Stuff reports:

Labour is defending the release of its plan to regulate power prices on the eve of the Government’s sell-off of power company assets.

Yesterday, Federated Farmers accused Labour and the Greens of trying to sabotage the sharefloat.

“There is suspicion this policy may be a tactical response to the Government’s asset sales programme,” Federated Farmers spokesman Anders Crofoot said.

However, Labour finance spokesman David Parker said if Labour had waited till after the shares in Mighty River Power and the other state-owned power companies had been sold it would have been criticised.

Of course it is sabotage. If it was not sabotage, they would have announced the policy months ago before the float document was released. To wait until the offer document is out in the marketplace is a calculated act of economic sabotage.

If their policy was to buy back MRP, then there might be a case for saying they had to wait to see the float details before announcing their policy. But there is nothing in the details of the MRP float that necessitated them waiting until after the float document was out, to announce their policy.

Here’s the good thing for investors. Their policy will probably see the share price set at the lower end of the range, however I don’t think it will ever be implemented which means that actually investors will get shares at a discount. Note this is not financial advice. So the real victim of the policy announcement will be taxpayers.

On the topic of the electricity policy, some must reads:

• An open letter from Seamus Hogan to David Shearer and Parker. He has 10 questions for them, including if they have even read the Wolak report they cite.
• A lengthy article by Lance Wiggs at NBR on the electricity industry and some more sensible alternatives to the Labour/Greens proposal.
• A column by Brian Gaynor on how the Labour/Greens policy would be a “major backward step for the economy” and saying “The best way to keep prices down is to ensure there is a competitive market rather than heavy-handed price regulation that is more reminiscent of the Muldoon era“
• A column by Liam Dann. Some extracts:

We’d all like lower power prices. It’s a clever election bribe. But if a government bludgeons down the returns available to international investors they simply won’t invest, they’ll go elsewhere.

New Zealand taxpayers in the future – my kids – will have to earn or borrow the money to pay for new power generation as the population grows.

 Capital is mobile.

If Labour wants to gain votes from swinging voters who still trust capitalism – rather than just appeasing those on the left that joined the Russel Norman party – then Shearer is going to have to do a very good job of convincing them that Labour is not a destroyer of wealth.

Shearer needs to distance himself from the gleeful schadenfreude of those who celebrated the $600 million value destruction suffered by Contact, Infratil and Trustpower in the day and a half after the new policy was announced.

As the policy was designed to sabotage the float of MRP, and destroy wealth, I can’t see any distancing.

He will need to communicate clearly how this policy ensures we have enough foreign capital investment to grow power supply as GDP grows. Presumably Labour still hopes it will grow. The Greens, remember, aren’t so wedded to GDP growth as a concept.

Despite Norman’s efforts to normalise the Greens by talking more about economics than core policy, this is still a party living in a hippie fantasy world. It is a party that “envisions an organic nation” in its policy on food production. Good luck with that. New Zealand owes its first-world status to a world-class, technologically-driven machine of a farming economy. We don’t put that on the tourist posters but let’s be realistic.

People don’t realise how extreme the Green policies are. Now Labour is buying into them, their joint policies are looking to be the an extremely radical policy change – at a time of huge global uncertainty.

The Press reports:

Student Volunteer Army founder Sam Johnson will not challenge Mayor Bob Parker in the upcoming Christchurch elections, despite agonising over an offer to team up with Labour MP Lianne Dalziel.

The Weekend Press revealed Dalziel – the MP for Christchurch East and Labour’s earthquake recovery spokeswoman – invited Johnson to be her running mate and would-be deputy mayor in October’s local body elections.

Neither Dalziel nor Johnson would comment on Friday, but Johnson admitted last night he “very seriously did consider” the offer. He finally decided against it on Saturday afternoon.

“I really wanted to do it,” he said. “It was a really difficult decision to make, but I don’t think it is the right thing for me right now.”

