I was behind a car a few days ago that was advertising Superloans and telling people they can help you make ends meet between pay days.

I commented to the driver that I bet you they charge an outrageous interest rate, so I checked when I got home. I was expecting an annualised rate of 100% or so.

On their website, there is no mention on the home page of their current interest rates. No mention under their super pay advance FAQs also.

Finally on their disclosure page you fund out their interest rate is 16%.

Not per annum though. That is per fortnight. That works out to 416% per annum.

I feel sorry for people so desperate that they allow themselves to be exploited by these loan sharks. Yes these are unsecured loans, but hell even if you had a default rate of 20%, then an annualised rate of say 50% would be a pretty reasonable 20% return on capital.

It would seem to me there is a market opportunity here for a company to undercut the rip off merchants. Maybe there are barriers to entry that make this difficult.

First day of the Sevens was lots of fun. As always I’m amazed by how creative some of the costumes are, and the sheer variety of them. It did make me think what it would be like if one year everyone was urged to come in the same costume – say as blue smurfs. A stadium of 35,000 cheering blue smurfs would look amazing. On the other hand, one would find it damn hard recognizing your friends, and there must be a good chance a fair number of people would go home with a stranger whom they thought was someone else!

The rugby side (yes I do actually go for the rugby) was good. Canada beating France was excellent, as was Tonga beating Fiji. South Africa playing quite well and beat England and NZ looking good in their three victories, but not unbeatable by any stretch.

Anyway two amusing stories. The first is of how not to pick up a girl.

A guy in a duff beer outfit is cavorting in the aisle and then sits down in the aisle next to one of our group (Anna). He doesn’t speak to her, just sits there for half an hour, occasionally smiling at her. We are having fun teasing her that she has picked up a friend. Then after half an hour of sitting there saying nothing he asks “So you’ll be going home soon”. As it was 9 pm or so, Anna answers “yes”. He then goes “So I’ll come with you then”.

Well you have to give some marks for the direct approach!

The other incident happened soon after that. A young guy (aged 21) dressed or undressed as the Ultimate Warrior came up. He was basically naked apart from his underpants/wrestling shorts. He very generously lowered himself over a couple of the girls and umm shook his booty in front of them. The girls were not objecting too greatly I must say (probably helped by the fact he did have a wrestler’s physique) and I was having great fun urging him to make sure none of the girls on our group missed out.

But as I was urging him on, he looks up from being draped over Kirsti and Anna and goes “You’re David Farrier*, I love your blog”. In fact he loved my blog so much, he insisted on also shaking his booty over me – to the extremely great amusement of the girls in the group, who I think now believe in karma.

Some very unfortunate photos were snapped on iphones, and my KiwiSaver savings are going to have to be raided to ensure sufficient bribes to stop them ever being published!

Anyway heading back in around 1 pm. Here’s hoping for a New Zealand win!

* People would be amazed how often people either get my surname confused with TV3’s David Farrier, or even mix the two of us up (as in I give them my name, and they say oh yes you’re that funny guy on Nightline).

UPDATE: Kirsti has provided this photo of the Warrior.

Was on Face Off this morning on Wellington ZB hosted by Sean Plunket. The other panelists were Josie Pagani and Greg O’Connor.

Josie and I got there early and went into the studio. Sean had the news break, so left the studio to have a nicotine break.

Josie and I started our normal chatter, which as you can imagine is not always as carefully phrased as when speaking in public. A short time into this, Josie then goes “Does that red light mean we are broadcasting?”.

Yes, Sean had forgotten to turn the microphone off. Very fortunate that Josie noticed the red light in time, as I suspect five minutes of our conversation accidentally broadcast would not have helped either of us!

Stephen Franks blogs a review of a new book:

ACCORDING TO CONVENTIONAL criminological wisdom, crime can be significantly lowered only by eliminating its “root causes”: poverty, inequality, and racism. Policing, in this view, can only respond to crime after the fact by making an arrest; preventing crime from occurring in the first place lies in the domain of economic and welfare policy. What makes New York such a powerful natural experiment is that it is, in all respects but one, Zimring shows, nearly the same city as it was in 1990, when its homicide rate was five times higher. The previously assumed drivers of crime—poverty, income inequality, drug use—have not diminished; and family breakdown—conservatives’ preferred root cause—has worsened. 

This has parallels to the debate on the child abuse green paper currently happening. Rather than focus on what law changes the Government can make to help lower child abuse rates, many are saying that there is nothing you can do unless you address poverty and/or income inequality.

