This story has gone global. Very cool.

Stuff reports:

Under-fire MP Brendan Horan has consulted police and the Privacy Commissioner about the leak of his phone records.

The bill from his taxpayer-funded mobile phone showed numerous calls to the TAB. But Mr Horan said he had not broken any rules and the calls added up to only about $20.

Mr Horan appeared to be pointing the finger at NZ First leader Winston Peters yesterday, saying the leaking of his calls “for political gain” was “grossly irresponsible and reckless”.

Mr Horan originally authorised the release of the records by Parliamentary Service, after Mr Peters asked to see them.

Now Mr Horan says the leaking of telephone numbers “jeopardised the protection of innocent people” who had contacted him confidentially.

I think Peters had the right to release them, but they should have blacked out all phone numbers on the statements except the ones to the TAB.

After meeting last night, the NZ First board released a statement saying that Mr Horan, “by his own action in notifying the Speaker that he be regarded as an independent Member of Parliament, had in doing so, relinquished his membership” of the party.

This looks like an attempt to get around the requirement in their own rules for a hearing into any expulsion. But on the face of it they are lying. Hansard records:

Honourable members, under Standing Order 35(1)(c) I have been advised by the New Zealand First Party that its parliamentary membership has changed and that Brendan Horan is no longer a member of the New Zealand First Party for parliamentary purposes. Accordingly, under Standing Order 34(4) Brendan Horan is from 4 December 2012 regarded as an Independent member for parliamentary purposes.

There is no mention by the Speaker about Horan notifying the Speaker. Peters did.

I think Peters has made the right ultimate decision, but that doesn’t excuse the total lack of any sort of fair process, let alone trampling on his party’s own rules. It is hypocrisy especially as Peters went to court over National’s non-selection of him in the 1990s.

This just confirms that NZ First isn’t a real political party. It is a personality cult. They haven’t even managed to elect a Deputy Leader more than a year after the election.

ZB reports:

Judith Collins is blunt in explaining why she wants a second opinion on the report on compensation for David Bain.

She says the retired Canadian judge’s report appears to contain assumptions based on incorrect facts, and shows a misunderstanding of New Zealand law.

The Justice Minister has asked for a peer review into the report by Justice Ian Binnie.

Judith Collins says the report lacks a robustness of reasoning used to justify its conclusions.

Since she told him she wasn’t happy, Justice Binnie has provided her with two revised versions of his report.

The minister says seeking a second opinion was not a decision she made lightly, but justice needs to be done, and a proper process undertaken.

It will be fascinating to see the original report, the revised reports and the peer review report. I’m hoping they will all be released.

Ben Heather  at Stuff reports:

A $2 billion Government overhaul, including more state homes and universal child support, is needed to fight child poverty, a report from the children’s commissioner says. …

They include scrapping many benefits for parents and replacing them with a universal payment for every child under 5.

Never ever ever. It is morally and economically wrong to tax people more so you can turn every family in New Zealand into welfare recipients. They want to turn the clock back to the 1970s.

The welfare state should be targeted at families in need. Handing out cash to every family with children is nuts and comes from people who have no appreciation of the fact all those welfare handouts need to be paid for by.

Voting is now open via the blog polls in the sidebar for the 2012 Kiwiblog Awards. Any names that got more than one nomination were included. As no person (except mikenmild) got nominated more than once for Public Servant of the Year, no voting for that category this year.

The nominees are:

Press Gallery Journalist of the Year

• John Armstrong
• Patrick Gower
• Rodney Hide
• Fran O’Sullivan

Rodney is not technically press gallery but he writes on politics so have allowed the nomination. Likewise Fran is a business columnist but again often writes on politics.

