A post from PaulL, an irregular contributor.

In recent years the USA appears to have been becoming more partisan and more polarised. Certainly this is the theme we hear from the media, and see online in social media. There is a consistent appearance of a hollowing out of the middle, and a view that the US is sorting into two parties along many more lines than just politics.

There are a set of people who live mostly in “fly over country”, they’re god fearing, they support capitalism, they like their guns, their dogs, their women are stay at home mothers, and they vote Republican. Then there are a set of liberals who live on the coasts, have never seen a gun, they like LGBTQI rights, socialism, they’re two income families, and they vote Democrat. The story is that where you used to live in a small town and mix every day with people of different opinions, nowadays there are these two homogenous groups who never really intermingle, and who accordingly “other” the opposition.

It’s a popular thesis, but I’m not sure it’s ever been true. I’m starting to see signs that the narrative is breaking down, and I welcome those signs.

A guest post by Common Ground Aotearoa:

Many New Zealanders are unhappy with their local government, but they don’t have to be. If local councils can get three things right, they’ll generally have a well-run city and happy residents. The three things: (1) keeping rates affordable, (2) providing quality services & infrastructure and (3) alleviating the cost of housing. These goals are often in tension with each other, and that’s reflected in local elections and around council tables. Rates could be kept low, but at a risk of underinvesting in critical infrastructure. Councils could seek to build public housing to reduce the burden of rent, but with the way rates are increasing at the moment, many won’t have the funds for it. Luckily we have a way forward, with a policy that will successfully enable all three goals. That policy is Land Value Rates.

Our names are Jesse Richardson and Aidan Homewood and we started Common Ground Aotearoa last year to advocate for changing the way rates are calculated in local government. Most councils in New Zealand charge rates based on the total value of your property (a.k.a Capital Value), we want to change the system so that rates are levied on your Land Value only. If you think this idea sounds counter-intuitive you’re not the first, but there are many good reasons to support it.

Firstly, you’ll more likely than not see a short-term decrease in your rates. We’ve analysed property data from cities and districts across New Zealand and a switch to Land Value Rates generally results in an average rates cut of 2%-9% compared to the status quo, with higher burden falling on vacant lots and the wealthiest landowners. To be clear, that’s a rates cut for average residents without any loss of council revenue.

Secondly, it’ll mean more housing supply where it’s needed. Under the current system, developers face an incentive against building houses because it means higher rates – if rates are instead based just on land value then they’ll pay the same no matter what they build, so they’re motivated to use the land fully rather than speculating on an empty lot. The higher the land value, the higher the rates, so prime real estate in the CBD gets developed, while properties in the outer suburbs and rural areas don’t face the same pressure & get lower rates to boot! 

We both support greater density in our cities, but if you live in a low density suburb and you don’t want to see huge changes in your neighbourhood, you should support Land Value Rates. Under our proposal, areas that are zoned for higher density will actually meet their housing capacity instead of sitting empty, so there’ll be less pressure on councils to zone more suburbs for high density. Imagine trying to fill a bathtub but your tap is broken. Zoning for more density is like trying to solve the problem by getting a bigger bathtub, what we’re suggesting is that you fix the tap.

Thirdly, examples of this policy show that it’ll lead to urban revitalization that will help councils afford crucial infrastructure without jacking up rates to unaffordable levels. Here’s a quote from a former US Senator: “When the people of Allentown voted for the land value tax in 1994, nearly 3 out of every 4 properties saw at least some sort of tax cut. Today, many of the properties that did pay more have new or better buildings on them, stabilizing the tax base to the point where we haven’t had a tax increase in five years.”

If you like the sound of a policy with a proven track record that will keep rates affordable while helping alleviate the cost of housing, we urge you to write to your local councilors and tell them to support Land Value Rates or get in touch to support our work: 

Email: [email protected]

Twitter: @cgaotearoa
Facebook: Common Ground Aotearoa

I write this Post as a current officiating rugby union referee (D2/D3 Men’s Club, 2^nd XV Men’s College, 1^st XV Women’s College and top High School games as well as some 7’s). I have also been a State level Youth Administrator of the game and I still help coach High School boys’ rugby.