They are wrong.

Stephen further blogs:

The only element of the reform I saw not touched on in the review is the contribution of the NY  courts. They cooperated. Justice became much more swift and certain. They provided 24 hour a day sittings to get rid of delays and backlogs. Instead of declining to sentence because Rikers Island city  jail complex was full, they sentenced anyway and left it to the prison authorities to handle the consequences. When I was there a prison system designed for 14000 had over 20000 prisoners. The drop in crime has cured that. The muster is now generally comfortably below the design capacity. But as stressful as it must have been for all concerned, I’m sure if we asked the thousands of offenders who were saved from being murdered had the lawlessness of the 1990’s continued, the hardships of the peak imprisonment period were a small price to pay.

New Zealand used to be the opposite. Rather than have the level of offending determine the prison population, the authorities would let the capacity of the prison system determine sentencing. The Government made changes to bail and parole laws so we would not have over-crowding in prisons!

I recommend people read the full book review.

In my blog at Stuff, I look at the latest Roy Morgan poll, and ask if National is now the underdog?

Chris Trotter writes at Stuff:

At the risk of being branded a “traitor”, I’m declaring my support for the Crafar farms sale. Not because I like seeing productive New Zealand farmland pass into the hands of foreigners, I don’t.

The reason I’m in favour is because I believe New Zealanders should keep their promises and fulfil their undertakings.

In 2008, this country ratified a free-trade agreement with the People’s Republic of China. It was hailed as the most important foreign policy and trade achievement of the 1999-2008 Helen Clark-led government. Not only was it the first such agreement to be signed between China and a Western-style democracy, but it also offered New Zealand businesses immense economic opportunities. …

It was all the more perplexing, then, to hear Opposition leader David Shearer declaring his and the Labour Party’s opposition to the sale. It’s simply inconceivable that Mr Shearer is unaware of the MFN prohibition against denying China the same right to buy land as the nations that bought upwards of 650,000 hectares of our national patrimony exercised when Helen Clark was Prime Minister, and Mr Shearer’s friend (and former boss) Phil Goff was the Minister of Trade.

To avoid the inevitable charges of rank hypocrisy and populist opportunism, Mr Shearer needed to accompany his statement opposing the sale with an announcement that Labour was committed, immediately on regaining office, to repudiating the New Zealand-China FTA and tightening up the legislation regulating overseas investment.

I’m still waiting for those other shoes to drop. And, frankly, I think I’ll go on waiting. Why? Because I simply don’t believe Labour is about to abandon its long-standing commitment to free trade. Nor am I confident Mr Shearer is any more willing to court the fury and retaliatory trade restrictions of the Chinese government than Mr Key. Both are well aware that this country’s future prosperity is inextricably bound up with China’s.

I actually see the deal as an exciting one. A partnership between Shanghai Pengxin and Landcorp has huge potential opportunities. The combination of their market contacts and capital, and our land and expertise could be golden.

The Daily Beast reports:

Match.com gave The Daily Beast an exclusive first look at the results of its second annual Singles in America survey—a dive into the values, attitudes, and sexual patterns of 6,000 American singles. …

Great to see a Minister sticking up for foreign investment. The Herald reports:

Not enough New Zealanders appreciate the benefits of foreign investment and economic growth, says Economic Development Minister Steven Joyce.

The reaction of too many people was “you can’t do this, you can’t do that, you can’t do the other thing”, he said, with little thought to the impact it had on potential jobs.

“The same people tend to turn around and demand more jobs one minute and then declare that they don’t want to see any things over here happen.”

Exactly.

Mr Joyce said that if people wanted more job growth, they had to take a more positive attitude to investment in the New Zealand environment, especially given the mobility of people and the mobility of capital. …

Economic growth required the use of capital, resources, skilled labour, infrastructure, innovation and a market.

“So all those things have to be managed. It’s not a case of carte blanche but every time you say ‘I don’t want that’ that shuts off another opportunity.”

Too many people see foreign investment as bad, or at best a necessary evil.

One fairly well known MP here, in her days as a LARPer or live action role playing gamers. In the many levels of nerdiness associated with gaming, the LARPers are the top of the pyramid 🙂

Hat Tip: Whale

UPDATE: A commenter points out LARPing would be more popular if it was all like in this photo below.

Image located here.

Stuff reports:

Angry pit bull owners are biting back over comments made by the SPCA that the breed is bad to the bone.