Minor Party MP of the Year

• Peter Dunne
• Kevine Hague
• Julie-Anne Genter
• Russel Norman
• Winston Peters

National MP of the Year

• Chris Finlayson
• Steven Joyce
• John Key
• Tony Ryall

Labour MP of the Year

• David Cunliffe
• Chris Hipkins
• Rajen Prasad
• Louisa Wall

MP of the Year

• Steven Joyce
• Russel Norman
• Tony Ryall

Regan Cunliffe blogs at Throng:

On monday, Sky and TVNZ launched their hardly anticipated new subscription television service.

Here’s our list of reasons why it shouldn’t be under your tree this Christmas or anywhere else in your house for that matter.

10. It’s probably still broken.  

The custom built platform was supposed to be launched months ago but has been delayed due to “technical problems”.  Is the launch simply exploitation of the spending season or a Christmas miracle?

9. TVNZ are involved.

Remember when TVNZ said “TiVo transforms television“? How are all those customers feeling today?  How long before Igloo too melts down?

8. A comparable Freeview box is less than half the price.

There are a number of basic models of DVB-T receivers which also have the ability to record to a connected USB storage device.

7. Sport is ultra-expensive.

The base “30 day channel pack” plus purchasing every Super XV match The Chiefs play during that period would cost you up to $99.74. On Sky this would cost $72.46 and include more channels, every Super XV game and a lot more sports besides.

6. Paying for content that used to be free.

Two of the eleven Igloo channels feature content that TVNZ used to broadcast for free:  Kidzone24 and TVNZ Heartland.

5. All Igloo content is Standard Definition.

The only content that you’ll be able to view in High Definition is from any of the free-to-air channels that broadcast in HD.  All of the extra content you’re paying for is delivered in standard definition.  This includes movies and sport.

4. High per channel price.

The “Sky Basic” package costs approximately $1.36 per premium channel compared with $2.27 per premium channel on Igloo.

3. Igloo is not a middle option.

Currently, a new 12 month “Sky Basic” package (~63 channels) with 3 months free sport and SoHo and free installation costs $553.44.

A new Igloo box (~34 channels) which you install yourself and a 12 month subscription costs $478.05

A new Freeview box (~29 channels) which you install yourself costs from $99.

2. Two thirds of the channels you can already watch for free.

That’s right.  They’re already free.  And also the most watched.

1. You’re not an Eskimo.

They’re the only ones who should have an igloo.

Those are our top 10 reasons why you shouldn’t get igloo and now we want yours.  We’ve got a brand new Samsung MyFreeview HD digital TV recorder (BDE-8500) worth $649 to give away.

In addition, if anyone reposts this on their own blog, we’ll include any comments made there in the draw. Have at it.

So if you comment below on Kiwiblog why you think people shouldn’t get Igloo, you can win a Samsung MyFreeview HD digital TV recorder!

7 News reported:

A record number of New Zealanders are arriving in Australia, and thousands are doing it thanks to cash handouts from their own Government.

Umm, not thousands. Six people.

The outrageous unemployment policy is turning Australia into a dumping ground for the out-of-work Kiwis.

Yes those six extra Kiwis last year have grown the Australian population by 0.000027%. How will they cope.

A nice new web resource – Wiki New Zealand. They are collecting as much data as possible on NZ, and presenting it graphically. I can see myself referring here often. You can help them out to:

•  Providing data or access and permission to use data
•  Providing guidance in your area of subject expertise
•  Notifying us of any content errors or technical bugs
•  Suggesting how Wiki New Zealand could be more effective or useful
•  Suggesting other topic areas for adding
•  Volunteering your time to create graphs
•  Telling us how else you would like to contribute

Wikipedia has become an invaluable resource, showing the power of a wiki approach. This is not structured quite the same way, but has great potential.

A huge and welcome announcement by Telecom today. They have concluded agreements in a number of countries, so Telecom mobile customers can data roam for a flat rate per day.

The rate is $10 a day for UK, US, Canada, China and Hong Kong and Taiwan (and a couple of others) and $6 a day in Australia. This is pretty damn decent, when you consider per MB rates tend to be $10/MB!

