Stuff reports:

A new Christchurch Central Development Unit has 100 days to prepare a ”Blueprint for Action”.

The unit will be headed by Warwick Isaacs, currently the general manager of operations for Cera, the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority.

The new unit was announced today by the Minister for Earthquake Recovery, Gerry Brownlee. He said it was time for action and the city needed a clear direction for the centre’s rebuild.

The unit has been created as part of Cera because of the authority’s wide-ranging powers, which include compulsory acquisition of land for major projects.

Brownlee said the Government had largely adopted the Christchurch City Council’s draft plan for the centre.

He said the unit would second staff from the city council and Environment Canterbury, but it would collaborate with the City Council and it was not a takeover.

The council will remain the consenting authority, but Brownlee made a commitment that building consents for the central city would be approved within 14 days.

Isaacs has an extensive record in local government. He was the chief executive officer of the Timaru District Council for 10 years before coming to Christchurch after the February 22 quake as part of Civil Defence’s emergency response team.

Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker welcomed the unit and said he was delighted that the Government had essentially accepted the community’s vision for its city.

He told a business leaders’ briefing this morning that the unit’s ability to develop and implement a plan showed that the Resource Management Act could not deliver the ”speed, direction and outcomes that we need”.

Seems pretty sensible to me. We await the condemnation from the Labour Party Mayoral candidate.

David Round blogs on Norway:

Norway’s recent terrible tragedy, I am sorry to say, marks a new and dreadful stage in the civil war which is slowly but surely beginning to break out in much of Europe and which threatens to finish off its enfeebled civilisation. It was a dreadful thing, and completely indefensible; but it was also inevitable, a natural consequence of the misguided, intolerant policies of a haughty elite contemptuous of the views of ordinary citizens; and it was predicted, by people rather more perceptive than those elites. But the elites, confident of their own superiority, were not listening, and I do not know how many of them are listening even now.

I reject David Round’s views entirely. There is nothing natural, or inevitable, about shooting 69 mainly teenagers to death.

This is like writing about the Nazis and saying “The Holocaust was a dreadful thing, and completely indefensible; but it was also inevitable, a natural consequence of the misguided policies which allowed Jews to become so rich and powerful in Europe”. No I am not comparing what happened in Norway to the Holocaust. I am saying that effectively blaming the victims is repugnant.

As it happens I agree that the immigration policies of Norway (and many other European countries) have been a disaster, and that the political elites are very out of touch on this issue. But that doesn’t mean that the killings done by Breivik were in anyway a natural consequence. You do not rationalise the acts of evil mad men.

I’d suggest David Round read the lunatic manifesto of Breivik, before pronouncing that his actions were a natural consequence of anything. Round continues:

‘[i]n April 2005, after virtually no public debate, the Norwegian Parliament passed a sweeping law that made it punishable by fine or imprisonment to say anything ‘discriminatory’ or ‘hateful’ about anybody else’s skin colour, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation. The burden of proof was placed on the accused: unless you could prove you hadn’t done or said something offensive, you’d be presumed guilty. Only the ‘populist’ Progressive Party had opposed this legislation.’

Now I agree such laws are a bad thing. I constantly blog against them myself. But I would never ever say what Round does:

But what would happen, you ask, if worried Norwegians were allowed to speak their minds? Surely they would say unpleasant things about immigrants and violence would result? Surely, to prevent such violence, Norway needs such a law?

That is a reasonable question, but there are reasonable replies. The first, of course, is that violence has already resulted as a consequence of this law and the general repressive regime it embodies. Breivik’s violence was a protest against the direction his country was heading in, and this law was a significant aspect of that. 

The Herald editorial:

Listening to the Greens, it could also be thought that one of China’s most senior figures has followed the Crafar farms saga in great detail, so much so that he is now prepared to place “enormous pressure” on the ministers making the final decision. This, again, seems fanciful. In pursuing the interests of a country with a fifth of the world’s humanity but only 7 per cent of its arable land, Mr Jia’s interests are surely far wider than one farm deal.

The Greens should have read his comments with a rather more open mind. Had they done so, they would have found plenty of encouragement for the future development of trade between New Zealand and China. Mr Jia refers to the “smooth implementation” of the ground-breaking free trade agreement signed in 2008 and the need for both countries to make good use of it to meet ahead of schedule a trade target of $20 billion by 2015. …

In terms of that balance, he could have been thinking of Fonterra’s plans, announced last Friday, to spend $100 million on two more farms in China’s Hebei province. This is part of the co-operative’s ambition to set up an integrated milk business in China that taps a growing middle-class demand for high-protein food. It wants its farming hubs throughout the country to be producing up to 1 billion litres of high-quality milk every year by 2020.

The Greens campaign against China is economically dumb. We even have the proof of how dumb it is. They railed against the FTA with China (as did then Foreign Minister Winston Peters).

So let us look at what these economic geniuses railed against:

The FTA was agreed in April 2008 and came into force in October 2008. Note up until then modest export growth and strong export growth with the trade deficit increasing steadily. Again remember this when Greens and NZ First complain about the trade deficit.

Then after the FTA, exports surge, and imports continue much the same growth. The result is exports break $6b for the first time ever and the trade deficit is cut by over two thirds.

This shows the annual growth. So the data for Jan 2007 is how much the value of trade was in the 12 months to Jan 2007 compared to the 12 months to Jan 2006.

