Scoop has announced:

Scoop Media Ltd. regrets that an investment from Sublime Group in Scoop Media Limited will not proceed at this time.

On Monday 24 February operational control of Scoop Independent News returned to the Scoop Media Limited shareholders.

The team running Scoop has now returned to normal, Scoop Co-Founder Alastair Thompson has returned to Scoop as Publisher and Editor, Gordon Campbell continues on as Political Editor & Werewolf Editor and Lyndon Hood remains News Editor.

Scoop co-founder Alastair Thompson said today:

“Scoop Media Limited’s shareholders regret that the investment proposition which we had been working on for the past year has been unable to proceed at this time.

In one sense this is back to the future, with it being back to the status quo of six months ago.

I’m unsure what is happening to Newsroom, that the Pelletts purchased to effectively merge in with Scoop. It was purchased off NZX. Is it now owned by Scoop, going to be managed by Sublime, or close down?

The Dom Post reports:

Faster, bigger buses have been officially chosen as the future of public transport in Wellington, snuffing out any chance of having light rail in the capital for the foreseeable future.

The Regional Transport Committee – a collective of Wellington’s mayors and the NZ Transport Agency – voted today to push ahead with plans to build a $268 million bus rapid transit network between the Wellington CBD and southern suburbs.

Detailed plans are yet to be drawn up, but it will involve hi-tech articulated or double-decker buses running along a dedicated busway between Wellington Railway Station and the suburbs of Newtown and Kilbirnie.

The route forms the southern part of Wellington’s public transport “spine”.

Today’s decision brings down the curtain on the Wellington Public Transport Spine Study, which began in 2011.

The Wellington city and regional councils jointly-commissioned the study along with the transport agency to find the best solution to Wellington’s public transport needs for the next 30 years.

It began by looking at 88 combinations of routes and types of public transport, which were effectively whittled down to light rail and a bus rapid transit network in June 2013.

At that point, the study revealed light rail could cost as much as $1.2 billion, largely because of the need to build a dedicated rail tunnel through Mt Victoria.

$268 million vs $1.2 billion makes it a very easy decision.

Wellington mayor Celia Wade-Brown, who was first elected in 2010 on the back of campaign promises to push for light rail, said today she had also been swayed by the ability of buses to go further than trams.

Good to see sense winning through.

Back in December David Cunliffe declared:

Labour leader David Cunliffe believes the party can win the Rangitata electorate in 2014.

He said draft boundary changes, which give parts of Rakaia to Selwyn, mean the seat is “anybody’s game”. In the last election Labour polled well in Timaru but National was stronger in the Ashburton district.

Mr Cunliffe, in South Canterbury to rouse the party faithful in Temuka, believes Labour can win Ashburton this time.

“Geraldine’s coming back in, we’ll have Point, we’ll have Temuka; I think we can win this seat.”

Labour’s win of Christchurch East showed what was possible in the next election. Membership of the Labour Party had nearly doubled this year. On December 1 membership was up 85 per on January 1.

“I’ve never seen anything like it. We are up 50 per cent since the leadership race started three or four months ago. People know Labour’s on the rise.”

So the Labour Party Leader thinks they can win Rangitata, even if humble outsiders like me are sceptical.

So how many Labour Party members have come forward to be the candidate for this seat which their Leader has declared they can win.

Well Matthew Littlewood reports at Stuff:

The Labour Party is still without a candidate for the Rangitata electorate for this year’s general election.

A party spokesman said it had extended the deadline for another month after it did not receive any applications before the February 28 cut-off date.

They couldn’t find a single party member who believed the Leader’s claim it was winnable.

3 News reports:

This really is appalling. It is unclear how much fault lies with KiwiRail, but shouldn’t testing have been done, rather than rely on assurances? And I hope the contract is watertight so the manufacturers are liable for all costs, including business interruption.

It does also raise the question about whether the Chinese company was the right supplier. What was their track record?

Questions for Oral Answer.

Questions to Ministers 2.00-3.00PM.

1. TRACEY MARTIN to the Minister responsible for Novopay:Does he stand by his statement of 11 February 2014, “education payroll is the most complex in New Zealand and more work remains to be done to simplify the business processes to ensure it runs as smoothly as possible each year”?
2. Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE to the Prime Minister: Does he stand by his statement that “the true builders of that future are the millions of New Zealanders working in the homes, the businesses, the industries of our country”?
3. MAGGIE BARRY to the Minister of Finance: What progress is the Government making with its share offer programme, which is freeing up money for reinvestment in new public assets without having to increase Government debt?
4. ANDREW LITTLE to the Attorney-General: Will he release all correspondence between the Christchurch Crown Solicitor or any other solicitor acting for the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, and counsel for Peter Whittall on the decision not to proceed with the prosecution of Mr Whittall under the Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992 relating to conditions at the Pike River Mine that lead to the deaths of 29 miners; if not, why not?
5. KEVIN HAGUE to the Minister of Health: When were Ministry of Health officials first informed that the dispute between the Southern District Health Board and South Link Health involved allegations of the misuse of public funding, and when were they first informed that this alleged misuse was suspected to involve elements that could be fraud?
6. Dr CAM CALDER to the Minister for Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment: What announcements has the Government made on the Tertiary Education Strategy for New Zealand?
7. Hon RUTH DYSON to the Minister responsible for the Earthquake Commission: Does he stand by his statement made yesterday in the House with regard to Canterbury Labour Members of Parliament that they “have made no more than five requests for assistance through the Earthquake Commission”; if not, when will he be correcting his statement and apologising?
8. MARK MITCHELL to the Minister for Communications and Information Technology: How is the Government’s Information and Communication Technology programme improving New Zealanders’ access to improved technology and better connectivity?
9. GRANT ROBERTSON to the Minister of Justice: On what date did she receive an invitation to visit the Shanghai office of Oravida Ltd during her Ministerial visit to China in October 2013, and what actions did she take to ensure this visit met her obligations under the Cabinet Manual?
10. CATHERINE DELAHUNTY to the Associate Minister of Education: Did the communities in Christchurch, Auckland and Queenstown, where four schools are to be built using a public-private partnership (PPP) model, ask the Government for private sector management of their school buildings?
11. PAUL FOSTER-BELL to the Minister of Health: What investment is the Government making in improving nutrition and exercise for pre-schoolers?
12. JOANNE HAYES to the Minister of Corrections: What steps has the Government taken to improve access to alcohol and drug treatment for prisoners?