The test for me is whether the rates are low enough that I would keep my NZ sim card in the phone, rather than buy a local sim. While local sims will still be cheaper, it is a hassle to have a different number while overseas and acquiring the sim can be a hassle also. So I’d say I’ll now stick with my Telecom sim when travelling overseas to one of those countries.

As you can tether your laptop to your phone, the $10/day charge is also cheaper than what many hotels charge for daily Internet. In some countries the hotels have free Internet, but not universal.

This new plan by Telecom will shake up the market dramatically. If Vodafone and 2 degrees don’t respond, I can see a lot of business travellers swapping over. Also as far as I know, a flat rate roaming deal is very rare outside Europe (which is basically one market now). This deal could have flow on effects to other markets.

I understand Telecom CEO Simon Moutter personally pushed this initiative, based on his experience as CEO of Auckland Airport. It seems one of the most common complaints he heard there was about international roaming rates.

Two thirds of Telecom customers turn off data when in Australia. I’m one of those. I’ll definitely keep it on for $6 a day (of course would not object to this lowering over time).

The worse thing about the per MB rates is you simply don’t know how much you’ll end up walloped for. There is going to be a fair use policy for use overseas but it won’t be a fixed limit or anything, Basically it will just be based on your data usage overseas being comparable to your usage in NZ. So don’t download any movies while roaming.

I find it quite easy to use 20  to 50 MB a day on my phone, just through normal activities such as web, GPS, youtube, e-mail, twitter and facebook.

I swapped from Vodafone to Telecom a year or two ago for my mobile (still Vodafone for landline and Internet) mainly based on the coverage. There were just too many areas (esp in Auckland) that Vodafone signal was too weak. If I hadn’t swapped. I’d be tempted to do so now just for the roaming rates. However I suspect Vodafone will be under great pressure to respond with a similar flat rate package for data roaming – which will be good. I love competition!

Baron Lawson of Blaby (father of Nigella) writes in the Daily Mail:

Thirty years ago, I was Secretary of State for Energy in Margaret Thatcher’s government, and one way and another I have been a close observer of the energy scene ever since. 

In all that time, I have never known a technological revolution as momentous as the breakthrough that has now made it economic to extract gas from shale.

Technology the Greens are trying to ban.

… shale gas is locked in dense rock. Energy companies must drill a well hundreds or thousands of feet deep to reach the layer of shale — which can be just 50ft thick — and then turn the drill sideways to bore horizontally.

Water, chemicals and sand are pumped into the hole under enormous pressure until the rock cracks, allowing gas locked up in the shale to escape and flow upwards into the well. 

This process is called hydraulic fracturing — or ‘fracking’ for short.

So how significant is this shale gas, that the Greens want left down there?

The consequences are difficult to exaggerate. Not just in terms of the economic benefit of a new and abundant source of relatively cheap energy, but in geopolitical terms, too.

Until now, the West has been heavily dependent for its supplies of oil and gas on an unstable Middle East and an unreliable Russia. Crucially, all that has changed because gas and oil-bearing shale is scattered throughout the world — including in Britain. …

The dramatic news emerged a few weeks ago that the U.S. will overtake Saudi Arabia as the world’s largest oil producer in 2017.

America is already the world’s largest natural gas producer, and it is estimated that, by 2035, almost 90 per cent of Middle East oil and gas exports will go to Asia, with the U.S. importing virtually none.

It is ironic that for decades the left have cried out that they want the US less dependent on middle eastern oil, and now that it can happen – they are fighting it.

For decades, the West in general, and the U.S. in particular, has had to shape, and sometimes arguably to misshape, its foreign policy in the light of its dependence on Middle East oil and gas. No longer: that era is now over.

For decades, too, Europe has been fearful of the threat that Russia might cut off the gas supplies on which it has relied so heavily.

No longer: that era will very soon be over, too. Thanks to the shale gas revolution, the newfound energy independence of the West is a beneficent game-changer in terms of world politics as much as it is in the field of energy economics.

