRob
        
        See my post above dated May 1, 2025 10:20am.
        
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        May 1, 2025 2:17pm
      - Mike
        
        Oh, your assertions.
        
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        May 1, 2025 3:25pm
      - RoboRob
        
        @Mike You probably will never see this but….. Come on, there are full page adds (as I said) in the newspaper archives paid for by unions. Thats not an assertion, its a fact.
        
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        May 2, 2025 3:23pm
    - Ghost
      
      Never seen anyone in union cars putting up hoardings. It’s usually party members.
      
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      May 1, 2025 1:20pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Who is pulling the strings in Wellington?
  
  There’s no way Andrew Little could organise this campaign by himself (there’ll be a near daily dose of TV/radio/newspaper spin about Little until local body election time).
  
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  May 1, 2025 10:05am
  - RoboRob
    
    Labour have already come out in support of Little. That means union notices telling people who to vote for and assitance with media and marketing.
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:22am
    - peterwn
      
      Post/Stuff will be a major supporter and has started already. Just wait for the half page gratis advertorial on the front page saying polls have him streets ahead.
      
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      May 1, 2025 11:46am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  No brown, female candidates standing. Who’s a sista to vote for?
  
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  May 1, 2025 6:21pm
artemisia

I see a recent ‘proud lefty’ poster has (been?) disappeared from Kiwiblog after warnings. That is a real shame as it is a good thing to have different POVs. I hope they may be back, possibly after time to contemplate taking the lead foot off the pedal.
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May 1, 2025 8:02am
- pdm
  
  On that arty – does anyone know where Steve Otto is?
  
  I noticed him mia earlier in the week.
  
  Hope he is okay health wise.
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:38am
  - Gravelroad
    
    Yes, Steve Otto North Shore has been a commenter on here for quite a while.
    Think he said a few weeks ago that as a result of a fall, he had concussion.
    
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    May 1, 2025 8:42am
    - pdm
      
      Thanks gravel.
      
      Guess he will be back, fitter, faster, stronger after the Super Rugby type stand down.
      
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      May 1, 2025 8:54am
  - Ghost
    
    He had a few health problems, maybe they caught up with him
    
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    May 1, 2025 11:39am
- RoboRob
  
  I saw all the usual suspects active yesterday. Who is this poster you refer too?
  
  p.s. agree that a reasoned alternative opinion is good to have.
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:14am
  - artemisia
    
    I didn’t want to name the person but left a clue in the last sentence!
    
    [Mod – no one has been banned]
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:46am
    - pdm
      
      Too deep for me arty – I have no idea who said missing lefty poster might be.
      
      I can say with some confidence it is definitely not Chuck Bird. lol.
      
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      May 1, 2025 9:53am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        He’s probably trying to suggest Mr Hanley is a leftie, s as bd he has been absent
        
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        May 1, 2025 10:48am
    - RoboRob
      
      To deep for me too I’m afraid. That said I dont often try and categorise posters, didnt realise Chuck Bird was a lefty for example. Mike and Ian Boag being exceptions but thats more becuase they seem to purposely want to goad people.
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:16am
    - artemisia
      
      Ha, Latin – lead. But I looked again and their posts yesterday were not deleted as I thought. Oops.
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:58am
Cassandra

A physics prof at Canterbury comments on our universities:

“Basically, I think folks on the right are trying to give universities a chance to reform themselves. We should take it… Why should we expect governments (left or right) to forever tolerate state-funded institutions which show evidence of clear political bias?”

“My hunch is that the government will give universities a couple of goes at reforming ourselves, and then go the Henry VIII/monasteries route. They’ll pluck out and save medicine, engineering, bits of science, law, and then simply defund the rest and sell the land beneath them. There was no great clamour to restart the monasteries, was there?”

I hope all the lefty academics listen to him. Although actually the H8 route has considerable appeal.

As Graham Adams says “How long taxpayers will agree to support universities which dedicate themselves to “decolonisation” and the overthrow of “Western knowledge” — and boast about it as Auckland University’s newsletter has done — is an open question.”
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May 1, 2025 8:03am
- imalwaysright
  
  If they want to decolonise themselves then we should defund them and then they can barter their skills for native birds, pippis and fern roots.
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:15am
  - Don Beckett
    
    @casandra.
    “There was no great clamour to restart the monasteries, was there?”
    Yes there was, but they fairly rapidly lost their heads – which prevents speech. 🙂
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:52am
  - PurplePen
    
    A Maori university, or whatever equivalent Maori had. There’s something I’d never considered. I wonder if Maori elite have.
    
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    May 1, 2025 11:48am
    - Jack5
      
      PurplePen’s …A Maori university …
      
      NZ has three “wananga,” State-funded Maori tertiary institutions set up to be parallel to universities.
      
      They exist in parallel with the increasing Maorification of NZ’s traditional universities.
      
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      May 1, 2025 1:15pm
    - Taieri
      
      There’re three wanangas in NZ:
      Te Wānanga o Raukawa
      Te Wānanga o Aotearoa
      Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi
      
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      May 1, 2025 1:15pm
- Nigel Kearney
  
  I don’t think micro-management is the answer, and neither is hoping Universities will reform themselves. University has been more of a credential than an education for a long time now. That situation only exists because employers allow it to exist.
  
  The answer is to do two things.
  
  1. Create job pathways that bypass Universities. The government can do this in areas such as law, teaching, nursing, and accountancy. The private sector can do this in other areas.
  
  2. Don’t fund mediocre students to attend University. More students mean lower standards. That also requires more teaching staff so the average quality drops there as well.
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:16am
  - peterwn
    
    It was effectively government decisions over the years that channeled various professions into a position where university qualifications were required. Training for nurses and primary teachers was achieved outside the University structure. Similarly with accountancy and land surveying – you could learn on the job as an articled clerk with some night school classes. Nursing training was very much a ‘boot camp’ for girls and at the end of it the young NZRN could hold her head high with a bright life ahead of her as well as having a wide range of useful life skills. I think it was a pity that the traditional system was broken down.
    Interesting Auckland University was not interested in having a full Engineering faculty in the post WW2 era. It was the drive and determination of the professor of the partial engineering faculty (Professor Leech) who hunted out premises (Ardmore) and recruited more professors (Professors Bogle and Mowbray were widely known and respected in the engineering profession) and against the indifference of Auckland University and established what was to be a top class faculty whose students won more than their fair share of Rhodes Scholars. Perhaps it is time the faculty was disassociated from the University and allowed to become something like MIT.
    
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    May 1, 2025 8:49am
    - Colville
      
      Nursing training was very much a ‘boot camp’ for girls and at the end of it the young NZRN could hold her head high…..
      
      as she carried her high heels down the road walking home after a night of partying and drinking?
      
      🙂
      
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      May 1, 2025 9:00am
      - peterwn
        
        And had to face Matron when she had to bang on the door of the nurses home to be let in.
        
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        May 1, 2025 9:27am
    - jonno1
      
      Ah, yes! Profs Bogle and Mowbray were my era, along with Ardmore. Those were the days!
      
