Labour’s desperation has shown with their policy announcement they will destroy the integrity of the tax system by exempting fruit and vegetables from GST, which will at best (if supermarkets even pass it on) save a low income household $5 a week.

I had a column in The Post last week which detailed all the various ways this was such a bad idea.

The Free Speech Union has organised a series of debates on topical issues. Far better to debate different ideas than try to censor them. The debates are:

Debate 1: “be it resolved; Governments should lead the fight to reach Net Zero.”
Location/Venue: Dunedin, Otago University – St David’s Lecture Theatre
Date: Wednesday, 16 August – 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Speakers: James Cockle & Rosemary Penwarden vs Simon Court MP & Damien Grant
Moderator: Jonathan Ayling

Debate 2: “be it resolved; our tax system is unfair and the wealthy must pay more”.
Location/Venue: Wellington, Victoria University, RHLT1
Date: Monday 4th September – 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Speakers: Jordan Williams & Hon. Ruth Richardson vs Dr Bryce Edwards & Max Rashbrooke
Moderator: Sean Plunkett

Debate 3: “be it resolved; ‘one person, one vote’ silences indigenous voices and must go”.
Location/Venue: Hamilton, Wintec, The Atrium
Date: Wednesday, 13 September – 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Speakers: Cassey Costello & Shane Jones vs Buddy Mikaere and TBC
Moderator: Ward Kamo

Debate 4: “be it resolved; #nodebate: some discussions will only cause harm”.
Location/Venue: Auckland, Pullman Hotel
Date: Tuesday 26th September – 7 pm – 8:30 pm
Speakers: Simon Wilson & Damian Sycamore vs Simon O’Connor MP & Prof. Holly Lawford-Smith
Moderator: Josie Pagani

Mark them in your diary now. FSU will release details on how to register.

The Taxpayers Union and a Technical Advisory Group have been working on drafting instructions for a bill to replace the Three Waters legislation. A great example of being proactive, not just oppositional.

They have a Q+A on the work.

The Local Water Infrastructure Bill will instead restore the local authority ownership of water service infrastructure. But it does not leave the status quo. Costs and responsibility are to be clarified by transferring water service assets and operations into Council Controlled Organisations (CCOs) with their own boards of directors and separate accounting.

CCOs are a tried and true mechanism. The council owned water utilities will draw on the familiar board procedures and directors duties of the Companies Act to insulate management from ordinary political pressure, and to oblige them to focus on efficient management of their water service businesses. Councils will retain the power to sack and replace boards over the long term, but with certain protections against routine interference in the water businesses.

Local authorities will continue to have oversight of water asset management, but their water utilities will keep water operations at arms-length from other council activities, making it easier to see whether money is being spent effectively and making infrastructure investment decision-making easier to regulate for reliability and long term adequacy.

So a CCO model for water, but one that retains democratic accountability.

The Bill enables (but does not require) water utilities to merge. It is for local communities to decide whether bigger is better, not central government ministries. However, it is expected that many local water services will find it more economical to combine with neighbouring services, to attain the required new standards and to access scale efficiencies.

The Bill provides a default scheme whereby shareholding councils can negotiate and seek community input on any decision to merge water utilities. No one-size-fits-all approach is mandated.

To overcome ‘patch protection’ and other loyalty impediments to sensible rationalisation, particularly within single watersheds or catchment areas, the Bill establishes an arbitration scheme to give binding rulings on the complex asset valuation issues that can arise when merging large entities. The arbitrators will be experts in engineering, water infrastructure and asset management who will be able to provide quick and authoritative rulings.

I suspect many Councils will merge their water CCOs to get better economies of scale – but they will get to make that decision.

Leighton Woodhouse writes:

As Oakland Slides Into Chaos, Its District Attorney Fights For Criminals

In May, Oakland police officers arrested nine minors, aged 12 to 17, for a string of 35 robberies throughout the East Bay. In one of those robberies, at 1:30 in the afternoon in an upscale shopping district, the teenagers repeatedly hit a 63-year-old woman in the head while dragging her by the hair.