For those not familiar with rugby, TMO is the Television Match Official used in major rugby games (premier domestic leagues in rugby playing nations, international competitions like Super Rugby, the 6 Nations and all test matches) to assist the on-field centre referee with various key decisions in the game via video replay. The problems with how the TMO is now used have been brewing for some time but came into sharp focus during the 2023 Rugby World Cup Final between New Zealand and South Africa on October 28th at the Stade du France in Paris. When a team wins by 1 point in a low scoring game that featured the All Blacks playing 2/3rds of the game with only 14 men, any controversial referee call is going to come under the spotlight. Let the record show that the ABs put forth an amazing effort playing so much of the game one player down. The record will also show that missed kicks and not taking points on offer cost us victory in a winnable game but rightly, many NZ fans have focused on the role the TMO played in the game. To have unofficial confirmation from sources inside World Rugby that the disallowing of Aaron’s Smith’s try due to a knock on four or five phases back was in breach World Rugby’s TMO guidelines explicitly limiting the review of retrospective actions in the run up to a potential try to only two plays, has merely added fuel to the already raging referee fire. As a personal aside, I do not blame Wayne Barnes for what happened. He made a few mistakes, and the Springboks got the rub of the green but he has been a stellar referee at the top of his career for many years (the 2007 NZ v France quarter final notwithstanding) and he acquitted himself well in the NZ v Ireland game. The most controversial calls were foisted on him by the modern TMO system.

The TMO problems

No one with any reasonable involvement with rugby believes the TMO should be scrapped. Video replays have become an integral part of almost all major sports and technology has greatly assisted referees and umpires across the sporting world. But the use of TMOs in top rugby games and indeed the whole TMO infrastructure has suffered from ‘mission creep’ and what began as a very useful aid to refereeing quality has become a multi headed hydra that is now overshadowing the game. The issues are:

Referee dependence

Refereeing rugby properly is not easy as any refs reading this will attest. Playing the game for years and avidly watching the game and even having a good understanding of the Laws do not prepare you for the complexity of being a centre ref. Like golf, getting good at refereeing rugby only comes from lots of refereeing rugby. All unions across the world have an extensive network of senior or retired refs who give back to the game as Referee Coaches mentoring young and up and coming refs. It takes a few years before a ref can competently referee at even a senior club and high school level and rugby playing nations have a careful grading system of referee skill and quality to aid in the assignment of games. Many parts of the rugby playing world suffer from a shortage of quality experienced refs due to attrition and lack of up-take due to on-field abuse of refs. This is sadly a problem with all major sports.

Once you get good enough to be on a senior National panel refereeing the kind of games that are televised and a TMO is assigned, you have earned your stripes making thousands of close and tough calls. There are a number of games just below the professional level where only experienced referees are assigned as Assistant Referees (as opposed to an untrained Touch Judge) and in many senior games, the centre ref and the ARs are miked up and can communicate with each other. In only about 10% of the games I referee am I miked up and in maybe 30% of the games I have the benefit of an experienced AR such is the dearth of refereeing talent in most US states. Having experienced ARs and being miked up makes it possible to properly and fairly adjudicate almost all tricky situations (foul play to the head, groundings of the ball in the in-goal, forward passes and off the ball foul play). For the calls you miss or get wrong, there is a widespread unwritten understanding that all good refs make some mistakes and mostly that players, coaches and fans take the inevitable mistakes as part of the game. I know if I’ve made a mistake, I find it best to admit to it to the captain and coach and that diffuses most tension unless the mistake influences the outcome of the game (which is rare). Refs also find subtle ways to even any imbalance arising from a poor call because so many calls, particularly in and around rucks and mauls (and to a lesser extent scrums and lineouts), can be arbitrary and could be called either way. The truth is that the Laws of the Game are so many and complicated that at almost every breakdown and set piece, if you were applying every single Law all the time, there could be some infringement you could blow up. Refereeing rugby is more art than science and, over time, you learn to adjudicate the more serious and obvious infringements and concentrate on allowing the game to flow. It’s a difficult and delicate balancing act that takes years to perfect.