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      May 1, 2025 2:32pm
  - Taieri
    
    Create job pathways that bypass Universities. The government can do this in areas such as law, teaching, nursing, and accountancy
    ———–
    
    Sounds easy, but…the international recognition of NZ qualifications may lapse if such changes were to be implemented. In the majority of countries, teaching, law, nursing and accountancy usually require a degree level education.
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:43am
  - Handyman
    
    The government should remove any pathway from being a fee paying foreign student to being a New Zealand citizen. The universities kid themselves that foreign students are drawn by the quality of the university staff so let’s see.
    
    Secondly, the government should remove all funding from universities directly but fund limited numbers of students per degree. The result should be to create some competition to enforce entry standards for engineering (not crazy like medicine), law, science etc. and a smaller number of lifestyle degrees.
    Universities can also accept fee paying students who may be on third party scholarships.
    
    Funding research streams could be allocated according to New Zealand’s needs. It costs more to totally fund a Spanish Professor than to hire a specialist surgeon. Decision needs to be made.
    
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    May 1, 2025 12:30pm
  - Philview
    
    A lady I know is a Nursing student and she showed me some of the new course materials. Very shocking indoctrination which after a clinical replacement she had to write a reflection on how her whiteness and power imbalance impacted on care of Maori patients. She didn’t have any patients who outwardly identified as Maori which made the task even harder.
    
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    May 1, 2025 1:42pm
  - Raphael
    
    I’ve been saying for years that IT, especially software dev should be done the same way as a Trade. There is no reason for IT to have to be a 3 year degree.
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:10pm
- Paulus
  
  Too late, as it started a long while ago in Primary Schoools, and as such would take no notice of what any Government wanted as they are always right and they know it.
  Pity so many older and real Teachers have retired, and look at what in the main are left.
  Teaching career, sorry not for men however, as boys are taught no longer to respect men, as many do not know otherwise.
  Education is a feminist world now with no chance of change.
  No wonder our PISA standards and other depreciate exponentially every year and it sadly cannot be changed.
  Our overall standards are far too low, and all are reduced to a common low level.
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:41am
  - Gravelroad
    
    Paulus – here is my experience (albeit limited to one school) – my grandkids attend the same large primary school that my own children attended.
    There are teachers still there from that time.
    When I go to pick up grandkids, it seems like stepping back in time to when my own children were there.
    I agree that the authoritarian nature of teaching has changed resulting in the expectation that children from a young age should take responsibility for their own learning and behaviour – which is fine in theory, not so sure about practice.
    The reporting to parents is different and involves the child sitting in on all discussions and giving their own opinions about school and what they need to do to improve their results.
    They like school and are learning to read, write, do maths and tech/computer stuff – and social skills.
    Kids still break school rules and expectations – same as my now adult kids did.
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:12am
  - Reg Perrin
    
    I was talking with my wife about this and it seems that every boy now who plays up has ADHD.
    
    Boys of that age have a lot of energy and with a lack of discipline will play up. I remember my time at school and we would have all been diagnosed now with ADHD. The difference was that teachers were authoritarian and we respected and feared most of them so limited our behavior. We were quick to pick up on the relieving teacher who wasn’t up to controlling the class and it would turn chaotic.
    The other thing we noticed that has changed is that every issue is now passed on to the parent to deal with, while in the past it was dealt with by the school, unless it was something serious like a suspension
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:25am
    - kowtow
      
      RP
      
      I’ve noticed schools for the past 20 odd years have been very quick to involve the police in what would have been minor internal pupil relations /school “growing up” matters.
      
      Whereas in past generations that would have been seen as the ultimate failure on their side .
      
      ( And no I’m not talking serious criminal matters).
      
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      May 1, 2025 9:52am
    - Jinky
      
      One of the risk factors for ADHD in boys is being raised by a single mother.
      
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      May 1, 2025 10:12am
- Mike
  
  What a load of piffle. No government is going to ‘reform’ the universities in any manner resembling Graham Adams’s fever dream.
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:28am
  - Swifty
    
    Please try to keep up – it wasn’t Adams that said it, it was an academic.
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:09am
  - Cassandra
    
    Not yet. Be patient.
    
    10 5
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    May 1, 2025 10:19am
    - Mike
      
      I’ve only 20-odd years left to me to wait for the kind of nutty libertarian ideas I’ve seen for 40 years to come true.
      
      2 9
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      May 1, 2025 11:02am
      - Swifty
        
        Stop trying to spoil our fun!
        
        8 0
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        May 1, 2025 11:27am
- sungsamning
  
  ACT, and NZF will have to lead the charge. The fake news would call Luxon ‘a meanie’; and he’d cave.
  
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  May 1, 2025 1:53pm
- pb
  
  Too late. Need to be defunded. The University is the Lefty Hive Mind. We need to throw fumigation pellets into the rabbit hole, and block the entrance.
  
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  May 1, 2025 10:01pm
Frank the tank

CimatePorn.

The new CovidCult where every storm now is a category 10 Typhoon and where knocked out power is equivalent to body bags on the street.

Maybe we can resurrect the Podium of Truth, Jacinda and Sean Hendy’s graphs to get us through this threat to humanity.

I’ll just wait for my emergency warning for the next heavy shower that hits Auckland.
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May 1, 2025 8:05am
- G152
  
  It’s weather whether the crazies call it global warming or climate change.
  And with weather comes storms, lots of rain lots of wind and lots of damage….
  And claims of melting ice, that is what ice does, melts and water refreezes
  
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  May 1, 2025 8:53am
- I remember when
  
  “where every storm”
  All weather is a storm now.
  
  14 1
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  May 1, 2025 9:30am
- Master Mariner
  
  Unfortunately Metservice is to be taken over by NIWA.
  Expect the fear to increase.
  
  6 1
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  May 1, 2025 11:33am
Souvlaki

I’m obviously ‘late to the party’….I had no idea Tama Potaka was a (?)former member of TPM😳. This explains the crass and tasteless ‘ crematorium’ remark over the Treaty Principles bill.
Don’t vote National 2026!

Fiona Mackenzie: Is National The Red Under The Bed?
https://breakingviewsnz.blogspot.com/2025/04/fiona-mackenzie-is-national-red-under.html?m=1
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May 1, 2025 8:06am
- Frank the tank
  
  We don’t call National LabourLite without reason.
  
  26 3
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  May 1, 2025 8:10am
- Simon
  
  When Potaka won a Hamilton by election Luxon was drooling over him. It was quiet disgusting
  
  Potaka has given ten of millions away to select Maori groups to “fire up Maori business”.
  
  National party are insane.
  
  30 2
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  May 1, 2025 8:17am
  - Colville
    
    Maybe you need a little help with numbers?? you obviously had a unionised maths teacher.
    
    Māori are one out of every six New Zealanders… you think Luxon should just ignore a sixth of the electorate?
    
    Maybe he likes the job he has a wants to win again? so needs people to vote for him?
    
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    May 1, 2025 9:05am
    - ISeeRed
      
      He’s a racial supremacist. Maori Uber Alles.
      
      11 3
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      May 1, 2025 9:48am
    - imalwaysright
      
      5/6 is more than 1/6
      
      10 1
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      May 1, 2025 9:55am
      - Fender
        
        Dr Suess star bellied sneeches comes to mind
        Nothing that can’t be brought to collapse very quickly if we all played
        
        2 1
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        May 1, 2025 1:15pm
      - imalwaysright
        
        Fender
        ???
        
