Deborah Coddington writes in the HoS:

It’s official: we’re a nation of idiots who can’t make decisions to save ourselves or take responsibility for our problems.

That’s according to two academics from Otago University, researchers in public health, Dr Gabrielle Jenkin and Penny Field, who specialise in the obesity epidemic.

Interviewed this week by Kathryn Ryan on National Radio, Field tossed off a comment which sent me into deep despair. Obesity, she said, was “not a problem with individual choice and self-discipline, which we’ve proved successfully doesn’t work”.

Instead it’s the fault of “big institutions and the market”.

Actually the problem is lack of market forces. Make overweight people pay more to fly, and pay more for healthcare and you’ll see more people lose weight.

This attitude from academics is patronising and silly. Yes, there are some grossly obese people for whom stomach-stapling is the only resort, so impossible is it for them to lose weight, but they’re a small minority.

For the rest of us, choice and self-discipline most definitely does work. Eat less food, whatever that may be, and exercise more. If we jettison that weapon in the weight-control battle, what next? Budgeting? Fighting fraud? Why bother prosecuting directors of finance companies who fail to protect the savings of investors by exercising self-discipline and choice, but excuse themselves by saying they were victims of the global financial crisis?

Jenkin’s final words were that the food industry needs to be held accountable for obesity. No. Individuals need to be held accountable and stop blaming food and its makers for their problem.

Hear hear.

Michael Daly at Stuff reports:

Recovery of the bodies of the men killed in the Pike River Coal mine disaster is not expected to be completed for at least 3 1/2 years, a new independent report says.

The estimates in the draft independent review by engineer Bruce McLean depend on a successful sale of the mine.

Even with a sale, the report does not expect recovery of the bodies until some time between July 2015 and June 2017.

That timetable depends on the completion of a new shaft or tunnel to establish a ventilation circuit by June 2014.

This report or review was commissioned by the families of the dead miners. While the conclusions are probably not the ones they hoped for, it is good they agree with the advice from the receivers and the Government that one can’t just rush in them in a matter of weeks or months.

The fact the Government won’t consent to a transfer of the license unless the new owner agrees to do best efforts to recover the bodies means that eventually they will recover the bodies or remains, I believe. It will be important closure for the families.

Whale has the photo of what happens if I back out too quickly of an unfamiliar driveway. I needed to get to a NZ Post store quickly to do a Western Union transfer and backed out the drive. I backed in a nice straight line, but the problem was the driveway wasn’t straight 🙂

The SMH reports:

An Australian Prime Ministerial staffer has been linked to yesterday’s ugly protest incident in Canberra, forcing his resignation and acutely embarrassing PM Julia Gillard.

In an early evening statement, the Prime Minister dismissed as ‘false’ claims that one of her staff had spoken to people at the Aboriginal Tent Embassy prior to yesterday’s angry protest that temporarily trapped her and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott.

But Ms Gillard acknowledges that a member of her media unit ‘did call another individual yesterday and disclose the presence of the Opposition Leader at the Lobby restaurant. This information was subsequently passed on to a member of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy.’ …

He is Tony Hodges, one of four press secretaries working in Julia Gillard’s media unit.

The link is deeply embarrassing for the Prime Minister and leaves her shouldering some of the blame for an incident where many had pinned responsibility on Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott.

This is typical Australian Labor tactics.  The press secretary would have leaked the info, hoping it would lead to anti-Abbott protests.

Instead it led to his own boss having to be dragged out by Police. And now they can’t blame anyone else for it.

Bronwyn Torrie at Stuff reports:

Wellington’s most loathed car will be reined in and reviewed after public outrage.

Wellington Mayor Celia Wade-Brown has ordered a review of the Parkwise spy car after growing pressure for it to be scrapped. It follows a flurry of complaints about unreasonable parking fines and overzealous operators.

The car will be limited to monitoring school zones – its original purpose – while the review is done.

Hopefully it will stay focused on school zones rather than revenue maximisation.

In my Herald column I argue Auckland needs to get bigger:

I’m not sure if Aucklanders are aware how much is at stake with this Auckland plan. Do they want a city where almost half the dwellings are apartments?

The other impact of this proposed intensification will be on house prices. Currently there are 400,000 houses and 100,000 apartments for 1.5 million Aucklanders. By 2040 there would be 2.5 million Aucklanders competing for only 500,000 houses. I can’t think of anything more guaranteed to push house prices up massively so only the rich can afford one.