So imports growing far faster than exports. Then as the FTA is signed, export growth skyrockets up to 35% and even three years on is still at over 20%. These are incredible figures. The Greens argue it is pure coincidence and would have happened regardless. I’d stick a Tui billboard around that.

Here’s another couple of stats. In the year prior to the FTA coming into force our average monthly exports were  $186m. In the last 12 months they were an average $505m a month.

The annual exports in the year before the FTA were $2.24b. If they had stayed at that level over the next three and a third years our exports would have been $7.45b. Instead they have been $15.79b. So that is an extra $8.3b of export income that the Greens and NZ First railed against, and still rail against.

God knows how many fewer jobs we would have without that FTA, let alone the greater deficit and debt.

A guest post by Peter Freedman:

I love quizzes, but only if they are trivia ones. That doesn’t mean the question can’t be serious, so long as the atmosphere is fun!

Once when I was a budget adviser I ran a quiz night for Lower Hutt members of the NZ Budget Federation. Most there couldn’t answer some questions because they were rolling on the floor. No, they were laughing, you pillocks, not the other thing!

Someone once told me I knew more senseless, absolutely useless pieces of history than any man she had ever met.

The reason is that as a journalist you know a bit about everything while not knowing much about anything.

So here’s a chance to prove her wrong!

Of the following 10 statements only ONE is true. All the rest I have made up. Your task is simple. FIND THE ONE TRUE STATEMENT.

Anyone using the internet will automatically be disqualified.

I will answer any question, on any of the statements, which is an open-ended question. If you don’t understand what THAT means, look it up, then reconsider whether to take part at all, you are not up to it.

Q!: Henry VIII had six wives

Q2: The capital of Brazil is Rio de Janeiro

Q3: British Secret Service used chickens to pass secret messages between France and Germany during WW1

Q4: Napoleon’s Army never invaded Egypt

Q5: There has been only one Boer War in history

Q6: In his will Shakespeare left his best bed to his wife

Q7: Perth isn’t the most remote major city in the world

Q8: During the shooting of the film the Prince and the Showgirl Marilyn Monroe and Laurence Olivier didn’t fall in love and have a secret affair

Q9: Before he committed suicide, Hitler appointed a Nazi as his successor

Q10: Genius can never be seen on television

 

As this is a contest there will be a mystery prize. This will go to the first contestant who produces the correct answer IF IM AM CONVINCED HE OR SHE DIDN’T USE THE INTERNET TO DO IT.

Ready, steady, go!

PS: To misquote Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes: When you have eliminated all the  false statements the one remaining, however unlikely, is the true one.

PPS: This competition ends when I or David decides to end it. All our decisions are final and no correspondence will be entered into. David can enter if he likes but he won’t win anything even if he is successful. I was beginning to like the guy, but that was before our separation.

As I know the answer, I won’t be entering!

I’ve blogged at length before on TVNZ7. I have praised a number of programmes on TVNZ7, but noted that their audiences were miniscule (seem to range from 0.1% to 0.4% of the population) and that trying to make TVNZ both a commercial and a public service broadcaster is doomed to failure (as former CEO Ian Fraser has noted).

I’d like to see other broadcasters (including Sky) apply to NZ on Air to broadcast some of the better shows that were on TVNZ7 such as Court Report, Media 7, Backbenchers and The Last Word. But at this stage I’ve not heard any are.

Clare Curran has blogged a number of things:

I am drafting a private members bill which would ensure TVNZ7 had adequate funding to continue. But a private members bill goes into a ballot with around 60 other bills and it’s the luck of the draw as to whether it gets pulled out. If it did, it would be interesting to see the support for TVNZ7 and public service television across the House. I think the government might find itself outnumbered.

The bill has no chance of achieving anything, and is a last minute publicity stunt (nothing wrong with those, but let’s not pretend it is something different). The bill hasn’t even been drafted yet (most MPs draft the bill then announce it), and could not possibly be passed by 30 June. Hell even it was drawn out of the ballot, I doubt it would even have its first reading by 30 June.

There are two schools of thought. The government’s view  is that public service television can continue to be funded by NZ on Air funding programmes on commercial channels. The problem with this is that the most interesting programmes are not shown in prime time.

True, but with the growing use of PVRs and TV on demand on the Internet this is less of a problem.

There’s a strong argument for a complete revamp of the sector and the Broadcasting Act. For a  new independent public service TV channel separate from TVNZ. For requiring commercial channels, including the pay TV channel Sky to contribute. For even a small levy on internet connections to enable a new service to embrace the broadband environment and develop more Kiwi content that is accessible to Kiwis.

I really do hope Labour adopt this Internet tax as policy and campaign on it.

I am not against there being a public service television broadcaster, but the appropriate funding mechanism would be taxes – just as Radio NZ and Maori TV are funded. And no I do not advocate increased funding in these tight fiscal times. I think one could seriously look at a ABC or BBC style combined radio and television broadcaster within the current Vote Broadcasting.

There’s a strong view that if TVNZ7 was able to continue, and however it is funded, it should be completely separate from TVNZ control and influence.

I agree with that. You can not be a public service broadcaster and a commercial broadcaster. Choose one, not both.

Clare quotes Judy Callingham:

The channel itself should be a  totally separate entity, run by a separate organisation. Whether that’s a trust, a government entity or a company is a detail that can be worked out later. What is important now is to remove the channel from the control of TVNZ  altogether – mere editorial independence isn’t enough.

