Labour have announced:

In the party’s first selection meeting for the 2014 General Election, Labour has endorsed Dr Deborah Russell as the candidate for Rangitikei.

Deborah Russell is a tax expert and left wing columnist, well known in New Zealand social media.

She was born in Taranaki and currently lives in Manawatu with her husband and three daughters.

I know Deborah and her family. She would be an excellent MP. Of course she has no chance in Rangitikei, so she will be relying on a good list ranking from Labour. Will they rejuvenate to make room for new blood?

I won’t spoil Deborah’s chances by pointing out that she recruited me into Young Nationals when she was the Otago University Chair of it 🙂 **

Dr Russell started her career as an accountant working for Deloitte and Treasury. She subsequently completed a PhD in Philosophy at the Australian National University. She went on to be a senior tax policy analyst for the IRD, and is now a senior lecturer in taxation at Massey University. Dr Russell chairs the Labour Party Economic Policy Committee.

Deborah is smart, a great debater, and a very nice person to boot. Labour will do much better with MPs like her in the House. Hence my saying such nice things about her which should doom her list ranking chances 🙂

** – my memory may be faulty. See Deborah’s comment below.

Stuff reports:

Labour leader David Cunliffe has given his strongest indication yet that his party would buy back state-owned assets if it became the Government.

He told Morning Report he “probably will” buy back the assets if Labour wins next year’s election, although stopped short of saying where the money to do so would come from.

Probably is the latest version of “Yeah, Nah”.  Doesn’t Labour has the courage of their convictions to just come out and say “We will borrow five billion dollars from overseas banks so we can forcibly purchase shares in some power companies and an airline”.

The Herald reports:

Prime Minister John Key has accused Mana leader Hone Harawira of taking a taxpayer-funded junket to South Africa after it appeared Mr Harawira did not attend Nelson Mandela’s funeral.

Harawira also refused to clarify if the taxpayer paid for his wife’s travel also:

Mana Party leader Hone Harawira won’t say whether his wife travelled to South Africa on the taxpayer dollar.

Mr Harawira has returned from a taxpayer-funded trip to farewell the late former South African president Nelson Mandela.

He told media at Auckland Airport this morning that it was a moving trip, which included performing a haka to Mr Mandela’s friends and family.

But he refused to say who paid for his wife’s trip.

“Come in with this kind of bullshit line about taxpayer funding when Hone Harawira goes, but nobody says boo about it when John Key goes.

“I’ll give you an answer when I hear his answer.”

Well that is easy. John Key changed the rules in 2009 so Minister’s no longer have their spouses travel with them at the taxpayers expense.  Rodney Hide was demolished for using his parliamentary funding to have his partner travel with him. Will Hone be held to the same standard.

UPDATE: Harawira has now said his wife was funded by private donors, not the taxpayer.

“This is a guy who has barely turned up to Parliament in 2013… He has spent a hell of a lot of 2013 doing anything other than actually taking his place in Parliament.

Hone has asked a total of three written questions in 2013. yes, just three. A disgrace. Three out of almost 17,000 asked by opposition MPs.

His contributions in the debating chamber have been almost non-existent.  In the last year his contributions have been:

• Six oral questions (these are allocated so no issue there)
• Spoke on the Budget debate, the financial review debate, the PM’s statement, two general debates, one urgent debate, one obituary, one local bill and one Treaty settlement. On average that is one speech ever six weeks!

So Hone Harawira has spoken on two bills in 2013. In the past year 145 bills passed into law, 57 had a first reading and 67 a second reading meaning 269 bills that he could have spoken on.

Hone Harawira has no interest or ability to be a parliamentarian. He is a very effective activist and protester. But he is a failure as a Member of Parliament.

The Herald reports:

New Zealand is getting fatter – with three in every 10 adults now regarded as obese.

A leading diabetes researcher has called the new figures alarming and has accused the Government of failing to take the problem seriously.

However, Health Minister Tony Ryall has rejected “nanny state” measures, instead arguing that providing information and support to people is enough.

“In the end, the Government can pass all the laws it likes but unless people eat less and exercise more, things won’t change,” Mr Ryall said yesterday in response to the new figures.

Exactly. The Government’s role is to inform and support, not dictate and ban.

The Government focus for new nutrition programmes has been on mothers and babies. It is also spending more on screening for diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and on providing more “green prescriptions”, in which GPs and nurses encourage patients to get more exercise and improve their diet. Some health advocates have called for more radical action, including taxing sugary drinks and fatty foods.