House prices are deemed to start to become moderately unaffordable when the median house price is three times the median income, seriously unaffordable at four times and severely unaffordable at five times.

In Auckland the median house price is currently 6.4 times the median income.

Under the draft Auckland plan, Auckland could by 2040 end up like Hong Kong – where house prices are more than ten times the median household income. Again, this will restrict ownership to the wealthy, but also lead to rents significantly increasing as a proportion of income. Already a growing number of families are paying more than 30% of their income in rent. Under the intensification plan, some families could end up having to spend over half their income on rent.

I conclude:

Auckland needs to grow outwards as well as upwards. A plan to have 75% of new dwellings occur within the current urban limit is too draconian. A 50/50 split would be a far better balance for Auckland’s future. The Government and the Productivity Commission have both asked the Council to alter their plan, to allow the city to grow outwards as well as upwards. I hope they listen.

If they don’t, I pity those under 20, who will have to live with the consequences.

Ports of Auckland have put out a PR around their plans to expand their current space:

In the context of the Auckland Plan process, the Port’s key interest is in protecting the current port zone, which has been through two public submissions processes and has been in place and public since 1987.

The zone effectively allows the option for port expansion in the future, but any actual proposals for expansion of Port operations would then be subject to widespread public consultation and Resource Consent processes.   

While I’m on POAL’s side when it comes to having an economically sane labour market, I’m very much against any expansion on their current site.

POAL say that their zone has been in place since 1987. That is in fact the problem. They were zoned for that area when the waterfront in Auckland was massively different to what it is today.

The same applies in Wellington. In 1987 the waterfront was a collection of sheds.

Waterfront space has become the most valuable space in urban cities. It is where people want to dine, drink, walk and shop.

In Wellington I am an advocate of shifting the port entirely from its current location over to Petone/Seaview. That will provide more jobs in Seaview, and open up the current port space to immense possibilities. Yes, it will cost money to shift – but a shift should be inevitable – when not if. The current port is an eyesore.

The same applies in Auckland. Ports of Auckland should not be relying on a 25 year old zone. They should be looking for a new site away from the centre of the city, as their long-term home. Sure you have issues such as rail and road links, but they can all be planned for also.

If you want to have your say and hopefully oppose Port expansion on its current site, go to Your Port Your Call’s page on Facebook or Twitter.

The small circle represents the size of the Crafar farms at 8,000 hectares. The large circle represents the amount of land sold to foreign owners under the last Labour Government at 650,000 hectares.

Under Labour, the equivalent of the Crafar farms were sold each and every month they were in office.

The table below lists in order what percentage of people who gave the Greens their party vote, gave their electorate vote to the Labour candidate.

This sort of split voting is somewhat different to Labour and Green voters voting for a National candidate or vice-versa. This is more left-wing voters splitting their vote between two parties of the left. It is more a measure of how tactical Green voters were.

There were 15 seats where over 60% of Green voters voted for the Labour candidate. This included the marginal and potentially marginal seats of Palmerston North, West Coast-Tasman, Rimutaka, Waimakariri, Acukaldn Central, Hamilton West, Wellington Central and New Plymouth.

In 28 seats over 50% of Green voters voted for the Labour candidate.

At the other end of the table, in 11 seats the Labour candidate got less than 25% of Green voters electorate votes.

Nicola Brennan-Tupara reports at Stuff:

A “tongue-in-cheek” advertising stunt telling people they were being evicted from their homes has backfired, forcing a public apology from the company responsible.

The orange flyer, left, has “Home Eviction Notice” written on the front, but inside explains the benefits of Generation Homes’ home and land packages.

It was sent to 15,000 Hamilton properties last week and while it generated some interest from potential buyers, it also upset a few. Generation Homes’ Hamilton director, Alana Savage, yesterday apologised for any offence caused after receiving a barrage of complaints from Hamilton residents.

“They were really quite upset by it.

“We’ve had people leaving messages on our phone really swearing.

“People are very, very upset,” she said.

It’s not all bad for Generation Homes though. They are probably now short-listed to run Labour’s 2014 campaign 🙂

Yes the awful secret was that John Key said he doesn’t like nasty politics, and thinks it doesn’t work for Labour.