Johnson did not intend to run for a seat on the Christchurch City Council and was undecided about standing again for the Riccarton-Wigram Community Board.

He planned instead to finish his law and politics degree and focus on the Volunteer Army Foundation and his work with the Ministry of Awesome.

I often talk to young aspiring politicians, and my advice almost always is not to stand too early. I think it is crucial that people do not just go from student politics to a job in Parliament to being an MP. While there are exceptions, you are a better MP if you have some life experience.

Now Sam has had some pretty incredible successes and experiences, and would have been a credible figure at a young age. But his decision not to rush things shows a good level of maturity.

However, he did not rule out dipping a toe back into politics in the future.

“I’m not a career politician. Later in life, maybe, but right now there are many other things that need to be done.”

Sensible.

Despite Johnson’s defection, Dalziel has not ruled out a mayoralty bid.

She would have been “exceptionally happy to stand alongside Sam”, but maintained she was not committed yet.

Oh, of course Lianne is standing.

Dalziel had previously ruled out standing for mayor but had been persuaded to reconsider, she said.

Oh, yes persuaded against her will I am sure. There’s nothing wrong with saying you want to be Mayor, but I can do without the false reluctance.

Even since Shearer dumped Lianne from the shadow cabinet, the bid was near-inevitable.

Lianne has said she will resign as an MP, if she stands. That means a by-election in Christchurch East. Who would stand for Labour?

UPDATE: I am told my multiple sources that Labour has already had their normal democratic selection process and the unions and hierarchy have chosen Tony Milne. Tony used to work for Tim Barnett, and is currently the National Manager of Public Health at the Problem Gambling Foundation.

Just as I thought you couldn’t get a crazier policy that Labour and Greens on energy, Winston has upped the stakes and is basically proposing to steal money from all our retirement accounts.

NBR reports:

New Zealand First is proposing the Cullen Fund and Kiwisaver funds be used to re-nationalise Mighty River Power and possibly Contact Energy. …

But speaking on TV3’s “The Nation”, Mr Peters said the Government had the ability to access the Cullen Fund. 

“You’ve got the ability to access Kiwi Saver in the short term,” he said.

He said buying back Mighty Rover Power would be bottom line for NZ First support for any Government.

You’ve also got the ability to internationally access the market and borrow, which as you know according to Treasury, because this is a high yielding asset, that makes economic sense to do that, he said.

Mr Peters said to use Kiwisaver funds the Government would need to change the investment rules.

“You could quite easily do that in the short term …

This shows what happens when politicians start competing for the most extreme policy in order to win votes.

KiwiSaver funds do not belong to the Government. They are the private property of those who have one. My KiwiSaver fund is just as much my private property as my bank account, my shares, my house, my car etc.

Winston has said that he wants to forcibly legislate to force anyone with a private KiwiSaver account to purchase back Contact Energy and MRP shares on behalf of the Crown.

That is outrageous. This is like saying we will force every homeowner to take on an additional mortgage, so the Government can build a new office block.

If you elect a Government that treats your private retirement savings as a play-thing for the Government to take over, then the boundaries between public and private will be shattered for ever.

These crazy policies will see us become a banana republic. Who the hell would invest in New Zealand? Why would I keep my money in a KiwiSaver account if Winston and his allies plan to take control of it after the election?

3 News reported last week:

JBWere has sent a strong message that it and other investors will flee the New Zealand stock market if the state intervention signalled by Labour and the Greens this week comes to pass.

“The steps the Labour/Greens are suggesting, if enacted, are significant enough for JBWere to consider a reduced allocation to the local share market,” the firm which oversees $1 billion of client funds in the New Zealand share market said.

“We doubt we would be alone in making this judgment.”

Of course they won’t be alone. We live in a globalised world where capital and labour are highly mobile. The combined policies of Labour, Greens and NZ First will send investment fleeing. And it is investment that creates jobs.

