Grant Robertson blogs:

I am very annoyed at Kennedy Graham’s misleading blog about Labour’s non-attendance at Rio+20. It is pure politics and just plain wrong. I presume I am the person he is referring to when he says he spoke to a ’senior Labour person’ about this last week. It is simply not true to say as Ken does that the reason I was not in Rio was because “I could not get away”. What I actually said was that I could not afford the cost of going. There is a big difference between the two. (In fairness to Kennedy he has now apologised for any personal offence, though the blog remains unchanged)

I would love to be there. I was at Rio+10 in Johannesburg as a member of the New Zealand delegation. I had spent the previous two and half years at the UN working on the preparations for the event. It was a big deal to me. On that delegation Nick Smith was there as the opposition representative. Just as ten years before at the original Rio Summit there had been an opposition representative on the delegation. This year the government decided not to issue such an invitation. I did raise with Amy Adams the funding for other MPs going to Rio and she said it was not happening citing “budgetary constraints”.

Grant is correct to point out he said that the reason he couldn’t attend was financial, rather than not being a priority to take the time to attend.

However it is worth pointing out that just because the Ministry for the Environment won’t pay for him to attend,  doesn’t mean he could not have still chosen to attend. Labour’s parliamentary budget is a total of $5.1 million. Labour could well have decided to fund Grant or another MP to travel to Rio out of that budget. However they obviously decided that was not a priority for them. So it was still a matter of priorities for Labour in deciding not to attend.

Personally I think it was the right decision. If I was an MP, I’d rather spend my parliamentary funding on some good policy research, rather than flying the Deputy Leader to Rio. But it was a decision open to Labour.

Stuff reports:

Scores are feared dead as rescuers race to save 200 asylum seekers who were on a boat that capsized en route to Australia.

Indonesian authorities were leading the rescue effort for the boat that went down in their jurisdiction about 200km north of Christmas Island.

The stricken vessel was spotted by an Australian Customs and Border Protection surveillance plane about 5pm (NZ time).

“It is believed up to 200 people could be on board, although this detail has not yet been confirmed,” Customs said in a statement.

West Australian Police Commissioner Karl O’Callaghan said about 40 people were spotted on the upturned hull, others were in the water and up to 75 others may be dead.

“We have grave fears for the remainder,” he told reporters.

What an awful way to die, drowning in the Indian Ocean scores of miles from land.

In December 2010, more than 50 asylum seekers, including women and children, died when a boat known as SIEV 221 crashed into rocks off Christmas Island.

The disaster was the largest loss of life in Australian waters in peacetime in 115 years.

And as many as 200 people drowned last December when an overloaded boat sank off the coast of East Java on its way to Australia.

Only 49 people survived the tragedy, which occurred in rough monsoonal seas on December 17.

So far this year, 57 boats carrying a total of 4006 passengers and 82 crew have arrived in Australia.

For the month of June, there have been 18 boats carrying a total of 1108 people.

The latest arrived arrived on Thursday and had 117 people on board.

I wonder how many were genuine refugees who gained asylum.

Not PC blogs:

Happy with her own lot, our former Aunty Helen thinks “we,” i.e., everyone else, could do with less.

Attending the eco-gathering in Rio in her new guise as United Nations Development Programme head, Aunty Helen told media

frankly human development in the West — we don’t need more cars, more TVs, more whatever. Our needs are by and large satisfied, although the recession has put a lot of strains on that.

What a pity Helen never told us this, when she was PM. That she thought we all had enough.

Cactus has blogged on the asset sales, and there’s a few areas I have a different point of view so figured I might as well prod the cactus.

1. Half-cocked. They are going through all this hassle and outcry for just a 49% sale. I could understand it if it was 100% of all SOE’s but just a few and minority interests?

There is a good case to be made for 100% sale, but that is not what the election policy was, and realistically National would not have got 48% of the vote if their policy had been for 100% sales. If that was their policy, then Phil Goff would probably be Prime Minister.

2. Clearly Maori have been bought off with preferential deals that mean the Maori Party support it. Imagine the outcry if a pre-determined deal was done with consortiums of businessmen of any other race? The Maori Party would not have supported the Bill to this stage without something big in it for them. Will they get a cheaper price? Loans? Deferred payment? These are questions the Opposition should be asking as the answer will be dirty no doubt which will again infuriate National Party supporters.

Umm, the Maori Party do not support it. It is excluded from their confidence and supply agreement at at the main readings they have voted against. As far as I know there are no deals or preferences. Iwi may well apply to purchase a stake, but they will be in the same category as other domestic institutional investors I believe.

3. How does this Future Investment Fund apply in terms of winning votes in 2014? Long term investment never pays off until the long-term. No one is going to thank National in 2014 for throwing $250m in Kiwirail or “modernizing” schools that already are doing okay. As for public transport, National voters don’t use it. Health and education are best provided for in the private sector yet the National Party are selling assets (a pro-privatisation move) to fund increased spending on public services (acting against the philosophy of privatizing these services).