A little more than a week later, they were back on the street with no charges filed. Alameda County’s District Attorney, Pamela Price, announced that there was not enough evidence to bring charges against any of them. She claimed that the police agreed with that assessment.

To Oakland residents, the case quickly became emblematic of the new DA’s approach to the surging crime wave inundating Oakland. Murders are down in the city by 13% since last year, but violent crime overall is up by 15%. There has been a 22% increase in robberies, a 41% increase in burglaries, and a 50% increase in carjackings.

This could almost apply to Auckland. Huge increases in crime, but we get told by the Government there is no problem.

The Australian reports:

The farming lobby was apoplectic with rage about Aboriginal heritage laws that even traditional owner groups did not like much.

And on Tuesday, the new rules requiring land owners to check for Aboriginal heritage at their own expense were put out of their misery just five weeks after they became law.

The laws were meant to modernise 50-year-old legislation that allowed Rio Tinto to gag traditional owners in the Pilbara from saying anything about the destruction of 46,000-year-old caves at Juukan Gorge. The gag clause was part of a perfectly legal agreement between the mining giant and the Puutu Kunti Kurrama people. The caves were blasted for iron ore with ministerial approval under the old laws.

The WA Liberals and Nationals will not volunteer it, but they actually voted for the new laws. The burning shame of the Juukan Gorge tragedy was front of mind for MPs on all sides as they ushered the legislation through.

But the laws went much further than a tightening up of regulations in the mining sector, which is organised, well-resourced and aware of its obligations. This was, fatally, also an attempt to bring some order to the mess outside mining.

So there was a problem that this new law was meant to solve. What went wrong?

The basic problem was that farmers had to pay to ascertain if any areas of their land they want to do work on, has Aboriginal heritage or value. This resulted in some farmers being told they would have to pay up to $100,000 for a cultural impact assessment, just so they can put a fence up. They revolted.

The Government has now said they will pay for any assessments, which is sensible.

Peter Menzies writes:

Here’s a word of caution for policy-makers looking to help publishers retrieve some of their advertising revenue lost to web giants such as Google and Meta: Whatever you do, don’t look to Canada for inspiration.

Canada’s efforts to “defend democracy,” as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau put it, have turned out to be a counterproductive fiasco. The government hoped the Online News Act would salvage a struggling legacy news industry and become a model to be copied globally. But it is the most spectacular legislative failure in Canada’s living political memory.

Inspired by an Australian publishers-collective that managed to squeeze deals reportedly amounting to as much as U.S. $150 million annually from Meta and Google, Canada’s Online News Act forces those same tech companies, provided they facilitate the sharing of links to access news stories, to pay for the privilege of doing so, even if the service is provided for free. As was the case in Australia, Canada’s legacy newspaper companies — the largest of which is owned by a New Jersey hedge fund — insist the American platforms have been “stealing” their content and profiting from it.

NZ sadly is going down this path also, as the Government looks to legislate to force tech companies to fund media companies.

The tech companies did roll over in Australia, but Canada is too large a market for them to do so.

As a result, Meta has concluded its only option is to “comply” with the legislation by beginning to move out of the business of carrying news links on Facebook and Instagram; Meta says it will complete the process before the Act comes into force toward the end of the year. Google also announced it would no longer be including Canadian news organizations in online searches performed in Canada.

Panicked efforts by the government to see if some sort of accommodation can be introduced under the law have been rebuffed completely by Meta, which might retreat from the news-carrier business globally. Google is still speaking with the Canadian government, but the latter’s description of these conversations as “negotiations” is most likely an overstatement. Google’s decision last month to exclude Canada from its Bard AI chatbox launch indicates the mood isn’t great.