When bullies lose their power, this is a good thing.

The company behind the exploration has announced that Blackpool is sitting on one of the biggest shale gas fields in the world — with a reserve of 200 trillion cubic feet lying under the Lancastrian countryside. 

To put that figure in perspective, it’s enough gas to keep the UK going for 50 years and create more than 5,000 jobs.

50 years of fuel in just one field. So what does this mean for peak oil?

For the world as a whole, technically recoverable gas resources are now conservatively reckoned to amount to around 16,000 trillion cubic feet. In short, as a result of the shale revolution, the Earth can now provide us with about 250 years’ worth of gas supplies.

The so-called ‘peak oil’ theory, which suggests that within the foreseeable future the world will run out of fossil fuels — coal, oil and gas — has never looked more absurd.

If you hear about peak oil again, laugh. And point out even George Monbiot has admitted peak oil has not occurred and will not occur for many decades or more.

While the world’s shale gas reserves appear to be massive, they could even be dwarfed by global oil shale reserves in sedimentary rock, which contains solid organic material that can be converted into an oil-like product when heated.

According to the U.S. government, oil shale deposits in an area called the Green River Formation in the western United States are estimated to contain up to 3 trillion barrels of oil — three times more than the whole world has consumed in the past 100 years.

And the Greens want us to stop building roads in New Zealand, because they say peak oil will lead to the death of the car.

We are living in an era when good news is thin on the ground. The shale gas revolution is the exception: a game-changing piece of good news, both economically and geo-politically, both for this country and for the world.

Hear hear.

Joseph Menn of Reuters reports at Stuff:

A landmark attempt to set global rules for overseeing the Internet threatened to fall apart on Friday as a rift pitting the United States and some Western countries against the rest of the world widened, participants in the talks said.

A 12-day conference of the International Telecommunications Union, taking place in Dubai, is supposed to result in the adoption of a new international treaty governing trans-border communications.

But in a critical session at the midpoint of the conference on Friday, delegates refused to adopt a US-Canadian proposal to limit the treaty’s scope to traditional communications carriers and exclude Internet companies such as Google, the ITU said on its website.

Further complicating the negotiations was what a US official at the talks called the “surprise” announcement of an accord among some Arab states, Russia and other countries to pursue treaty amendments that are expected to include Internet provisions unacceptable to the United States

A still-secret draft of the coalition’s proposals is to be introduced soon by the United Arab Emirates, the official said.

I have a simple test on Internet issues that rarely fails me. If the proposal comes from Russia, China or an Arab state, then it will be really really bad.

The emergence of the new coalition, whose members are generally seeking greater Internet censorship and surveillance, is likely to harden battle lines separating those countries from the United States and some allies in Western Europe.

And New Zealand!

The United States and others objected to the introduction of complex new material midway through the conference.

This is the danger. That something get slipped into a working group under the radar. They have no rules requiring proposals to be made in advance, let alone in public.

That would potentially isolate America and its allies from much of the world, and technology leaders fear that the rest of the globe would agree on actions such as identifying political dissidents who use the Internet and perhaps trying to alter the Net’s architecture to permit more control.

Identifying political dissidents who use the Internet? Sounds like the Labour party caucus!

The 147-year-old ITU, which is now under the auspices of the United Nations, historically has set technology standards and established payment customs for international phone calls. But under Secretary-General Hamadoun Touré, it has inched toward cyber-security and electronic content issues, arguing that Internet traffic goes over phone lines and is therefore within its purview.

Which is nonsense. The proportion of the Internet that goes over copper phone lines is diminishing anyway. The future is over fibre, plus mobile, satellite and wireless.

At the ITU meeting, the American delegation had counted on support from at least Japan, Australia and other affluent democracies.

But its effort to stave off wholesale changes has been hindered by complications in Western Europe, where some countries were supporting a change to the economic model that would have Google, Facebook and others pay for at least some of the costs of Internet transmission.