Today Labour are asking three questions. These are about the economy, CERA, and Judith Collin’s obligations under the Cabinet Manual. The Greens have two questions, one of potential fraud in the health sector and the other on Public-Private Partnerships to build new schools. New Zealand First are asking about Novopay and, Pike River.

Patsy of the day goes to Paul Foster-Bell for Question 11: What investment is the Government making in improving nutrition and exercise for pre-schoolers?

General Debate 3.00PM -4.00PM

An entertaining and informative debate consisting of 12 speeches of no more than 5 minutes each.

Government Bills 4.00PM-6.00Pm – 7.30PM-10.00PM.

1. Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill -First Reading

2. Environmental Reporting Bill– First Reading

3. Energy (Fuels, Levies, and References) Amendment Bill– First Reading

The Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill is being introduced by the Minister for Building and Construction, Maurice Williamson. This bill amends the Building Act 2004 to improve the system for managing earthquake-prone buildings.

The Environmental Reporting Bill is being introduced by the Minister for the Environment, Amy Adams. The purpose of this Bill is to create a national-level environmental reporting system to ensure that reporting on the environment occurs on a regular basis and can be trusted.

The Energy (Fuels, Levies, and References) Amendment Bill is being introduced by the Minister for Energy and Resources, Simon Bridges. The objective of this Bill is to allow for the costs of meeting New Zealand’s oil stockholding treaty obligation under the Agreement on an International Energy Program to be met through a levy on fuel.

John Drinnan at NZ Herald reports:

Labour has extended the deadline for selection of the candidate for Tamaki Makaurau electorate to allow for Television New Zealand inquiry into Labour Party activism at the TVNZ Maori and Pacific unit.

This is a clear indication that their head office is holding the seat open for Taurima. The appropriate response would be to declare that as Taurima showed such appallingly bad judgement that he thought it was okay to run a Labour Party branch from within TVNZ, that they don’t think he has the judgement to be a candidate. Instead they delay the nominations to benefit him, which obviously reflects their view that the only thing he did wrong was to get caught.

The selection period could be extended further of the inquiry was not complete by March 28, Barnett said.

However long he needs, they’ll comply.

NBR reports:

This morning, a strategy document written by Labour associate information and communications technology (ICT) spokesperson Clare Curran was accidentally sent to ICT Minister Amy Adams’ Office, Ms Curran says (though not by her specifically).

That’s the second time they have done that, it seems. Taking open data to a new level!

The document is here.

Stuff reports:

Telecom is bristling at the suggestion Labour could impose a “content levy” on internet providers.

Labour was left red-faced today after MP Clare Curran’s ideas on ICT policy were accidentally emailed to her National Party counterpart, Communications Minister Amy Adams.

These include imposing a revenue-based levy on telecommunications carriers to create a contestable fund to support the “creation and accessible distribution of New Zealand digital content”.

This is a tax on telcos and ISPs. That is effectively a tax on Internet users, as it would be passed on. So Labour is thinking of taxing people to use the Internet, and give the money to “content producers”.

One might wonder if it would be used to help fund programmes by broadcasting Icons like Brendan Horan, Tamati Coffey, Shane Taurima, Martin Bradbury, Fran Mold, Kris Faafoi and Matt McCarten!

The Herald further reports:

The minister said she only had a brief look at the documents but it appeared that Labour’s main idea was to start all their policies with the word Kiwi.

Ms Curran’s document outlined plans for policies called KiwiMap, KiwiCode, KiwiCall, KiwiCap, KiwiCloud and Kiwis Come Home.

Maybe they could call their levy plan, KiwiTax!

What is even more interesting is where all these policy ideas came from. I understand that they are very similiar to policies that will be announced by the Internet/DotCom Party and that they may have been discussed between Dotcom and Curran. The purpose being to have policy alignment between the parties, so they could be endorsed when he winds his party up just before the election and asks his supporters to vote for whichever parties he endorses.

So a simple question is whether these policy ideas were ever discussed with Kim Dotcom, and what input has he had into them.

UPDATE: Vodafone also is against Labour’s idea to tax us all more through our ISPs:

Vodafone chief executive Russell Stanners described the proposed levy as “crazy and outrageous”.

“Labour should go the whole hog and nationalise everything,” he said. “The document also says multiple networks are wasteful. Why don’t we go for one network, one TV company, one bank, so there is no wastage, and then you can have as many levies as you want.”