I don’t think there are a lot of votes in the FIF either. To be honest it is a bit of a marketing gimmick, trying to make the point that free up capital in one area allows investment in another. The policy would have been fine without this.

4. The sell has been awful. National do have a mandate for asset sales with their election victory but the policy has had such a s.l.o.w rollout that it will not gain more support it will only become more unpopular as people now have a chance to object to it in isolation with other policies they had to induce at election time.

The law change is about to occur six or so months after the election. It could only really have occured quicker by use of urgency, which would be highly undesirable and politically very unpopular. The fuss at the moment will recede somewhat by 2014, but if the Govt had used urgency it would be a cudgel to beat them with for years to come.

5. The incompetence of Government. I do not trust the current government to be skillful enough to actually sell these assets properly. I trust Labour less of course but they aren’t the ones promising to sell them.

Actually the sales of Contact and Auckland Airport in the late 1990s were done very well by Tony Ryall and Winston Peters respectively.

6. No win situation. If the price of the shares goes up on the NZX the Opposition will hammer National for selling the shares too cheaply. If the price goes down there will be a whole heap of National voting shareholders who will be pissed off and the Opposition will attack the Government again saying the sale was a failure.

Yep, a fair point. But I think there will still be a lot of share-holders who will just see it as a good safe long-term investment.

7. Reasons for the sale. When Labour sold assets during their glory years it was more because of an underlying philosophical that government should not run these businesses. I hear nothing substantial from National MP’s with respect to any philosophical objection for owning these assets, it is all about money so they can all have warm hugs and fuzzies using the “invest” word.

I agree that a case should be made that Government are better to  act as the neutral regulator of utility companies, rather than be an owner and regulator. As the policy is to sell 49% only, that is a more complex case to make but one worth still making.

8. Easy question – are the Nats selling the assets to pay down ANY debt or not to create new debt as they already have the spending earmarked in this FIF set-up? I don’t see much repayment of debt here or commitment in reduction in welfare and spending.

Even if the books are in surplus, there is always capital borrowing, so this is about reducing the amount of borrowing needed.

9. Looking after your electorate. I don’t care what people too poor to buy shares actually think as these people have not actually paid for the assets in the first place. They are not and never will be the National Party’s electorate. The people in Labour’s 80’s privatization were rewarded with massive cuts in tax, there is no such reward here.

The tax cuts occurred well before the asset sales, and were not linked together.

10. The question comes down to do we think the current Government’s damage with respect to stuffing up the partial sale of the few assets will be more or less than the damage done by having the SOE’s in collective ownership in the first place?

I don’t think there has been any stuff up. The fact Labour and the Greens are whining about losing the election isn’t surprising. By 2014, I suspect people will wonder what all the fuss was about – just as Contact Energy was not a big issue in 1999.

Back with the birds- a common garden favourite

“Seeing Double”

Click for larger, higher res image

Bob McCoskrie reports:

 The B.C. Supreme Court has ruled that Canada’s ban on assisted suicide is unconstitutional. Justice Lynn Smith issued a 395-page ruling in the Carter v. Canada case Friday morning, determining that the ban discriminates against the disabled. The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, which intervened in the case, immediately urged the Crown to appeal Smith’s decision to the BC Court of Appeal and to seek an order that stays the effect of the decision until such time as that appeal is heard. Given that suicide is legal in Canada, Justice Smith argues that the ban violates the equality provision in section 15 of Canada’s Charter because it prevents the disabled from getting the help they may need to kill themselves. The case centres on Gloria Taylor, who was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease or ALS in 2009. Taylor says she does not currently wish to kill herself, but wants to have assurance that she could receive help to commit suicide in future. Justice Smith argues that the ban “perpetuates disadvantage” because it “is felt particularly acutely by persons such as Ms. Taylor, who are grievously and irremediably ill, physically disabled or soon to become so, mentally competent and who wish to have some control over their circumstances at the end of their lives.” Ironically, Justice Smith also argues that the ban violates the right to life under section 7 of the Charter because it could lead someone to commit suicide earlier than they might otherwise, while they are still physically able to do it themselves.

I think the court is absolutely right. Our current laws do mean people commit suicide before they might otherwise. Read Rodney Hide’s speech here for a sad example. An extract:

I want to raise a memory of a man whom many members knew—Martin Hames, who died last year on 8 August. If Mr Brown’s bill had been the law, Martin Hames would still be with us, I am sure. He would not have needed to take his own life, as he did. He had Huntington’s disease. He discovered in 1979 that his mother had it. He did not marry, because he had a 50 percent chance of getting it, and he was diagnosed with Huntington’s disease. He had watched his mother die a terrible death—a death where one loses one’s mind and loses control, to the extent that one cannot swallow.