        0 0
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        May 1, 2025 6:27pm
    - Yabster
      
      …and there’s the problem- you think Maori all vote and think the same? National seem to think so.
      Maori aren’t special- they are just like any other NZ citizen.
      Potaka is an activist – and he is Nationals Maori minister- Brillant!
      
      16 2
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      May 1, 2025 10:00am
    - Cassandra
      
      Colville: the vain hope of the Maori vote motivated Key too. The Maoris who respond to National’s bribes are never going to vote for them. Key and Luxon (and Bolger etc) are deluded.
      
      13 0
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      May 1, 2025 10:44am
    - Burtland
      
      “Māori are one out of every six New Zealanders”
      
      most are no more maori than they are irish, scottish or english of their other parts and yet nobody tries to gather votes by proposing separate irish governance
      
      maori were assimilated through colonization and ceding sovereignty
      – winding this back with apartheid is just crazy
      
      17 1
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      May 1, 2025 11:00am
  - kiwimike
    
    National support Maori Co-Governance and are ignoring the Foreshore and Seabed.
    
    Many in National subscribe to “we stole NZ from Maori” and support the adage that Maori are equal partners with Colonisers as a race, not equal citizens with the rest of us.
    
    They support racist and undemocratic laws, by-Laws and processes, incl sentencing and Police and health rules, incl quotas in Unis.
    
    17 2
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    May 1, 2025 10:40am
    - Gravelroad
      
      There was a rather dull tv programme on the other night from a series called “World’s Most Scenic Railway Journeys”.
      And – tah rah, tah rah! It was about the railway journey between Auckland and Wellington.
      The voice over person read out guff about how the Maori were colonized and the ensuing dreadful consequences for Maori etc etc.
      Have seen some other episodes of this programme which were quite interesting and with magnificent history and scenery.
      But sadly, not this one on Aotearoa.
      Turned it off.
      
      12 2
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      May 1, 2025 11:55am
      - Lenice
        
        Note photo in NZ Herald of 19th century Ponsonby
        bay villa listed as “NZ’s most valuable State house”.
        I am not questioning the desirability or official value of the house but can someone please explain
        how a house of this age became a “State house” before such a concept existed?
        
        4 0
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        May 1, 2025 1:00pm
      - Lenice
        
        Thank you for the warning.
        
        3 0
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        May 1, 2025 1:01pm
- Nigel Kearney
  
  It is a failure of leadership. There are plenty of Tama Potakas out there. How much damage they can do depends on decisions made by Luxon.
  
  26 1
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  May 1, 2025 8:18am
- pdm
  
  Souv – I did not know that either.
  
  Tama Potaka – a Maori Party wolf in National Party clothing.’
  
  27 1
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  May 1, 2025 8:47am
  - H. Upmann
    
    It’s not looking good for traditional National supporters.
    
    What with Luxon as a mole for Greens and Potaka doing the inside job for TPM, not the centre-right happy place it should be.
    
    15 1
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    May 1, 2025 9:55am
- DimChappie
  
  I can’t find any web reference to Potaka having belonged to The Maori Party. It would not surprise me but needs to be verified. Anyone?
  
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  May 1, 2025 2:05pm
NeverMindTheBollocks

Shell Lane (The Terrace) bike rack report:

At 8.08am, one bike today. Heroic.

A wet, dark, windy morning in the Capital, terrible for cycling.
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May 1, 2025 8:08am
- AitchW
  
  Perhaps the heroic cyclist got pissed last night and took an Uber home intending to pick his bike up today…
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:49am
  - Swifty
    
    Plausible.
    
    10 0
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    May 1, 2025 10:21am
    - Tarquin North
      
      Tory rides a bike?
      
      11 0
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      May 1, 2025 10:52am
Simon

Has any of the Wellington Clown Show gone to Ukraine to serve in any capacity?

Phil Goff, for eg, the big man, why isn’t he driving a truck in the Ukraine?
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May 1, 2025 8:20am
- G152
  
  That is an absurdity. Goff has a stomach affliction in that he can only protest the universe from NZ streets….
  
  13 1
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  May 1, 2025 8:57am
- Mike
  
  Yes, one wonders why senior politicians from the UK, France, Germany, Poland, etc are not digging trenches in eastern Ukraine.//
  
  12 9
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  May 1, 2025 9:30am
  - RoboRob
    
    No but one wonders why after all the promises of support from said leaders very little of it is actually being provided. The most recent EU support pleadge for example is in limbo as states (countries) like Italy, Spain and Greece cant afford their share of the donation.
    
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    May 1, 2025 10:25am
Swifty

Think of all the years Ardern, Robertson and Hipkins must have ignored this situation, preferring instead to use taxpayer money to pad ministries with unnecessary bureaucrats, fund friendly media companies to support Labour policies and to buy votes through wasteful public programmes.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360670040/paddy-gower-dear-simeon-brown-please-spend-75-million-help-our-dying-children
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May 1, 2025 8:25am
- Yabster
  
  cmon swifty a link to stuff is bad enough but one to dumbass Gower- spare us.
  
  16 1
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  May 1, 2025 10:04am
  - Swifty
    
    Heh
    
    9 0
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    May 1, 2025 10:20am
imalwaysright

Prisoner voting.

To get a 3 year sentence in NZ you would have to commit a very serious crime such as take an undersized paua…

Baby bashers, rapists, murderers, and drug dealers will still be able to vote while on Home D.
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May 1, 2025 8:26am
- pdm
  
  ima – that would be a white cis male getting 3 years jail for taking the undersized paua wouldn’t it?
  
  20 3
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  May 1, 2025 8:51am
  - Yabster
    
    yep – otherwise its just customary rights bro…
    
    13 3
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    May 1, 2025 10:06am
- Mike
  
  I asked yesterday. Is the voting rights restriction based on punishable sentence for the crime, or on actual sentence imposed? And if the latter, does parole restore the right to vote?
  
  5 9
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  May 1, 2025 9:33am
  - Fender
    
    [Mod – debate the topic]
    
    0 3
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    May 1, 2025 1:20pm
  - rouppe
    
    My understanding is that it is currently intended as simple as if you’re in jail on voting day, you don’t get to vote.
    
    I heard someone whine that a person with a six month jail sentence (does anyone get those anymore?) who happened to be sentenced just before an election is disadvantaged compared to someone sentenced to 2 years just after an election.
    
    My view is, too fucking bad. Suck it up.
    
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    May 1, 2025 5:06pm
Scooter

Juliana Herrera inquiry. So privacy out ranks safety when you are potentially living next door to a murderer and actually living next door to a rapist. After the inquiry no one will be held to account, NZ doesn’t hold anyone to account, eg doctors who misdiagnose. We are a society of no fault, no repercussions. So we continue to make the same mistakes.

“Responding to questions from Corrections lawyer Pip Currie, the officer said she was not authorised to notify neighbours of an offender living near them, due to privacy.