The one and only fat tax implemented in the world was a disaster that was scrapped after barely a year. But that doesn’t stop the advocates.

Stuff reports:

Sensationalised mass media, the rise of populist pressure groups and distrust of expert input has led to New Zealand’s Third World levels of imprisonment, a leading academic says.

In a paper titled A Punitive Society, Victoria University criminology Professor John Pratt has attacked New Zealand’s continually rising imprisonment rate and what he terms “penal populism” around crime.

I’ve never ever heard a criminology academic (exception of Greg Newbold) say anything on law & order that isn’t 1000% predictable.

In New Zealand, there are 194 prisoners for every 100,000 people.

This is higher than anywhere in Western Europe and sits between African countries Gabon and Namibia on a global league table.

This is carefully cherry picked as saying that our imprisonment rate is only the 74th highest in the world doesn’t sound anywhere near as sexy. Also note the careful selection of Western Europe only so European and OECD countries such as Estonia, Czech Republic and Poland are excluded.

The crime rate has been falling for years and yet the prison population and corrections spending has ballooned to $1.2 billion this year, Professor Pratt said.

Corrections spending includes rehabilitation and extra money for drug and alcohol treatment. Is Professor Pratt against this?

The leading academic also has the most basic facts wrong. He claims the prison population is increasing. It is not. The latest head count has 8,474 prisoners. Three years ago it was 8,747. That is a decrease.

The Herald reports:

The next three Avatar films will be made in New Zealand, the Prime Minister has announced at a press conference with the film’s director James Cameron.

Mr Key announced this morning that the Government had signed a memorandum of understanding with the film’s makers to secure the multi-film deal.

He said investment would be “significant” – a minimum of $500 million for the three films.

Great news.

I await however Labour and the unions condemning the memorandum of understanding as crony capitalism.

20th Century Fox Hanneman said an undertaking of the scope of Avatar required a significant collaboration between the film industry and Government.

“New Zealand offers unparalleled support to films of this scale.”

Changes to the screen productive incentives will mean Avatar is likely to benefit from a 25 per cent rebate.

Changes to the incentives for both overseas and local film makers include raising the rebates from 15 per cent to 20 per cent – and those which provided extra benefits to New Zealand would get extra ‘points’ entitling them to an extra 5 per cent on top of that.

Economic Development Minister Steven Joyce said he expected the Avatar films to meet that top 25 per cent rebate – the deal includes marketing of New Zealand and substantial local employment.

The Avatar agreement includes committing to a long term relationship with 20th Century Fox, spending at least $500 million on production in New Zealand, including most of the live action shooting and visual effects.

It also commits the film’s makers to ensuring at least 90 per cent of the live action crew are New Zealanders and New Zealand will host at least one of the three premieres.

The Wellington red carpet has never been used so much!

Mr Cameron said he was expecting the films to be released in Christmas 2016, 2017 and 2018.

Again, great news for the thousands of people who work in the screen industry.

Cameron committing to NZ long term is strategically important also as it reduces our reliance on Peter Jackson.

Danyl blogs at Dim Post:

So the first thing I do is put the whole Bevan Chuang, Cameron Slater, Luigi Wewege, John Palino, John Slater sleazefest to one side for a minute. Then get a bit of perspective by asking myself: Danyl? How would you feel if a right-wing politician secretly took $39,000 from a casino company to cheat on his wife while he was lobbying to have the law changed to benefit that casino company and then lied about it to the public?

Well, my reaction to that would be that the hypothetical right-wing politician was a disgusting, corrupt untrustworthy crook and that he’d disgraced his office and should resign. Which means – since I think politicians should be held to the same standard irrespective of their political allegiances – that I think Len Brown is disgusting, corrupt etc and should resign. That was pretty easy!

It wasn’t of course $39,000 from a casino company. That is the amount from all hotels. But the point remains.

No Right Turn was the same:

I don’t care who Len Brown fucks, and I don’t really want to know. But I do care that he maintains basic standards of integrity in public office, and that means declaring all significant gifts. Particularly when those gifts come from organisations in a position to receive favours from him or the Council. Brown has failed in that basic task. He must resign.

The Council has a huge influence on hotels – rates, tourism levies, services, zoning etc. Nothing wrong with taking donations or freebies so long as you disclose them – but Brown didn’t.