The separate entity could still use TVNZ studios and staff and equipment if need be.  It would hire them, just as private companies do. It would, and should, expect mates’ rates, but it shouldn’t expect to use the facilities for nothing, although perhaps the cost could be absorbed and become a paper addition to TVNZ’s annual dividend.

This would never work long-term in my opinion. TVNZ would always prioritize itself and other customers over an entity paying very little for its facilities.

Also this model overlooks one of the reasons why TVNZ7 had such dismal ratings. TVNZ never promoted TVNZ programmes in prime time on other channels. Trying to run a stand-alone broadcaster on $15m a year would inevitably fail. This is why the model of a larger combined pubic service broadcaster is better. One could promote the better TV programmes on radio, and vice-versa. There would also be synergies where (for example) something shown on the Court report could be followed up on Radio NZ the next day. When did you ever see One News follow up something from TVNZ7? Very rare.

Going on about “saving” TVNZ7 sounds good, but it was always a flawed model. What the debate should be about is how to best get quality public service programmes onto television. Is it purely NZ on Air or should it be all through a dedicated public service broadcaster or something inbetween? And how do you make it affordable in our current fiscal environment.

A good op-ed by Telstra-Clear CEO Allan Freeth:

During my involvement with the international activities and meetings of Save the Children and the World Economic Forum, I have been struck by the inner turmoil of stakeholders from the old superpowers, Britain and America.

In their heads they realise that the Indian and Chinese economies are coming into predominance. But in their hearts, they cannot give up the idea that they will continue to reign supreme.

Much the same is being seen in New Zealand with the current foreign investment debate.

In the Herald, Fran O’Sullivan reported on prospect of Fonterra partnering with a Chinese company to develop dairy farms in China. The company, Shanghai Pengxian, is the same one awaiting a government decision allowing it to buy the 16 Crafar dairy farms, around 8,000 hectares of land.

I have said for some time that the proposed partnership with Shanghai Pengxian and Landcorp, could result in massive economic opportunities for New Zealand.

I recognise that land has a special status in the eyes of many New Zealanders, but this is in the face of the sale of thousands of hectares to foreigners, particularly US citizens, over the past few years. I hesitate to suggest that the issue may be a cultural one as opposed to economic, but it is hard to see the extreme result being anything other than some type of xenophobic knee-jerk reaction.

Take just this week. When Bill English is over in Australia talking about how more and more Australian companies want to invest in New Zealand, and no politician says a word. But then you have a Chinese leader visit and promote investment from China, and the Greens rush out a press release. It is absolutely playing to xenophobia. Not all opposition is xenophobic, but much of it is – and politicians play to it.

Some of the anxiety about foreign investment is driven by laudable, but in my view misguided, concerns about the environment. But other concerns may be based on a fear that foreign investment, particularly in land, in some way erodes our sovereignty.

Even before the High Court ruling which sent back the Overseas Investment Commission’s decision on the Crafar farms sale, politicians, interest groups and individuals had expressed opposition to the sale of the farms to Chinese interests. Yet, as you read this, there is another New Zealand trade mission in China, from Auckland, seeking business and investment.

I am not sure we can continue a strategy of trying to have our cake and eating it, too!

More importantly, such protests fuel a growing public anxiety that foreign investment is a bad thing. In my view, foreign investment is not simply good for our economy, it is critical to our long term, sustainable economic future.

Exactly. China especially is a massive opportunity for us.

National went into the 2011 General Election promising more investment in infrastructure, and developing a more export-focused economy, delivering more jobs for young Kiwis.

It would be difficult to find fault with those objectives, and even more difficult to see how they might be met without the continued investment from overseas necessary to support the planned and sustainable development of our resources, including minerals, energy, forestry, agriculture and technical innovation.

Do those opposed to this investment want to tell the rest of the world that New Zealand isn’t open for business? Do they understand global trade and investment is reciprocal, or do they think it is just a one-way street? Do they know that of the $60 billion in FDI in New Zealand, around $40 billion, or two-thirds of the total, comes from Australia, $10 billion from the US and $5 billion from the UK?

Do they know that China’s investment in New Zealand is around $1.8 billion mostly in the forestry sector, followed by manufacturing and commercial construction? Do they really want to send one of the world’s biggest economies a message that their money is not welcome in New Zealand?

The economic nationalism put forward by Greens, NZ First and more recently Labour is reckless.

Those opposed to foreign investment in our enterprises should consider the investment made by British firms in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in New Zealand’s meat processing industry.

British owners and shareholders profited by that investment, but if the investment hadn’t been made by them at that time, where would the money have come from to build the plant and infrastructure? And where would our economy be today, if that investment had not been made all those years ago?

But at least our carbon footprint would be smaller!

The economic contribution from foreign investment is as relevant today as it was then. New Zealanders need to learn more about the importance of foreign investment to our economy and take an active role in the debate on both sides.

Then, if they remain opposed to the idea, let the opposition be based on information and not ignorance, or the fact that they do not know how to deal with a global shift in economic and social power.

I won’t hold my breath waiting.

NewstalkZB reports:

Former Chief Families Commissioner turned Labour MP, Rajen Prasad, has hit out at the current Families Commission Chief for reportedly saying Labour’s plan to extend paid parental leave is unaffordable.

Dr Prasad told Newstalk ZB’s Larry Williams it’s wrong for the Chief Commissioner to make a decision that the government and Treasury should make.

“The Chief Commissioner by taking this view has just tainted his own reputation by taking a view that’s been taken by the government and in that way his independence is just compromised.”