Unless Trudeau’s team can cap Google’s liability at an agreed-upon level and future-proof that cap — sources indicate an extra $100 million annually is Google’s firm offer — it appears Canada is on the verge of destroying far more journalism jobs than it ever could have hoped to save.

The loss of access to Meta’s Facebook and Instagram platforms would be, Canada’s already-struggling publishers said in Senate hearings, disastrous and amount to millions of dollars in losses. For emerging and innovative providers — 217 have launched in Canada since 2008 to offset the disappearance of an estimated 450 newspapers — the impact is considered even more devastating. Most (if not all) of them have built their business models on maximizing the value they receive through Google and, primarily, Facebook.

The media need the tech companies far far more than the tech companies need the media. Good on them for standing up to legalised theft via government.

If you expand the list you will find us at the very bottom with Turkey at 0.01%.

Shameful.

Lloyd Burr writes:

It’s understandable that a gift is required for a departing boss. Maybe two or a third at a push. But certainly not 21 gifts costing the taxpayer $7555.49: 

I assumed the $7,500 cost was one or two very expensive gifts. I think it is actually worse that it was 21 seperate gifts. How could senior management have not said “Hey, maybe 21 gifts is a bit too much”.

The August Curia-Taxpayers’ Union poll has shown Labour down into the 20s for the first time.

What I have found interesting is that Labour’s support is going everywhere.

Only 1 in 2 Labour voters (in 2020) are voting Labour again. This is a massive fall, unprecedented in the MMP era. Usually losing more than 10% of your support is seen as a large swing, and here they are losing almost half.

So where are the 2020 Labour voters going?

• 1 in 7 have gone to National
• 1 in 7 have gone to the Greens
• 1 in 25 have gone to ACT
• 1 in 25 have gone to NZ First
• 1 in 50 have gone to the Maori Party
• 1 in 12 are undecided

The Herald reports:

A lavish event including gifts to farewell the boss at the Ministry for Pacific Peoples (MPP) last year failed to meet the “moderate and conservative” standards of the public service, a review has found. …

MPP spent $39,262.22 on the farewell, including $7500 on gifts for him – understood to include carvings and fine mats – and $3000 on “discretionary items” including photography, flowers and ceremonial drummers.

$40,000 is so far beyond moderate and conservative it isn’t funny.

Janet Albrechtsen in The Australian writes:

Drumgold should have remembered the words of the ACT Prosecution Policy, which Sofronoff quoted in his report, “that the purpose of a criminal prosecution is not to obtain a conviction; it is to lay before a court what the prosecution considers to be credible evidence relevant to what is alleged to be a crime”. …

But what of accused people who do not have the good fortune to have the talented and honourable Steve Whybrow SC and all Bruce Lehrmann’s team of skilled and dedicated lawyers in their corner? Remember that when Lehrmann initially sought help from ACT Legal Aid, he says he was told by a lawyer there that Legal Aid would not challenge a complainant’s account of the facts as a pack of lies – only that they were mistaken. One can only wonder if there are people sitting in ACT jails because Legal Aid would not defend them properly or because prosecutors withheld critical evidence. …

Finally, we must acknowledge this is not solely an ACT issue. It is quite possible that all across the country zealous prosecutors are hitting targets for conviction rates by withholding evidence or playing other cute games with defence teams. Without an equivalent of a national Sofronoff inquiry, we can only point to anecdotal evidence of such abuses, but there is certainly plenty of that. Since I began reporting on this case, and on the Sofronoff inquiry, I have been deluged by barristers, solicitors, family and friends of alleged perpetrators of sexual offences with increasing numbers of anecdotal cases of apparent unfairness. Some I have investigated appear to have merit – these are for future articles. Some complaints seem baseless. There are enough of the former, however, to lead me to the conclusion that the pendulum of Australian justice may well have swung too far against alleged perpetrators.

While the columnist is Australian, and this occurred in Australia, it is worth reflecting how sure are we in New Zealand that prosecutors are not withholding evidence etc in an attempt to get a conviction?

