General Debate 26 August 2026

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Ghost

Rape should never be a home detention. This shit has to stop. The sentencing act needs to be fixed

A young sex offender granted Corrections Department permission to leave his home detention address for six hours, used the time to rape a 16-year-old girl, the Timaru District Court heard on Friday.

The now 27-year-old Timaru man, who was added to the Sex Offenders’ Registry in July 2022 for offending that included two charges of sexual connection with a young person aged 12-16 years, was sentenced to 11 months home detention by Judge Dominic Dravitzki.

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August 26, 2026 8:02am
- David Garrett
  
  Ghost: Home D for rape…an offence that carries a maximum penalty of 20 years. This judge is a fucking disgrace.
  
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  August 26, 2026 8:45am
- lastmanstanding
  
  It never ceases to amuse me how rich pricks like the guy backing Opportunity want to pull up the ladder and stop anyone else doing what they have done. Like make millions out of property and then tax the hell out of anyone wanting to do the same.
  
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  August 26, 2026 9:04am
Yvette

The Maori Party and ancestral wisdom?

If a party receives more party votes than seats, they get list members to bring their total closer to their party vote. Voting in Parliament is usually by the number of MPs, including electorate and list MPs.

Overhang seats are for when electorate voters must be represented even if the party doesn’t win enough seats.

The Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Act 2018 aims to enhance public confidence in the electoral system and maintain party vote proportionality in Parliament.

While no other statute explicitly states this purpose, it’s embedded in several areas of New Zealand law and parliamentary procedure:

Electoral Act 1993 (Sections 191–193): These sections calculate and distribute list seats using the Sainte-Laguë allocation formula.

Standing Orders of the House of Representatives: Internal parliamentary Standing Orders enforce party-vote proportionality during daily operations, including proportional seat allocation on select committees, question time, and speaking order calls.

Laws surrounding MMP referendums, like the Electoral Referendum Bill 2010, legally define the mixed-member system by ensuring total party representation matches the popular party vote through party list seats.

Overhang seats are an anomaly to accomodate certain circumstances.
A question may be: Is it moral to purposely set out in an Election campaign to create the circumstance which givens a party more representation that their party votes warrants?

John Tamihere, President of Te Pāti Māori, has frequently stated that the party is a “tikanga-based movement“. He emphasises that the party’s internal processes and general philosophy are grounded in ancestral intelligence and traditional Māori values rather than Western political norms

Tamihere emphasised that Te Pāti Māori is a tikanga-based movement guided by ancestral wisdom. “There is a tikanga-based solution to every problem in the Māori world,” he said. “Our ancestral intelligence gives us the opportunity to work through issues in a way that doesn’t look for heads on platters – that’s Pākehātanga.”
https://www.facebook.com/waateanews/posts/te-pāti-māori-focuses-on-tikanga-response-after-kapa-kingi-allegationste-pāti-mā/1402732648520115/

Without it being set out in a form that is explicit and unified and able to be studied, it is desired by some (Supreme Court being one) that tikanga becomes part of New Zealand law.
The greatest argument against that at the moment is John Tamihere’s demonstration of what the Maori Party exhibits as tikanga.
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August 26, 2026 8:02am
- Nigel Kearney
  
  Yes, it is moral. The rules of an electoral system are a completely artificial construct, like the rules of chess. You may as well complain about the morality of a knight jumping over another piece. Anything permitted by the rules is also moral.
  
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  August 26, 2026 8:32am
  - Yvette
    
    Nigel, last time I played chess, about sixty years ago, it would have been immoral to purposely call Checkmate when none of my opponents pieces were in check.
    
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    August 26, 2026 8:45am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      I play chess and you lost me. 🙂
      
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      August 26, 2026 8:50am
- Benedict Yu
  
  “There is a tikanga-based solution to every problem in the Māori world,”
  
  I find this irritating. Firstly, if that is the case why were rival tribes fighting and killing each other?
  
  Secondly, the “Maori world” was largely based on mysticism. Sadly it still is. Mysticism does not solve problems. It just gives false comfort to its adherents.
  
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  August 26, 2026 8:49am
mandk

Rest in Peace, Dolly.

She will always be loved.
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August 26, 2026 8:06am
- Tauhei Notts
  
  Many years ago I heard a raconteur on radio pose the question;
  “Did you hear about the Irish mosquito?
  It bit Dolly Parton on the elbow.”
  
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  August 26, 2026 8:50am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Lost me.
    
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    August 26, 2026 9:11am
artemisia

China’s future workforce. And New Zealand’s. We may have an edge in some repetitive function hort robotics, for now, but China and much of the rest of the world will surely be fast followers. Our economy and our people are not ready.

The BBC has visited industrial sites where we have been shown robots that do not look human, or dance or leap on stage but weld, paint, lift, assemble and work around the clock without a break or benefits.

China is not doing softly softly.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c62m4zn1q6mo
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August 26, 2026 8:06am
- rouppe
  
  I read that yesterday as well. Yes, China is galloping ahead in robotic automation.
  
  I’m more concerned about the robot games, as events such as this were originally spectacles of strength and combat skills.
  