I don’t know about you, but personally I think having the Chief Families Commissioner retire then pop up on the Labour Party list does far more to tarnish the reputation of the office, and compromise its independence.

Dr Prasad’s anger is because the Chief Commissioner made the rather obvious point that there is less money available than in the past. Treason to Labour.

A further story reports:

Rajen Prasad says Mr Davidson’s credibility has been damaged by his reported comments and he now has two choices – to retract his comments and say he got it wrong or to resign.

Disgraceful bullying of public servants.

Labour seem to have an obsession with Simon Lusk. Trevor Mallard has been blogging on him for over a year, and then in a rush of blood to his head (or somewhere) decided he was the secret leaker in the ACC saga. Never mind that the ACC Minister hasn’t spoken to him once in the past year.

As Trevor’s defamation defence will be based on proving his wild theories had a semblence of credibility, he set his assistant defence counsel Chris Hipkins to work. Chippie filed no less than 259 written questions to Ministers on Mr Lusk. Putting aside the cost to the taxpayer of their paranoia, his fishing expedition was very wide. He asked every single portfolio Minister the following:

Has he or his representatives had any written communication with Simon Lusk within the last six months in his Ministerial capacity; if so, on which date or dates and what was the nature of the communication?

Has he or his representatives had any oral discussions with Simon Lusk within the last six months in his Ministerial capacity; if so, on which date or dates and what was the nature of the discussion or discussions?

Has he or his representatives met with Simon Lusk within the last six months in his Ministerial capacity; if so, on which date or dates and what was the nature of the discussion or discussions?

One or two Ministers are yet to reply, but from what I can see 100% of the responses are “No”. So Trevor’s defence strategy is looking pretty shaky.

Plus anyone who knows Simon knows that at this time of year the last thing he worries about is politics. His main activity is being out on a grassy knoll with a high powered rifle looking for venison to go in the freezer.

The Dom Post reports:

Notorious criminal John Gillies allegedly smashed into a man’s house, punched him on the jaw, then threatened to come after him with a bat.

But charges against him were dropped and Gillies was allowed to remain outside prison.

This all happened on parole. The charges were dropped as no witness would testify.

July 1993 – stabs Gisborne police officer Nigel Hendrikse in the neck, chest and thigh, leaving him fighting for his life. Hendrikse is permanently disabled. Gillies sentenced to 12 years prison.

That would have been strike one.

1995 – has two years and nine months added to his sentence for attacking his girlfriend while she visited him at Paremoremo prison.

And that would have been strike two.

May 2004 – arrested after a 3km police car chase at speeds of up to 170kmh in Hawke’s Bay. He assaulted officers, who found cocaine, methamphetamine and $21,040 cash in the car.

And that would be strike three. Maximum sentence with no parole. Instead:

2005 – sentenced to seven years prison.

February 2010 – parole declined after telling the Parole Board he had no intention of attending the Violence Prevention Unit.

May, 2011 – released on parole, a year early.

June 22, 2011 – breaches parole conditions. Comes back before parole board on August 15. Released again from October 14.

February 10, 2012 – charged with burglary, assault, threatening behaviour and breach of parole conditions. Recalled to prison.

April 5 – released under parole conditions after the charges were dropped when witness did not answer their summons. Convicted on charge of breaching his parole conditions, and ordered to come up for sentence if called upon within six months.

Gillies has over 105 previous convictions. Who thinks he will no longer offend?

Remember it is Labour and Green policy to repeal the three strikes law.

The Legal Research Foundation has organised a forum on media and new media regulation in Auckland on Tuesday 1 May. It will discuss the issues raised in the Law Commission paper reviewing regulatory gaps with media and new media.

My submission on the paper is here.

There is a star-studded line-up of speakers (plus me). They are:

• Justice Raynor Asher, President of the Legal Research Foundation
• Law Professor John Burrows and former editor Cate Brett from the Law Commission
• Hon Barry Paterson QC, Press Council Chair
• Claire Bradley, Mediaworks Legal Counsel
• Martin Cocker, Netsafe Executive Director
• Steven Price, Barrister
• Judge David Harvey

You can register at the link above, or just send an e-mail to [email protected], and the LRF will invoice you.

The issues being discussed are very important, and could well have a significant impact on the Internet. Id encourage interested people to attend, if they can.

The left have been trying to push a meme that this Government has not been spending enough money. That if only we did not have the tax cuts, we would be able to have extra spending. Putting aside the fact that National’s tax packages have had less of a fiscal impact than Labour’s proposed tax cuts, I thought it would be useful to look at actual spending by term. Has National really been slashing spending? If only. First let us look at total expenditure.

The dark blue line is total government expenditure for each term of Government (from 1 July after each election). So total government expenditure increased 21% under National, from Labour’s last term. If you compare to the last term of National’s 4th Government it is a whopping 131% higher. It is also 92% higher than Labour’s first term.

Now next let us look at it in terms of real or inflation adjusted expenditure, which the red line. Ideally inflation should be 1% or so, so the impact is minimal, but that has not always been the case. Real expenditure is 11% higher than from the previous term, and 69% up from the 4th National Government.  It is 50% higher than in Labour’s first term.

Now total expenditure includes SOEs and the like. A more common measure is the core crown expenditure, which excludes this. In nominal terms this increased 19% from Labour’s last term, 83% from Labour’s first term and 105% from the last National Government. This is the green line

To take account of inflation we also have the purple line of core real expenditure.  Well this term National’s core real expenditure was 9.6% higher than the last term of Labour. It is 43% higher than Labour’s first term and 51% higher than the 4th National Government.