Martin Hames loved life. He loved independence. He could not stand the thought of ending without the ability to swallow. Last year he prepared everything. He swallowed a whole lot of pills and he passed out. He had bought new pyjamas, and he had a note pinned to his chest saying “Please do not resuscitate”. The ambulance came, and they resuscitated him. He came to in hospital, and they said to Martin Hames that he had septicaemia in his legs and they wanted to take them off. He said: “What would happen if you don’t take my legs off?”, and they said: “You will die.” He said: “Well, good, because I have Huntington’s disease.”

They gave him some pain relief and pushed him off to the side in Wellington Hospital, and he spent the day dying. I dreaded going to see Martin Hames and saying goodbye to a very special friend, but one of the greatest things I have ever done is seeing a man dying with dignity. He told me, when I went in there, and he told all his friends—from Treasury, from Michael Cullen’s office, people from across the political spectrum who had worked with him, and from the National Party—that he was having a good death. He used to call me “Boss”, and he said: “I’m having a good death, Boss, because I didn’t think I’d get the opportunity to say goodbye to all my friends.” He had that chance.

A sad end, which was avoidable.

From general debate yesterday:

ANDREW LITTLE: I gave her the benefit of the doubt because I am a generous chap. I am a generous chap. Some would say naive, and others might say innocent. Well, I have learnt my lesson, because what has become patently obvious is not only that this Minister has no interest in cleaning it up—she wants to see the board gone—but also that this is part of a nasty, ugly, dirty, filthy game being played out inside the National Party, with ACC and its board as collateral damage. That is what is going on.

I regarded the Minister originally as responsible, but not to blame. I have changed my mind. She is responsible and she is to blame. She is not fixing the problem. She is not fixing the problem; she is making it worse. It is time for her to do the right thing.

It was bad enough that there was a privacy breach to begin with. It was bad enough that ACC did not seem to respond effectively, and it is bad enough that since the privacy breach there have been even more privacy breaches. But none of this compares to the prevarication, the evasion, and the dissembling that has gone on in this House with the Minister failing and refusing to front up, and no wonder. It is quite clear that her conduct is not the conduct of a reasonable and responsible Minister. Her conduct is the conduct of a sociopath, Ms Tolley. Maurice Williamson understands that, because he has worked with too many of them for too long. He knows sociopathic conduct when he sees it.

David Shearer is a decent man. I am sure he does not condone his spokespersons calling Ministers of the Crown sociopaths. Hopefully someone in Labour will have a quiet word to Mr Little, and tell him to pull his head in.

The Press reports:

Where are all the desperate tenants?

That is the question some Christchurch landlords are asking as they struggle to rent their houses.

While a shortage of cheaper homes in the city is attracting attention, mid-priced and dearer houses are sitting empty.

Mark Marcijasz got “not one call” when he advertised a five-bedroom Huntsbury house, complete with five heat pumps, for short-term rental at $450 a week.

“I’m totally flabbergasted that the phone didn’t ring once,” he said.

“It’s a nice house. There’s some external damage, but it’s perfectly liveable and warm.

“We’re not trying to price-gouge. We just thought it would see people through the rest of the winter.”

In nearby Cashmere, Michael de Lautour took nearly three months to find tenants for a three-bedroom, north-facing house and had to reduce the asking rent from $480 to $430 to secure a tenant last week.

“People talk about rents going up but we’re actually worse off. It was easier to rent before the earthquakes,” he said.

De Lautour’s house has exterior damage, but he said it was in good condition inside and had been repaired and had a heat pump.

He said there was a “total over-supply” of homes in some parts of the market, and the Government’s $330 subsidy for displaced families had created a threshold, especially for tenants still paying a mortgage on their damaged homes. Another landlord, David Cary, has been advertising a three-bedroom Sumner house for $385 a week, with no takers.

Having prices drop because they can not get tenants is good – the market working.

Despite having a double garage and a heat pump, being located near a school and with a lack of quake damage, the house has sat vacant for more than five weeks.

“I’m not trying to make a killing. I thought it would be ideal for someone and there’d be no dramas renting it,” Cary said.

“I’ve never had this problem in the years I’ve had rentals; certainly not for this length of time.”

Browsing listings on the TradeMe website reveals the imbalance in the market, with 693 Christchurch homes advertised yesterday at rents of over $300 a week and only 190 at under $300 a week. Some dearer homes have been listed for several months.

Property manager Agnes White, of Rosevear Wing and Associates, said the rental market was mixed, with shortages of cheaper homes, furnished houses and homes in some school zones.

Otherwise, there were “plenty of houses out there.”

Some tenants had ruled out the east side of town because of cracked houses and neighbourhoods perceived as damaged.

That is what I suspected. That there is not necessarily a shortage of affordable housing in Christchurch as a whole, but rather in certain areas. Now that is a very different proposition.

This was Daniel Briant’s car. He proudly shows it off on his Facebook page.