Labour and Greens want to nationalise the electricity industry. NZ First want to nationalise KiwiSaver. How confident are you that is where they’ll stop?

Grant Jacobs at Sci Blogs blogs:

The Ministry of Health has released it’s 2013 Immunisation Health Report.^[1] As you would expect overall we’re a nation of vaccinators. Looked at more closely, though, we could do better.

The report, done in partnership with The Meningitis Foundation Aotearoa New Zealand and Pfizer New Zealand^[2] surveyed 1500 people, most of who were parents. Here are some of the results:

• Overall, 87% fully vaccinated their children.

• 96% at least partly vaccinated their children. (“4% of parents surveyed told us they do not immunise their children at all.”)

• 78% vaccinated their children on time. (Furthermore, “Of those parents who do fully vaccinate their children, 19% do not adhere, or were unsure they adhered, to the age appropriate schedule and this rises to 50% among parents who only partially vaccinate.”)

• Younger parents were slightly less likely to fully vaccinate their children. 80% of parents aged 18 to 24 fully vaccinated their children compared to 89% of older parents, aged 25 to 44.

• 90% of those surveyed believed vaccines are safe.

On a minor note, the report was done by Pfizer and The Meningitis Foundation, not the Ministry of Health. Curia did much of the research for the report.

The Ministry of Health has set targets for vaccination of under 8-month olds. They aim to have 85% of these children vaccinated by July 2013, 90% by July 2014 and 95% by December 2014. (This will tie in with levels needed for effective herd immunity.)

I’m not sure I heard correctly but I think Tony Ryall at the report launch said that in the last few years the vaccination rate has increased from 68% to 93% for very young infants.

Jacobs quotes another report on parents who delay immunisations:

• The Compromised – support immunisation but face significant individual, family/whānau and/or environmental barriers to immunising their infant(s) on time.
• The Considered – support immunisation but are concerned with the timeliness of the schedule. They therefore immunise at times that they feel are more appropriate for their child.
• The Conflicted – have concerns about immunisation and immunise their infants when they feel there is a heightened risk of disease, or through a sense of pressure from their partner, family/whānau and/or health provider.

The full report is here.

The impact of meningococcal and pneumococcal meningitis is very nasty. It can vary from death to brain damage to limb amputation. They are preventable diseases.

Opinions on a couple of policy issues around vaccinations were canvassed:

We asked whether families should lose some of their family tax benefit (as part of Working for Families) if they do not have their children immunised. Opinion was divided – 49% of respondents did not agree with financial penalties; 40% were in favour, and 11% did not know.

We also asked whether children who have not been vaccinated should be accepted into early childhood centres such as day care. Opinion was again divided. While 45% of respondents would not exclude non-vaccinated children, 42% were in favour of exclusion, and a further 13% were unable to answer or did not respond.

The exclusion issue is a difficult one. You don’t want to exclude anyone from ECE, but an unvaccinated child can be a health risk to the other kids.

Two polls out tonight. A One News and 3 News poll. They differ significantly.

The weighted average of the last three polls is above. What they show is that the centre-right would have 58 seats, centre-left 60 seats and Maori Party the balance of power with three seats.

Now three polls in as many days have had quite different results – Roy Morgan, Colmar Brunton and Reid Research. The Roy Morgan was over a different time period, so it is less surprising that it has a different result.

The differences between Colmar Brunton and Reid Research are a bit surprising. I regard both companies as good ones, and it is worth pointing out that their results are just within the extremes of the margin of error – ie one may just be at the high end of the normal range and one at the low end. And also recall 1 in 20 polls will fall outside the normal margin of error.

But people often ask when they differ this much, how to decide which one is accurate.

Generally my advice is to average them out. This tends to be pretty reliable, and the recent US elections found the polling averages very reliable.

You can look at how each polling company did in regard to the last election. However I’d be careful about putting too much weight on that, unless a company was way off-beam. Judging the accuracy of a company off one single poll that has a 3.2% margin of error is dangerous. It may be that the final pre-election poll was accurate, but that things changed in the final few days after the poll was taken.