Equally repugnant. They already pay for website hosting and for connections to their local ISPs. What the telcos want is termination charges like you have for toll calls, so countries and telcos can collect revenue on not just their customers, but on people who send data to their customers. It would cripple the Internet model.

Kathryn Powley at NZ Herald reports:

Ewen Macdonald faces his first Parole Board hearing at Manawatu Prison on Tuesday.

Macdonald is serving a five-year sentence for arson, vandalism and killing deer and calves on neighbouring Feilding farms.

Much of his time in prison was served while on remand and during his trial for the July 2010 murder of his wife’s brother, Scott Guy. In July, he was found not guilty of Guy’s murder.

Macdonald has served a third of his sentence, meaning he is eligible for parole, but it would be very unusual for parole to be granted at a prisoner’s first hearing.

Personally I think the fact that Macdonald appears to have sociopath tendencies is a pretty good reason not to give him parole!

The same story also reports:

Meanwhile, a prisoner has complained about the way Macdonald’s lawyer Greg King handled a previous case.

Law Society president Jonathan Temm told the Herald on Sunday a prisoner on a long term of imprisonment for a “whole range of very serious sexual offences” was at the heart of the report. The prisoner is understood to be in Rimutaka.

“He has made a complaint against Mr King’s conduct as his trial counsel and he is represented by a relatively senior member of the profession on the appeal.”

Temm would not comment on the merits of the appeal, but noted some people convicted of serious offending often complained about their lawyer.

“I’m not sure whether complaints against Mr King will resonate with a result that [the prisoner] will get a new trial, but who knows? These things do happen.”

The prisoner’s complaint also claimed impropriety around a legal aid claim.

Temm said there was no complaint before the Law Society about King and he believed the complaint had been to the Ministry of Justice.

However, a ministry spokesman would not comment, citing an order from Coroner Wallace Bain suppressing details around King’s death.

Again this substantiates the story broken a month ago by Truth. They have left out the fact that a call was made by the Dominion Post to the King family about the legal aid allegations shortly before his death.

There’s been a great volume of posts and comments on the left blogs about one or more people in Labour, including an MP, allegedly targeting Labour party members for comments they have made on blogs under a pseudonym. The best summary comes from Danyl at the Dim Post:

My understanding of what’s happened here is that most authors on The Standard comment under pseudonyms. And they’ve commented on the Labour blog Red Alert using those same pseudonyms. Now, when you comment on Red Alert you have to provide your real email address. So these have been matched to Labour’s membership and the dissenting members have been contacted by party officials. All pretty creepy.

It is creepy and authoritarian, and worse.  If correct, I think the actions may breach the Privacy Act.

Lynn Prentice has commented:

I’d advise anyone who has used a pseudonym on Red Alert that could compromise them in real life to expect problems. The system operators over there are quite compromised, don’t act responsibly, and have been that way for some time. Quite simply they are not operating in a way that makes it safe to leave comments there unless you have cast-iron anonymity. …

Which incidentally, is why you don’t see Red Alert on our feed

That is a hugely damning statement. The person in charge of the most read left blog in New Zealand (and a long term Labour party member) says he won’t even link to the Labour caucus blog because of their ethical standards in using private registration details to target people.

If I was a journalist, I’d be asking whoever is in charge of Red Alert to confirm or deny the allegations from their own party members.

It seems that once the identity of certain people commenting at The Standard was known (by cross-matching the e-mail address they used on Red Alert to their membership database) they were heavied, as were their friends. The Sprout has said:

My friends were heavied in an attempt to intimidate me to stop posting during the leadership contest between Shearer and Cunliffe. Clearly someone in Wellington didn’t like me saying their pony was a rightwing puppet who couldn’t lead a party to save himself. Despite me only stating the obvious, it spurred a pretty awful and nasty intimidation campaign. They knew the people being threatened weren’t me, but they knew too that doing that to my friends would quieten me. How shitty North-Korean is that?