I am worried that Labour may take up Stanners ironic suggestion and adopt it as serious policy.

UPDATE2: Clare Curran has been unfairly maligned as responsible for the accidental e-mail leak. She silently took one for the team, but it has been revealed it was actually a staff member in David Cunliffe’s office who sent it out. It seems it was Irish Bill, so that is not a good week for The Standard with one blogger sending Labour party policies to National and the other being the genius behind Cunliffe’s secret trust!

The Herald reports:

Aspiring teachers should be trained mostly at schools instead of university to help get the best and brightest in front of classrooms, a report argues.

The push for “training schools” comes in the first year of a groundbreaking scheme by one Auckland school in which aspiring teachers complete their training in school and as members of staff.

A report released today by the NZ Initiative think-tank and co-authored by former Auckland Grammar School headmaster John Morris argues more options are needed for those interested in teaching.

Teachers are the single biggest influence on student achievement in schools, theTeaching Stars: Transforming the Education Profession report states.

One way to improve the profession should be the option to train teachers in schools, which would have top schools accredited as training schools where teacher qualifications could be offered in conjunction with a university.

Sounds an excellent idea to me.

John Morris is the co-author of a NZ Initiative report on teaching quality with Rose Patterson, which argues the case for performance-related pay. The report, published today, proposes a performance-related pay system in which teachers would need to apply to ascend levels on a pay scale, moving up when certain standards were met.

You mean like almost every other job does. I find the idea of automatic progression up any scale as ludicrous when it is for a professional role. Think if we paid MPs more for the length of time they have been in Parliament!

Mr Morris said the standards would not be based on student achievement data but on factors such as contribution to the school as a whole. He said the Education Council of Aotearoa NZ (Educanz), which will replace the Teachers Council, was a strong candidate to articulate such standards.

Mr Morris is the chairman of the transition board overseeing the establishment of Educanz, and his comments have infuriated the PPTA union, who strongly oppose the proposed pay overhaul.

President Angela Roberts said she had written to Education Minister Hekia Parata calling for Mr Morris’ resignation from the board.

Ms Parata said Mr Morris was well-respected and one of 11 people on the transition board. “I am confident that any potential conflicts of interest can be managed,” she said.

Rather than attack Morris, I’d rather hear from the PPTA why they think progression should be automatic, and have their input into what factors should progression up the pay scale be based on if it is not automatic.

The Greens have announced:

The Green Party has launched an appeal to cover the costs of defamation action being taken against the party by Conservative Party leader Colin Craig.

Or is it!

The fine print:

You should know that any funds not used in the court case will go towards the Green Party’s work to create a smarter, cleaner, more compassionate New Zealand for all of us.

So actually it is a plea for campaign funds. You see it is highly likely that the Greens will use the taxpayer funded leader’s budget to cover Norman’s legal costs. They have every right to do that, but don’t be surprised if they use that fund to cover most of the costs, and then pocket all the donations for their election campaign.

On Facebook, a Green party member, Alan Bell, comments:

Totally misguided and somewhat deceitful. Nothing to do with free speech. Russel could well have spoken about Green policy without referring to Craig. Does the Green party so underestimate our intelligence as to infer we are unable to evaluate Craig for ourselves? Do the Greens plan to repeal the Defamation Act? Will the Greens introduce policy that means access to the courts is available to all rather than only the wealthy? Russel made his bed and should lie in it – his political stunt backfired. As a paid up member of the Green party I expect my representatives to stand up for the rights of all NZers including women and homosexuals and respect my ability to gauge for myself the policies of other parties. Craig has a right to defend himself against defamation – I despise the man and hope his case falls over. But I also think positing this as a defence of free speech and LGBT and womens’ rights is a load of bollocks and a stain on the integrity of the party. MPs are are on far more than “middle income” (as Cunliffe should know) so you lot can pay for it.

Another person, Graham Hooper comments:

Rusell could have made a speech defending the rights of Women and Gay people without mentioning Colin Craig. Why give the Guy any News coverage? You MPs get a Good pay. if You feel that you should waste money on Paying Lawyers then your Choice but there is an election coming up why not just say sorry and put the money towards an election

So sounds like some unrest with members and supporters.

Hat Tip: Pete Goerge

Stuff reports:

The Anglican church says a British multimillionaire’s suggestion that it hand over Christ Church Cathedral for restoration is “completely bizarre”.

UK businessman Hamish Ogston yesterday announced he would fund an independent survey to find out what residents wanted to see happen to the ill-fated Cathedral Square centrepiece.

I’ve got a better idea. Why doesn’t Mr Ogston fund an independent survey to find out what residents think he should do with his money and property.

The media announcement took place at the Christchurch City Council building alongside former MPs and co-chairmen of the Great Christchurch Buildings Trust (GCBT), Jim Anderton and Philip Burdon, and Christchurch Mayor Lianne Dalziel.

I don’t expect Anderton or Dalziel to understand what private property rights are. I’m disappointed that Burdon doesn’t seem to either. It is not their bloody cathedral. It is the Anglican Church’s.

Spokesman for the Anglican Diocese Jayson Rhodes told The Press Bishop Victoria Matthews was “astounded” when she heard about Ogston’s proposal through the media. “There was no information, no invitation to the announcement – there was nothing,” he said.

“It’s just completely bizarre and we feel like the odd one out at kindergarten when everyone else has been invited to a party except us.”

Incredible.

Dalziel said she liked the idea of “asking what people want for the heart of their city”.