NBR reports that the Maritime Union is slowly losing its death grip on the Ports of Auckland.

In April last year, after eight months of bitter industrial action, the parties applied to the Employment Relations Authority for “facilitation.”

Instead of engaging in banter through the media, they were required to sit down and logically explain their arguments in a structured way and in legal terms.

Away from the previous dramatic and underhanded tactics, the port was able to state its need to lift productivity to compete commercially so it could lift returns to its ultimate owner, Auckland Council, which demanded it lifts returns on its investment.

The union, meanwhile, relied on health and safety concerns over the rosters.

It’s clear Ports of Auckland won that battle.

Although ERA head Alastair Dumbleton’s recommendations to the parties were confidential, the port company said it would immediately accept them.

The union, meanwhile, issued a statement saying they were “a useful basis to enter into what it hopes will be a successful round of negotiations.”

Without saying which way he was leaning, Mr Dumbleton had previously said he found “instructive” a report by the ERA’s fatigue-related risk expert, Associate Professor Sally Ferguson.

Earlier this week, union national president Garry Parsloe said, somewhat bitterly, that facilitation was a “whole wasted year.”

What this means is that experts found their claims to be scare-mongering and without merit.

Since negotiations for a new collective agreement started in August 2011, has the union lost members?

And have some of those jumped ship to PortPro, the rival union at Ports of Auckland?

Alongside his comments about facilitation, Mr Parsloe says the dispute has cost his union more than $1 million – a figure which is yet to be publicly verified because the union is yet to file its 2012 and 2013 accounts.

They should be deregistered for not filing. If you are a company and do not file your annual return by the due date, then after a certain grace period you are automatically deregistered. The same rules should apply for incorporated societies and unions.

Yet, what does the union have to show for this costly battle? And will the union’s new collective agreement be materially different from what was offered in September 2011?

We’ll have to wait and see on that last point, but it looks as if the union’s line about flexible rosters being a health and safety risk is losing steam and the body itself seems weakened and fractured.

Mr Parsloe is retiring and PortPro is taking on his union’s former members.

In May, the union confirmed some of its members are working under the new, 12-hour flexible rosters, despite its apparent concerns over health and safety.

As previously stated, some of its members have been sacked, and those dismissals have been endorsed by the Employment Court as proper.

And those sacked have been union officials – not because they are union officials, but because their behaviour was so bad they were justifiably dismissed.

With the port company abandoning its unpopular stance on contracting out, it is unlikely the flags and banners will be waved again, in huge numbers, any time soon.

The port is taking on more staff, lending credence to arguments that a more efficient port is positive for workers, the port company and, through its council ownership, all of Auckland.

Look at Port of Tauranga, where most of the staff are shareholders. Productivity is high and industrial action very rare.

Avalanche Creek Falls, Arthurs Pass National Park, New Zealand

I love shooting waterfalls and while some are more challenging than others this particular one was quite simple. If you are travelling through Arthurs Pass village through the break you can easily find it a short distance from the information centre.

Click on the image for a larger view of this photograph.

Free Desktop Wallpaper

You can download this photograph as a free Desktop Wallpaper HERE and please share with your friends.

Cheers

Richard [richardhume.com]

Some interesting stats on taser use from the Police over the last three years. Highlights:

• Force used by Police in just 0.2% of face to face interactions
• Tasers drawn or used in just 0.4% of apprehensions
• Seven of of eight times a taser is drawn but not used
• When force was used tasers used just 16% of time, pepper spray 32%, handcuffs 34% and physical restraint 37%
• Tasers only used 2% of 36,440 mental health incidents and discharged for 0.3%

So what was all the fuss about?

The Herald reports:

Auckland Mayor Len Brown says he will not pay any of the $100,000-plus costs of a damning review that found he failed to declare more than $39,000 in free hotel rooms and upgrades.

Mr Brown said he supported the review by council chief executive Doug McKay and agreed to the terms of reference, which cleared him of using council resources or providing preferential treatment in connection to his affair with Bevan Chuang.

But when it came to costs arising from the rest of the inquiry that found he received nine free hotel rooms worth $6130 and 64 upgrades worth $32,888.50, Mr Brown said that was something Mr McKay had pursued.

Mr Brown said he he would pay his personal costs for legal advice from Philip Skelton, QC, but would not pay any costs of the review.