Finally we have also had population growth. I don’t accept that all government expenses should increase per capita, but to take account of this we have the light blue line which goes on the second axis. It shows National is spending in real terms per capita 6.2% more than the last term of Labour. It is 28% more than Labour’s first term, and 32% more than the last National Government.

It is interesting to look at the real increase per capita for the last four Governments. The 1st term of Labour saw this increase a modest 2.5%. The second term of Labour saw it increase 6.2% – the exact same increase as under National. The outlier is Labour’s third term is when it increased 13.8% as Labour was so embarrassed by the size of its surpluses it invented all sorts of new spending schemes.

So Labour trying to portray National as mean and stingy, and cutting spending to fund tax cuts is just bonkers. If anyone should be complaining, it is fiscal conservatives who think government spending shouldn’t increase in real per capita terms (something the Government has now agreed to in principle, thanks to ACT).

People may be interested in the real increases from Labour’s last term to National’s first term. They are:

• Health +11.4%
• Education +8.3%
• Law & Order +7.9%
• Defence 5.0%
• Welfare +9.2%

Remember those when someone claims National has slashed education or health funding.

A guest post by Peter Freedman:

IF ANY AUSTRALIAN EVER CLAIMS PHAR LAP…….

You have my permission to do him grievous bodily harm. Just make sure the last words he hears before those of his Maker are “Phar Lap was a bloody Kiwi, you nong!”

Nong is of course an Australian expression. It can be used in such endearing phrases as “Ya gotcha trackie daks on back ter frint, yah silly nong!”

If Phar Lap is claimed by a thick Aussie ask him two questions:

Q1 “Where wereya born?” He will, of course, reply : “Orstralya, ya nong”

Q2: Does that make YOU Australian?” “Of course it duz, drongo, whatareya?”

Then quietly mention that Phar Lap was born in Timaru. That will almost certainly mean your new mate will suddenly find his bladder is full to the top and he can’t possibly come back till next week and it is a shame about you and your missus leaving for Timbuktu in two hours.

Phar Lap’s record reads: Starts 50, Wins 36, 2nds 3, 3rds 2. I look upon him as the best racehorse ever. Looks good but stats are cold things. The story of Phar Lap must be one of the most extraordinary yarns about an animal and the humans who knew him that ever has been told.

Other punters will name his superior and the fun part is that you can never be wrong. You can’t compare a horse that races in the 1930s, with one of today, the courses are different and knowledge of the horse’s frame has changed with technology. In the 1930s, when Phar Lap ran, trainers worked with intuition, not science.

Two Melbourne men nearly went to jail over a fight as to which horse was better – Phar Lap or an NZer called Carbine. Charged with offensive behavior, the men were lucky the magistrate had a sense of humour. He freed them so long as they continued the argument in a “quiet and gentlemanly manner”.

Only one man originally saw how great Phar Lap could be. He was a struggling trainer, Harry Telford, a man with a brutal temper. He didn’t have a bean, but he knew his racehorses. He chose Phar Lap even before he had seen him.

He was leafing through a sales catalogue for Trentham when a horse’s pedigree caught his eye. He found the horse, though seemingly poorly bred (his Mum, Entreaty broke down after her first race) had royal blood if you went back far enough. Ironically the blue blood in his background belonged to a horse named……..yes, it was Carbine!

Night after night for a month, he went back over the pedigree again and again. Not only did each sleepless night make him more convinced this one could be a champion, but could be the best horse of time.

But Telford had no money, it was the depression and all the wealthy had all the spoils.

So Telford managed to persuade a rich American, Dave Davis, to buy the horse without seeing it. Phar Lap was bought for 160 guineas, almost nothing even in those days.

When Davis saw his purchase he said: “Sell him, he looks like a camel” True, he had boils all over his face and was very skinny. But he didn’t have two humps, he had a man who believed in him and blue blood in his veins.

So Telford leased PL from Davis for three years for nothing. If the horse won any money Davis would get a share.

Both men were happy. Davis was mega rich and had nothing to lose, Telford whose record to that time was very ordinary, had three years to pursue his dream.

When PL first appeared on a course, people laughed at him. Some joker said to call him Lightning because he was so slow.

That much seems to be true. What happened in the next few moments is subject to debate. We do know that Telford, having no sense of humour, rejected the Lightning name, but only after serious consideration. He refused, he said, because the name had too many letters .

It has to have seven letters he declared.

Why seven?

“The three last three Melbourne Cup winners all had seven letters, It has got to be seven.”

Then the stories differ.

The generally accepted view is that an Oriental gent nearby suggested “Phar Lap” because that was a Sinhalese for lightning. The story sometimes says that word was farlap and Telford only accepted it when it was pointed out to him that he could change the “f” to a “ph”. Nice yarn but definitely not so.

But did the Oriental ever exist? The authoritative written work on Phar Lap, while pointing out the words are Thai, doesn’t even mention the gent from Asia. But a researcher met the man’s sister who insisted her medical student brother, Aubrey Moor Ping, HAD named Phar Lap.

Other true stories about this, the greatest of all horses include.

• He ran a poor last in his first race. He took five starts to land a win, and was unplaced in his next four. Then he ran a second.

• After that, he was third twice, then won 31 races, a sequence broken only by two thirds and two seconds.. He followed that up with eight more wins, before finishing well back in the 1931 Melbourne Cup under a record weight.