Holly Walker blogs at Frog Blog:

The release of these studies comes while Social Development Minister Paula Bennett is in the middle of an intensive road trip consulting on her Green Paper for Vulnerable Children. She was in my town, Lower Hutt, last night, and in Whangarei earlier this week while I was there. From local reports, it sounds like the consultation process has been somewhat fraught, with locals in Whangarei frustrated that the Minister wasn’t open to hearing from people directly, insisting instead that they “put it in a submission“. Nevertheless I applaud the proactive way that the Government has approached the task of consulting on the Green Paper – they’ve really gone all out with meetings, websites, social media, and NGO engagement. Submissions close on 28 February and I do encourage you to make one.

It’s good that Holly is encouraging submissions, and encouraging participation in the process.

I’ve heard from those who were at the Lower Hutt meeting last night that the cost of living and inequality were are major theme of responses from the audience, but that the Minister’s focus was very much on reporting and information-sharing. …

Until we address child poverty and inequality, we can’t hope to make serious inroads on the child abuse issue.

I don’t accept that child abuse is just about child poverty and inequality. There are Asian countries with much greater poverty and inequality that have almost no child abuse.

While I commend Holly for her post, and promoting the green paper consultation, could I suggest MPs “eat their own dogfood” so to speak. Rather than rely on third hand reports of what was said at a local meeting, I would hope local MPs would go along and attend.

I understand there were 150 people at the meeting in Lower Hutt, including six National MPs. Labour and other parties have been calling for a bi-partisan approach to child abuse. So I would have though local MPs would go along to hear what their communities are saying. But none on non-National MP attended – despite all being invited.

I think it would be of more importance than a Frocks on Bike bike maintenance workshop. Frocks on Bikes is a commendable initiative, but I do think it is a pity none of the local MPs actually attended the meeting, and heard first hand what people were saying. I recall Metiria Turei attending the launch of the green paper, which was commendable.

I don’t think you can declare an issue will be bi-partisan or non-partisan as different parties have genuinely different beliefs on how to reduce child abuse. National will believe their welfare reforms will help reduce child abuse, while the Greens will disagree (for example). But despite those differences in beliefs, there is no reasons people can’t take part in the process, and have their views heard. I do not believe the Government in any way has pre-determined outcomes on this review. There are no easy solutions, so whatever decisions do eventually get made will inevitably upset some segments of the community.

UPDATE: Holly has commented below, explaining she was running the session she attended and had agreed to do so back in November. But she did send her EA to take notes.

Came across this reptile from his comments on the You Tube tape. It is hard to believe, but people like this really exist. His comments on You Tube include:

charlie sheen is a jew, always has been, always will be.the only good jews a dead jew.

Actually Carlos Estevez is Catholic.

i fully agree, fuck the jews, especially that black jew they call the worlds president. THEYRE ALL LIARS…. fucking scum…

Well that is a new twist – he’s not only from Kenya, but he’s Jewish also.

GO WINSTON!!! NZ’S ONLY HONEST POLITICIAN!!!!!

So hates Obama, and loves Winston.

wow talk about a faggot cocksucking poofter yaself, maybe you should get off john keys cock you jew faggot

Not a fan of the Prime Minister it seems.

The reason I am shedding some light on this reptile, is because sunlight is the best disinfectant. Also though, I’d welcome anyone who can work out his identity, based on his Internet footprint.

At Stuff I blog on Winston’s dilemma:

The sale of the Crafar farms must pose an awful dilemma for Winston Peters.

The leading bid for the 8000 hectares of farmland is $210 million from Shanghai Pengxin, a Chinese company.

Winston has spent most of the last 20 years railing against the Chinese. He has railed against Chinese immigration to New Zealand, he has railed against Chinese investment in New Zealand and despite being the foreign minister, railed against the 2008 free trade agreement with China (despite its having increased our exports to China by $3 billion and reducing our current account and trade deficits). …

But look at who else is lined up to buy them. Sir Michael Fay leads a group which is offering $170 million for the farms – $40 million less than Pengxin. If Pengxin is turned down, then Fay will pick the farms up for $40 million less than the market price.

Now if there is one person that Winston Peters hates and rails against even more than the Chinese, it is surely Fay. Peters alleged all sorts of wrongdoings by Fay and Richwhite in the late 80s and early 90s, and this led to the Winebox inquiry.