And this is it now.

Stuff reports:

Constable Jason Andrews said on one occasion Briant was caught doing burnouts in the middle of State Highway 1 near Paraparaumu in front of an off duty police officer.

He was arrested as he tried to change his “shredded tyres” in the Burger King car park nearby.

Tolley said less than three hours after receiving his third strike from the court Briant was back behind the wheel performing a burnout.

He lost control and crashed into a fence. It is understood he and a passenger fled the vehicle on foot.

He was awaiting sentencing on that fourth offence.

He had already been found guilty of driving while suspended, sustained loss of traction and dangerous driving leading to a 21 month disqualification.

A perfect first case.

There were 116 people on their second strike. “Those who are not clever enough to heed the warning should be aware that their cars could be seized and undergo a radical change in shape,” Tolley said.

I suspect most of those will be careful not to go on and get a third strike.

Good to see the law pushed through by Judith Collins have an impact.

The Herald reports:

 ACC bosses laid a police complaint alleging blackmail by claimant Bronwyn Pullar and Michelle Boag after being pressured by their minister Judith Collins, Labour MP Andrew Little says.

In a general debate at Parliament this afternoon Mr Little claimed that during a meeting between ACC Ralph Stewart, chairman John Judge and Ms Collins in Auckland the day after a massive privacy breach at ACC was revealed, Ms Collins told the two men to “go after Michelle Boag”.

“She urged and pressured and pressed the chief executive and chairman of the board to make a complaint to the police and that’s what they did”.

It seems Andrew has learnt one lesson. He has refused to repeat this claim outside the House, so is hiding behind parliamentary privilege.

If he had been able to produce even one shred of evidence for his previous claims about the Minister, then one might give him the benefit of the doubt on this issue. But we’re all still waiting for his proof.

Anyone can get up in the House and claim anything about another MP. They have a legally privileged right to do so. but it is an abuse of that right if you do not have some proof for your assertions.

Oral Questions 2.00 pm – 3.00 pm

1. Hon DAVID PARKER to the Minister of Finance: Does he accept the BNZ statement that New Zealand’s increasing current account is “a very clear risk for New Zealand’s credit rating with Standard and Poor’s”?
2. SHANE ARDERN to the Minister of Finance: What reports has he received on the economy?
3. KEVIN HAGUE to the Minister for ACC: Can she confirm that staff in ACC’s Recovery Independence Service teams receive more or less remuneration dependent on whether the proportion of people receiving weekly compensation is less or more than specified duration targets?
4. Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE to the Minister for Economic Development: Does he stand by all his recent statements?
5. JAMI-LEE ROSS to the Minister of Police: What actions has the Government taken against illegal street racers?
6. Hon MARYAN STREET to the Minister of Health: Has he received any reports or correspondence regarding the Community Pharmacy Services Agreement with District Health Boards and if he has, have they caused him any concern?
7. TIM MACINDOE to the Minister of Justice: How is the Justice sector contributing to the Government’s better public services programme?
8. GARETH HUGHES to the Minister for Climate Change Issues: Does he agree with the statement made by the Minister for the Environment, Hon Amy Adams in Rio, that, “Money spent on fossil fuels is money that could be spent on other sustainable development priorities”, and will the Government re-allocate the $889 million for ETS credits in Budget 2012 towards sustainable projects and a green economy?
9. MIKE SABIN to the Minister of Immigration: What reports has he received on the benefits to New Zealand of the Recognised Seasonal Employer scheme?
10. KRIS FAAFOI to the Minister of Police: Does she stand by all the statements she made to the Law and Order Committee yesterday?
11. NICKY WAGNER to the Minister for Courts: What recent announcements has he made regarding court services for Christchurch?
12. DENIS O’ROURKE to the Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery: Does he still believe that the best way to deal with the price increase in home rentals in Christchurch is to leave it to the market?

Today there are five questions from National, four questions from Labour, two from the Greens and one from NZ First.

Patsy of the day goes to Q5 – What actions has the Government taken against illegal street racers?

Labour are asking on current account deficit, a gotcha to Steven Joyce, pharmacies and a gotcha to Anne Tolley.

Greens are on ACC and climate change, NZ First on Christchurch housing.

Government Bills 3.00 pm – 6.00 pm

1. Mixed Ownership Model Bill – committee stage continued
2. Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (2012 Expiry and Application Dates) Amendment Bill – second reading
3. Dairy Industry Restructuring Amendment Bill – second reading continued

The Mixed Ownership Bill committee debate has concluded Parts 1 and 2 but some time left still on the preliminary provisions.

The Mixed Ownership Model Bill was introduced in March 2012 and enables the Crown to  remove Genesis Power Limited, Meridian Energy Limited, Mighty River Power Limited, and Solid Energy New Zealand Limited from the State-Owned Enterprises Act 1986, and restricts the Crown from holding less than 51% of the voting rights in each of the companies and will restrict non-Crown individuals and entities from holding more than 10% of the voting rights in each of the companies. It passed first reading 61-60 with National, ACT, United Future in favour and all other parties against. The Finance and Expenditure reported it back with minority reports from Labour and Greens. It passed second reading 61-59.

The Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (2012 Expiry and Application Dates) Amendment Bill was introduced in April 2012 and aims to  extend the restrictions on the awarding of compensation for one more year from 1 July 2012 until 30 June 2013. It passed first reading 72 to 48 with National, NZ First, Maori, ACT, United in favour and Labour, Greens, Mana against. The Justice and Electoral Committee recommended that it pass, with minority reports from Labour and Greens.

The Dairy Industry Restructuring Amendment Bill was introduced in March 2012 and seeks to  introduce a new regime in relation to Fonterra’s milk price setting, proposed capital restructure, and share valuation. It passed first reading 64 to 54 with Labour, Greens, NZ First and Mana against. The Primary Production Committee recommended it pass with amendments, with Labour and Greens giving minority reports.

The Herald editorial:

 On the strength of its election result, the Green Party has been given a great deal more public money to spend at Parliament. It needs to be careful how it spends it. Taxpayers might be surprised to learn the party is spending $76,000 of its allowance to hire people to collect signatures on a petition for a referendum on asset sales. This is not a proper use of the money.

It also makes you wonder about the boasts from the Greens that they have so many members and activists. Yet, they have to pay people to collect petition signatures. The Greens are ironically doing what they always rally against – bringing US style political campaigning to NZ, where money is used to purchase a result.

The country pays for a Parliament that has been set up to resolve public issues and Parliament provides elected parties with funds to ensure they can research issues, question ministers and contribute to legislative debate.

The law provides a separate procedure for citizens outside Parliament to petition for referendums when they are so moved. The citizens’ initiative, as it is called, is supposed to be exactly that. It is not a second chance saloon for those who have the privileges of Parliament.

It is obviously wrong for Parliamentary funds to be used to pay people to get signatures to petition Parliament!

There appears to be nothing in Parliament’s rules to prevent a party using its leader’s office allowance in this way, though that may be because it has not happened before. The Parliamentary Service’s general manager said the Greens were within the rules because the petition does not ask the public for money, membership or votes. But that is a rule for election spending and referendums held separately from an election should not be promoted by parties with public funds.

Especially as the Greens have consistently tried to limit people spending their own money on referenda. Their true motivations it seems is to restrict the voices of those who do not have taxpayer funding, while allow themslves to spend as much as they can, with the taxpayer paying. They were the only party in Parliament to vote against repealing the horrific Electoral Finance Act, and they constantly call for greater taxpayer funding of political parties with no restrictions.

Stats NZ reports:

Economic activity, as measured by gross domestic product (GDP), grew 1.1 percent in the first three months of 2012, Statistics New Zealand said today. This strong growth follows revised growth of 0.4 percent in each of the previous three quarters.

Compared with the March 2011 quarter, economic activity in the March 2012 quarter was up 2.4 percent. For the year ended March 2012, economic activity was up 1.7 percent compared with the year ended March 2011.

“This quarter we saw growth spread across a number of industries, while in previous quarters the industry picture had been more mixed with growth in some industries offset by falls in others,” national accounts manager Rachael Milicich said.

The main contributors to the increase in economic growth this quarter were, by industry:

• manufacturing (up 1.8 percent), due to increases in primary food manufacturing and metal product manufacturing
• business services (up 2.0 percent), which include professional, scientific, technical, administrative, and support services
• agriculture (up 2.3 percent), mainly driven by an increase in milk production.

The market was expecting growth of 0.5% to 0.6% so this is an excellent result. The annual figure is very respectable also. The Government will be pleased. The challenge is to keep growing, and to have it sustainable.

People may wish to ponder how a significant factor in the growth was an increase in milk production, and the official Green party policy is to kill (or make magically disappear) every fifth cow, which presumably would decrease milk production by 20%.

The Herald reports:

Frontline police staff will not have their pay cut in talks due to resume this week, but are facing a pay freeze because of a tight policing budget.

Police Commissioner Peter Marshall could not confirm yesterday whether sworn police officers would get a raise in pay negotiations which are being held with unions.

I do wish the full facts would be presented. The Police Commissioner can not just refuse a pay raise. He can make an offer, which the union can accept or reject. The union can make a claim, which the Commissioner can accept or reject. If they can not agree, their the final offer and claim go to a three person independent arbitration panel, which will decide to either accept the Commissioner’s offer in its totality or the union’s claim in its totality.

Police have predicted that a 3 per cent wage increase would cost $75 million a year and CSI increases would cost $42.5 million a year.

That’s a strange figure. If a 3% wage increase would cost $75 million a year, then that means the current wage bill is $2.5b a year.  As their total operating costs are $1.48b a year, that figure must be wrong.