However for those interested the average difference between the polling company’s results and the average result for all parties was

1. Colmar Brunton 0.9%
2. DigiPoll 1.1%
3. Reid Research 1.3%
4. Research International 1.6%
5. Roy Morgan 1.6%

A difference in the average variation by 0.4% is not great, in my opinion. And as I said, I’d be very careful judging off a single poll. In the US they have polls covering scores of elections, so can get a good idea there if a company systemically has one party too high or low.

Now we can’t do that in NZ, but we can look at how each company has rated the major parties over an electoral cycle. Now again be wary of this comparison because over a three year period, the polls will be done at different times. If I get the time, I might try and do a comparison of polls done within say the same week, but for now thought a quick and dirty analysis could be interesting.

Over the 2008 to 2011 period, the average for each polling company and party was:

• Colmar Brunton – National 53.6%, Labour 31.1%, Greens 7.3% = Lead for National of 15.2%
• Reid Research – National 55.0%, Labour 29.6%, Greens 8.5% = Lead for National of 16.9%

So in the last term Colmar Brunton on average had the gap 1.7% tighter than Reid Research. Now again, that is not saying company A is correct and company B is incorrect. As I said these are polls generally taken over different time periods. But it is interesting there is some difference.

The SST reports:

Extremists “inspired by millionaire Gareth Morgan” are accused of deliberately killing cats in Northland, sparking a bitter fight between conservationists and cat-lovers.

Images of cats caught in traps – described by cat supporters as “horrifying” – have been posted on a Far North conservation group’s Facebook page.

But cat-lovers are accused of extremism too – sending abusive and threatening emails to community board members considering the fate of a controversial cat colony, sparking complaints to police.

The ugly spat centres on a colony of about 10 strays being fed on a council reserve in Paihia in the Bay of Islands.

Morgan labels the colony “vile” and a threat to wildlife. But its supporters describe themselves on Facebook as “soldiers” in the “Battle of Paihia”. Their “war” is against conservation group Bay Bush which seemed to revel in posting photos of dead cats on Facebook, and a community board that last week voted to remove the stray cats permanently.

Their hate figure is Morgan, the businessman and philanthropist turned anti-cat crusader. Auckland Cat Coalition member Anne Batley-Burton squarely blames him for the trouble.

“Gareth Morgan is inciting the conservationists and getting them all worked up about the cats going out and killing all the birds. It’s causing so much trouble between people in communities.”

Another Cat Coalition member, Diane O’Connor, believed Morgan’s crusade had encouraged “radicals” to harm cats. “There are extreme people who now think, ‘yay, we’ve got the green light to hurt, maim and make animals suffer’.”

She said some of the cats were caught in possum traps that had been converted especially to lure them.

The Bay Bush Action Facebook page featured images of trapped cats, including one graphic picture of a black tom hanging by its mouth.

Several people commented on the page that the pictures were like something

from a horror movie and were inappropriate, but others cheered on the killers. “Well done . . . I wonder how many baby kiwi that evil cat killed,” one post said. The images have since been removed, the group conceding they were inflammatory.

Sticking up photos of cats killed in traps is pretty sick.

Meanwhile, two members of the Bay of Islands-Whangaroa Community Board have complained to police after a Facebook group called Cats to Stay – set up in opposition to Morgan’s website Cats to Go – encouraged cat lovers from around the world to email councillors and Far North Mayor Wayne Brown ahead of a meeting last Wednesday to decide the fate of the Paihia strays.

“It was severe harassment,” said deputy chair Belinda Ward. “I’m a ‘terminator’, a ‘murderer’, a ‘cat killer’. I had three days of bombardment. It educated me that cyber bullying by extremists is alive and well.”

Extremism on the other side is equally unhelpful.

Stuff reports:

A man has been jailed for watching cartoon videos of elves, pixies and other fantasy creatures having sex.