“What about the ability to knock on the door just to see who lived there?” Currie asked.
“I didn’t have the authority. [It is] a potential breach of privacy to even knock on the door.”

https://www.thepress.co.nz/nz-news/360669326/tearful-probation-officer-recounts-escalating-risk-joseph-brider-murder
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May 1, 2025 8:35am
- kowtow
  
  Where’s the feminist media hashtag mob when they’re really needed.
  
  15 2
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  May 1, 2025 9:16am
  - Mike
    
    Reporting the inquest?
    
    3 15
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    May 1, 2025 9:33am
    - graham
      
      Alison Mau is reporting the inquest??
      
      11 1
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      May 1, 2025 10:09am
  - pdm
    
    Easy answer kowtow.
    
    Obviously the deceased was born female, grew up to be a woman and stayed a woman until that cretin murdered her.
    
    Therefore of no interest to the feminazi or their media mates.
    
    16 4
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    May 1, 2025 10:00am
  - kiwimike
    
    Ali Mau
    You;re joking surely ?
    
    Have you ever seen her supporting Iranian women for not wearing a hajib ?
    any Muslim woman in distress for that matter.
    
    Only clickbait for her !
    
    13 3
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    May 1, 2025 10:45am
- MCōs
  
  This guy was released from prison on parole three months before the end of his sentence
  Does that mean in another three weeks or so he would have been free to go where he liked unsupervised?
  
  Who’d want to be a probation officer? Odds on they’re understaffed
  
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  May 1, 2025 11:40am
OlderChas

I think the new rules with regard to some tradies being able to certify their own work is a good move. Should speed up building work in that you don’t have to wait a couple of weeks before some Council wonk can be spared to come and inspect, and give you a bill for thousands for doing so.
News readers were enthused that if his/her is found wanting, the certifier can me fined up to 1.5 million dollars.
So is the fine handed to the customer so that the faulty work can be remedied? Or can the tradie be ordered to redo the work at his/her own expense as well?
And what if the tradie simply does not have the money? (And none of the right kind of insurance – even if you can insure yourself against not doing work up to acceptable standard).
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May 1, 2025 8:55am
- Colville
  
  Builders can self certify if they build the same house multiple times (over 10 per year I believe) so its going to be apartments and terrace type houses only.
  
  (Builders will just open a company for a job and close it afterwards to avoid liability)
  
  But yeah plumbers drainlayers etc getting on a level playing field with sparkies is a good move.
  
  Councils having to take an inspection within 3 days will be a wait and see exercise.
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:11am
  - Ehlana
    
    I know it is commonly done, but should builders actually be allowed to do that?
    It isn’t, after all, how most tradespeople and professionals operate – they work on different projects under the same company name all the time, why can’t builders too? Especially if the prime use of separate companies is to avoid responsibility for mistakes and failures.
    Does anyone know the answer?
    
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    May 1, 2025 12:17pm
    - All_on_Red
      
      Developers use single purpose companies for each Project so they can isolate assets and manage each Projects funding requirements better.
      Much simpler for the Bank/Fund. It also ensures money doesnt get siphoned off to , ahem, problem areas and stays in the same Project.
      Also if the project fails (as they sometimes do) then the problem doesnt cascade over to everything else.
      
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      May 1, 2025 12:53pm
      - rouppe
        
        In order to truly isolate assets, they’d have to have different bank accounts and different credit cards for each job, and be extremely diligent in not using one for another job.
        
        They’re also have to have separate trade accounts for each job at Bunnings or wherever.
        
        As soon as one account is used for more than one job, there’s cross over which weakens any separation argument.
        
        I think not enough is done to ensure liability rests with the tradespeople. For example the rather rampant activity of connecting rainwater to sewage lines on residential properties.
        
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        May 1, 2025 5:02pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  I’d like to see more photos & video fed into an AI powered image recognition machine, as an alternative to Council inspection.
  
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  May 1, 2025 6:38pm
Bridgenag

“Trust the Science™” comes with a gag order.
The Censorship machine

Check out the blue suit story

From -Andrew Austin, on Facebook

“This is hilarious. Facebook flagged this image in some countries because some foreign sites said it was altered. But when I challenged it, they (FB) removed the “false information notice” because they said the “independent fact-checkers removed the true rating.””

https://open.substack.com/pub/rwmalonemd/p/trust-the-science-comes-with-a-gag?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
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May 1, 2025 9:04am
Lenice

Note photo in NZ Herald of 19th century Ponsonby
bay villa listed as “NZ’s most valuable State house”.
I am not questioning the desirability or official value of the house but can someone please explain
how a house of this age became a “State house” before such a concept existed?
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May 1, 2025 9:05am
- Mike
  
  I think the first ‘state houses’ were built under the Seddon government in the 1890s.
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:35am
  - riffer
    
    That would be correct. 1905, Petone.
    
    Although the newly formed Liberals went on to win the election in 1905, so there may have been some crossover, but the Seddon government initiated them.
    
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    May 1, 2025 1:43pm
    - Mike
      
      Seddon government was the Liberals.
      
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      May 1, 2025 2:00pm
- JimBobJoe
  
  The State housing agencies over the years do actually purchase homes on the open market. If it is in fact a State house it was probably bought in the 1960’s or 1970’s when Ponsonby was a working class suburb … It only started becoming desirable real estate in late 1970s and 1980s, as close to the CBD and has great access to a lot of facilities
  
  Remember Ponsonby was once the first home of many newly minted Kiwis of Samoan ancestry – as Ponsonby was cheap and close to the entry point i.e. Port of Auckland
  
  https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/72897184/colourful-hard-case-ponsonby-in-the-1970s
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:46am
- MCōs
  
  State houses date back to Richard Seddon’s time and back then the Ponsonby area wasn’t the flash area it is now. In fact it was decidedly down market about fifty years ago
  
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  May 1, 2025 9:53am
  - Jack5
    
    The big push in State housing came under Labour in the 1930s.
    
    A Fletcher subsidiary, Residential Construction, initially was in effect underwritten by the Government but went on to profit from mass building of State houses.
    
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    May 1, 2025 1:20pm
I remember when

Q&A decided to kill two birds with one stone and advertised Shaun Hendy’s new book and promoted the official response to Covid.
Apparently, Shaun’s covid performance was faultless, well he nearly made some mistakes but not really.
Whitewashed ‘Plan B’ and Simon Thornley’s covid arguments and highlighted their ‘errors and misinformation.’
“We vaccinated like crazy which had a big impact on our model.”
Had to admit that the Swedish result was on a par with New Zealand, but ‘they had restrictions for longer.’

Confirmed his attention to detail by stating, “Maori have ‘decades’ less life expectancy than Pakeha.”
A model answer??
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May 1, 2025 9:07am
- Yabster
  
  a model moron…
  
  20 2
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  May 1, 2025 10:09am
- RoboRob
  
  He is now claiming his statement that 80,000 would die was media exaggeration. Except of course that we can remember seeing him on TV making the claim.
  
  23 1
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  May 1, 2025 10:39am
  - riffer
    
    Yes, quite the exaggeration. Even if we had experienced the deaths that, say, USA did (1 in 300), that’s still less than 20,000. Of course, it’s easy to look on with hindsight, but the modelling done seems to have been based on covid being both harsher and easier to spread.
    