Also with 9,000 Police officers a claim that a 3% wage increase would cost $75m a year means each officer would get a pay rise of $8,300 or so. For that to be 3%, it means the average pay rate would be $275,000 a year approx.

Vernon Small at Stuff reports:

The Government has backed down on a move that would have allowed it to sell more than 49 per cent of partially privatised state assets, providing the extra shares did not carry voting rights.

Fairfax Media highlighted the loophole in April and it is understood that sparked a backlash from United Future leader Peter Dunne. It is understood the Government made a U-turn after Dunne dug in his toes, arguing the wording in the Mixed Ownership Model Bill would breach his party’s support deal with National.

Last night SOE Minister Tony Ryall moved the amendment to the Bill, which changed the requirement on the Government from retaining 51 per cent of the shares with voting rights to 51 per cent of all shares. …

But under the wording originally approved by ministers, the companies could have issuing or sold non-voting shares, diluting the taxpayers’ slice of the dividends and profits that the companies generate.

In April a spokeswoman for Ryall said voting rights were the best way to measure ownership, because it was the voting shareholding that determined the ability to control the companies.

Non-voting shares are effectively more a type of debt, rather than equity. Basically it is debt, with a variable return. If you get none of the benefits of ownership such as voting, it is not ownership.

Just as non voting shares would reduce the taxpayer share of dividends and profits, so would increased debt – in that the interest on the debt would mean less profit and hence dividend.

So I didn’t think that there was an inconsistency. However perception can be very important, and hence it is not a bad thing that the Government agreed to the United Future change. It means that at least on this issue, there can’t be any scare-mongering that the Government will dilute its 51% with non-voting shares.

Personally the actual issue non-voting shares would have been highly unlikely. It is an unusual way to raise capital. People generally want a guaranteed rate of return, or a stake in the company.

It also is useful for Peter Dunne to be able to demonstrate that he got a change in line with his confidence and supply agreement.

Stuff reports:

Two people have turned themselves in and one other has been arrested after they were named and shamed on a new wanted persons website.

The website was launched by police yesterday morning and featured 31 people who had warrants for their arrest who or needed to be identified.

Within hours of the launch two people, one wanted in Wellington and one in the Eastern districts, turned themselves in.

Another person in Wellington was arrested after the police received leads about their location.

Their mugshots and details have since been removed from the site,www.police.govt.nz/wanteds.

Excellent. Three more crims off the street.

A lengthy and fascinating interview with John Key by Guyon Espiner in the Listener. Definitely go read the whole thing. Some extracts:

He changed the law for Warner Bros to keep making the Hobbit movies in New Zealand and says it “created 3000 jobs”. Now he’s at it again. “This will really wind people up,” he says leaning forward, his shirtsleeves ending in bulbous cufflinks that almost conceal an expensive watch. “They now want me to go to LA and see Fox and Disney and a whole lot of other major studios,” he says with the enthusiasm of a boy who’s been invited to, well, Disneyland. “The word in Hollywood is that we are really supportive of the film industry to the point where the Prime Minister of the country would actually engage himself in negotiations to make sure those movies are made.”

Your reaction to the Prime Minister going to Hollywood to woo the movie moguls is probably a good measure of your view of him. Good on him for getting off his chuff and trying to help New Zealand make some money. Or, “Johnnie goes to Hollywood” to pimp the film industry while (create your own deprivation index here) continues unabated at home. Key knows his opponents will hate him for it. “But I would say it’s a really positive thing to do. You can make a difference. And it’s like the convention centre. People want to chase their tails in conspiracies. There is no conspiracy. The conspiracy is we haven’t had a convention centre for decades. We will get 160,000 visitor-nights. They will spend roughly twice as much as everybody else. The Government has got no money to pour into it.”

Key is right that opinion on this will be highly polarised. Personally I’m glad Key puts the interests of getting NZers into jobs ahead of placating an Australian union that was sabotaging our entire film industry.

His stories often have a touch of the Boy’s Own adventure about them. Key loved hanging out with the SAS in Afghanistan. He enjoys the Diplomatic Protection Service security detail. It’s not hard to see he grew up without a dad.

An interesting insight.

He’s just been to a ceremony for bootcamp graduates. A tough Maori kid repeatedly thanked him for the opportunity to do the course. As the boy left, his school principal whispered into Key’s ear that this was the son of the local Mongrel Mob boss. Key is fascinated by New Zealand’s dark underbelly and incurably optimistic about fixing it, even with no money …

Unfortunately, the statistics have remained unmoved by the rhetoric and there are still more than 200,000 kids living in poverty. “We’ve done a lot more than probably we have been given credit for,” he claims, listing the insulation of nearly 200,000 homes and the lifting of early childhood education participation rates. And, of course, his beloved boot camps. He says 60% of participants go on to get jobs and he is now going to use his prime ministerial powers of persuasion to shame companies into employing everyone who finishes the course.