Ronald Clark downloaded the Japanese anime cartoons three years ago, setting in train events that would see him in court in Auckland and jailed for three months for possessing objectionable material, and sparking debate as to what harm is caused by digitally created pornography.

Clark has previous convictions for indecently assaulting a teenage boy and has been through rehabilitation programmes, but the video nasties he was watching in this case were all cartoons and drawings.

He says the videos came from an established tradition of Japanese manga and hentai (cartoon pornography), a massive, mainstream industry in that country.

They weren’t even depictions of people – Clark’s lawyer Roger Bowden described them as “pixies and trolls” that “you knew at a glance weren’t human”.

Bowden said the conviction for possessing objectionable material was “the law gone mad”.

However, while the cartoon characters were elves and pixies, they were also clearly young elves and pixies, which led to concerns the images were linked to child sexual abuse.

Anti-child pornography group ECPAT Child Alert director Alan Bell said the images were illegal because they encouraged people “to migrate from there to the real thing”.

It is a difficult issue. Should possession of a digitally created image be illegal? Does it encourage migration? Or can you argue it is a safe outlet? But what if the digital images are not of pixies and trolls but are of young children, and look life like? Do you want a law that says you can download digitally created child porn images so long as they do not look too realistic?

In the end my yuck factor wins out, and I think you can’t have a dividing line between actual images and digitally created ones. It would make it too difficult to enforce the law, as you might then need to prove a photo is of real people.

Also the fact that Mr Clark has form for child abuse is relevant. The Sensible Sentencing Trust reports:

Clark was convicted in the Hamilton High Court on charges of sexual violation by unlawful sexual connection, attempted sexual violation, five charges of indecent assault, plus a number of cannabis sale and supply charges. The victims were three boys aged 11 to 13 and he had supplied them with cannabis and then taken advantage of them. He had started a relationship when the first complainant was 11 and abused the boy regularly for a year. A second boy was 13 when he replaced the first one. Judge Spear stated nothing good could be said about Clark, who had shown no remorse and continued to deny the offences.

The offending resulted in a 10 year sentence in 1996.

The HoS reports:

The Herald on Sunday has obtained emails from the investigating officer in the case, Constable Paul Sharples, sent to witnesses working for NZTC. We showed the emails to Auckland district commander Mike Clement and he confirmed a review of the case was under way.

In an email from Sharples dated October 11, 2011, to an NZTC staff witness, he explains how his brief would be presented: “I will get this laminated on A3. Judges are like children, they like bright colours.”

Personally if I was a Judge I’d be amused, not offended. I’m sure after wading through thousands of pages of documents, a Judge does appreciate a nice colourful A3 statement!

The reference to being like children is in the context of the case being forged qualifications for a childcare worker, so it probably seemed a witty analogy.

Stuff reports:

The surviving suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing lay hospitalised under heavy guard as people across the area breathed easier and investigators tried to piece together the motive for the deadly plot.

Dzhokar Tsarnaev, 19, was reported in serious condition and unable to be interrogated the morning after he was pulled, wounded and bloody, from a boat parked in the backyard of a home in Watertown, Massachusetts. 

The capture came at the end of a tense day that began with his older brother, Tamerlan, dying in a desperate getaway attempt.

President Barack Obama said there are many unanswered questions about the Boston bombings, including whether the Tsarnaev brothers – ethnic Chechens from southern Russia who had been in the US for about a decade and lived in the Boston area – had help from others.

“When a tragedy like this happens, with public safety at risk and the stakes so high, it’s important that we do this right,” Obama said. 

“That’s why we take care not to rush to judgment – not about the motivations of these individuals, certainly not about entire groups of people.”

However, Watertown Police Chief Edward Deveau told CNN the early indications were that the brothers did act alone.

That appears to be the case. In fact it seems the (deceased) older brother probably put his younger brother up to it.