Mr McKay has estimated the cost of the EY (Ernst & Young) review at $100,000-plus. Other associated costs include legal advice to the council by Crown Solicitor Simon Moore, QC.

Brown brought in his own QC and threatened the Council which had to hire a QC also. The legal costs on top of the EY costs will be significant.

Mr Brown has never apologised to the council for the two-year affair and showed little remorse on Friday when his free hotel rooms and upgrades were revealed.

He views the report as a vindication. No one fair who reads it could see it that way.

The Press editorial:

There was never any chance the present Government was going to take any notice of the latest one.

In any case a botch-up by the organisers meant it was delayed so that by the time it was held, the programme it was meant to influence was almost over.

Incredible they had such a high proportion of duplicate signatures.

The latest referendum was not strictly a citizens’ initiated one.

Unlike earlier referendums – on the number of MPs there should be in Parliament, on the proper punishment for violent offending, and on smacking of children – it was not led by any great popular groundswell.

Instead, it was largely promoted by the Green Party.

It spent a significant sum organising the petition for it.

Not sure the Greens spent any of their own money on it. They used their taxpayer funded parliamentary budget. The main purpose of doing so was to collect e-mail addresses from the petition.

To the loaded, if muddled question, a clear majority of voters signalled their opposition to asset sales, although not in such large numbers as some had expected.

In all the previous referendums, the vote for the position supported by those promoting the issue has been won by majorities of at least four to one, and in one case (in the poll on violent offending) by nine to one.

In the latest poll the margin was two to one.

Considering the concerted campaign run by those supporting the no-vote, who would have been expecting better, it was not a striking result.

It was a confusing question. Some of those who voted no might want more than 49% of assets sold. Some might want four of the five companies sold, but not all five. And yes the margin was way less than most expected.

Referendums are a crude instrument for influencing public policy. They require simple yes-no answers.

Most political questions are more complex than that and involve trade-offs.

It is for that reason that few countries bother with them. The latest one was a prime example.

The issue it dealt with was decided with the result of the last general election. Whether voters are still happy about that will be properly judged at the next one.

Labour declared the last election was a referendum on asset sales. They were right.

Brian Gaynor writes:

There are several reasons New Zealand’s economic outlook is more comparable to the early 1950s and early 1970s than the past 40 years. These include:

Terms of trade: The country’s terms of trade index rose 7.5 per cent, to 1356, in September, the highest level since December 1973. Australia’s terms of trade have fallen 18 per cent this year.

Dairy: GlobalDairyTrade auction prices have appreciated 52 per cent over the past twelve months and dairy exports surged 49.1 per cent in the three months ended October 31 compared with the same three months in the previous year. Recent surveys show that farmers have significant investment intentions, an important feature of New Zealand’s strong economic performance in the 1950s.

China: It is now New Zealand’s largest export market and is expected to continue to grow by more than 7 per cent a year.

Christchurch rebuild: The inner-city rebuild programme should gather momentum when construction begins on the justice and emergency services precinct from March next year, to be followed by the health precinct in the June or September quarter. These projects, which are mainly funded by the Crown and city, should encourage private sector investment in the inner city.

Migration: The country has had strong net migration inflows in recent months and had total net migration of 17,490 for the 12 months ended October.

This figure is expected to increase steadily over the next few months, and Statistics New Zealand figures show more than 90 per cent of new arrivals settle in Auckland.

Housing: The strong migration inflow should continue to boost the housing market and housing construction, particularly in Auckland.

Government finances: The Crown’s financial deficit is falling and the Key Administration may announce tax cuts in May’s budget. However, large expenditures on the Christchurch rebuild may restrict this option.

Confidence: Business, consumer and farming confidence are all at, or near, all-time highs.

Companies: Most domestic companies have strong balance sheets and plenty of capacity to expand and invest. Rod Drury and Xero have lifted the ambitions of New Zealand companies and we now have a large number of young entrepreneurs with aggressive global aspirations.

KiwiSaver: Last but not least is KiwiSaver, which is giving us a pool of private permanent funds that can be partially invested in the domestic productive sector. KiwiSaver ought to have the same positive effect on the domestic economy as Australia’s compulsory superannuation has had on its economy.

In view of these factors the outlook for the New Zealand economy is exciting, the best it has been since the early 1970s.

I’m not quite as positive as Brian Gaynor, but I do agree that the fundamentals are all looking good.