“If the people of Christchurch send a strong message, it will help the conversation.”

No it won’t. Asking people about what a private owner should do is not helpful, but gross interference. It is even less helpful when the decision has been made, after the Church itself ran its own consultation exercise.

Vernon Small writes at Stuff:

Three months and three gaffes.

It is an understatement to say it has not been the greatest start to election year for Labour leader David Cunliffe.

The slip over the baby bonus, by failing to disclose in his speech that it would not be paid on top of parental leave, took much of the wind out of his January sails.

It also deflected attention from a $500 million spending pledge that Labour had hoped would set the agenda.

No sooner was the House back in February than the $2.5m property-owning man was attacking Prime Minister John Key for living in a leafy suburb and defining his own mansion as a doer-upper and his own situation as middle of the road.

The climb-down came at the weekend.

This morning he has admitted it had been wrong to set up a trust for donations to his leadership bid. (If the cost was about $20,000 for his leadership campaign, why seek donations at all?)

That from a man and a party that has attacked National’s old habit of funneling donations through entities like the Waitemata Trust and joined in the condemnation of Finance Minister Bill English using a trust structure for his Wellington pile.

Cue, too, unwelcome echoes of former Labour leader David Shearer’s memory lapse over his undeclared United States bank account.

One gaffe might be unfortunate, two careless.

Three in three months is bordering on accident-prone.

Making Shearer look like a safe pair of hands.

Kiwi Poll Guy looks at what has been happening on iPredict:

iPredict is running a contract on National winning the 2014 election.  It was originally launched on 26 October 2011, a month before the 2011 General Election, and has been floating around between $0.40 and $0.60 since then.  It’s only in the last month that the stock has moved significantly beyond $0.60, so it’s worth taking a quick look.  Full trade history is taken from Luke Howison’s excellent API interface for iPredict, and then tweaked with a bit of Excel.

As shown in the graph below, the increase in price since has been pretty constant since it was trading at about $0.45 in October 2013, about a month or so after David Cunliffe was elected leader of the Labour Party.  The average daily price hasn’t dropped below $0.60 since 8 February 2014.

And last night was at 68.5%. In four months the probability of National winning the election has increased by over 20%. That is a huge movement, and while some of it is related to the economy and National’s improved performance, a fair bit must be about Labour not looking anywhere near ready to govern.

The Dom Post editorial:

David Cunliffe has made a hash of the donations issue. He was slow to admit that he used a trust to hide those who gave to his campaign for the Labour leadership.

He was slow to admit that this was problematic. Now he says he doesn’t think ”in hindsight” the trust ”fully represents the values” he wants to bring to the job of Labour leader.

These are awkward phrases which reveal a deeper conflict. The brutal truth is that hiding the donations inside a trust opens Mr Cunliffe to charges of hypocrisy. This is partly because he belonged to the Labour-led government which specifically outlawed the use of trusts to hide political donations. And hiding election donations is against basic principles of openness.

Now he has disclosed the names of three donors but not of others who he says required anonymity. You would think this kind of thing would have set off alarm bells for an aspiring Opposition leader. Hadn’t he heard the fuss caused by other ”anonymous political donations?”

This is what astonished me – that it never rang alarm bells for him, or any of his team. How could anyone in Labour think a secret trust was a good idea after they spent the last decade railing against them. Cunliffe and Presland had both railed against them personally. Either they’e incredibly stupid or their previous opposition to secret trusts was fake – they’re only against other people having one.

The Labour leader got into a similar pickle when he attacked Prime Minister John Key for living in a big house in a wealthy suburb. So does Mr Cunliffe, and once again the critics called him a hypocrite. It didn’t help that he then blustered about his house being a ”do-upper”, the worst house in the (very expensive) street.

This cuts no ice at all. Most voters see little difference between Mr Cunliffe’s $2.5m house in Herne Bay and John Key’s $10m house in Parnell. Both are by ordinary standards opulent homes owned by obviously wealthy people. Mr Cunliffe made an ass of himself by posing as the champion of the proletariat against the toff.

He needs to decide who he really is and what he stands for.

Here’s the trouble. If you need to “decide”, then it isn’t real.

TVNZ reported:

There are claims Justice Minister Judith Collins may have breached parliamentary rules around perceptions concerning conflict of interest.

Ms Collins visited the Shanghai offices of Kiwi fresh milk exporter Oravida when she travelled to China in her capacity as Justice Minister in October last year.

Her husband is a director in the company.

“I drop into a lot of New Zealand companies if they ask me to and I think it’s absolutely completely appropriate,” says Mrs Collins.

A photo taken during the visit was posted on Oravida’s webstie along with a Chinese quote saying “Mrs Collins personally tasted Oravdia’s products, giving her full endorsement of these products”.

The rule book governing cabinet ministers states no minister should endorse any product or service in any media.

“Well I certainly don’t endorse any products other than the fact that I always try and help New Zealand companies who are trying to export,” says Mrs Collins.

Ms Collins says she wasn’t aware of the comments on the website and would ask for them to be removed if they breach cabinet rules.

Collins is reported as saying she dropped in briefly on her way to the airport, and has done so for other NZ companies.

You do need to be careful if a family member is involved with a company, but her husband is a director, not a shareholder, and all she did was drink a glass of milk. I don’t think that is really an endorsement.

Mr Key says he is aware Mrs Collins visited Oravida and doesn’t believe her husband’s directorship creates a conflict.