SPCA Executive Director Bob Kerridge last week said pit bulls are the exception to the rule that dogs are not born bad. …

I’d be interested to hear from any pit bull owners as to why they have a pit bull.

While not all pit bulls attack humans, the proportion that have or do is notably high. So I can’t work out why anyone would acquire a pit bull, unless they specifically wanted a dog that will attack.

This graph looks at the various minor parties since 1954. Prior to 1954 no minor party got a significant level of support at an election.

Social Credit were the dominant third party from 1954 to 1990, when they effectively disappeared. It’s interesting that it was all downhill after their peak support in 1981. Incidentally they may have never made it into Parliament if Ruth Richardson in 1975 was successful in her challenge to Sir Roy Jack in Rangitikei, as it was his by-election two years later that got Bruce Beetham into Parliament.

We also see the Values Party of the 1970s, who peaked at 5%.

Following them was the Bob Jones New Zealand Party which formed to get rid of Muldoon, got 12% in 1984, and then basically disbanded.

The red line shows New Labour, which became the Alliance and then split off the Progressives. Their peak was 1993 and then all downhill.

The Greens are interesting. They also emerged in 1990, went into the Alliance in 1993, and then was out for 1999. From 1999 onwards it has been basically all been increases except in 2005.

NZ First has had the most ups and downs in their support. Almost every election their support reverses direction – up then down then up then down.

I’ve grouped the different Christian parties together (CC/CH/CD/Kiwi/Family/Destiny/Cons) and as you can see the peak was 1996 but an increase in 2011.

The decline of ACT is apparent. They kept their support for three elections, dropped in 2005, recovered in 2008 and then right down in 2011.

As they are always on the ballot, you can see ALCP since MMP began in 1996.

I’ve also combined together the Mana and Maori parties so one can see overall support for Maori identity parties over the last four elections.

And United is there also, with their big result in 2002 obvious.

Been texted screen shots of the annual Durex survey about NZ MPs. They seem to have two additional questions this year. First the normal question:

Off memory John Key has won the male title for the last two years but with Winston back and a more prominent David Shearer, he may have competition. Also the addition of Jami-Lee Ross into the ranks. I suspect his harem in the Research Unit will be voting for him multiple times.

Nikki Kaye won the female award first time, and then Jacinda Ardern the following year. None of the new Green MPs are included (for which I am sure they are very grateful) so the old favourites may battle it out.

I suspect more women will answer this question, than men. But, hey who knows.

Another new category, with several different names there. I wouldn’t want to be the person who has to inform the winning MP, they have won.

Meet Steven Karu.

On July 4 last year, Karu was riding a bus when he performed an indecent act, the Palmerston North District Court heard yesterday.

A 13-year-old girl on the bus saw what was happening and texted her parents, asking what to do. They told her to take a picture to show to the police and to get off at the next stop. She did. Trouble was, Karu got off too. …

On October 13 last year, Karu was jailed for one year on an indecency charge but while in Manawatu Prison awaiting sentence, he sent the girl a threatening letter dated August 22. …

“And on the back ‘original hoodlum pay back’.” There was also a picture of a gang gesture and the phrase “Highbury gonna get you”. The letter to the girl contained threats against her and her family.

In it, Karu described himself as “Highbury’s worst criminal”.

He also commented that he was due to be released when the girl would be aged 16, the legal age of consent for sexual intercourse.

His letter said:

“Delete the photo or else. “I don’t want you, me, and your mum and dad to have a problem. “I didn’t mean for this to happen, I’m sorry. “If my mum dies when I’m in here, so does yours and your dad.”

Sounds a lovely chap. But this is the part that staggered me:

Judge Lynch noted Karu’s long history of offending, dating back to 1989, which included more than 180 convictions.

I might be wrong, but I imagine more than a couple of those offences would be serious enough to qualify for a strike under the three strikes law.

Karu sounds like exactly the sort of offender who should no longer get the benefit of parole and shortened sentences. I think at 180 convictions we can all agree he is not going to stop offending.

Former Labour Party General Secretary Mike Smith blogs:

Donations over $30,000 from the same source must be declared to the Electoral Commission within 10 working days. National overstepped the mark in declaring a total donation of $86,005 from Gallagher Industries outside the limit. I can sympathise as I missed a connection once when I was Labour’s Secretary. These days  the Electoral Commission doesn’t get involved – the penalty is a fine of up to $40,000 on summary conviction.