Colin Espiner reports:

The Conservative Party is poised to stand its high-profile chief executive Christine Rankin against National’s Paula Bennett in Upper Harbour, setting up a potential battle of the former solo mums next election.

Conservative Party leader Colin Craig confirmed to the Sunday Star-Times that the party’s board had formally asked the controversial former boss of Work and Income New Zealand to stand in next year’s general election. …

Bennett and Rankin have similar back stories; both grew up in households without much money, had children at a young age and raised them alone on the domestic purposes benefit. Both ended up in charge of their former paymaster; Rankin as chief executive of Work and Income New Zealand and Bennett as Minister of Social Development.

It will be an interesting contest. I suspect both women will agree on a lot of stuff around welfare reforms but perhaps disagree in other areas.

Polling had indicated Rankin would do well in the proposed electorate that would wrap around the north and west of Auckland’s Waitemata Harbour. …

Independent polling by Research Solutions for the Conservatives obtained by the Star-Times shows Rankin has 24 per cent support in Upper Harbour, with 20 per cent opting for “another candidate” and a large 56 per cent undecided.

I’ve blogged on this before, but a poll which names only one candidate has little value in predicting the outcome of an election. A poll should either be totally unprompted (Which candidate or party’s candidate would you vote for) or totally prompted (Which of the following candidates would you vote for). A poll which just asks “Would you vote for Candidate A or some other candidate” has relatively little value.

The Herald reports:

Chorus could cut its funding shortfall for the ultra-fast broadband project from $1 billion to $200-250 million if the embattled-lines company introduced savings initiatives, changes to dividend policy and debt headroom, says an independent report released today.

Chorus said last month that a Commerce Commission ruling to cut wholesale internet prices could lead to a $1.07 billion funding shortfall for its portion of the ultra-fast broadband scheme.

It’s not a funding shortfall for UFB. It is a funding shortfall for Chorus. Chorus does more than UFB. They have signed a contract committing them to UFB in return for a subsidy by way of loan.

The Government then commissioned Ernst & Young (EY) Australia to investigate how the cuts would impact on Chorus’ ability to deliver on its UFB contracts with the Crown.

This report was released today and said Chorus could reduce this $1.07 billion funding shortfall to between $200 and $250 million by introducing “cash-flow savings initiatives”.

Possible revenue, operating expenditure and capital expenditure initiatives could reduce the funding gap by $400 to $450 million, the report said.

The report said that another $290 million of the funding gap could be reduced if Chorus made changes to its dividend policy.

The report suggested that if a two year “dividend holiday ” was introduced and then payouts made of 12.75c per share until 2020, the funding gap would come down by another $290 million.

As well as this, changes to debt headroom could reduce the shortfall by $130 million, the report said.

Even if these changes were made, EY said there was still a risk Chorus might breach its agreements with its banks.

The report is here. It is excellent. They note:

In FY13 Chorus’ return on equity was  29.7%, which is significantly higher than other infrastructure businesses which have average returns of 12.5% (New Zealand peers) and 11.2% (Australian peers).

Even with the Commerce Commission determination, Chorus remains a profitable company. They do run into problems around their debt ratios and these can be a serious issue for them.

Chorus and CFH have already begun the discussions about possible changes to UFB contracts to help close the funding gap.

In releasing the report today, Communications Minister Amy Adams said the Government expected Chorus to meet a “significant part” of the funding shortfall itself.

“The Government will be monitoring closely the progress of discussions between CFH and Chorus,” she said.

This is as it should be. I have said all along that government intervention should be the last resort, not the first.  Chorus needs to do internally what it can to stay within its debt agreements. If after that there is still a shortfall, then some tweaking to the UFB contracts (such as longer repayment times) may well be appropriate.

An HoS Key Research poll has National on 48%, Labour 40%, Greens 8% and no minor party above 1%. It depends on the exact votes each minor party actually got, but an estimate of the seats would be National 58, Labour 48, Greens 10 and if existing electorates hold Maori 3, Mana 1, UF 1 and ACT 1. So CR 60 seats, CL 59 seats and Maori Party 3 seats.

National will be happy on 48%. Labour will be delighted if they are on 40%. Worth noting that the latest Roy Morgan poll had Labour on 30.5% and Greens on 14.5% so the two polls are starkly different when it comes to how the left vote is splitting. They both show National around equal with them combined though.