“I don’t think it does preclude her from dropping in, there is no commercial value,” says Mr Key.

In the end the Cabinet Office will advise if there is an issue, but I don’t see anything wrong. Basically a Minister pops into a successful export company for half an hour or so, has a glass of milk, and they stick a photo up on their website. It is important that the company doesn’t try to make it look like an endorsement, but many many MPs attend business openings and promotions.

Oravida is listed as a donor to the National Party, which is the great thing about transparency with donations. But I don’t think anyone thinks you need to be a donor to have an MP drink a glass of milk. Ministers and MPs routinely do photo ops like this.

The Cato Institute is a libertarian free market think tank in the US that is very pro free trade.

However they have string reservations around the TPP, specifically the intellectual property chapter. The fact these come from normal champions of free trade agreements makes them harder to rebut.

They have a webinar on the TPP on Thursday morning for those interested.

The blurb is:

 Intellectual property has been a focus of U.S. trade policy for many decades, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations include an especially ambitious effort by the United States to strengthen international intellectual property laws. At the same time, however, there is serious debate within the United States over the proper scope and level of intellectual property protection. Is it in the interests of the United States to seek to harmonize intellectual property rules around the world, or is the U.S. position overly influenced by special interests hoping to export bad policy abroad and to lock it in at home? Come hear our panel of experts discuss why trade agreements cover intellectual property law, whose interests are served, and what, if anything, should be done about it.

Hopefully the NZ negotiators will maintain their position of opposition to the proposed US text for the intellectual property chapter.

Stuff reports:

MP Maggie Barry is labelling a Shore politician’s claims she is trying to remove him from office as “ridiculous”.

But Devonport-Takapuna Local Board member Grant Gillon says it’s no conspiracy theory.

Ms Barry, National MP for North Shore, had her bill to stop people serving on two or more Auckland local boards drawn from the member’s bill ballot.

Very sensible. You can’t be the MP for Wellington Central and say the MP for Mana. Your job is to represent one locality.

Among the few politicians this would affect is Mr Gillon who serves on both Devonport-Takapuna and Kaipatiki local boards.

Mr Gillon believes it’s motivated by his support for stopping housing at Bayswater Marina and opposition to closing Takapuna Beach Holiday Park to make way for a national sailing centre.

“There can be no other reason why the local MP considers removing me from office as the most important issue for the North Shore in an election year.”

He says the bill is poorly drafted and will force at least six costly by-elections across Auckland.

There is an SOP with the bill to clarify it is not retrospective. There will be no by-elections. The issue is whether politicians such as Gillon should be allowed to serve on two or more local boards concurrently.

Ms Barry says double dipping opens up the “real potential for conflicts of interest”.

“This has allowed local board power to be concentrated in the hands of a few people, many of whom don’t even live in the area they represent.”

The idea of local boards is that they are, well local.

A guest post by Kiwi in America:

The left are totally invested in big government. The power of the state is the mechanism that they use to bring about a just and equitable society. Their goal is to tax the productive sector as much as possible to pay for ever more costly social programmes that they hope will create equality and thus a fairer and happier society. When they run up against the reality that the owners of capital are intelligent and seek the best returns on their assets and that a good percentage of capital is mobile and can be moved to jurisdictions less hostile to enterprise, they show their utter ignorance of how the free enterprise economy works.

A game I love to play with lefties who are employed in the government sector is to ask them who pays their salary. The conversation goes like this:

Me       Who is your employer?

Lefty   The University

Me       Who funds the university?

Lefty   The government

Me       Who funds the government?

Lefty   The tax payers

Me       Who employs the taxpayers who pay the taxes who fund your salary?

Lefty   Pause ….employers

Me       What percentage of employers are private sector companies?

Lefty   Cottoning on to where I am heading – “well the taxes from the employees of the government sector pay as much tax as the private companies and anyway all private company owners do is try to avoid tax”

Me       Actually 85% of the total government tax take comes from the taxes paid by private sector companies, their employees and the self-employed – the productive non-government sector of the economy

Lefty   That’s absolute rubbish and right wing propaganda

If any of you have had this discussion, here are the statistics to back up the claim – that 85% of all tax receipts source from the private sector activity in the economy. Almost all the money that governments expend on government services and benefits come from the pockets of hard working New Zealanders who own, or are employed by, evil capitalist companies. The chart below is a summary only and each line is footnoted – some to government department websites and the rest to supplementary charts that are available below the fold for those interested in seeing how I arrived at the total numbers. Note that the staff numbers for government entities were lifted from the statutorily required Annual Reports that each file in Parliament or from the entity’s own website.

The table provided is embedded below.

Public vs Private Sector

Questions for Oral Answer.

Questions to Ministers 2.00PM -3.00PM.

1. Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE to the Prime Minister: Does he stand by his statement “our approach is to put everyday New Zealanders at the heart of everything the Government does, so we organise services around them”?
2. IAN McKELVIE to the Minister of Finance: What reports has he received on momentum building in the economy – particularly trends in jobs, wages, and business confidence?
3. Hon DAVID PARKER to the Minister of Finance: When did he first become aware that Treasury had miscalculated estimates of household disposable income?
4. TE URUROA FLAVELL to the Minister for the Environment:Will she continue to protect the concept of cultural impact assessments as a key tenet of the Resource Management Act 1991 and does she agree with David Taipari, Chair of the Māori Statutory Board for Auckland Council, that, like built heritage, it was important to protect archaeological sites or sites of significance to mana whenua?
5. JACINDA ARDERN to the Minister for Social Development:When was she first advised about the miscalculation affecting “estimates of disposable income”, and how was this advice received?
6. TIM MACINDOE to the Minister of Science and Innovation:What announcements has he made to encourage further investment in research and development by tech-savvy firms?
7. METIRIA TUREI to the Prime Minister: Does he have confidence in all his ministers?
8. Dr JIAN YANG to the Minister of Health: What progress can he report on the Government’s health targets for district health boards?
9. BRENDAN HORAN to the Minister of Energy and Resources: Does he stand by all his statements regarding iron sand seabed mining; if so, why?
10. NICKY WAGNER to the Minister of Education: What recent announcements has she made on the Greater Christchurch Education Renewal Programme?
11. DARIEN FENTON to the Minister of Transport: Does he have confidence in KiwiRail following the discovery of asbestos in DL locomotives?
12. JONATHAN YOUNG to the Minister of Commerce: What decisions have been made on crowd funding following the passage of the Financial Markets Conduct Act 2013?

Today Labour are asking four questions. These are about services provided by the Government, accuracy of Treasury estimates, household income, and asbestos in Kiwirail locomotives. The Greens have one question, to the Prime Minister about whether he has confidence in all his Ministers. Brendan Horan is asking about seabed mining.

Patsy of the day goes to Jian Yang for Question 8: What progress can he report on the Government’s health targets for district health boards?

Government Bills 3.00PM-6.00Pm and 7.30PM-10.00PM.

1. Appropriation (2012/13 Financial Review) Bill – Committee Stage

2. Electoral Amendment Bill – Committee Stage

3. Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill – Committee Stage

4. Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill – First Reading

The Appropriation (2012/13 Financial Review) Bill is being guided through the house by the Minister of Finance, Bill English. The purpose of this bill is to confirm and validate financial matters relating to the 2012/13 financial year.

The Electoral Amendment Bill is being guided through the house by the Minister of Justice, Judith Collins. This bill proposes amendments to the Electoral Act 1993 to implement recommendations made by the Justice and Electoral Committee in its Inquiry into the 2011 General Election. The purpose of the amendments is to improve services to voters, candidates, and political parties.

The Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill is being guided through the house by the Minister of Customs, Maurice Williamson. This bill proposes amendments to support the implementation of the Trade Single Window component of the Joint Border Management System.

The Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill is being guided through the house by the Minister of Building and Construction, Maurice Williamson. This bill amends the Building Act 2004 to improve the system for managing earthquake-prone buildings.

The Press editorial:

Labour leader David Cunliffe perhaps scored one or two electoral points last week when he visited – in her damaged home – an 85-year-old widow who told him she had been “pushed from pillar to post” in her dealings with EQC. …

Unfortunately, it was no substitute for a cohesive and well-articulated earthquake recovery policy from Labour, which continues to look lacklustre when it comes to explaining how it would handle the rebuild.

Cunliffe followed up his photo opportunity with a pledge to set up, if elected to Government, a $2 million fund to help individuals bring test cases against EQC and insurance companies, to “clarify the law, remove blockages and help get things moving”.

There is an immediate perception problem with the amount, which seems almost insignificant given the scale of the problem.

While Cunliffe talks of millions, the Government in election year is bound to keep repeating its mantra that it is funding $15 billion of a $40b rebuild.

Cunliffe’s rhetoric almost invites critique. If elected to Government, it would be better for Labour to clarify the law itself, even if that involves seeking its own declaratory judgments from the courts, rather than relying on citizens bringing test cases.

Paying people to take EQC and insurance companies to court might also create blockages, rather than remove them, at least in the cases of those who become involved in litigation.

It seems to be one of their more stupid policies. We’ll pay people to take our own insurance company to court.

And, given the length of time such cases take to be heard and adjudicated, then potentially appealed, it is hard to imagine how this scheme will help to get things moving to any significant degree.

A great way to delay things. Will they fund cases all the way to the Supreme Court?

It would be inviting them, in some cases, to sue EQC, a government department. What Cunliffe is saying, essentially, is that “if elected to govern, we will give you some money so that you can take our own officials to court, so that they can have a better idea of how they should be handling your case file”.

This is not what electors are looking for in a credible opposition party campaigning in election year.

It sounds like a policy a 22 year old staffer dreamt up the day before the visit. The key word in the editorial is credible. The policy is not credible, and neither is the party promoting it.

Just imagine the howls of outrage from left wing commentators if the successful winner of a National Party leadership race was found out to have used a secret trust for donations from businesses to fund their leadership campaign. Their outrage would be massive. As far as I can see, No Right Turn is the only left commentator to have said anything at all on Cunliffe’s secret trust.

The Herald reports:

David Cunliffe has admitted a trust was used to take donations for his leadership campaign, allowing him to sidestep the obligation to disclose donations in the MPs’ register of financial interests.

So the public will never know who funded his successful leadership campaign. These donations were not to a political party, but effectively to the MP personally to pay for their leadership campaign.

Mr Cunliffe said his campaign team opted to use a trust because the Labour Party’s rules for the contest specified donations would be confidential. “That is a decision we made as a campaign team at the time, pursuant to the rules which meant donors could have an expectation of confidentiality.”

Asked if he was trying to hide something he said “not at all. That has been common practice in New Zealand.”