New National panel refs bring this experience to the highest level games they must now officiate and suddenly they have the luxury of video replay. At first they call on the TMO in only the most gnarly, tricky and consequential calls but, over time, conscious of many more loud fans in stadiums, the pressure from top level players on the field, coach criticism and something novel to a new national panel ref, media scrutiny. Thus the price of a bad call in a Premier division, ITM Cup or Super Rugby game is much higher than a D1 Men’s Club match or a Secondary Schools final. Over time, senior international level refs gradually have become acculturated to the use of the TMO and they begin to lose some of the instant decision making instincts that served them well at lower levels of the game. Whereas before the team of three refs rated themselves to handle all decisions, because the ARs adjudicating at this level are drawn from the same pool of senior referees, they too become decision averse and will allow the centre ref to defer to the TMO. So, what began as a back up reference tool for an on-field ref, it has morphed into the main go-to tool for almost all tricky decisions. The problems with the TMO are not just World Rugby policy (that I will get to later) but a more deeply ingrained problem of excessive reliance that has become deeply embedded in the culture of rugby’s top referees.

Mission Creep

The next problem (that is more easily fixed IMO) is the gradual expansion of the use of the TMO and also the rising power granted to TMOs. This latter issue is the most problematic. In the early years, the TMO was limited to decisions around a possible Try (the “Try – No Try” call). A referee could go back maybe to one phase of play to see if say the pass to the try scorer was forward. As time went on, World Rugby opened up the use of TMOs to more disputed incidents most particularly for high/dangerous tackles. Here again mission creep evolved in two phases: 1 – the use of the TMO for high tackles morphed from being a back up to the centre ref and ARs double checking to see if an incident warranted just a penalty or a card to the TMO proactively advising the centre ref AFTER the centre ref had made a call. This greatly changed the way a centre ref viewed borderline tackles and the spectacle of lengthy and repeated replays stopping games sometimes multiple times for many minutes. 2 – to counter the criticism of the lengthy delays of multiple TMO replays disrupting the flow of games, World Rugby used a bunker system at the 2023 World Cup. This added an additional layer of off-field intrusion in that a panel of 4 or 5 TMOs were holed up in an offsite location and became responsible for reviewing any referred dangerous tackle where a yellow card was awarded, and the centre ref did not have the time to do on-field multiple replays to judge the severity of the card. When a carded player was referred to the bunker, this group had all the time in the world to replay an incident endlessly to gauge severity and increasingly, yellow cards were upgraded to a red card. Red cards are a serious matter. Outside of very lopsided games, very few teams who lose a player for the rest of a game, depending on how far into the game the red card award occurs, go on to win. As a referee you never award a red card lightly and indeed, I have only awarded at the most one per season versus probably averaging 15+ yellows per season depending on how many games I get assigned. The increasing number of red cards comes as a consequence of World Rugby’s more stringent guidelines around high tackles as an attempt to improve player safety. Whilst it has likely had some impact as players and coaches are much more conscious of high tackles, the impact of more red cards has disrupted games more profoundly.

These various phases of mission creep of the TMO are strangling the game and the end result was the awful spectacle we witnessed in the RWC final. Almost all my South African mates and fellow refs and coaches have not been too triumphant about their victory and some privately admit that the circumstances of the game and the refereeing controversies left an unfortunate taint on the victory. Whilst there can be some pretty shocking refereeing amongst the lowest grades and youngest age divisions as those games are the training and proving grounds for newer less experienced refs, most who participate in senior level games accept refereeing mistakes as part of the game. The TMO has morphed into a capricious and arbitrary intervention that lacks consistency. TMOs are diving so deep and far back into the game in the pursuit of absolute adjudicatory perfection that it is stymying the spontaneity and flow of top-level rugby and undermining the authority of the centre referee.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Something needs to be done and done quickly. The NZ v SA final was the ugly culmination of a gnawing creeping trend. More people are beginning to realise that men’s/boy’s rugby is a game in decline. Yes, there are the odd new markets where it is growing (the US used to be a strongly growing market, but that growth has stalled and is now patchy) with the only consistent strong growth coming from women’s/girl’s rugby. There are many reasons for this decline that might keep for another Post but the problems with refereeing at the highest level merely adds to the woes. Here are some recommendations as to Law changes that begin with reforming the TMO

Use the TMO like other sports

In looking at the use of video replay technology in the world’s major sport such tennis, football (soccer), American football, cricket, tennis, basketball and rugby league, a common theme is usage is mostly restricted to using the video replay function as a backup to the main referee/umpire and is augmented by the ability (usually restricted) of teams to challenge an on-field decision. The rugby TMO should be:

• Mostly a backup to a centre referee’s on-field decision with NO TMO ability to intervene and advise the centre ref either off their own bat or retrospectively on any incident. This forces referees to work as they used, with the ARs to decide on almost all issues.
• In the “Try – No Try” decision, being able to review no more than one or two phases before the try.
• Scrap the bunker and limit the centre ref to no more than 3 TMO repays of a single incident of dangerous play. Almost all yellow and red card worthy events are relatively clear cut.