  We’re currently amazed at the drone technology used in the Ukraine/Russia war. Imagine 10,000 robots walking onto the shores of Taiwan with another 10,000 every month until “unification” is achieved.
  
  Incidentally I saw a piece on the TV recently about a NZ based plastic extrusion company using similar technology, with (young) operators using “gaming skills” to operate them.
  
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  August 26, 2026 8:21am
  - cmm (semi-retired edition)
    
    The robotic games stuff is moronic nonsense for the technically illiterate.
    It helps pump the public perception and it helps pump share prices, but that is all.
    
    Real robots don’t do kung fu moves or run around race tracks. They don’t look like people. They look like washing machines, cars and wending machinery.
    
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    August 26, 2026 8:56am
Colville

Two and a half hours of restarting the TV to try to get Sky Sport working… Sky saying its fixed an hour ago… utter useless pricks!

Public flogging is too good for some crimes!
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August 26, 2026 8:06am
- rouppe
  
  It’s OK. I’m going to watch the replay on tv3 at 9am
  
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  August 26, 2026 8:35am
- MCōs
  
  I leapt out of bed at 5am and watched a makeshift AB team stagger home to beat the Lions and just as that finished a news flash came up on the NYT ticker that Dolly Parton had died
  https://x.com/FranMallon1/status/2092318887358402839/video/1?s=61
  
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  August 26, 2026 9:02am
Tomtoddy

Farming is our ‘thing’. It is the solid backbone of our economy, has seen us through multiple crisis and is increasing its contribution year on year.

The reality is that farming is under attack. The attacks are growing in number and intensity. It is happening internationally and here at home. It may not be all that evident yet and complacency is a problem both at farmer and government level.

Environmental regulations, fines, changing rules, new costs are increasing rapidly. Some are needed, most are overkill, and merely jobs for the boys or engineered by ignorant bureaucrats full of their importance. There is a gathering momentum around slaughtering cows because of methane emissions. NZ is spending over a billion dollars on mitigation and has achieved almost no useful result. What is likely will cost farmers in money, time and safety for no measurable difference.

Restrictions around water use have gone from necessary to absurd. Councils are now applying rules that are hugely expensive but deliver little or no good. Health officials with not enough to do are hammering our products with little science to their claims.

Welfare issues are mounting and will be the bane of farming in the next decade. Some extremists are plainly stark crazy but it is the more normal centre punter who is letting the crazies determine outcomes.

Farmers need to fight back or lose the battle.
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August 26, 2026 8:14am
Yvette

Tania Waikato
Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi, Green candidate Tania Waikato and Labour’s Toni Boynton can all trace their whakapapa back to some of the same tūpuna.
With the Māori electorates poised to make an outsized difference in the election, one of the three will be the voice of their people in Parliament – an undertaking none of them see as a particularly pleasant experience, given the building’s tendency for spiritual corruption.
https://newsroom.co.nz/2026/08/25/three-waiariki-relatives-prepare-to-wade-into-parliaments-spiritual-swamp/?

Check Waikato’s support of He Puapua

Waikato points to one high-profile example: New Zealand First’s head provocateur, Shane Jones. “He was an activist in the 1970s alongside some of our most ardent supporters of te ao Māori, and look where he is now,” she says. Jones’ coalition Government introduced the Treaty Principles Bill, which sought to redefine how New Zealand regarded the foundational document. Though Jones didn’t support it, some saw his involvement as a betrayal of te ao Māori.

An explanation how Shane Jones is a traitor to Maori in that his “coalition-Government introduced the Treaty Principles Bill, which sought to redefine how New Zealand regarded the foundational document”, and how Tania Waikato et al in supporting He Puapua don’t “seek to redefine how New Zealand regarded the foundational document”, would be welcome.
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August 26, 2026 8:40am
Raphael

I don’t know why National is insisting on pushing ahead with the U16 Social Media ban when it is right before the election, and it is extremely apparent that a significant majority of their base is against it.

As a parent, I see the evils of that Social Media can inflict on our children, but at the same time, those decisions belong with parents, not the government.

Add to that that most of us see it as a Trojan horse for Digital ID, which I have yet to find anyone who wants; it seems like a way to alienate people you want to vote for you.
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August 26, 2026 8:42am
Maggy Wassilieff

Our local marae is prominently displaying about half a dozen large billboards supporting the local Te Pati Maori candidate.

TPM must be so grateful that the general public keeps propping up venues for their political posturing.
(This particular marae received $3.4 Million in 2018 for upgrades)
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August 26, 2026 8:59am
RoboRob

Yesterday in respect to the 16 social media ban I said….

‘Also Labour, will support the concept but not allow the bill to pass. They will have enough ‘questions’ to drag the process out. Even thought they are likely 100% behind the bill (it is a very left wing policy), the last thing they want is it to pass before the election. That would politically benefit National and as we know its all about politics, not what it best for New Zealanders.’

Well that didn’t age well and Labour certainly proved me wrong with their pledge to support it to select committee. It was a political master class move. Labour, a party who had not bothered to even come up with a policy, now looks like a party that supports the ban, National look stupid as they admit they wont bring it to select committee because there is not enough time. This makes Nationals policy look like virtue signalling.
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August 26, 2026 9:10am

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