It is still a very distressing case. The two killers were relatively well integrated it seems, but the older brother appears to have become a radical Islamist. Hopefully we may learn from the surviving brother if there was a specific trigger that led to this.

The Herald reports:

More than 10 jobs will be axed at the Human Rights Commission under a proposed shake-up which could see its head office moved from Auckland to Wellington.

The commission launched an organisational review after the Government signalled it would receive no extra baseline funding until 2020.

Chief Human Rights Commissioner David Rutherford said the review aimed to determine how the commission could make human rights more relevant and valuable to all New Zealanders.

But the Public Service Association said the shake-up would impact on the commission’s ability to ensure human rights were upheld.

Staff were told Thursday that 10 full-time jobs would be cut, as well as a number of part-time and fixed-term positions.

PSA national secretary Richard Wagstaff said the scale of the proposal, which would reduce staff numbers by about 15 per cent, had taken staff by surprise.

“In an organisation of its size with only about 72 full-time staff, that’s a pretty big hit and will have significant flow-on effects in terms of workload and efficiency.”

I’m amazed that the Commission currently has 72 staff. Some of the work the Commission does is very valuable, some of it less so. But for some reason I assumed that it had around 20 staff or so.

The Herald editorial:

The Green Party is upset that Trade Minister Tim Groser’s international travel costs soared to almost $250,000 in the first three months of this year as he lobbied for support for his bid to be the director-general of the World Trade Organisation.

As far as I can tell the Greens don’t support there being a WTO, or in fact trade. The logic seems to be:

1. Trade requires transport
2. Transport requires power and fuel
3. Power and fuel cause greenhouse gas emissions
4. Greenhouse gas emissions cause global warming
5. Global warming will destroy the planet
6. Hence trade is evil and must be stopped

True, that sum is more than the combined totals of the Cabinet’s other frequent flyers – the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister and the Defence Minister.

But it pales into insignificance when viewed alongside the potential gains for this country, and for global trade, if Mr Groser were to succeed Pascal Lamy at the end of August.

The main advantage for New Zealand, if Groser wins, is that he is the best person for the job. This means he represents the best chance of getting a global trade agreement to conclude the Doha round. Such an agreement would be worth billions.

The knowledge and experience gained from these ventures into areas of huge complexity make him the candidate most likely to achieve a successful conclusion to the Doha round talks.

It may well be that the fact that no director-general has ever come from Latin America will thwart his bid. That, however, is no excuse for pettiness.

Well said.

I don’t think people realise the precedent that will be created if you allow a Government to nationalise the entire power generating industry, on the grounds that they are not competitive enough and charge too much.

I said that using the same logic, you could nationalise supermarkets on the grounds we do not have enough competition there. Any politicians from the left have been going on about the lack of competition there for some time.

Now Fran O’Sullivan says the energy policy is a Chavez style nationalisation. Well read this story to understand where things may end up:

Citing price-gouging and “multiple violations of Venezuelan laws”, Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez has nationalised Exito, a chain of supermarkets under French and Colombian ownership.

 

Chavez accused the chain of raising food prices without just cause, after Venezuela devalued its currency earlier this month.

Now both Labour and Greens want to devalue the NZ currency. The inevitable impact from doing so, is price increases. So if supermarkets increased their food prices, it would be the perfect excuse to introduce a single buyer for food also, effectively nationalising supermarkets also.

Some people may say Labour’s policy is not nationalisation, but it substantially is. In theory the power companies remain privately owned, but they will be forbidden by law to sell to anyone but the Government at whatever price the Government demands. That is effective control.

Chris Finlayson has announced:

Today’s signing between the Crown Ngāti Tama ki Te Tau Ihu at Onetahua Marae in Golden Bay marks the final deed of settlement for historical claims in the South Island, Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Minister Christopher Finlayson announced.

“This government is committed to resolving all historical Treaty grievances, and so it is a monumental occasion as we sign the last outstanding deed of settlement for historical claims in the South Island,” Mr Finlayson said.