“I am going to put the hard word on them that I think it is the right corporate responsibility to do that. There are enough big companies around New Zealand. We are talking about 1500, maybe 2000, kids a year, for them to collectively stand up and say, ‘I’ll take one and I’ll take two.’”

Cool. And on optimism:

The Government may still have significant reserves of political capital but Key accepts it will never have any real money to spend. “In terms of money I don’t think that position is going to change dramatically, because whatever you think [of the situation] in Europe, the really good case scenario is that they muddle through and any scenario other than that is a lot worse.” And it’s official: Bill English was right and Key was wrong. “When Bill first used to say that this will go on for 10 years, I thought he was wrong. Now I think he is right,” Key says. Even though he knew it was the biggest financial collapse since the Great Depression, he thought “the fluidity of the modern economy” would allow those issues to be resolved. “But what is different is the destruction of capital and huge structural change that has to happen, so this is about real, fundamental, core change.”

If Key accepts he was wrong, he believes he was wrong for the right reasons. “That optimism is not only well-placed, it is important to the national psyche,” he says. “Finance Ministers are paid to say no and Prime Ministers are paid to say yes. That’s the way it works. Who the hell wants a Prime Minister who is down in the mouth? “If you don’t think the country you are leading is a great country, why are you leading it?”

And he comments on the smile and wave nickname:

Key has never been lacking in confidence and still believes his opponents underestimate him. “I always remember when people used to go on about ‘smile and wave’ and all this sort of stuff – what a load of nonsense. I mean the New Zealand public never believed it and it just used to make me laugh. “The more they did it the more I was happy they did it, because it just deluded the Labour Party that somehow I didn’t have a view of where I wanted to take the country,” he says. “It has always been about lifting economic performance.”

I think Labour stole it off Cactus Kate. On the under-estimation Chris Trotter adds:

The reason members of the Labour Party underestimated John Key from the beginning is all to do with intellectual snobbery, says left-wing political commentator Chris Trotter. “No matter how much people crow when they add Labour and the Greens’ latest polling together, Key’s is an extraordinary result to be looking at three-and-a-half years into his time in office and in the midst of economic circumstances that could hardly be described as benign. “For a political leader to be in charge at a time such as this, and for people to say, ‘Oh, look, he’s only got 45.8% of the vote’, really is an extraordinary testimony to his political skills.”

Trotter contends that the left-wing of New Zealand politics always “grossly underestimated” Key’s skills – to its cost. “There is a tremendous amount of intellectual snobbery in the Labour Party particularly, if not across the left in general, which regards someone who’s done very well in business as a lesser being than someone, perhaps, who’s won the Booker Prize. There’s just this attitude that ‘he can’t be that good if he hasn’t lectured at a university or if he isn’t called Dr’. And this approach is very, very self-defeating on the part of the left, because you just have to be guided by the facts.”

The facts, says Trotter “are that this guy took over the National Party, its numbers recovered almost immediately and they soared to unprecedented levels in the polls”. What’s more, that polling occurred under a proportional representation system “when it is extraordinary to see any single party win 44-45% of the vote. “So, unless you’re putting National’s success down to sunspots, you have to sheet home responsibility for those results to the political leadership of the party.

The under-estimation is still there. Senior Labour MPs like Trevor Mallard (who delivered the worst result for Labour in 100 years, yet still drives their strategy) boasted today that Labour will win in 2014, 2017 and 2020. To claim victory 30 months before an election is arrogance enough, let alone the two after that. They have convinced themselves that all they have to do is wait.

Key’s skill was demonstrated by dropping the class-size issue, Trotter says. “That ability to simply say, ‘This isn’t worth it, get rid of it, go hard to starboard’, is rare in politicians. Most will die in a ditch rather than admit they were wrong. “Key has this facility, which we saw over mining in national parks and now over class sizes, where he just cuts his losses, and I think that’s attributable in a strange way to his experience in the currency trade, where you do not throw good money after bad. If you’ve made a bad choice, take the loss and make it up somewhere else in the next few hours or next few days. That’s a marvellous ability to bring to politics, because if you’re on a hiding to nothing, then accept nothing and stop taking the hiding.”

Related to this is that Key doesn’t hate doing a compromise. In business, the way you get an agreement is you compromise. In politics compromise is seen as weak by many leaders, but Key sees it as a strength. And in an MMP environment, where the Government does not have a majority, it is a necessary skill.

Morgan Godfery blogs:

 Hone Harawira is known for a lot of things, but not many people realise he is a social and moral conservative. He is against, for example, drug liberalisation and gay marriage and in an interview with Bryce Edwards Hone claimed to be against a society of “choice”. This, I think, reveals an authoritarian attitude not uncommon in Maori males of Hone’s generation. …

Anywho, as I said Hone Harawira is opposed to gay marriage, or marriage equality as it’s positively framed. This position has been opposed universally within the Mana Party. Leading members have asked Hone to justify his position, but he is yet to face the membership with a justification. This is unacceptable from the party leader and he will be rightly savaged for it. 