That’s a very serious accusation. As Mike Smith says, a late return can result in a $40,000 fine. So let’s see if National were late.

The Electoral Commission says that National received $66,705 on 20 December 2001 from the Gallagher Group Ltd. This was on top of an earlier $19,300 so exceeded the $30,000 threshold for reporting within 10 working days.

It was declared on 10 January 2012, 21 days later.

But the Electoral Act refers to working days, as quoted by Mike Smith. S210C(6) says:

A return must be filed under subsection (1) or (2) within 10 working days of the donation being received by the party secretary

Now what is a working day? Well the Electoral Act specifies that in S3:

working day means any day of the week other than—

• (a) Saturday, Sunday, Good Friday, Easter Monday, Anzac Day, Labour Day, the Sovereign’s birthday, and Waitangi Day; and

• (b) a day in the period commencing with 25 December in any year and ending with 15 January in the following year

The 20th of December was a Tuesday. Friday 23rd December was the third working day and Mon Jan 16th the 4th working day. Tuesday 24 January 2012 is in fact the 10th working day after the 20th of December 2011.

So National made the deadline with a fortnight to spare.

Mike may wish to amend his post.

Sam Sachdeva at the Press reports:

At least 2000 people attended a protest calling for mid-term elections and the removal of chief executive Tony Marryatt and mayor Bob Parker in central Christchurch yesterday afternoon.

It would be nice if protesters had a basic understanding of the law.

I have no problem with people calling for Bob Parker to be sacked. He is an elected official. I would note though that I reckon a fair number of those demanding the Government sack the Christchurch City Council were also those who protested against the Government sacking the Canterbury Regional Council. Consistency would be nice.

I’m actually of the view that the Council may have to be sacked, if the Crown Observer can’t help sort things out. But Kerry Marshall and the Council should be given a chance to sort things out.

But what is really dumb is calling for the CEO to be sacked. Because if that actually happened, a $60,000 payrise would be the least of their aggravations. Marryatt has a 2.5 year contract. He would inevitably win a court battle requiring him to be paid out the remaining two years of his contract, which means he would walk away with $1.1 million.

John Hartevelt at Stuff reports:

The Government appears set on publishing primary school performance data, criticised by a teacher union as “junk information”.

Education Minister Hekia Parata yesterday said she would consider setting up a website similar to the MySchool resource that operates in Australia.

The Australian example “deals with a number of the concerns that have been rumoured” about the risks of league tables, Ms Parata said.

Comparisons between schools on MySchool were only between “statistically similar schools,” giving a fairer picture of performance.

“I think that parents vest a lot of trust in the principals and teachers of the education sector – and so they should – and that trust should be returned by letting parents know accurate information about what’s happening,” she said.

I think it is far better to have a database which allows parents to do “smart” comparisons, such as between schools with the same decile rankings, rather than just leave it to the media to compile their own tables.

The solution to bad data is good data – not banning the publication of data.

An interesting look at the election results of National and Labour since the first election they both contested.

Up until the 1990s, the gap between the parties was never that huge. A 10% gap was around as big as it got. Then in 1990 one had the first gap of well over 10% – almost 13%.

Then of course in 2002, there was the blowout to Labour who beat National by 20%, much the same as National beat Labour by in 2011.

There was also an interesting trend of declining support for both parties from the 1950s to 1984. We then saw both increase in support as Social Credit died, and then the volatility of MMP.

National’s growth over the last three elections under Brash and Key is quite remarkable.

Tomorrow we’ll look at the various third parties.

Seamus Boyer at Stuff reports:

Hollywood movie mogul James Cameron is coming to live in Wairarapa – and he is bringing his family with him.

The director of blockbuster films Titanic and Avatar has purchased two large plots of land along Western Lake Rd in south Wairarapa, where he is expected to arrive and live later this year.

Records released today from the Overseas Investment Office show that James F Cameron, of Canada, was given consent in December to purchase two separate properties, one 817 hectares and the other nearly 250 hectares.

That’s around 15% the size of the Crafar farms. where are the howls of outrage from Labour? I mean Cameron is a foreigner.

But the documents show that Cameron’s New Zealand connection will be more than just a working one.

”James F Cameron and his family intend to reside indefinitely in New Zealand and are acquiring the property to reside on and operate as a working farm,” it notes.

But but but what expertise do they have in farming?

Under Labour’s election policy on foreign investment, Mr Cameron’s application would be declined as they said all sales will be declined unless the purchaser “will also invest in significant further processing of related primary products and related jobs”.