This is the 62nd deed of settlement signed by the Crown since 1990. It is the 36th to have been signed since November 2008.

“This government is committed to just and durable settlements of these grievances in a timely fashion,” he said. “We have increased the rate at which settlements are being reached, so that full and final resolution of these issues is accomplished sooner for the benefit of Māori and all New Zealanders.” …

“Over the past four years the completion of all historical settlements has gone from being a vanishing point constantly beyond the horizon, to being recognized as an achievable goal that is now well advanced,” Mr Finlayson said.

The only major area which has a settlement yet to progess is in Northland, where Iwi find it difficult to agree on who does the negotiation.

Over around 25 years, the settlements will total around $1.5 billion. That is not a huge amount of money considering the Government is spending around $70 billion a year.

I expect the final historical settlement to occur in this decade. That will be a very good thing. Many Iwi such as Ngai Tahi have gone from grievance mode to achievement mode.

The completion of historical settlements will not mean an end to Treaty issues. There will still be arguments over resource consent issues, water rights, airwaves and the like. You can’t pass a law saying people are not allowed to argue!

I blogged on Wednesday the following graph:

I was pointing out the Greens are against nuclear, coal and large hydro which doesn’t bode well for the future cost of power.

Now Gareth Hughes has responded with this graph:

But do you see what is missing? The cost of capital or construction. These costs are often the largest part of total costs.

Of course once you have a dam in place, or a wind turbine in place, the operating costs are less than having to keep digging up coal from the ground. But capital is not free (unless you print money!) and there is an ongoing cost to capital – either interest or opportunity cost.

So if you look at the graph I provided, it shows that solar has no operating costs (of course) but huge construction costs.

Now don’t get me wrong. I think renewables are the future. I think wind, hydro, solar and even tidal are part of our future energy supply. But they need to be cost effective. Blanket bans on coal and large hydro are not the way to go.

Hat Tip: Whale Oil. Original here.

Bryce Edwards has a great collection of images around the same sex marriage debate. They range from cartoons to the voting sheets to newspaper headlines. Some of my favourites are:

Fran O’Sullivan writes in the Herald:

The ghost of Hugo Chavez is alive and thriving within the Labour Party as it turns its back on its free-market past to buy itself back into power courtesy of the taxpayers’ chequebook.

And not just nationalisation, but free electricity!

If David Shearer and Russel Norman muster enough votes to win the next election, they say they will toss us all the equivalent of a free 300KW block of electricity

Just as the Greens think you can print money, they and Labour also think you can just give electricity away for free, and somehow new generation will be built.

We are asked to believe this policy will also produce 5000 new jobs and generate $450 million worth of new economic activity because two pages of bare analysis on Berl’s equilibrium model tells us so.

I don’t think so. No one with any residue of grey matter left will believe Shearer’s protestations that the timing of this joint announcement has nothing to do with the pending Mighty River Power IPO.

This policy has all the signs of being rushed out with one aim in mind: To spook the private investors (including the many smaller shareholders who are being enticed back into a New Zealand sharemarket, which was on the verge of its own demise a few years back) who are lining up to buy shares in the forthcoming float.

Indeed.

But the decision to insert a state-owned monopsony – or monopoly buyer – called New Zealand Power between the supply and demand sides of the electricity industry without first undertaking any stringent analysis and submissions from existing privately listed companies like Contact Energy, TrustPower, Infratil and the privately owned Todd Energy really amounts to nothing more than effective renationalisation of the competitive sector.

And why are they nationalising them? Because they hope it will gain votes?

But what is really instructive from the BusinessDesk report (a good scoop, by the way) is Jones’ admission that not only do asset owners need dividends but “politicians need dividends as well”.

The report went on to note that to win the 2014 election, Labour needed to move about 5 to 7 per cent of the voting public to favour it.