Neither Grant Robertson or Shane Jones used a trust. And while trusts have been used previously in wider political terms, they have been outlawed for general elections and local body elections (can still be used but donors to the trust must be revealed so donor identities can not be hidden). And the party that has campaigned loudest and strongest for outlawing these trusts – Labour. Cunliffe himself has railed in Parliament against the use of secret trusts, yet here he is defending his own one/

By deadline, Mr Cunliffe had not responded to further written questions about whether he knew the names of donors who had given to the trust, or whether he had included individual donations in his return to the Labour Party under its rules.

That’s a fascinating question. I suspect that Cunliffe does know the donors (especially if family members are trustees of the trust, which is what I have heard) and has revealed them to the party. He is just refusing to reveal them to Parliament despite the requirement in Standing Orders to do so.

What surprises me about this is the political idiocy in using a trust to hide donations. When he decided to run for leader and someone proposed setting up a secret trust to launder the donations through, did none of his advisors think or say “Hey, that may not be a good idea, we could look a bit hypocritical”.

Equally surprising is Labour’s response to this is to focus on the legality, not the politics. The brand damage to Cunliffe from having a secret trust for his donations is considerable. It neuters Labour on any issues of transparency. If I was an advisor to Cunliffe I’d be saying “Why don’t we ask the donors if they are happy to be named”. I imagine most donors would be happy to do so. Shane Jones received donations and he has stated his are included in his Register of Pecuniary Interests.

Getting permission from the donors seems the obvious thing to do, to defuse this. The fact they are refusing to do so, despite the political cost, makes you wonder why. I can only conclude that they believe revealing the identities of the donors would do more political damage than keeping them hidden.

UPDATE: Labour are in full retreat now. Cunliffe now says using the trust was an error in judgement. No shit Sherlock. Why did it take so long to work that out. Two donors are refusing to be named, and their donations are being returned. Named donors include Selwyn Pellett (owner of “independent” Scoop News), Tony Gibbs and Perry Keenan. Keenan appears to be a colleague from Boston Consulting Group now based in Chicago. I presume Tony Gibbs is the company director.

UPDATE2: Just returning the anonymous donations doesn’t avoid the need for transparency. Maybe they’ll just donate the money to Labour now instead. At the end of the day the donations were made in the last calendar year and should be disclosed in his Register of Pecuniary Interests – even if refunded this year. And you have to wonder why those two donors are so desperate not to be named? How embarrassing would it be if their names were disclosed.I can only assume the answer is greatly, if they are being refunded.

UPDATE3:

This is hilarious. Attack National for secret trusts (which were wound up in 2007 by the way) and then go and set up a secret trust for your own leader to hide the donations to his leadership campaign. Again, how did no one think this was a bad idea?

The number of “errors” by David Cunliffe is growing. Off memory it includes:

• The secret trust for donors
• Getting the details wrong for the baby bonus and a false advertisement
• Claiming he had  a”middle range existence”
• Breaking the law by encouraging people to vote Labour on the day of Chch East by-election
• Including details in his CV that were inaccurate

I leave the last word to Danyl Mclauchlan:

@Dovil @CTrevettNZH Not like he’s campaigning for a job that requires sound judgement or anything . . .

— Danyl Mclauchlan (@danylmc) March 3, 2014

Imagine what it would be like if they were running the country!

UPDATE4: Idiot/Savant at no Right Turn quotes Cunliffe:

“I don’t think in hindsight that a trust structure fully represented the values I would like to bring to this leadership. Decisions that were made to set up the trust could have been better. I have learned form that and am now making sure I do whatever I can to ensure transparency.”

Idiot/Savant comments in turn:

Which is just sociopathic “sorry I got caught” bullshit. The thing about values is that you live them, and they’re instinctive. Cunliffe’s aren’t. When faced with a choice between transparency and corruption-enabling secrecy, he chose the latter, and then tried to cling to that choice when it was questioned. These are not the actions of an ethical man who believes in open politics – they are the actions of someone trying to get away with something they know is wrong. 

I’m sorry I got caught!

Stuff has an extract from the the women’s mags about the 30th anniversary of John and Bronagh Key’s marriage. Had a wee chuckle about John learning that he’s learnt answering back is not a good strategy, and also how Bronagh had set a time limit on how long he can use his new waterblaster for (they are so fun to use!).

What struck me was this line:

He also dropped off his own dry-cleaning and returned DVDs.

It’s just such a normal thing to do – both hiring DVDs for family viewing, but also dropping them back. What I mean by that is that when you are Prime Minister it is very easy to get caught up in your own importance. You have an entire country to run. You work 80+ hour weeks. You need to prioritise your valuable time to the areas where you can make the most difference. So it would be very easy to have a view that it is ridiculous for you to be the family member who pops the DVDs back to the video store.

But the fact he does, I think says a lot about why he is still so popular. He has stayed remarkably down to earth, ranging from beer pong to delivering pizza to his son to dropping back the DVDs. Some will say nah it is all an act, but with respect I disagree entirely. You can’t fake that.

I’m not saying that is a reason to vote for him – absolutely not. I’m saying it is part of why he has remained very popular.

DIA has the latest stats on the number of pokie machines in New Zealand.

Since 2008 the number of pokie machines in New Zealand has dropped by 2,613 and in Auckland by 612. These are relative declines 13%.

The convention centre deal with Sky City allows them 230 additional pokie machines. This is around half of the annual drop nationwide, so even when implemented there will be fewer pokie machines than the year before, if this trend continues.