So I look forward to Labour MPs forming a picket line at the airport waving “Cameron go home” placards.

Of course I think it is a good thing Cameron has been allowed to purchase land here. There are numerous way we may benefit from his presence in New Zealand.

Just as when Julian Robertson purchased rural land up north. Who would have thought that he would come to love this country so much (despite not being a citizen) that he would donate over $100 million of art to New Zealand galleries.

That is why I think the current test of “in the national interest” is the appropriate one rather than Labour’s highly restrictive criteria.

APNZ report at NZ Herald:

A reporter from the website Scoop will resign from Parliament’s press gallery after being caught photographing documents in Labour leader David Shearer’s office.

Lyndon Hood was among a number of journalists waiting in the office for an interview with Mr Shearer yesterday afternoon, and was spotted taking photos of documents on the leader’s desk by a Labour Party press secretary.

That is a real shame – both for Lyndon whose better judgement deserted him, but also for media/politican relations generally.

Just as MPs should be able to have a conversation without worrying if someone has a concealed recorder at their table, MPs should be able to have media come into their office and not worry about if they may photograph any documents on their desk.

I understand Labour have recently removed access for journalists to enter their corridors in Parliament. If this is correct, you can’t criticise them for that.

Labour MP Raymond Huo has blogged:

Now that David Farrar is holidaying in South Africa and sending us pictures showing how big the turtles are there and how Hyenas are eating dead baby elephants. I wish to take his holiday spirit and send him this letter as my Christmas present.

His Kiwiblog is powerful and I hope this letter plays a small role in helping make his blog a bit fairer on some issues.

While on a roller-coaster over the past three weeks of being in and out of Parliament, I was told that Mr Farrar, rather indirectly, blogged on me by saying more than once that to the effect that: “It will hurt Labour. While not a huge contributor to Labour within Parliament, I understand he is a relatively large fundraiser for Labour”.

It is unfortunate that David Farrar made this sweeping comment without delving deeper into the subject.

The comments Raymond is talking about are here:

For Carmel, she is out of Parliament entirely, and Raymond Huo is once again a Labour List MP. A bit of a blow to the rejuvenation efforts for Labour, but at least a boost to their fund-raising efforts.

That was meant to be more a compliment to Carmel, that she was one of the younger new MPs who had helped rejuvenate their lineup.

I also said earlier:

The bigger loser is Raymond Huo, who loses his list place, as Sepuloni makes it back. While not a huge contributor to Labour within Parliament, I understand he is a relatively large fund-raiser for Labour.

Raymond thinks that these comments don’t reflect the contribution he makes as an MP, saying:

The Chinese community, along with wider communities, is a rather large constituency. They come to MPs for help or for an answer with all sorts of different issues: immigration, corrections, law and order, resource consent, leaky building remediation work, national standards and constantly, how to grow the economy.

To be an MP serving such a large constituency with many members virtually being unable to communicate effectively (both in a linguistic and political sense) is a difficult task. Therefore the selection criteria must be harsh – if not harsher – than the process to select a ‘mainstream’ candidate. It requires skills, knowledge about both NZ and the migrant’s country of origin, and above all, integrity to provide service that reflects the quality and name of our House of Representatives.

This provides a good opportunity to elaborate more fully on the different aspects of being an MP, as I see them. Some people have suggested that Raymond shouldn’t worry about what I have blogged, as I support National. That is a legitimate view, but I would state that I do try to be reasonable fair to individual MPs. While I’m never going to say “Vote Labour”, I do often highlight Labour MPs whom I think are high flyers, will make good Ministers etc. and this is based on my honest opinion.

The different aspects of an MPs job are:

• Working on behalf of your electorate or community
• Participating in select committees
• House work
• Policy formulation
• Being a Minister
• Assisting your party

Now in terms of work within his community, I have no problems saying that I’ve only heard good things about Raymond from the Chinese community. he is well respected and i like the fact he and Dr Jian Yang (new National MP) have talked about working together in some areas to improve ties with China and the like.

It is important to have a Parliament that is broadly representative of New Zealand, I think a strength of MMP is that MPs like Raymond can work with non geographically based communities.

But there is more to being an highly regarded MP than your elecotrate and community work. The parliamentary side of the job is also important. Parties need MPs who can lead their team’s effort on a select committee on a bill, who can analyse bills and points out weaknesses in them, who can hold the Government to account, who can drive policy in a portfolio area etc etc.