Other desperately needed Law changes

These are my suggestions and there is some overlap with an article doing the rounds published in the Daily Telegraph by UK rugby writer Charles Richardson:

1. Stricter enforcement of the 5 second warning at the base of the scrum or ruck. Half backs routinely delay the process of passing the ball out. It should be a free kick for first offense and penalty for each thereafter akin to how you police early shoves in the scrum.
2. Limit mauls to one stoppage where the team in possession has to get the ball out after one time the maul ceases forward momentum. Mauls have become too one sided in favour of the attacking team where only the most experienced and disciplined teams can avoid a defensive penalty for a maul infringement.
3. Likewise, scrums are being used to milk penalties with increasingly more frequent tactics of the team with the put-in trying to force a usually minor defensive error that results in a penalty. Make all scrum infringements (except dangerous or cynical play) a free kick.
4. Intercepted passes. Current World Rugby guidelines are a nightmare for referees to enforce with great inconsistency with some refs yellow carding the most innocent of attempts. Yellow cards should be reserved for only the most blatant and cynical swat downs with most attempts either a penalty or “play on”.
5. Scrap the Mark. It’s an archaic and time-wasting tactic.
6. Red cards for 20 minutes as was trialled in Super Rugby this season and reserve a black card (off for the remainder of the game and automatic one game suspension) for what red card offences used to be for, the most blatant, vicious and dangerous of hits like deliberately shoulder charging a player, high speed malicious tackles straight to the head, stomping on the head and punches to a player or ref.
7. Keep goal line drop outs only for held up in goal. The current Law is confusing and leads to poor kicking incentives around the ball being kicked into the in-goal area.

I’m not overly hopeful that there will be much change. World Rugby are notoriously arrogant and inured to criticism. The financial success of the 2023 RWC (essentially full stadiums for all games) will be the thing that matters most to them and they will all be patting themselves on the back. The appalling draw that pitted the top four nations on one side of the Pools resulting in brutal quarter finals from Pools A and B and easier quarterfinals from Pools C and D, even there the reasons given were weak and inadequate. If FIFA can wait until the result of regional games across the world before announcing the Football World Cup draws then World Rugby can announce a draw after rankings reflect things like that year’s 6 Nations and the Rugby Championship results as those two competitions cover the top 10 rugby playing nations except Italy.

There is a malaise in boy’s/men’s grassroots rugby that is masked by the big tournaments and competitions at the international and national level. Crowd numbers are dwindling and, outside the glamour schools in rugby heartland countries that self-select top rugby talent, lower tier boys competitions and team numbers are shrinking rapidly. There are various factors at play but the confusing Laws and the inconsistent administration of the Laws are part of the mix and are a relatively cheap and pain free fix. Here’s hoping.

The Herald reports:

The implementation of a controversial new science curriculum that caused outrage for its lack of any mention of physics, chemistry or biology has come to a halt – both delighting and frustrating educators.

Consultation on the draft new science curriculum, which caused uproar when an early version was leaked, has been put on hold for a second time, with the Ministry of Education waiting to “engage” with the new Government before it is sent out.

The National Party waded into the education debate during the election campaign, promising to “rewrite” the New Zealand school curriculum, meaning the controversial proposal may never see the light of day.

The first move of the new Minister of Education should be to shred all remaining copies of the draft science curriculum, and start work from scratch. No one involved with the draft should be involved with work on the new one. Hopefully that way we get a science curriculum that mentions physics, chemistry and biology!

Nate Silver writes:

So my view as of six weeks ago was that it was probably just too late to replace Biden. But as Biden’s polling gets worse — his approval ratings are near their lowest-ever number — I’ve been increasingly hedging on that. Democrats would be taking a huge risk by replacing Biden — but they’re also taking a huge risk by nominating him. There’s no getting out of this.