So far it’s been CV, millsy, Peter Wilson, and me – that I know of – but who knows who else has been leaned on to shut up?

Eddie confirms this in a post:

Now, a senior Labour MP has written a letter to the New Zealand Council trying to stamp on debate by party members online. The MP has singled one individual commentator in particular for attack in the letter (don’t worry, you know already if it’s you) after using back-end data from Red Alert to identify them.

To be clear, a senior MP is attempting to change the membership rules of the party to punish a member for writing somethings that the MP doesn’t agree with in the comments section of blogs (which everyone knows Labour MPs don’t read anyway). Talk about breaking a butterfly upon a wheel. Talk about abusing your institutional power in an attempt to insulate yourself from criticism, no matter the cost to the party itself.

And this comes from the party that says it is from open government and protecting people’s right of free speech on the Internet. Can you imagine what they might do if they were actually in Government?

One of those allegedly targeted was Colonial Viper. To make it harder for Labour MPs to work out who to target, many of the commenters as The Standard have adopted similar pseudonyms in a Spartacus strategy! Nice solidarity.

Pete George has a comprehensive set of links on this issue.

Tamsyn Parker interviews Simon Power in his growing role with Westpac:

Power says one of the big differences in moving to Westpac has been getting used to the change in culture.

“In politics people’s motivations can be mixed – here everyone is very supportive.”

Ha “mixed” is a euphemism!

Siobhan Leathley at NZ Herald reports:

Police have condemned “violent” protesters who attacked two police officers and set fire to cardboard boxes as they tried to force their way into free trade negotiations.

A handful of police and SkyCity security staff were overwhelmed by more than 150 protesters, forcing the on-the-ground commander to call in reinforcements from around Auckland.

“Police staff moved in to prevent escalation and two officers were separated, attacked and kicked numerous times. Fire appliances were called to the scene to help,” police said in a statement. “Two arrests were made. One of these arrests was a female that stomped on a constables head.”

Charming. Such idiocy and violence from those protesters actually damages their cause.

I wonder how many of the 300 were on their tenth protest or more of the year?

The HoS editorial:

 New figures released by the Ministry of Transport are effectively that New Zealand research and confirm beyond doubt that the Government must act now to lower the blood-alcohol limit.

The data, released under the Official Information Act, reveals at least 20 people have been killed over the past four years in road accidents in which the driver had an alcohol reading of between 50mg and 80mg.

I don’t have the data they have under the OIA. But I suspect that the stat they quote includes drivers who are aged under 20 who already have a legal limit of 30 (now 0). The relevant stat is how many drivers who can legally drive at 50 to 80 mg blood alcohol have fatal crashes. Hence if you change the law (and assume that those drivers will obey the new law) how many fewer fatal crashes might there be.

Now again I don’t have the OIA data (but happy to be sent it), but we do have 2008 to 2010 data on the Transport website. The data for the number of drivers killed who were over 20 and had a blood alcohol level of 50 to 80 is three per year over those four years.

Now there is definitely a case to say three fewer fatal crashes per year is worthwhile – it is. But what we don’t know (and what the data is being collected for) is how many people drive at 50 to 80 blood alcohol and would be affected by a lower limit. Without solid data, how do we know whether the limit should be 50, 80, 30, 65? It is easy for media to portray an issue as simple and not complex – but I think it is the duty of Government to understand the impact of a proposed law change -how many drivers will be impacted by it, and what is the accident rate for driving at that level. If you don’t have data on the prevalence of driving at that BAC, you can not calculate the accident rate.

The NZ Herald reported:

Independent MP Brendan Horan’s last links with New Zealand First – the party which took him into Parliament – are likely to be severed following a board meeting on Monday evening.

The NZ First party rules clearly state that a member can be expelled only after a hearing, and that Horan must be sent by registered mail notice of the hearing and details of the nature of the complaint, the date, time and place of the hearing. Has this been done?