This issue will be interesting to see play out.

Hone is a Maori nationalist politician who is left economically. Most of his party though are hard core leftists, who detest social conservatism. This naturally creates tensions.

The other friction is that Hone is not a “Explain yourself” type politician. he is more in the Jim Anderton mode of my way or the highway. I still believe his departure from the Maori Party was more about ambition – he could not secure the leadership. So he may be reluctant to moderate his views, no matter how much his supporters want him to.

Russel Norman said:

 Mr Norman said that though the party would not support any new coal mines it did not oppose any new mines for other minerals.

The BOP Times reports:

 Green Party members worried about gold mining in Te Puke are to meet locals to discuss what they see as potential risks to the community.

Not against all mining – yeah right!

Note that the Greens are meeting locals. So this is a bunch of people who do not live in Te Puke heading down there to interfere.

Diamond drilling and exploration mining for gold and silver was already under way at Muir’s Reef mine on No.4 Rd, 15 minutes drive from Te Puke township. …

Glass Earth is the company involved in the operations in No.4 Rd. Chief operating officer Simon Henderson said the area involved was farmland and nobody would be displaced by mining and no areas of significant natural value would be destroyed.

Mr Henderson said the company had no plans to expand to a large gold mining operation but had received “encouraging results”, allowing for mining to continue until at least the end of this year.

The only community feedback on the set up of a potential goldmine had been positive, despite concerns raised by the Green Party, he said.

“Te Puke is struggling with the devastating effects of Psa which has left a large hole economically and socially with many people leaving the area.

“Gold mining is a golden opportunity for Te Puke to have a new stream of development which does not rely on kiwifruit and will inject jobs and money into the local economy,” Mr Henderson said.

I suspect not many people who actually live in Te Puke will want to say no to jobs and income.

Tony Ryall reminds us:

Remember when Labour sold 49 per cent of state owned Spring Creek Mine for millions of dollars to American multi-national Cargill Coal?

In 2007 Labour was happy to sell state owned businesses to foreign interests, now they even oppose everyday New Zealanders buying a share in these companies”, says State Owned Enterprises Minister Tony Ryall.

According to the Chairman of Solid Energy in a letter to the editor, the 2007 sale of Spring Creek Mine had approval from the Labour Government’s Minister of Finance, and Trevor Mallard, their Minister for State Owned Enterprises.

And, because it was sold to a foreign company, it needed Overseas Investment Office approval.

The National led Government has always been upfront about its minority share offer.  We announced it in January 2011.

Many in Labour’s caucus don’t believe a word of what they say on asset sales. They just think it is wrong when they don’t do it. Did Labour campaign in 2005 on selling Spring Creek Mine? No. National, unlike Labour, has been upfront on its policies and plans.

Idiot/Savant blogs at No Right Turn:

Faced with the prospect of extradition to Sweden to face allegations of sexual assault, Julian Assange has done a runner, hiding out in the Ecuadorian embassy and applying for political asylum.

Its a very weak case. Assange is not facing persecution in Sweden; he is facing justice for his alleged crimes. There’s no suggestion that he won’t receive a fair trial or that he would face cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. As for the fear that he will be subsequently extradited to the US, he will have the full protection of the ECHR on that. And the ECHR will not allow him to be extradited to face the death penalty or torture. Finally, despite his claims today, Assange has not been “abandoned” by the Australian government; they have made it clear that they will continue to offer consular assistance in the normal manner [PDF].

It is of course up to Ecuador who they grant asylum to and on what terms. But under the normal international law criteria, Assange wouldn’t qualify. He’s not a refugee with a well-founded fear of persecution; he’s just an alleged criminal trying to escape justice.

I can only agree with I/S on this issue.

Incidentally I did not think the case against Assange in Sweden was that strong, and that he would have a reasonable chance of an acquittal if or when trial proceeds. His behaviour, while deceptive, was not necessarily criminal.

Mark Textor writes in the Sydney Morning Herald on his ten tips for surviving a campaign. Worth reading the full article, but a summary is:

1.  Look after your feet.
2. Avoid the booze.
3.  Keep your lips sealed.
4. The biggest mistake you can make is to not tell someone you have made a mistake.
5. Ignore media commentators and stick to your part of the plan.
6. Look after your soul.
7. As they say in the Tour de France, pace yourself and wait for the mountains.
8. Be frank. You are not there to be popular. Only useful.
9.  Eat well.
10. Don’t gamble on a campaign

He concludes:

Regardless, soak up that responsibility. Unlike the spectators, your actions have consequences on those relying on you. While this responsibility must be taken seriously, it is satisfying. Don’t enjoy being on the campaign, enjoy the satisfaction of the successful execution of your responsibilities.

Good advice.