Certainly an an anecdotal level, there are cases which go to trial, where jurors have said afterwards there was never any possibility of a conviction.

Stuff reports:

National leader Christopher Luxon has revealed the party’s policy to ban cellphones at schools, to help children focus on their lessons. 

“Many schools here and overseas have experienced positive outcomes, including improved achievement, after banning the use of cellphones,” he said.

Luxon teased the policy on Tuesday, when he was at St Joseph’s School Fairfield in Hamilton, but outlined it on Wednesday morning.

Phones would only be permitted for educational purposes or for health reasons, but schools could decide how to enforce the ban. …

It is also a timely announcement. Last month, the UN’s education, science and culture agency, recommended smartphones be banned from schools.

In a report, it linked excessive mobile phone use to worsening educational performance and classroom disruptions, and found high levels of screen time had a negative effect on children’s emotional stability.

Sounds like a good step towards trunk to improve outcomes for kids at school.

I am sometimes accused of only pointing out the problems with education in NZ including schools and teachers.

I have had the very great privilege of working with incredible educators as well as being able to sit at the feet of coaches such as Lydiard, Jack Ralston, John Hart and Sir Graham Henry and being able to pick the brains of Joe Schmidt. Effective teaching and sports coaching have a great many things in common.

There are some features that make a teacher/coach outstanding. Some are difficult to define but none-the-less important.

1. Planning and subject expertise.

Great teachers are well qualified. They know their subject area and if there is a weakness – e.g. a primary teacher with not enough Maths background – they fix that.

They plan from a full course overview and are thorough. They know what they are doing, when they are doing it, why and what success looks like.

2. Expert Classroom Management and Teaching

Great teachers are experts with the personal interactions in their class. Some of the very best teachers I have come across may not be great with adults and formality (I, for one, am not) – but put them in front of a bunch of young people and there is genuine synergy.

A great teacher can laugh at themselves and laugh with kids when they are funny.

They will have clear and defined boundaries but they will be well reasoned and for the learning good of a child.

As tough as it sounds – every child will be favoured as if they are the teacher’s own.

3. They have unlimited energy and never complain about their job or young people.

One of the stupidest things I have had occasion to hear is when you are in a school in the holidays and someone says; “Beautiful place when there are no kids.” Or, sitting in a staffroom, you hear a teacher venting prolifically and negatively about students and/or their families.

If you do not love working with young people – and all that it involves – do something else. If it is just an income – then earn it another way.

Good teachers NEVER complain about their career. They see obstacles and work to overcome them but it is always with the good of the students in mind. Nothing should happen in a school that is not for the good of the students.

Good teachers also rarely count the hours or delineate between their private and professional time. You are a teacher 24/7 when needed. I have had the tragic experiences of three young people die while being a part of schools I was in. There have also been tragedies when family members have died or someone’s world gets turned upside down for other reasons. Your time and care needs to be freely available.

4. Great Teachers have qualities that appear intangible – but can be – and have been – developed.

A great teacher makes you feel like you matter and that your efforts and achievements matter. You don’t want to let them down, but you also know that when you get things wrong they will give you another chance and back you up to achieve next time. Great teachers allow Mulligans.

Great teachers look for role models. They read widely about best practice. They deliberately care and communicate. They know that they are only as good as their last class and want to be better tomorrow.

Great teachers are deliberate about the details and provide feedback that always helps a child to understand what the next best step is.

I probably cannot sum it up better than this short interaction with a teacher involved in Mt Hobson Academy Connected (which I helped establish but have no vested interest in now). Her name is Jennifer Cummins. She teaches Science and is superb.

Jennifer: “Had a 12 hr day, with a 4 hr parent teacher interviews. Amazing and so grateful to be in partnership with parents and their children.”

AP: “That is because you are one of the very best and it is such a privilege for those children and their families to work with you.”