The Herald reports:

Conservatives’ leader Colin Craig hopes to fast-track a defamation claim against Greens co-leader Russel Norman so a court hearing can be held before this year’s election.

Mr Craig had given Dr Norman a deadline to apologise over comments he made in a speech at the Big Gay Out, but Dr Norman refused to do so.

The Conservatives’ leader today said his defamation claim against Dr Norman would be split into two stages in the hope of fast-tracking a court hearing.

“After extensive discussion and advice from my legal team, I’ve decided to proceed immediately against [Dr] Norman regarding his claims about the place of women.”

I think this is unwise. In defamation cases both sides tend to lose out. Craig looks thin-skinned by resorting to defamation. Norman i associated with personal attacks that go against the Green principles. It’s a lose lose.

Conservatives’ leader Colin Craig hopes to fast-track a defamation claim against Greens co-leader Russel Norman so a court hearing can be held before this year’s election.

Mr Craig had given Dr Norman a deadline to apologise over comments he made in a speech at the Big Gay Out, but Dr Norman refused to do so.

The Conservatives’ leader today said his defamation claim against Dr Norman would be split into two stages in the hope of fast-tracking a court hearing.

“After extensive discussion and advice from my legal team, I’ve decided to proceed immediately against [Dr] Norman regarding his claims about the place of women.”

By narrowing the claim, the job is harder for Norman. He has to defend it on the basis that Craig has expressed views along the lines of women should be in the kitchen.

As I understand it, Craig is not suing for damages, just a declaration that Norman defamed him (and costs). If Craig wins he will have seriously damaged Norman and the Greens (how do you have a co-leader who has been found to be a liar by a court) but he will also have damaged himself by looking litigious. If he loses, then it is all bad for him.

Mind you Winston has sued several people for defamation, and he still makes 5%!

NZ Herald business editor Liam Dann writes:

Cunliffe and his quietly spoken deputy David Parker seem determined to turn away a large and valuable chunk of the electorate – the business community.

Positioning yourself so far to the left that you don’t think business is worth fighting for is not a strategy that has worked for Labour since Norman Kirk. The Lange government took business with them, the Clark government at least convinced business that it represented a tolerable and temporarily necessary change.

A begrudging acceptance of change from the business community, even if most won’t change their vote, is something that reassures the nervous middle classes who do swing their votes.

Helen Clark talked knowledge-wave and delivered a free trade deal with China that has ultimately been our lifeline through the global financial crisis.

What is David Cunliffe offering? A dramatic experiment with a winning formula? A worrying fix for something that isn’t broken?

Labour’s embrace of Green Party policy to reform the Reserve Bank Act is a big stumbling block for the party if it wants mainstream acceptance from the business community.

In almost every policy area, Labour is moving to the left and embracing Green party policies. They’ve done it on tax, on welfare, on monetary policy, on electricity, on housing and almost on mining.

Helen Clark ran a pretty left wing Government. She was replaced as leader by Phil Goff, a former Rogernome. He came out with policies to the left of Clark, such as paying beneficiaries the in work tax credit.

Goff was replaced as leader by David Shearer, a man who once wrote approvingly about the role the private sector could play in defence and security. he went even more left than Clark and the new Goff and proposed effective nationalisation of the electricity generation sector and setting up a massive Government building programme.

Shearer was replaced as leader by David Cunliffe, who was often seen as one of the most centrist or right leaning members of Clark’s cabinet. Just like Goff and Shearer he abandoned his previous beliefs and tried to go further left than Clark, Goff and Shearer by proposing extending welfare payment to families earning up to $150,000 a year.

Each Labour party leader is trying to be more left wing than the one before. That’s great for National, but not great for New Zealand if they ever finally get elected and start implementing policies which nine years ago they decried as lunatic Green Party policy.

Dann focuses again on monetary policy:

The monetary policy reformists are full of ideas about the magic a broader definition of the Reserve Bank Act might achieve. But they ignore the extent to which having one target – inflation – has worked. And just how fundamental controlling inflation is to creating a stable economy on which growth can be built.

Why, when the act has just seen us through such an enormous global downturn so efficiently, would you change it. In the hope it might bring the dollar down?

Well, if you damage the economy the dollar will certainly fall. But it seems a brutal path to take.

And why, if you were going to make changes, would you loosen the shackles during the growth phase of the economic cycle – just when inflation starts to become a serious risk.

We should be grateful we don’t have to make radical changes to our economy. We’ve come through the downturn well, and while National can take some credit for steering the ship, so too can the last Labour Government for the healthy growth it oversaw.

Radical change is for those nations that have run out of options. Let’s leave it to the Greeks.

Some will sneer that Labour should not worry at all about business opinion, as most business people will not vote Labour, and they are not a large proportion of the population. This is true. But Helen Clark found out the hard way in 2000 what happens when you treat the sector that generates pretty much 100% of the tax take as mortal enemies. They plunged in the polls.

I’ve not seen the full list, but based on tweets by NZ Herald deputy political editor Claire Trevett, there is only one Labour MP facing a challenge for his or her party’s nomination.

So just one challenge to a caucus brimming with deadwood. So it must be to an MP who is really low profile, has no public appeal, never lands any hits in public. Right?

Well in a sensible party yes. But this is Labour. It seems that the only MP facing a challenge for an electorate nomination is Shane Jones!

The one MP actually achieving positive headlines for Labour, and the only MP being challenged. Its hilarious.