    6 2
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    May 1, 2025 1:46pm
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    Heck, his team even predicted 100,000 deaths (population mortality rate of 2%) if we went into lockdown and then control measures were relaxed all at once
    
    . If control measures are lifted altogether, the eventual outbreak could
    be as serious as a completely uncontrolled epidemic, leading to population-wide mortality rates of
    around 2%.
    
    (2nd paragraph of discussion)
    
    https://cpb-ap-se2.wpmucdn.com/blogs.auckland.ac.nz/dist/d/75/files/2017/01/Supression-and-Mitigation-New-Zealand-TPM-006.pdf
    
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    May 1, 2025 1:56pm
- Master Mariner
  
  Yep watched this interview with him squirming in his seat, So many times he could of been pulled up with his answers and was not by Tame.
  He and his Ilk are too far removed from society hidden under a blanket of “supposed” academia.
  That was my take away.
  Know your enemy.
  On a side note, I watched an podcast / interview with Peter Thiel.
  Key take aways from it was,
  1. He’s anti Globalist and aligns Globilisation with anti Christ ( he is religous).
  2. How else would you respond during Covid if you ( Fauchi) really thought a Bio weapon had been released as opposed too normal “pandemic” plans. Interesting as maybe really thought a Bio weopon had been released and was not sure how destructive it would be, Hence total Lockdowns etc etc.
  3. During the 1900’s when real inroads were being made on scientific discoveries, Industrialisation etc into advancing society, There was ONLY 1/20 of PHD’s around, Saying all these extra PHD’s from Universities today are totally worthless.
  Good Points.
  
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  May 1, 2025 11:46am
- Jack5
  
  Hendy, who describes himself as a physicist and science communicator, with Siouxsie Wiles led the petition against the Listener Seven.
  
  These were the seven academics who dared to question whether Maori knowledge was science.
  
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  May 1, 2025 1:24pm
  - slijmbal
    
    @Jack – I notice that Hendy and the academic (I forget his name) from Imperial College are both physicists. I believe Hendy’s work is based on his modelling, which was wildly out. As someone with a physics degree I am utterly bemused that a physicist is the go to guy for this stuff. Someone like a biostatitician specialising in contagious diseases or similar would be much more appropriate.
    
    Just reminder – a model is numbers wrapped around a bunch of assumptions – the numbers make models look more accurate than they normally are.
    
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    May 1, 2025 3:39pm
sungsamning

https://www.foxbusiness.com/media/china-exhibiting-end-of-regime-conduct-expert-warns-perplexing-behavior
China is exhibiting ‘end-of-regime conduct,’ expert warns of ‘perplexing’ behavior.
Something is “very, very wrong” in Beijing right now, according to foreign policy expert Gordon Chang, who is signaling more “end-of-regime conduct” coming out of Xi Jinping’s China.
“At a time when China needs friends because it’s not selling goods to the U.S., it is going out of its way to antagonize not just the Philippines, not just Taiwan, but also South Korea and Australia,” Chang, a senior fellow with the Gatestone Institute, said on “Mornings with Maria” Monday.
“This shows that… this is end-of-regime conduct, because Xi Jinping, he can’t appear to be giving in to the U.S.,” he added.
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May 1, 2025 9:25am
- Sir Henry Morgan
  
  Eventually, assuming he lives long enough, Gordon Chang’s predictions of a CCP implosion might come true. He’s been predicting this for at least three decades now.
  
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  May 1, 2025 2:23pm
sungsamning

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3avwAiOW98
Bannon UNLEASHED: Dalio Nails Debt Crisis; Time to CRUSH Universities & China | War Room.
Dalio Was Right: Praises Ray Dalio for cutting through mainstream narratives to identify the unsustainable US debt as the core economic problem crushing the working/middle class.
Economic War Plan: Calls for rejecting tax cut extensions for the wealthy ($1M+ bracket to ~40%) while making cuts permanent for workers (tips, overtime, SS). Demands significant defense spending cuts aligned with Trump’s “hemispheric defense” strategy (away from Eurasian land wars) before tackling social programs.
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May 1, 2025 9:26am
Ehlana

So I watched One News yesterday night. First up, retirement of an NZ Rail Ferry. OK. Story ended with the reporter telling us that due to expected weather conditions in Wellington for the rest of the week, NZ Rail was cancelling sailings. Useful add on. Completely missing – whether this weather will affect sailings by the other ferry company.

The next story was about something the Human Rights Commissioner (HRC) did say and something he might have said. And featured someone telling us that the job of the HRC was to protect minority rights. Not the rights of all humans, apparently.

I gave up after that. Maybe next year.
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May 1, 2025 9:30am
Bridgenag

Very interesting live broadcast from The White House. All the money men there. Put in the browser for notifications if you don’t have TDS
5 7
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May 1, 2025 9:41am
- MCōs
  
  You talking about the likes of this woman?
  Btw
  What are all those baseball caps on the table
  https://www.mediaite.com/politics/ag-pam-bondi-makes-absurd-announcement-in-cabinet-meeting-claiming-trump-saved-over-75-of-americans-from-dying/
  
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  May 1, 2025 10:25am
  - Mike
    
    I noted this absurd claim yesterday. These clowns probably wonder why they’re not respected. Mind you, if President Trump claimed that he had personally saved every American’s life, half his fans would believe it as the literal truth, while the other half would sane wash it as a ‘metaphor’ or some other nonsense.
    
    5 12
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    May 1, 2025 11:09am
    - Conservatarian
      
      “These clowns probably wonder why they’re not respected.”
      
      I wonder how much respect a certain Libtard judge now has for the administration.
      
      Let’s refer to her as Hannah Dugan of Wisconsin, and let’s assume she hid a criminal alien, up on battery charges for beating up two people, in her jury room so as to stop him from being arrested by ICE agents. Let’s assume she’s been arrested by the FBI for obstruction of an official proceeding and with concealing an individual to prevent discovery and arrest.
      
      Let’s assume Tom Homan warned Libtard judges off performing such stunts. Let’s assume Hannah is crying HARD. Let’s assume Hannah thinks she is Oskar Schindler or maybe just Rosa Parks.
      
      6 4
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      May 1, 2025 2:34pm
  - Hard Cheese
    
    You’d be hard pressed to come up with a bigger collection of imbeciles than the Trump administration. Bondi, Hesgeth, Lutnick, Navarro, Trump, Leavitt, Rubio, Bessent – it’s like a village idiots convention.
    
    2 6
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    May 1, 2025 2:37pm
    - Conservatarian
      
      What’s your opinion on Lee Zeldin, the EPA administrator? You failed to include him among the “village idiots” you listed, so I presume you think he’s a superb appointment. I do too.
      
      I enjoyed him destroying a New York Slimes reporter last week during a press conference for claiming that Zeldin presented “no evidence” to back up his claims of waste, fraud, and abuse from the previous Biden administration.
      
      “I have a duty to make sure that we don’t light on fire billions of dollars of tax dollars,” Zeldin said. “And I’m not going to stand before any member of the media and get bullied into lighting billions of dollars on fire.”
      
      https://www.dailysignal.com/2025/04/21/epa-administrator-confronts-new-york-times-reporter-claiming-he-had-no-evidence-waste-fraud-abuse/
      
      5 5
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      May 1, 2025 3:16pm
      - Mike
        
        None of his wild claim were ‘evidence’. Like the DOGE claims of thousands of social security recipients aged over 120.
        It’s all performative bullshit, eagerly lapped up by the fans.
        