Silver goes on to quote an article that says Biden won’t be able to do a normal campaign in 2024 due to a lack of capacity. Silver comments:

But if this is a consensus view — a widely-acknowledged truth that other people are too afraid to say, including people in the White House — then that’s enough to pull me off the fence. It would be extremely foolish to nominate an 80-year-old man who is not up to the rigors of a modern presidential campaign — even more foolish than replacing him, which just to be clear is also an extremely foolish thing to do.

I tend to agree with Silver. A second Trump term would be a disaster for democracy, so if the best way to stop that is Biden not standing again, that is what he should do.

The Herald reports:

A man jailed for swinging his penis around in a supermarket, then masturbated on and violently attacked a woman, has not been deemed high risk enough to be put on an extended supervision order, despite exposing himself to staff while in prison at least 44 times.

He exposed himself in a supermarket, attacked and masturbated on a woman and has exposed himself 44+ times in prison and somehow he is not. deemed high risk!

While he served his time in prison between 2017 and 2021, the Department of Corrections recorded Reuben indecently exposing himself to “prison staff, nursing staff, and other health professionals at the prison 44 times.

“Corrections thought that was likely an underestimation.

“Mr Reuben explained to the District Court that it was true, it was always to female staff and ‘the main reason was boredom, but also sexual arousal or low mood, and interest in how the targeted staff member would respond’.

“He said he was sometimes laughed at, sometimes ignored, and on 16 occasions given a misconduct,” the Court of Appeal wrote.

Why is this man out? They should have charged him for the prison indecent exposures.

I have little doubt he will be back before the courts soon, after some more victims.

Ashley Church has done an excellent explainer about Israel and Hamas. It is very long and detailed (with references) and I recommend you share it with anyone genuinely interested in what is happening there.

Former health official Michael Hundleby writes:

Te Whatu Ora just released a report describing its first year of performance.

The dryly named “Clinical Performance Metrics” report describes our 11 key health system performance measures for the year ended June 30, 2023. Unfortunately, it’s very technical language means it is hard for the public to understand what it is saying.

It is worth analysing the report as it reveals the overall health system performance is very poor and is getting worse. It records what is probably the most staggering decline in health system performance ever.

The decline is staggering. It is no surprise this report came out after the election.

The report is also deliberately unhelpful. It gives results for each former DHB area but fails to give an overall result for New Zealand, which is a key piece of information.

As time allows I will go through the report and do population weighted calculations for NZ, and blog them here so people can see the extent of the failure.

It is therefore little wonder emergency department (ED) presentations are up 5%, and in June 2023 over 28.8% of people waited in EDs for over 6 hours – up in one year from 24.1% who stayed over six hours.

When Labour came to power in 2017 only 7% of people were in EDs for more than six hours.

So the proportion waiting more than six hours has quadrupled.

With mental health a key Labour priority, how has that gone? Under 25-year-olds should be seen by a mental health specialist within three weeks of referral. In the year to July 1, 2023, 31.7% were not seen within three weeks. A year ago, 27.6% were not seen within three weeks.

Their big campaign promise in 2017 and Budget in 2019 was about mental health. Another failure.

1 News reports:

The seat, held by former Labour prime ministers Michael Joseph Savage, Helen Clark and Jacinda Ardern, held a margin of more than 21,000 in 2020 and more than 15,000 in 2017.

On preliminary results, Labour’s Helen White retained the seat for Labour with a 106 vote margin. After special votes were counted, that shrunk to just 20 votes.

A judicial recount was called by closest rival, National’s Melissa Lee, and the margin between the two is now just 18 votes.

From a majority of 21,000 to a majority of 18!

And two schools for Maori that are well ahead of the curve on all things education.

Alwyn Poole
Innovative Education Consultants
www.innovativeeducation.co.nz
www.alwynpoole.substack.com
www.linkedin.com/in/alwyn-poole-16b02151/

The Herald reports:

A compromise was reached within the Labour Party to quell dissent about the leadership of Chris Hipkins and allay concerns the party had abandoned its base.

Labour’s constitution forces each leader to be endorsed by 60 per cent of their caucus within three months of a general election. That vote was held last week, with Hipkins winning.

Almost immediately after the vote, Hipkins confirmed that wealth and capital gains taxes were back “on the table” for the next election, after Hipkins ruled both out earlier this year.