It gives me a certain pleasure to reflect that whatever the outcome, Winston will be unhappy 🙂

John Key has said in a speech:

the Government’s four key priorities for the term are to:

• responsibly manage the Government’s finances
• build a more competitive and productive economy
• deliver better public services
• rebuild Christchurch.

The rebuilding of Christchurch may prove to be the most challenging. The continual after-shocks are making it very hard.

Mr Key said that the Government’s focus on responsibly managing its finances includes a commitment to return to surplus in 2014/15 – which National campaigned on at the election.  The Budget Policy Statement, which will be released on February 16, will update the track toward that surplus.

“Today I can confirm that we are still on track to post a surplus in 2014/15, and the upcoming Budget Policy Statement will show a forecast surplus in the range of $300 to $500 million in that year,” Mr Key said.

That is getting tight. It will be extremely challenging.

A copy of the teapot tape has been placed online, and the link e-mailed to a huge number of people from an anon e-mail address.

There are a very small number of people who have that file. Bradley Ambrose and the senior staff of the Herald on Sunday and TV3. Will any of them be brave enough to admit they did it? I will say I don’t think it is anyone from the Herald on Sunday. To be fair to them, they didn’t publish the tape originally, and it was TV3 that turned it into a daily circus.

I said before the election it was inevitable it would come out at some stage.

The recording is on You Tube (uploaded by 2Johns2Cups), plus two other locations. I’m not providing a direct link due to the questionable legality, but I do not believe saying where it has been published (as I have done) makes me a publisher, anymore than when newspapers reported Whale Oil had broken a suppression order (which sent everyone off to his site).

The irony is that the recording is quite benign, as the PM has said. The media beat this up into a nonsense, that just lowered their standing with most New Zealanders.

Hopefully this release will mean that we can all move on now, except of course we await the Police decision on the legality of making the recording.

Please do not post a direct link in the comments.

Jordan Carter blogs:

I am not yet sure of it, but I think it is possible by the end of this year, the New Zealand Labour Party will have an institutional role for members in choosing the leadership of the Party.  We will, if that is so, be joining our fraternal parties around the world, and will be giving people a big new reason to join the party and be involved.

I’m a fan of giving the members a vote, as the UK Conservatives did in choosing David Cameron.

The process we choose will be important.  My view is that in a country as small as this, we should do our best to keep it deliberative.  We could, as Patrick suggests, have an electoral college model between the Caucus, Members and Affiliates, and that would work for me to a degree with postal ballots for the latter two, and in person ballots for the Caucus.

I’m more a one person one vote person. Jordan’s model (which is used in UK Labour) would see union bosses controlling say a third of the votes.

Why not just have a postal ballot of all members of the party, a member being someone who has filled in a membership form and paid a sub.

But good to see Labour looking at involving their members more.

Stuff reports:

Auckland media celebrities Mike Hosking and Kate Hawkesby are reportedly preparing to tie the knot.

Hosking, NewstalkZB’s breakfast host, and Hawkesby, a former TVNZ Breakfast host and Newstalk ZB newsreader, are reportedly getting married at her father John’s Waiheke Island property in the coming days.

I’m glad they are finally getting married.

When they were on One’s Breakfast together, they always looked liked they desperately wanted to jump each other.

The table below lists in order what percentage of people who gave the Greens their party vote, gave their electorate vote to the National candidate.

It is worth noting that not all electorates are equal. Where a seat had a Green MP as a candidate, few Green voters voted for the National candidate. Also in seats where Labour were trying to win the seat, many Greens voted tactically for the Labour candidate.

Epsom at the top is again no surprise, and represents tactical voting. It is interesting that more Green voters tactically voted than Labour voters. In hindsight standing Parker in Epsom was a mistake.

In seven other seats, the National candidate got more than 25% of Green voters.

The seat where the National candidate did best with Green voters, but did not win the seat was (excepting Epsom) Manurewa with 15.4%.

The seat where the National candidate got elected but got the fewest Green votes was Coromandel with 7.8%. Green MP Catherine Delahunty stood there.

The overall bottom seat for Greens voting for the National candidate was Rongotai where Russel Norman stood.

Headline in The Press:

Plea for Canty fracking moratorium

But how will they repopulate Christchurch with a fracking moratorium?