        4 5
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        May 1, 2025 3:29pm
      - Conservatarian
        
        Does Kilmar Obrego Garcia think the Trump II administration is “performative bullshit”? Or is he enjoying spring in El Salvador?
        
        5 5
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        May 1, 2025 3:52pm
    - Allan
      
      As opposed to your stellar achievements.
      
      [Mod – deleted]
      
      2 4
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      May 1, 2025 5:20pm
- MCōs
  
  You talking about the likes of this woman?
  Btw
  Why are all those Gulf of America baseball caps on the table
  https://www.mediaite.com/politics/ag-pam-bondi-makes-absurd-announcement-in-cabinet-meeting-claiming-trump-saved-over-75-of-americans-from-dying/
  
  7 14
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  May 1, 2025 10:27am
Pope Punctilious II

Auckland’s Northcote College Head of English David Taylor says he will not teach the proposed new English curriculum and is urging others to boycott it too.

Why? Because the curriculum “makes no mention of Te Mataiaho, a framework grounded in Te Tiriti o Waitangi.”

If a Christian fundamentalist teacher at a state school refused to teach evolution, he would rightly be fired. And so should this plonker. It won’t happen of course, as the righteous Mr. Taylor will find plenty of sympathizers in the Ministry of Ed and the teachers’ union.

The Treaty of Waitangi has no bearing on the teaching of any school subjects except history.
30 1
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May 1, 2025 10:21am
- Ehlana
  
  It’s an English curriculum. I wonder if it makes mention of the role of English as an international language and the importance of using an internationally understand English vocabulary when speaking and writing publicly in English?
  
  And by year 12 & 13, shouldn’t our students be able to appreciate and understand English classics like Shakespeare and 19th century novels? Part of the point of reading is surely to gain understanding of times and places you do not personally know.
  
  15 1
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  May 1, 2025 12:25pm
- Bobba Fret
  
  Then the head master should have a discussion with him, and if he really doesn’t want to teach it, say please hand in your notice by the end of the month.
  
  8 0
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  May 1, 2025 3:40pm
Ghost

Stuff announces Lorde’s new album has striking cover art

https://www.stuff.co.nz/culture/360672159/lorde-announces-new-album-virgin-striking-cover-art-x-ray-pelvis

Where? Boring album art, certainly not striking
10 2
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May 1, 2025 10:57am
- Pope Punctilious II
  
  But possibly not as boring as her music.
  
  8 1
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  May 1, 2025 2:07pm
- Sir Henry Morgan
  
  I remember back when Lorde first got famous there was some video where she has tied a guy to a chair, pushes him into a swimming pool to drown, then somehow ignites the swimming pool to produce a blazing inferno.
  
  It was groundbreaking and empowering stuff. The future is female and all that jazz!
  
  1 3
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  May 1, 2025 2:28pm
- marcw
  
  Heh, even the (her?) uterus leans to the left. Hard core socialist.
  
  6 2
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  May 1, 2025 2:39pm
Ian Boag

Finance Minister Nicola Willis has left the door open to means-testing for large Budget items, including Government KiwiSaver subsidies, as she looks to make savings ….

Willis also left the door open to means-testing the Best Start payment for new parents

Already done for access to oldie care of course.

Goodness. Here was me thinking that means testing was all a bit hard … must only be hard for the pension 🙂
8 5
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May 1, 2025 10:58am
greybeard

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360672579/greens-promise-40000-jobs-8-billion-plan-no-funding-details

The headline says it all ,really.
No doubt hundreds of these “new jobs” will involve the printing of all that new money to pay for all the rest !
“In announcing the scheme, Swarbrick called the Greens’ plan “a serious, seismic shift in how we do economics.”

They truly are lunatics.
16 2
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May 1, 2025 11:09am
- jacthecat
  
  ‘The Greens proposed a scheme where existing Crown Infrastructure Delivery entity Rau Paenga would morph into a Ministry of Green Works.
  
  This would employ 250,000 people in the construction sector making laminated timber products which would be used in Kāinga Ora homes and other government-funded green projects.’
  
  250,000?! Really? Where will they come from? Job Seekers?
  
  12 1
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  May 1, 2025 12:54pm
  - rouppe
    
    The 250,000 has been corrected to 25,000.
    
    Because stuff are idiots
    
    8 0
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    May 1, 2025 3:20pm
- PurplePen
  
  Am I correct … 8,000,000,000 ÷ 40,000 = $200,000!
  
  3 0
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  May 1, 2025 5:29pm
RRM

Yeah…

I’m actually with the obnoxious lefty politician grifter here. This isn’t any of our business.

(What a mess!)
3 0
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May 1, 2025 11:17am
Jack5

May Day today, and 66 countries around the world will celebrate, mostly in a small way, but there can be a five-day break in China if a weekend is manipulated.

May Day celebrations will be of traditions that pre-date Christianity, or, as in China, of labour rights under the title of International Workers’ Day.

Labour links are said to begin with the Haymarket massacre in Chicago in 1886, when an anarchist threw dynamite at police, and the cops opened fire on the crowd.

Also on this day:

– In 1707, the Act of Union joined England and Scotland.

– In 1753, Carl Linnaeus’s Species Plantarum was published leading to his universal naming system for plants and animal.

You didn’t notice May Day? No surprise. Compare the lack of notice with Stuff’s endless boosting of the recently invented Matariki.

Here’s a satirical take on May Day, an old joke sung to the tune of The Red Flag:

The working class can kiss my arse,
I’ve got the foreman’s job at last.
12 1
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May 1, 2025 11:30am
- Paulus
  
  I remember 80 years ago at Primary School in London dancing round the erected Maypole, after practice 0f the dance, along with the prettiest girl (my Cousin) as the May Queen.
  
  4 0
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  May 1, 2025 3:26pm
  - Jack5
    
    Maypole and May Queen. Two fertility symbols!
    
    3 0
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    May 1, 2025 4:21pm
NothingLeft

NZ-fucking-Post. Sent an urgent courier document package to Asia last Saturday, $160 using the most expensive express tracked service option offered, and 6 days later they have only just bothered to get it to the outbound depot. Not even on a plane yet.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. Never again.
18 1
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May 1, 2025 11:42am
- Taieri
  
  6 days later they have only just bothered to get it to the outbound depot
  ———-
  
  A few years ago, I sent an urgently required document to Europe via NZ Post express service. It took 3 months to reach its destination.
  
  9 0
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  May 1, 2025 1:23pm
- MCōs
  
  I bought an iPhone X in Onehunga that needed repairs about a year later so I took it back. They couriered it to a repair shop near the airport and they couriered it back again.
  Sounds easy enough. Point A to point B would be half an hour except it was misdirected and went to China.
  I became increasingly annoyed after ringing everyone involved; none of whom took any responsibility. Eventually I rang Apple who sent me a replacement phone the next day plus $350 discount off anything in the online store.
  One imagines they also gave the repair shop a severe dressing down.
  