Jones suggested energy analysts’ capacity to “make 5 to 7 per cent of the public hate us [because of this policy] is zero. Our capacity to impress that percentage [with this policy] is infinite”.

In other words, the sniff of power is so enticing to Jones that he is prepared to give away the return on state-owned assets to consumers to bribe his party’s way back to power.

Their next policy may be to announce that if you have more than one house, the government will confiscate it and give it to an aspiring home owner.

The word has been that Lianne Dalziel will announce her candidacy for Mayor in the next two weeks, despite over a year of denials.

The Press reports:

Labour MP Lianne Dalziel has asked the founder of Christchurch’s Student Volunteer Army, Sam Johnson, to stand together to challenge Mayor Bob Parker in this year’s local body elections, The Press understands.

Speculation has been mounting as to who will run against Parker in October. And The Press can now reveal Labour’s Canterbury Earthquake Recovery spokeswoman Dalziel has asked Johnson, 24, to be her running mate and would-be deputy mayor.

Johnson himself would have to be elected as a councillor to assume the deputy’s position, and Dalziel is believed to have sounded out other running mates too.

But Johnson’s reputation soared after he organised the much-celebrated student army to help quake-affected Cantabrians and in 2012 he was named Young New Zealander of the Year. He currently sits on the Riccarton-Wigram Community Board and in January indicated he could seek a seat on the city council .

Maybe Sam should stand for Mayor, rather than be Lianne’s deputy!

Stuff reports:

One of the country’s worst drink-drivers has been sent back to prison but has exposed the “pathetically weak” sentences available to judges.

Dean Murray Holder clocked up his 47th conviction yesterday for driving either drunk or disqualified. He was hit with the toughest sentence the judge could give him – 18 months in prison.

A drug and alcohol expert who works with repeat drink-drivers said extreme offenders such as Holden were worse than paedophiles and the law for dealing with them was “pathetically weak”.

Eventually a repeat drink driver will kill someone, so is there a case for preventive detention for them? Not after three strikes by say after 15?

If people are addicted to alcohol, that is fine (not fine, but only hurtung themselves). But take a bus or taxi. There is no excuse to drive drunk hundreds and hundreds of times.

UPCOMING THIS WEEKEND 0930 SATURDAY – 0800 SUNDAY TV3

www.frontpage.co.nz will have all video and transcripts at 10:00 Sunday
Labour’s energy plan – David Parker
The Greens Energy plan – Gareth Hughes
NZ First’s energy plan (and why he’s supporting the GCSB legislation) – Winston Peters
Former Energy Minister, Max Bradford, on all the plans
Colin James on the politics of it all
On the Sunday Media Panel – Brian Edwards, Bill Ralston and guest, Investigate editor Ian Wishart on how the Christian media covered the gay marriage bill.

The Herald profiles the Sensible Sentencing Trust and details their policy wishlist. Some good issues to debate.

no bail for anyone facing a violent offence

I think that is a step too far. I think bail is too easy to get, and far too many offences are done by people on bail. But if you are a first time offender, there is a presumption of innocence.

fewer chances to apply for bail having once been rejected

Not sure how many chances there are, but I agree they should be few.

appeals to carry a punitive cost if they fail, so offenders who appeal and lose go to jail for longer

I agree with the principle that there should be some incentive not to have appeals in cases where there is no chance of success – such as cases where they are caught red handed.

sentences for multiple crimes to be served end on end rather than together

I think cumulative sentences would be a step too far.

prior criminal convictions to be revealed as evidence in court and considered as adding weight to guilt

I don’t think they should be considered as adding weight but I think in the Internet age it will prove impossible to keep previous convictions hidden. I’d have them public, but Judges should warn to judge a case on the facts only.

performance reviews for judges and the ability to sack those who did not meet standards

I think collection of data on decisions of Judges is a good thing, but Judges should only be sacked for misconduct – not for making unpopular decisions.

simpler sentencing laws because the current laws have been developed to deliberately confuse the public.

Need to know details to comment.