In 2010 I blogged an analysis of the output of various Labour MPs. A crude, but still interesting tool. Raymond was near the bottom with just 12 press releases in a year, 3 news stories and 116 written questions.

The analysis had Prasad and Choudary also down at the bottom. It may be unfair to them a bit, as they are encouraged to spend a lot of time building support in their communities, but I suggest none of them have the balance quite right. You won’t be regarded as highly by your party, if you are not making more of an impact in Parliament. You don’t have to become a Trevor Mallard, but you don’t want to be a Larry Sutherland.

Raymond also said:

I did organise public meetings and fundraising dinners quite successfully over the past few years, as acknowledged by David Farrar. For an opposition back-bencher I don’t have an ever-popular Prime Minister to offer smiles and photo opportunities which must have enriched National’s support as reported in the NZ Herald. This only proves the point that I am popular and have done a good job.

When the time was not with us and the trend was against us, this kind of response is regarded as a form of approval and endorsement by the constituency.

It is unfortunate that he seemed to imply that we Asian MPs are ATM machines for political parties and are token inclusions in Parliament. I hope the National Party does not have this same expectation of its Asian MPs. It is certainly not the case in Labour, where the vision of inclusive and strong communities has inspired many, including myself, to enter into politics.

I would not use the phrase ATM machines for parties, but I would say that in my experience both National and Labour value MPs who are able to help the party fund-raise. This comes under the category I listed of helping your party. Different Mps do it in different ways (some do campaign strategy, some teach candidates how to campaign better etc). There is nothing wrong with being a good fund-raiser for your party.

Labour especially will, I suspect, value effective fund-raising. I understand that their head office fund-raising was so dismal this cycle, they they had to be rescued by Jim Anderton who stepped in as their corporate fund-raiser, hitting up businesses.

In my experience Asian MPs do do far better than most other MPs at fund-raising for their parties. This is party a reflection of the fact they have strong links to their communities, and in return their communities are keen to back them by attending fund-raising dinners and the like.

Many years ago I was a Deputy Regional Chair for National, and as part of that role attended the Wellington Asian Committee meetings. I recall at one event they were arranging a Yum Char fundraising lunch. I was atsonished as they went around the room asking the committee how many $40 tickets they think they can sell. Most of the committee members said they will sell 40 – 50 each. When it came to me, I blushed and said I think I could handle two tickets 🙂

The point Raymond was making I think, is that Asian MPs should not just be seen as MPs just there for their fund-raising ability. I agree. Pansy Wong was certainly well regarded for her fund-raising ability, but I (like many others) also highly regarded her for many other things.

So, going back to the beginning, I do place a high premium of MPs serving their community. I think it is a vital part of being an MP, and think it is great when MPs who have done a great job serving their communities retain their seats (such as in Auckland Central).

But my point is that just being a great local or community MP is not enough. One also needs to have profile in Parliament, if you want to enhance your chances of remaining an MP and/or becoming a Minister.

So I hope that has clarified my views. I’m always happy to acknowledge the work done by communities of MPs from any party. At the end of the day I actually regard around 90% of MPs as quite decent hard working people just wanting to make New Zealand better.

In bloggin this though I can’t resist a link to firstly the Dim-Post who finds that I have been mentioned on Red Alert almost as often as the Prime Minister and ten times more than Bill English.

Even funnier is Imperator Fish who blogged:

Labour Party MPs are said to be red-faced, after discovering that prominent blogger David Farrar is not the Prime Minister of New Zealand.

Mr Farrar has been the target of numerous attacks by Labour Party MPs over the last couple of years.

A source inside Labour has confirmed that party officials identified Farrar as the leader of the country shortly after the 2008 election, despite being given evidence to the contrary. Rumours that John Key was the actual leader of the National Party as well as the Prime Minister of New Zealand were dismissed at the time as mere speculation.

But this morning, in a shock announcement, Mr Key revealed that he is in fact the Prime Minister, and that David Farrar is merely an enthusiastic National Party member with a popular blog, a couple of newspaper columns, and only moderate political influence. …

Mr Mallard also vowed to keep piling the pressure onto Mr Farrar.

“He’s not fit to hold office. He’s certainly not fit to be in Cabinet,” said Mr Mallard.

“When Parliament reopens we’ll be piling the heat on David Farrar, and holding him to account. This Farrar-led government has been a disaster for New Zealand.”

I think disaster is too strong a word 🙂