Stuff reports:

Secret talks are being held this weekend among Auckland councillors who say the city has been “humiliated” by the Len Brown affair and want the wayward mayor censured and his powers reined in.

The Sunday Star-Times understands a cross-party group of councillors has taken legal advice over what measures can be taken to censure Brown and to bring greater oversight to the mayoral office.

The code of conduct for the Council will be meaningless if the Council does nothing to enforce it.

But the Star-Times understands there is serious discontent with Brown and the EY report across party lines.

Some councillors who had been prepared to continue working with Brown for the benefit of Auckland were stunned by his lack of contrition after the report was released and believe some form of formal censure needs to be handed down. “There is an arrogance and a sense of entitlement there,” the councillor said.

Brown seems to think he has done absolutely nothing wrong. He has been exposed as someone who lied to the media, and did use Council resources for his affair – the phone calls, the limos etc.

The HoS also reports:

Councillors are shaken by Friday’s damning EY audit report, which found the mayor had made 1375 calls and texts to his mistress, Bevan Chuang, and failed to declare $39,000 in free hotel rooms and upgrades.

He breached the council’s code of conduct, by not declaring hotels rooms, an NRL grand final ticket and an iPad (which he auctioned for charity).

Brown took three free hotel nights and five upgrades at SkyCity hotels during the time he was championing the pokies-for-convention-centre deal.

Strangely Labour have been silent on this. Imagine what they would be saying if the Mayor wasn’t a member of the Labour Party.

Brown has apologised for misleading Aucklanders. He said he had wrongly claimed he paid for all the hotel trysts with Chuang out of his own pocket, putting it down to “not having full power of recollection”.

Bullshit. Chuang made the claim, and Brown denied it entirely. How is it credible that Chuang would have perfect recollection of it, yet Brown (the one who had the room booked and was responsible for paying it) would not.

Waitakere’s Linda Cooper said the governing body could censure Brown and most councillors expected an apology. “If he was in central government politics he’d be gone. People do stupid things … it’s how they respond to that and how they redeem themselves that’s important. I don’t see any of that happening, and that’s what I’m disappointed in.”

Pansy Wong resigned for far less. Lianne Dalziel was sacked for a lie.

Also on another note, once again Brown laundered his donations through a trust:

By far Brown’s biggest donor, though, was the New Auckland Council Trust, which chipped in $273,375. The trust allows donors to hide their identities when they make contributions.

Brown’s campaign spokesman Lewis said the trust was not breaking any laws as many donations were made to the trust before rules around anonymous donations were changed.

They knew the law was changing, yet they still used a trust to keep their big donors secret. Did Sky City donate again?

The SST reports:

Extended members who care for children who are not their own will get an extra $35 million in benefits, the Government will announce today.

More than 12,400 kids in New Zealand are cared for by relatives, often grandparents, when their parents are either incapable or unwilling to raise them, often due to drug use, violence, neglect and mental health issues.

Around 8500 foster parents already receive an unsupported child benefit, with the Government paying out about $111.5m between July 2011 and July 2012. But many say the money is not enough.

Social Development Minister Paula Bennett said today’s funding package would include a one-off establishment grant of $350 when a carer takes a child into their home. It would also include a “start-of-year payment” that will range between $400 for kids under five and $550 for children over 14 to relieve caregivers having to buy school uniforms and pay fees.

The ministry will also set up a discretionary extraordinary care fund of up to $2000 a year for children with significant difficulties, or who show promise. This fund will become available in July 2014.

I have huge respect for those people who care for children who are no theirs.

Colin Espiner writes:

The sad fact is, your chances of going to jail are far higher if you swipe a packet of cigarettes from a service station than you are if you con an elderly couple into investing in a pyramid scheme.

Here’s the challenge. Has anyone ever gone to prison for stealing something worth around $20, if that is their only crime?

I doubt it. I think Colin would be surprised how many times you would have to shoplift before you end up with a custodial sentence.

Matthew Hooton writes in NBR:

In Mr Key’s cabinet, only Mr McCully entered Parliament before the 1990s. A quarter of his cabinet – Mr Joyce, Mr Bridges, Ms Kaye, Hekia Parata and Amy Adams – is from the class of 2008. Treaty of Waitangi and international trade specialists Chris Finlayson and Tim Groser have only been around since 2005. The same is true of Welfare Minister Paula Bennett and Defence Minister Jonathan Coleman.