Jennifer: “Thank you Alwyn, I could almost believe it, but can only aspire to be the best.”

Maybe a good way here would be to name some of those great people that have influenced you. I certainly consider Peter Reid of Wanganui Boys College in the 1980s as someone who transformed my life and for whom I will be for ever grateful.

Alwyn Poole ([email protected])
Innovative Education Consultants
Cambridge Festival of Sport
www.innovativeeducation.co.nz
www.cambridgefestivalofsport.co.nz
www.alwynpoole.substack.com
www.linkedin.com/in/alwyn-poole-16b02151/

The Herald reports:

ANZ economists have warned that inflation is not yet beaten and restated their case for one more Official Cash Rate (OCR) rise in their latest quarterly outlook.

They also warn that New Zealand is still on track for a more serious recession in early 2024 as monetary policy starts to do its job and slow the economy.

In a report, headlined Waiting on the last domino, ANZ chief economist Sharon Zollner argues the Reserve Bank (RBNZ) will need to lift the OCR to 5.75 per cent at its November review.

That’s depressing. ANZ is forecasting we will have a second deeper recession in 2024, and interest rates will be increased after the election.

The Herald reports:

An Act Party MP has admitted being shot when he was a 17-year-old after a drug deal involving his friend but denies being involved.

Simon Court said he suffered serious injuries and the shooter was arrested and charged.

He told Newstalk ZB he was on a camping trip “up north” and one of the guys he was with wanted to buy some “weed.”

The were told to go to a property and when they arrived his friend talked about buying some marijuana, Court said.

“I felt very uncomfortable with those people there and, ah I left.

“At some point later in the evening some people turned up at our campsite and put a shotgun in my face. My friend was with me at the time, he’d come back [from doing the drug deal].

“They demanded the key to our car and the weed. I didn’t know anything about it, I didn’t know where the keys were or where the weed was, it wasn’t my weed.”

Court said they had a “bit of a discussion with the people and they shot me.”

“They couldn’t find the keys or anything they were looking for and they left me seriously injured,” Court said.

As a 17-year-old he said he was like a lot of teenagers and didn’t always make good decisions.

What a huge yawn. So when Court was 17, his friend purchased some cannabis. Court, who did nothing wrong, was shot. He was the victim.

Lloyd Burr writes:

They look good on paper: Nine new solar farms and three new wind farms that would produce a combined peak output of 1566 megawatts – more than three-and-a-half Clyde Dams. 

The solar farms would comprise 1.9 million panels and would create 2300 jobs in their construction. 

The wind farms would see 840 construction jobs to install 82 turbines which would cut 150 million kg of carbon emissions. 

But there’s a problem: they might not actually go ahead. 

They haven’t been consented. They haven’t been approved. Some of them we already knew about.

The Government is announcing a massive ‘if’. Their press releases used phrases like “if approved”, “could generate” and “could create”. 

There’s every chance the expert consenting panels may decline them, in which case the Government has just announced a whole lot of nothing. 

Ironically the biggest opponents of renewable energy projects tend to be local environmental activists and NIMBYs.

Stuff reports:

Damien O’Connor, a senior minister at the centre of the climate change issue, started the week with a blunt assessment of the tax-climate issue. He told the red meat sector: “We probably don’t have enough tax in this country.”

In the 2017 Budget, tax was forecast to be $74.6 billion or 27.7% of GDP.

In the 2023 Budget, tax was forecast to be $123.2 billion or 29.7% of GDP.

Under Labour, the tax take has gone up by around $50 billion. The problem is that the Government has got terrible results for what they spend.

Ranapera Taumata murdered his girlfriend. The minimum sentence is life with a non-parole period of 10 years.

Taumata has previous convictions for family violence (x5), as well as robbery, aggravated robbery, and assault with a weapon.

He pleaded not guilty, and his victim had more than 50 cuts, bruises, abrasions and fractures on her 55kg body.

Yet he still only got a 10 year six month non parole period.