NZ First president Kevin Gardener yesterday confirmed Mr Horan’s membership was on the agenda for the board’s Monday meeting where Leader Winston Peters was expected to give his reasons for expelling him from the NZ First Caucus this week.

Mr Peters yesterday said he was relaxed that his decision to expel Mr Horan following allegations the MP had taken money from his dying mother’s bank accounts was the right one.

Mr Gardener said he had confidence in Mr Peters’ judgement, “and all the board will”.

Good God – not a big believer in natural justice or hearing both sides are they? This confirms that the party is a personality cult rather than a democratic organisation.

On the basis of what is known, I actually think Peters was right to take action against Horan. But the way they have taken action has been appalling in terms of process. They need to write to him and put the complaints to him, and have a hearing where he can put a defence. I also suspect (based on the precedent Peters himself created with National in the 1990s) that any board member (such as the President) who has pre-judged the matter can’t be part of the hearing. If they do not follow their own rules, they can face judicial review.

Tony Wall in the SST reports:

 MP Brendan Horan offered to pay $25,000 to his mother’s estate after he was accused of taking money from her bank accounts, but the deal collapsed, the Sunday Star-Times has learnt. …

Sources close to the family say they offered to settle the dispute by allowing Horan to take a $40,000 reduction in his share of his mother’s estate. …

The Star-Times yesterday saw a spreadsheet of 28 questionable cheques, totalling $180,000, going back to 2000. The largest, in February 2007, was for $50,000, and there were others for $35,000, $10,000, and several for around $5000. Investigators are still looking into who they were made out to.

If this is correct, I think its is fast becoming a criminal matter. I’m not saying any crimes have been committed. I’m saying that allegations of $180,000 of presumably unauthorised cheques are extremely serious.

If NZ First follow the process laid down in their rules, they can make a decision to expel Horan (if justified) before Christmas. Once there has been a process which has some natural justice attached to it, then he should resign from Parliament having lost the support of his party.

news.com.au reports:

THE boss of the radio network at the centre of the hoax call suicide tragedy has defended radio pranks as the government watchdog begins to investigate the incident.

A visibly shaken Rhys Holleran, CEO of Southern Cross Austereo that owns the radio station, has expressed the network’s “deep sorrow” at the death of nurse Jacintha Saldanha, 46, on Friday just days after she answered Sydney radio station 2DayFM’s hoax call.

I think there is a place for prank calls, but I don’t regard what that radio station did as a prank call. I think it was a nasty little lie. There is nothing clever or funny in ringing up a nurse and pretending to be someone else to access the private health records of a patient – no matter how famous.

If they had even an ounce of empathy, they should have realised in advance their call, if successful  would result in the employees concerned being massively distraught at their mistake in trusting them not to be lying. Also I don’t see what is funny about a young women having her first baby being in hospital due to complications.

No the suicide of Jacintha Saldanha was not predictable in advance, and I am sure they are genuinely upset by what has happened. However it was predictable that that nature of the call and the hoax they were enacting was going to cause great distress to the hospital staff they conned. The only thing unknown was the extent.

Now two children do not have a mother, and Kate and William’s first child will always be associated with the death of an innocent. Prince William already hated the press for what he saw as their role in the death of his mother. No doubt this addition to the media death toll will only harden that hatred.

News.com.au reports:

Former Mildura laundry owner Kevin Andrews has been convicted of repeatedly bullying several of his workers physically, psychologically and verbally at his business between 2007 and 2009.

Magistrate Hugh Radford said Andrews’ “disgusting and appalling” behaviour had caused workers to suffer nightmares and depression up to five years on.

Mr Radford said Andrews had asked one employee to bring his dogs to the laundry, “and if an employee stuffed up they would be bitten by the dogs, that is the employee would be locked up with the dogs in a shipping container”.

“Further the accused threatened the employees that he would dissolve them in acid, a substance that was available to them in the workplace,” Mr Radford said. …

Andrews also referred a female employee as a “big fat bush pig”, called women “brain-dead c—s” and had said “all women are dogs”.