• He ended his career winning his only international run, donkey licking smart field at Aguq Caliente in New Mexico

• He nearly didn’t make it to his Melbourne Cup victory. After an attempt on his life (see below) he was smuggled out to a safer property. When it was time for him to leave for Flemington the horse float wouldn’t start. When he finally got there, just minutes before the race the crowd roared: “He’s Arrived!”

And by the time he died he was, and will inevitably remain, the most popular athlete in Australia, human or non human.

So what happened? How did this seeming carthorse became the greatest equine in the world?

Two things:

1. The size of his heart, Literally. After he died, Phar Lap’s heart was weighed in at 6.2 kgs, nearly twice the normal size.

2. A man who seemingly didn’t have a heart at all. Telford decided early that his new horse had ability he was just lazy. So he put the gelding through a training schedule that would have killed a lesser horse. But Phar Lap thrived on it.

Even in death, Phar Lap caused controversy. He died just after his New Mexico race and fans to this day still believe he was killed by bookmakers who knew how much he was going to cost if he lived.

After all, bookies had tried before. Just days before his effortless Cup win there was an attempt to shoot the horse from a moving car. Phar Lap reared and his regular attendant, Tommy Woodcock put his body between the car and the horse to save him.

Almost certainly the death came from natural causes – colic due to munching wet grass.

Some of the people who also lived the Phar Lap legend met sticky ends. His first jockey, Cashy Martin, did in a race fall while still in his teens. Like Telford, he knew Phar Lap was going to be great and lived long enough to see him win his Melbourne Cup.

Tommy Woodcock and the horse were inseparable. Woodcock lived to a ripe old age and nearly trained a Melbourne Cup winner himself when his horse, Reckless, finished a close second.

After Phar Lap, Telford never had a decent horse again. He over reached himself financially and died in 1960.

His regular jockey, Jim Pike, won a fortune and then lost it on gambling and booze. He died in a home for destitutes.

Dunno what happened to Davis, the rich Yank and no one cares. He was a liar and a rogue and publicly insisted that the first time he clapped eyes on the horse he knew he had a champion.

Phar Lap was one of only two sports figures who were so good the authorities tried to change the rules in order to make them lose.

And, of course, the Aussie battlers loved him. It was in the depression and Bobby, as he was known affectionately, and his battler trainer were sticking it up the toffee noses.

There have been many good horses and will be many more. But there was only one Phar Lap. His body, stuffed and mounted is in Melbourne Museum. It looks so lifelike you can almost hear him thinking: “Let’s give those toffee noses just one more hiding, Jim”

An interesting history of Phar Lap.

THIS WEEK ON BACK BENCHES: Watch Wallace Chapman, Damian Christie, the Back Benches Panel and special guests discuss the week’s hottest topics!

WHAT THE FRACK?: Fracking—the mining process which blasts a mixture of water, sand and chemicals deep into the earth to extract gas or petroleum. We’ve been doing it for decades but now there is Parliamentary inquiry into process. The Greens are calling for a moratorium on fracking until the inquiry is over but the Government says that’s not necessary. It’s controversial—the practice has been blamed for groundwater contamination and earthquakes. Is fracking safe? Is there enough oversight? Oil and Gas exports bring about $3 billion to the economy. Can we say no to the practice?

PAID PARENTAL LEAVE: A bill by Labour’s Sue Moroney says 6 months(26 weeks) rather than the current 3.5 months/14 weeks. The Government says that is unaffordable. Do we need more time for the country to recover financially? Key has left the door open for the future—but will our country EVER be able to afford extended leave? Is it ever a good idea to borrow money for additional entitlements? Or are there benefits, bigger than financial to consider?

Join us for a night of LIVE pub politics from the Backbencher Pub: Wednesday, 18th of April. Our Panel: Green Party MP Gareth Hughes, Labour MP Annette King, and National MP Katrina Shanks.

Wednesday at 9.05pm and Saturday at 10.05pm

Trelissick Park

EveryTrail – Find hiking trails in Californiaand beyond

A lovely hidden walk in the Ngaio Gorge. You enter Trelissick Park from Kaiwharawhara Road, and most of the time you are walking a path next to the stream.

Audrey Young at NZ Herald reports:

Cabinet minister Paula Bennett has confirmed that her new husband is Alan Philps and that he is an old boyfriend.

“Alan and I first met over 23 years ago when he was a truck driver and used to stop in at the diner I was waitressing in,” she told the Herald.

“We recently got back together and Alan and his kids moved back from Australia to New Zealand so we could be a family together.

“We are very happy, and both feel very lucky to have found each other again.”

The pair married on Saturday on the beach at Piha. The wedding feast was champagne and fish and chips.

They are having a brief honeymoon and she is expected back at work tomorrow.

It can be challenging to find time for romance, while being an MP, let alone a Minister. Congrats to Paula and Alan.

AFP report at the NZ Herald:

The internet Age is becoming as known for patent litigation as it is for online innovation. …

The break in the unofficial truce was inspired in part by “patent trolls,” entities that buy or file patents with the sole intent of some day suing entrepreneurs who use the ideas.

Ranks of patent trolls are growing, as is the number of large companies turning to patent litigation not just to cash-in but to gain or protect market terrain, according to Chien. …

AOL this week announced plans to sell more than 800 patents to Microsoft in a US$1.056 billion deal giving the faded Internet star a needed cash injection.

Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith said that the software giant is getting “a valuable portfolio that we have been following for years.”

Facebook in March confirmed that it bought 750 software and networking patents from IBM to beef up its arsenal on an increasingly lawsuit-strewn technology battlefield.

Early this year, Google bought 188 patents and 29 patent applications related to mobile phones from IBM but did not disclose how much it paid.

Last year, IBM sold Google 2,000 or so patents ranging from mobile software to computer hardware and processors.

I’m one of those who think copyright over code is the better way to protect software intellectual property than patents, as seen by these ridiculous and expensive patent wars.

Danya Levy at Stuff reports:

Key, who is in Jakarta on a trade mission, said he had discussed the use of the veto with English, who made the announcement while the prime minister was on holiday with his family.

Everyone acknowledged paid parental leave was important for mothers and families.

“It’s an important time they bond with their children. Everyone acknowledges having more time with their infants would be an important thing to support.”

However, the Government’s number one priority was getting its books back to surplus.

“We think when the Government’s balance sheet is in order, that provides greater strength for families overall because it is not just paid parental leave we support; it’s Working For Families, it’s access to early childhood education and many other initiatives.”

The reality is that surpluses give you options, deficits just give you debt. Borrowing money to fund extending paid parental leave is not sustainable.

Meanwhile, Key has indicated he would support a Green members’ bill to introduce a record of lobbyists who work at Parliament.

“I don’t think any Government has done as much in terms of introduced transparency into Parliament as we have in the past three-and-a-half years. There’s much greater transparency in terms of MPs’ expenses and the likes.”

Key said he was not “fundamentally opposed” to having a register.

“That’s a matter for our caucus to consider but in principle I’m not opposed to it potentially going to a select committee.”

I’m not a clairvoyant, but I predict National will vote for the bill at first reading 🙂

Ian Steward at Stuff reports:

Auckland lawyer and Maori Party political candidate Davina Murray has been charged with illegally smuggling contraband to convicted murderer and rapist Liam Reid, who she believes is innocent.

Murray lost her name suppression today after she and her lawyer Barry Hart had battled for months to keep her name secret.

Murray was charged with delivering an iPhone 4, a packet of Marlboro cigarettes and a Bic lighter to Reid at Mount Eden prison on October 7 last year – two months after a smoking ban was introduced.  

She had a new charge laid earlier this month of “holding a communication with him that might prejudice the safe custody of a prisoner” – in essence, passing on inappropriate information.

Reid is serving one of New Zealand’s heaviest sentences for the 2007 rape and murder of deaf Christchurch woman Emma Agnew and the rape and attempted murder of another woman in Dunedin soon after.

He was originally sentenced to preventive detention with a 26-year minimum period, but that was later reduced to 23 years on appeal.

Murray is understood to have visited Reid frequently and had communications with him at Mt Eden prison.

It is alleged that Reid was searched before one of their visits and had nothing on him, but after the visit he was found to have an iPhone, cigarettes and a lighter.

Murray stood for the Maori Party as a list candidate in the 2011 election.

She is a criminal barrister in the chambers of Hart, a prominent defence lawyer.

Hart had argued Murray should keep her name suppression as her reputation would be irreparably damaged and she and her family might suffer adverse consequences from being named.

Yes the reputation is damaged – if she is found guilty. And if she is guilty, her reputation should be damaged.

Liam Reid is not a good person. Even putting aside the rape and murder of Emma Agnew and the Dunedin rape, he had 61 previous convictions before that.  If she is found guilty, the Maori Party should dump her as a candidate.

The third and final play for this weekend was Floral Notes, also at Circa.

Floral Notes was a charming and poignant production. It was a smile silently rather than a laugh out large affair. Probably a play that appeals more to the older theatre-goer, who will relate to the characters and plot. Having said that, I still found it an enjoyable experience.

It is a two woman show, with Geraldine Brophy and Jane Keller playing two former pen pals who resume their correspondence after a forty year break. Brophy plays the widowed Kiwi, whose love of gardening gives the play its name. Her character Rosemary badly misses her dead husband.

Keller play Iris, a wonderfully blunt and sarcastic New Yorker who is twice divorced and in fact still living with her 2nd ex husband and his gay lover! She also has some pain to cope with, but more hidden.

The play is part-musical, with the ever talented Michael Nicholas Williams on the piano. Keller is a professional singer and always a delight to listen to. Brophy’s singing was fine, but up against the strength of Keller, was slightly jarring for me. It’s not that it was in any way bad, but if you have someone great and someone just good singing together, it doesn’t always work. I recall once being at a party where Jim Bolger and Dame Malvina Major sang together on the karaoke – it was umm memorable 🙂

I liked the plot, as we discovered why the girls had stopped writing to each other so long ago, and how they started up again. Both Keller and Brophy are larger than life characters who dominate the stage easily. The set kept them physically separate, so you got the sense of their communications.

Like with many plays, it was a mixture of joy and sadness. You smile often at their letters and e-mails, but also share their sadness as events emerge. It was a gentle ending to my weekend of plays.

The play runs until Saturday 28 April.

Labour’s Iain Lees-Galloway has said:

The Government is deliberately ignoring health data that doesn’t tell the story it wants the public to hear, Labour’s Associate Health spokesperson Iain Lees-Galloway says.

“Statistics collected by the Ministry of Health reveal that every district health board (DHB) except one is failing to get close to acceptable rates for early smoking cessation intervention.