  3 1
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  May 1, 2025 4:08pm
Chuck Bird

I must let the Taxpayers’ Union know about the $14,000,000 waste of money.

Bryce McKenzie On Why AgriZeroNZ Is A Waste Of Taxpayers’ Money

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xeQMajbi60
7 4
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May 1, 2025 11:59am
Keith White

The needle and the damage done…

Hospitals in Athens, Greece, incorrectly attributed hundreds of deaths to COVID-19, according to a peer-reviewed study published Monday in Scientific Reports.

A team of 19 Greek doctors and researchers studying 530 deaths that occurred in seven Athens hospitals between January and August 2022, found nearly half of the deaths attributed to COVID-19 were unrelated to the virus.

Researchers determined the virus was directly responsible for only a quarter — 133, or 25.1% — of the deaths.

In an additional 157 (29.6%) cases, COVID-19 “contributed to the chain of events leading to death” — for a total of 290 deaths “from” COVID-19.

Another 240 (45.3%) deaths occurred among people “with” COVID-19, but the deaths could not be directly attributed to the virus.

Karl Jablonowski, Ph.D., senior research scientist for Children’s Health Defense, highlighted another key outcome of the study not mentioned in the text, but found in an accompanying table.

According to Jablonowski, among the 288 deaths of people whose vaccination status was known, and who died “from” COVID-19, more than half — 53.8%, or 155 — were vaccinated, either fully or boosted.

“Of the vaccinated who died ‘from’ COVID-19, 65.8% (102 of 155) were boosted,” he said.
11 4
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May 1, 2025 12:09pm
- Northshoredoc
  
  Always good to link to the study.
  
  https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12012217/
  
  As for Karl Jablonowski and Children’s Health Defense, I’ll be polite and merely suggest they are misguided in their view of vaccines.
  
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children%27s_Health_Defense
  
  3 1
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  May 1, 2025 2:58pm
greybeard

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360671222/tiebreaker-vote-necessary-945k-bridge-repair-agreed

The first thing to do would be to get a few more quotes for this job !

“The bridge repair option recommended to council would cost $945,000 and would involve the installation of temporary propping to support the bridge while repairs were completed.”

Who “recommended” this repair option? Sounds like a scam.
5 4
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May 1, 2025 12:30pm
- Ghost
  
  Who “recommended” this repair option?
  
  Someone who knows what they are talking about.
  
  4 1
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  May 1, 2025 12:42pm
  - greybeard
    
    So, who was it ?
    
    1 2
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    May 1, 2025 2:43pm
    - Ghost
      
      You do realise the process of fixing a bridge right? Or do you think it is a basic job?
      
      Rangitata Has taken months to repair. Putting in a temporary support so people could still use it while it was being repaired
      
      2 1
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      May 1, 2025 2:55pm
      - greybeard
        
        I have no idea whatsoever about fixing bridges: all I am doing is questioning the “recommended” figure, and wanting more information about the number of quotes and who provided them. Ratepayers deserve nothing less.
        The Wellington “City-to-Sea” bridge repair/replacement is another recent example of these council issues.
        Am I the only person who has doubts about the veracity of quotations / estimates / recommendations by contractors to councils, when they know the money supply is virtually guaranteed ?
        
        6 4
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        May 1, 2025 3:04pm
      - Ghost
        
        And yet here you are claiming the above is a scam.
        
        3 2
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        May 1, 2025 3:12pm
      - Mike
        
        He could probably get the info from the council under the LGMOIA. Unless his complaint is that full details of every item of council expenditure is not published automatically.
        
        3 5
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        May 1, 2025 3:33pm
  - rouppe
    
    Well we recently discovered that Wellington Water was paying three times the price of anywhere else to repair basic water leaks.
    
    So I wouldn’t just assume that whoever made this quote knows what they’re talking about.
    
    In addition, all we’ve heard about that bridge is that it’s “earthquake prone”. A basic bridge, 4 or 5m up, that has already stood through plenty of earthquakes. No one lives under it. What is the actual risk?
    
    7 3
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    May 1, 2025 3:17pm
    - Ghost
      
      All you’ve heard about this bridge is it is earthquake prone? The article doesn’t even mention earthquakes, neither do the council
      
      Riddiford’s Bridge on Te Awaiti Rd was built in 1948 and had developed large cracks running almost the entire height of the western pier.
      
      And you wonder what is the risk……
      
      https://swdc.govt.nz/wp-content/uploads/713057.005-ME-20231214-Bridge-94-inspection-1.pdf
      
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      May 1, 2025 3:43pm
Jack5

The art of bluffing …

Trump and Ukraine have agreed on a deal giving the US access to Ukraine’s minerals, but without Trump’s demand that the US be allowed to recoup billions of dollars of military aid.

Ukraine’s minerals include lithium and “rare earths,” uranium, and manganese.

Ukraine’s geology — the “Ukrainian shield”.

https://modernsciences.org/ukraine-minerals-geopolitics-critical-resources-march-2025/
5 0
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May 1, 2025 1:27pm
- Northshoredoc
  
  Let’s hope it’s a win/win for Ukraine and the USA.
  
  More importantly let’s hope that it encourages Tzar Putin to the table for a lasting ceasefire.
  
  7 2
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  May 1, 2025 2:04pm
  - MH
    
    Trump, or Putin,, Which one is a.k.a Benedict Arnold ?
    
    1 1
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    May 1, 2025 4:59pm
- Master Mariner
  
  Interesting, Where is the Study ? Not mentioned or referenced too.
  Trumps mineral deal included ” Oil and Gas” and I believe the Rare Earths was a “curve Ball”.
  The real deal and end game is control of Oil/Gas and Pipelines in Ukraine.
  The last Geological study was done 30 yrs ago by the US and mentions EU study. Where is this EU study ?
  
  4 0
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  May 1, 2025 6:07pm
  - Master Mariner
    
    “This includes minerals deposits, oil, natural gas, and other relevant infrastructure, but, notably, it does not include resources that are already serving as a revenue source to Ukraine, such as the operations of Naftogaz and Ukrnafta, Ukraine’s largest oil and gas producers. This means, the profitability of the fund is entirely dependent on the success of new investments in Ukraine’s resources.”
    https://www.csis.org/analysis/breaking-down-us-ukraine-minerals-deal
    Ukraine and EU were on the Cusp of looking at developing Offshore Oil and Gas, Then Russia invaded a week after a joint announcement.
    This I believe was the catalyst for the invasion of Ukraine.
    And,
    “Contributions to the fund will be reinvested into projects in Ukraine to further develop assets including mineral deposits, oil, natural gas, infrastructure, and ports.”
    Critical , Rare minerals / Earths are just a smoke screen, The real control is Oil/Gas and pipelines and always has been from Day 1.
    
    2 1
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    May 1, 2025 6:30pm
  - Master Mariner
    
    “According to the former director general of the Ukrainian Geological Survey, there is no modern assessment of rare earth reserves in Ukraine. Existing mapping was done 30–60 years ago by the Soviet Union and relies on old exploration methods.”
    
    Referenced to the link above.
    