I’m amazed he was only fined $50,000!

Claire Trevett at NZ Herald writes:

National MP Tau Henare has indicated he has given up on the race to be the next Speaker, claiming the “scaredy cats” Maori Party had broken a promise to support his bid.

Mr Henare announced he intended to run for the Speaker’s position on Twitter in September – and yesterday he again turned to Twitter to send a signal he was about to end his campaign.

Their support was key. If all the opposition parties and the Maori Party vote together, then they have 60 votes. If Tau voted for himself he could have become Speaker by 61 votes to 60.

His tactics were bold and somewhat unprecedented. I doubt there ever has been a Speaker elected who didn’t receive a single vote from any of their party colleagues. It would have been a huge defeat for National to have a Speaker elected whom they did not support.

Not that I personally have any issues with Tau as Speaker. He’s funny and feisty and would throw Trevor and Winston out a lot – which has to be a plus.

However, Mr Henare was optimistic and had lobbied hard until yesterday when he tweeted that the Maori Party had now reneged on an undertaking to support him, which he said was critical to his decision to run in the first place.

“All I can say is maybe someone should start another Maori Party, maybe one that doesn’t renege on deals. Scaredy cats,” he tweeted.

He said he had that agreement in writing “and they still turned tail”.

I imagine they received some indication of how (un)successful their 2013 budget bids would be, if they voted for Tau.

Actually I don’t know what happened, but the reality in politics is government survive on trust and co-operation. The Maori Party probably worked out that humiliating the Government by electing a Speaker not supported by the Government (as far as I know no modern Speaker has ever been elected against the will of the Government) would seriously damage their relationships with Ministers and the Prime Minister.

The Maori Party co-leaders could not be contacted last night. Their support is unlikely to have been enough to get Mr Henare the job even with Labour’s support. The Speaker is voted on by Parliament and it is understood Henare was trying to persuade some of National’s caucus that they did not need to vote along party lines to try to make up the numbers he needed.

Labour MP Trevor Mallard said Labour had not yet decided who it would support for Speaker. Asked whether he had given any undertaking to Mr Henare, he said “I told him if we made a difference to the numbers, I’d take it to caucus”.

That would have been a fascinating discussion.

On Twitter, Mr Mallard had another job suggestion for Mr Henare, observing Mr Henare’s old job was up for grabs again – as deputy leader of NZ First.

Heh. They can hardly pick someone worse than the former deputy – Peter Brown!

Fran O’Sullivan at NZ Herald writes:

Economic Development Minister Steven Joyce has taken a leaf out of Obama’s book by taking to Twitter to chew out high-tech entrepreneur Selwyn Pellett for raising hell over the Endace takeover.

Joyce’s Twitter exchange was more prosaic than the US President’s, but no less focused.

What got up Joyce’s nose was the implication that Pellett – who is a cherished Labour Party favourite – was having a bob each way on the issue du jour: whether Endace should pay back $11 million of Government R&D loans it received before it passes into 100 per cent foreign ownership, substantially enriching its founders.

Let’s say upfront that Pellett has been a thorn in the Government’s side.

I expect he will be on the Labour Party list. He is their biggest cheerleader on Twitter.

He is a spokesman for the Productive Economy Council and has kicked the Government’s shins hard over its plans to sell down its holdings in state-owned assets. So it’s no surprise that Joyce – who has been remarkably unrestrained recently – took the opportunity to have a slash back. …

The Twitter battle between Joyce and Pellett was great sport:

“So you collect taxpayer support, decide to sell shares, make lots of money & then moan about it in @nzherald #unbelievable … BTW R & D co-funding is about doing R&D in NZ, not supporting individuals. But happy 4 u 2 repay so we can fund others,” Joyce tweeted at Pellett.

Pellett tweeted back: “Mr Joyce, you should check all yr facts. Interesting a Minister would target an individual for speaking out on policy.”

It’s called hypocrisy. It is fine to target people for that.