Of today’s cabinet, only Bill English, Tony Ryall, Nick Smith and Mr McCully were part of the National government of the 1990s and the first three only towards the end. Of them, only Mr McCully was a genuine supporter of the Bolger/Richardson regime. One of the most important factors in Mr Key’s success is that his government was genuinely new and it has kept renewing over its five years.

In contrast, two of the top performers in David Cunliffe’s opposition, Phil Goff and Annette King, were ministers in the Lange/Palmer/Moore government of the 1980s. Ruth Dyson was party president during that era, and Maryan Street in the early 1990s. Mr Cunliffe and his deputy David Parker were two of Helen Clark’s favourite ministers, while Grant Robertson and Jacinda Ardern were on her staff. Party strategist Trevor Mallard first became an MP in 1984, before even Mr McCully. The only confirmed Labour retirement for next year is its racing spokesman, Ross Robertson.

Labour is still very dominated by the past.

The breakdown by the 70 electorates is interesting. The turnout by group was:

• Below 30% – five electorates
• 30% to 35% – five electorates
• 35% to 40% – seven electorates
• 40% to 45% – 14 electorates
• 45% to 50% – 30 electorates
• Over 50% – nine electorates

In terms of the no vote, the breakdown was:

• Below 50% – two electorates
• 50% to 60% – 11 electorates
• 60% to 70% – 29 electorates
• 70% to 80% – 19 electorates
• 80% to 90% – 3 electorates
• Over 90% – 7 electorates (Maori seats)

In terms of overall stats:

• Not Vote 56.10%
• Vote No 29.48%
• Vote Yes 14.25%
• Informal Vote 0.13%
• Invalid Vote 0.03%

And comparing the results (the desired percentage voting with them) the petitioners got with previous CIRS:

1. Reform of justice system 91.8%
2. Firefighters 87.8%
3. Anti-smacking law 87.4%
4. Size of Parliament 81.5%
5.  Asset Sales 67.2%

So it is the closest result of any CIR. No other CIR was below 80% and this was below 70%.

Fran O’Sullivan writes in the Herald:

If he had any skerrick of honour left, Len Brown would by now have tendered his resignation as mayor to the people of Auckland.

It is absolutely clear that Brown has obtained multiple private benefits by virtue of his position as Mayor of Auckland.

It’s now time for Auditor-General Lyn Provost to open up a much wider inquiry to satisfy Aucklanders – and New Zealanders at large – just where Brown’s abuse of his position stopped.

Brown is a lame duck and has no chance of getting re-elected. He is just going to take the salary for the next three years.

But the real issue – as I have opined before – is how the Mayor of Auckland obtained special benefits for himself by virtue of his position, especially the $6130 of “freebie” hotel rooms disclosed in the EY report. Then there was the $32,888.50 worth of free hotel upgrades revealed by EY yesterday.

And more: the use of the mayoral car to squire his mistress about town; introductions of her to high-level Chinese visitors as his unpaid “translator”; the undisclosed gifts; the rearranging of his official overseas itinerary to squeeze in a private dinner in China with an unnamed female guest and a mayoral staffer.

As it turns out, she was a personal friend the mayor had requested to provide what proved to be unpaid translation services on the Guangzhou extension of his trip, and the staffer advised EY she had “no recollection of the dinner or attending diner” that was paid for by the council.

These issues have been barely mentioned by other media.

Frankly, accepting nine “freebies” at prime Auckland hotels – three of them at hotels belonging to SkyCity – doesn’t cut it. It is not merely “embarrassing” but is improper behaviour, given the fact that the council has had to adjudicate on controversial issues around the SkyCity Convention Centre “pokies swap” deal where the mayor clearly needed to be seen to be above the play and not putting himself in a position where he could be subject to unconscious bias, or more.

If he was a Minister of the Crown, Labour would have insisted he resign by now.

Brown has clearly flouted Auckland Council disclosure guidelines and general standards. This is symptomatic of a politician who believes he is above the rules. The fact that he was a “no show” at yesterday’s press conference indicates Brown has no answers outside the carefully crafted but ridiculous spin that his bevy of well-paid mayoral office press people have been churning out in recent days to try to deflect attention from the damaging findings in the review.

The TV interviews were so lame, that I wonder what has happened to interviewing skills. Did anyone confront him over his confirmed lies to the media? His communications director said (on the basis of what Brown told him) that he accepted no free hotel rooms when staying with Chuang.  That was a lie, and has been exposed as such.