    1 1
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    May 1, 2025 6:31pm
greybeard

https://www.stuff.co.nz/home-property/360672474/wild-weather-heres-how-make-your-home-safe

But obviously the FIRST thing you must do is log onto “Stuff” so you can read these pearls of wisdom.
Pity all of those who do not, as they are lost souls.
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May 1, 2025 2:56pm
Jack5

Can you educate a nation of budget wizards without skilling them first in basic maths?

Presumably, the idea’s that calculators and smart phones will take care of the detail.

“Financial literacy” will be taught in New Zealand schools next year. Kids will be taught about banking, budgeting, interest rates, and tax.

“We will be including financial education, right from year one, all the way to year 10,” said Erica Stanford, Education Minister.

Interest rates, tax, and investment will be for older kids.

Have we forgotten about the campaign to lift over-all teaching standards? Can you have financial literacy for kids who can’t add up?

Beside Erica Stanford at the announcement, Finance Minister Nicola Willis talked of “financial literacy.”

Making kids financially ~~literate~~ numerate:

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360672103/financial-literacy-be-taught-schools-next-year
4 1
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May 1, 2025 4:05pm
- Ian Boag
  
  Maths is not just arithmetic.
  
  When was the last time you added a list of 20 3-digit numbers by hand – or did a long division – or multiplied two three-digit numbers – by hand?
  
  Maths proficiency involves knowing when to use which operations to solve a problem eg if 21.6 metres of carpet costs $1119+15% GST what will 17.5 metres cost if you have access to a 6% discount from the normal price …. ?
  
  Solving this involves some specific arithmetic operations.
  
  Would you expect a kid to be able to solve that with just a pencil and paper? Could you?
  
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  May 1, 2025 4:43pm
  - rangitoto
    
    Yes.
    
    5 0
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    May 1, 2025 5:22pm
  - Jack5
    
    Agreed arithmetic’s slower by hand, but not outlandish for kids in an age of value-added tax like GST.
    
    I seem to recall, Ian Boag, that you’re a former electric-engineering academic, and are used to intricate maths, but surely someone wouldn’t sell carpet in units of less than a metre. Except for gold-threaded stuff.
    
    I’d write off the cents in your example and round off the the carpet piece for $1042 including GST.
    
    – (($1119 divided by 21.6) x 17.5) x 1.15
    
    Right or wrong, I think arithmetic by pencil and paper creates a sort of instinct or feel for figure operations. Bit like when you’re learning a language if you use cursive (hand writing) for noting new words.
    
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    May 1, 2025 5:31pm
    - Ian Boag
      
      (($1119 divided by 21.6) x 17.5) x 1.15
      
      Math proficiency is knowing that what you have written is the appropriate sequence of operations. If you can get that right then you might as well use the calculator on your phone ….
      
      I did some year 8 math mentoring a few years ago. You tell the kid something is $2/metre and how much is 3 metres? He looks at you and says “$6” as if it’s a dumb question. Ask how he got that answer and he says “well it is, isn’t it?”. So try 3.5 metres at $2.75/metre and get a blank look – “multiplication” is not thought of ….
      
      Would you really do 1119/21.6 longhand if the answer mattered?
      
      Myself I would do the whole thing in a scratch Excel sheet 🙂
      
      (Chemical engineer and applied statistician) …
      
      2 2
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      May 1, 2025 5:53pm
    - Master Mariner
      
      Well documented and plenty of case studies prove without a doubt Writing things down improves memory and retention.
      Hence my wee rant about giving 6 year olds Chrome books in school so they can do maths “Puzzles”.
      
      4 1
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      May 1, 2025 6:35pm
      - Ian Boag
        
        My point is that maths proficiency involves knowing what operations to do in what sequence, not so much the arithmetic manipulations.
        
        The year 8 kids I was mentoring had Chromebooks provided by the school. I was pretty impressed by what the kids did with them. Chromebooks are relatively dumb and can’t do zippy games ….
        
        2 1
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        May 1, 2025 6:47pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  It’s not the kids I’m worried about. It’s the innumerate teachers that concern me.
  
  Garbage in, garbage out.
  
  2 1
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  May 1, 2025 7:00pm
RRM

Chloe Swarbrick talking to HDPA on ZB this evening.

How they will fund the 40,000 “green jobs”:

1. The top 300 income earners pay half as much tax as they should, that’s where the money will come from.

2. It’s crazy that we pay private companies a profit margin to build our infrastructure, we need to go back to having a Ministry of Works.

It’s mind-blowing.
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May 1, 2025 5:45pm
- Ghost
  
  Maybe we should look at getting some sort of ministry of works back. A few weeks ago there were repairs to some of our roads. Today three of those areas have been cordoned off with road cones because of the massive pot holes that formed. About two months ago work was done relaying the road going onto our two bridges. The potholes have already started to form again.
  
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  May 1, 2025 6:03pm
- NothingLeft
  
  In reality if we dropped the tax on the top 300 earners (or just had an upper limit on total tax like some other countries) we would increase tax revenue over next 5 years by bringing in more high net worth individuals to live in NZ – who would spend lots, create businesses and employ lots of people.
  
  5 3
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  May 1, 2025 6:05pm
  - Ian Boag
    
    upper limit on total tax like some other countries …. bringing in more high net worth individuals … create businesses and employ lots …
    
    Laudable stuff. Can you point us at one or two of these other countries where all this good stuff has happened?
    
    2 3
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    May 1, 2025 6:21pm
Sparrow

Yesterday I raised concerns about Ministers of Finance from both sides of politics. Today its the Ministers of Health. Just watched TV1 news yes I know I should not but I did, yes I realise they are biased, but having said that their report of the Doctors strike was neutral. The doctors and nurses came across very well caring, committed but highly frustrated. Yes the previous lot were useless and f..up the system. However this government is in the firing line and another inappropriate Minister came across as a little weasel. I checked him out. Opposed to abortion supported the reversal of abortion in the USA very conservative on moral issues thus another who is out of step with most kiwis. The Health system is probably the second most important issue for kiwis after the price at the supermarket. If the Nats don’t sort this out, they will be out on their arses next year. Christ how do these people get into parliament oh yes. The Affluent Pathway to Parliament. Thanks Bryce
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May 1, 2025 6:40pm
- Ghost
  
  do tell us how his views on abortion have interfered with his job as minister. He has been in the job for 3 months, give him a chance. Health is a mess and won’t be fixed over night, it’s going to take a lot of work and time to fix
  
  5 3
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  May 1, 2025 6:52pm
  - Sparrow
    
    Hi Ghost, I never suggested his views on abortion impacted his role as a Minister. However I believe its important that the general public are aware of the beliefs of people in the public arena especially persons such as Ministers they give up some of their privacy when they enter that ring. I do not have any stats to support my view that it would be unusual outside of the USA for a Minister of Health in liberal democracies to hold those views. Thus the general public should be aware of them, that’s all I am saying. They can make up their own minds.
    
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    May 1, 2025 7:59pm
    - Ghost
      
      His beliefs are of no importance. It has in no way impacted his ability to do the job. He has in no way changed peoples access to abortion. This is just throwing out mud, hoping it will stick. This is labour tactics. The general public don’t care about this type of dirty politics.
      
      7 1
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      May 1, 2025 8:16pm

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PO Box 12270, Thorndon, Wellington 6144

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