This raised some eyebrows, given Hipkins had been clear earlier this year that those taxes had been ruled out under any government he were to lead, whether it be this year, next year, or after the next election.

So Hipkins said there would be no asset or capital gains tax under any government he led ever, and he ha snow reneged on this in order to keep his job as Labour Leader.

If only Labour could focus on getting good quality results for the tax money they do spend, rather than always trying to find new ways to tax people more.

The Herald reports:

Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown says the city’s motorists could soon be charged $5 per trip on some of its busiest highways.

Speaking to Newstalk ZB’s Heather du Plessis-Allan this afternoon, Brown said he is looking at placing the congestion charges on SH1 between the Penrose and Greenlane on-ramps, and SH16 between the Lincoln Rd and Te Atatu on-ramps.

“Between 7am and 9am, those two motorways jam up and between 4.30pm and 6.30pm, they jam up again,” Brown said.

He claimed travelling at peak times was “easily avoidable”.

I’m not sure it is easily avoidable but I do think congestion charging is a better form of user pays for roads than merely petrol tax. It is the peak time congestion that requires additional roads and lanes, so motorists should pay more for using a road at peak times.

So Labour said their health reforms would increase accountability, and the reality is that it is now much much harder to find out how local hospitals are performing. We’re in mid November and we still don’t have ED waiting time data for either the second or third quarter of 2023.

So you can’t even book a room on campus to discuss a murder, because someone says it might offend someone. This is so depressing.

The new Government should give legislative teeth to the requirements for academic freedom and free speech on campus, and tie funding to it.

Newshub reports:

Newshub can reveal there are new allegations of bullying behaviour against sitting Labour MP Ginny Andersen from a young person.  

In an exclusive interview on Monday, he accused Andersen of being manipulating, nasty and making comments to body-shame people she worked with. Labour is refuting the allegations.  

So this is the third allegation in just one week of bullying behaviour – two from young activists and one from a former staffer.

Not a great look for someone touted as a future Deputy Leader for Labour.

The Post reports that Wellingtonians may be facing annual rates increases of 20%.

This is due to the choices Council has made. They are proceeding with a town hall renovation of $330 million, $40 million corporate welfare for a multinational cinema chain and trying to spend $100 million to get rid of cars from Lambton Quay.

A household paying $3,000 in rates two years ago will face a $5,000 rates bill next year. This is staggering. This hits house owners and renters as it pushes up rental prices.

The only way to stop this will be to elect more fiscally responsible councillors.

The Herald reports:

A young child was allegedly hit on the head by a shovel-wielding man while leaving a pro-Palestine rally in Auckland’s Aotea Square yesterday afternoon.

Hundreds of people gathered in the square around 2pm on Sunday, calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.

A member of New Zealand’s Palestinian community who was at the rally, Rand Hazou, said witnesses described the attacker waiting off to the side on Greys Ave between the Town Hall and the square.

“At the close of the rally around 5pm, we got a report he had attacked a young child.

Superintendent Sunny Patel, the acting Auckland District Commander, said police had arrested a man after a child was seriously hurt as he was leaving a protest.

The assault occurred behind the Auckland Town Hall as crowds dispersed, Patel said last night. The victim was in a serious condition in Starship Hospital. The boy was described by witnesses as being about 5 or 6 years old.

“Prior to this attack, the man arrested had been receiving support of the mental health services. Police are still working to establish the events that occurred in the lead up to this incident and we are speaking with a number of witnesses.”

It is unclear the motivation of the attacker but regardless of motivation, the attacker should face serious criminal consequences for their actions. To attack a child with a shovel is disgusting.

The Term 2 attendance data finally came out, and as Alwyn Poole pointed out, it is a shocker.

The number of students who are attending less than 70% of the time is at almost 100,000 – 97,016. This compares to 37,904 in Term 2 of 2017. That’s an additional 60,000 kids basically not attending school. Under 70% attendance means they were absent for at least three weeks of the term.

The number of Māori students attending less than 70% has gone from 16,393 to 41,091. How the hell can you close the gaps between Māori and non-Māori when that is happening.

Less than one in three Māori and Pacific students are attending school at least 90% of the time. What a terrible legacy left for the incoming Government to inherit.