“The Government wants us to believe it has made smoking cessation a priority. These figures highlight the reality – it hasn’t, “Iain Lees-Galloway.

“The Ministry of Health expects 90 per cent of smokers who see a GP to be provided with advice and help to quit, yet only one DHB is reaching that target.

“No other DHB is even close. In fact, on average they are underperforming by 57%.

“Tony Ryall, of course, is allergic to bad news, so these figures never get reported.

 “Interestingly he talks up statistics around smokers who end up in hospital* and the advice they get there.

“But only reporting smoking cessation activities in hospitals is ludicrous. Far more people see their GP than go to hospital.

This is an interesting issue. Lees-Galloway is taking about two seperate things – the proportion of smokers who see their GP who get advice and help to quit, and the proportion of smokers in a hospital who get advice and help to quit.

The hospital figure is the official national health target. It was 90% and has just gone up to 95%. The DHB average was 95% in the first quarter of 2011/12 and slipped back to 89% in the second quarter. Six DHBS made 95% and 12 made 90%, while eight did not.

Now hospitals are actually run by DHBs. DHBs control hospitals. A DHB has the ability to put in place policies around offering quit smoking services to patients. Also be aware that the average person spends hours or days in hospital, so it is easier to do something additional to the reason they are in hospital.

GPs are not employed by DHBs. They are private entities, that only get a portion of their income from the Government. The ability of a Government to get GPs to do something is very limited, and frankly it is silly of Lees-Galloway to think they can.

Now from what I can tell, the DHBs only started funding GPs to even code their patients as to whom are smokers and non-smokers. Sure it is recorded in notes in long-hand, but it is a big job to go through every file and mark them in the database as a smoker.

The new target for GPs only started this year, and they noted:

Unlike the other health targets, this measure started from scratch as provision of advice and help to smokers was not recorded previously nor even offered routinely.

So imagine what is involved to get every GP in NZ recording the status, and then also recording if they offered quit smoking assistance. I’ve worked in a medical centre. The average visit is around 15 minutes, and covering anything apart from the immediate problem slows things down a lot. Now this is not to say it is not a good idea – it is. But expecting 90% achievement in the first year is silly.

Liam Hehir writes in Manawatu Standard:

 It is trite to extol freedom of expression as being a right that is fundamental or the first freedom in any just society.

Such an essential right, free speech has surprisingly recent origins as a feature of our legal framework.

For many centuries, English law  from which much of our law is derived  provided that any person who disparaged the King could be hauled before a special court known as the Star Chamber.

The censorship powers of the Star Chamber grew and it eventually took for itself the right to approve all literature for publication.

In 1632, the court even issued an outright ban on all “news books” that lasted for six years.

Things got better:

The freedom to disparage the king was soon added to the corpus of rights considered to be the privilege of freeborn Englishmen and the licensing order was allowed to lapse in 1694.

With time, that freedom was transmitted throughout the British Isles and was carried over to British possessions in North America, Australia and, in 1840, New Zealand.

Then things got worse:

Canada has for several decades intrusively regulated speech on sensitive issues such as multiculturalism and religion.

The bodies doing the regulation are so-called “human rights tribunals” whose powers and procedures are actually not unlike the old Star Chamber.

There are very few procedural safeguards for defendants and the tribunals have in the past imposed lifetime speech bans and taken the totalitarian step of ordering forced apologies.

Australia may be headed down the same path. Last year, broadcaster Andrew Bolt was convicted of racial vilification for arguing that some people with tenuous links to Aboriginal culture were so identifying for political and pecuniary purposes.

The federal government has recently held a review which has suggested drastic tightening of government control of the media.

But the worse examples are the UK:

Freedom of expression has been most undermined, however, in Britain. There are literally thousands of examples of Her Majesty’s constabulary policing the manners of her subjects.

An 11-year-old was prosecuted for calling another boy a “Paki” and other unpleasant names.

A 14-year-old was arrested and fingerprinted for asking her teacher to put her with another group because the rest of her group spoke Urdu.

A 21-year-old was recently been sent to jail for tweeting a nasty comment about a black football player.

The British police, so reluctant to intervene in the midst of the rampant property destruction of last year’s riots, have seen fit to place undercover detectives in ethnic restaurants to arrest patrons who order “flied lice”.

A man was even arrested in the Isle of Wight for singing Kung Fu Fighting at a karaoke bar. …

So why is it so bad in the UK:

One wag put it thus: “In Britain everything is policed except crime.”

If only that were true. The fact is that under laws like section 5 of the UK Public Order Act 1986, it is a crime to use “insulting words”  and that’s the problem.

British MP Dominic Raab recently discovered that the police invoked section five 18,249 times in 2009 alone.

My response to a law banning use of insulting words is “get fucked”!

We often like to think of New Zealand as being an exceptional place and, in this regard, it seems we are.

There are few limitations on what you can say or write here.

If you slander or libel someone you may face civil liability for defamation and you may not incite crimes or publish obscenity, but our police will not call in at your doorstep to question your views on the issues of the day.

Long may it last, but we must remain vigilant. We saw the original Electoral Finance Bill which would have made it illegal to e-mail your view on a current issue without an authorisation statement. We see religions demand that it be an offence to insult them, and we see some call for “hate speech” laws. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance, said John Philpot Curran, and he was right.

A photo of former IMF Dominique Strauss-Kahn after speaking to students, business leaders and politicians in Kiev (Reuters / Galeb Garanich). Captions welcome below.