Business Desk reports:

Three Waters Reform Programme officials are keeping secret both the advice that led to its controversial television advertising campaign and the identity of its author.

In its OIA release, the three waters programme directorate deleted several paragraphs summarising the proposed campaign, an appendix with the full proposal, and the identity of its author. The anonymous supplier is described in the paper both as “an independent marketing and communications consultant”, and “an independent consultancy firm“. 

Donnelly said it was also “not acceptable” that it took 50 working days for the three waters programme to decide not to release the advice and its author.  This comprised the statutory 20 working days allowed under the OIA, a 15-day extension (also allowed), and another 15 working days without a deadline extension. “The statutory obligation is to respond to a request for official information as soon as reasonably practicable,” Donnelly said.

This looks very suspicious. They took 50 working days (10 weeks) merely to refuse to release the name of the author. Why are they hiding this information?

Stuff reports:

Two Wellington bar owners have been left with permanent injuries and feel like they have lost 10 years of their lives after an unprovoked attack on them by a patron.

Ray and Sue Cullis​ were in court to see what finally happened to Hugh Soper, having waited more than two years for a resolution.

Both had their victim impact statements read to Wellington District Court judge Bruce Davidson​ at his sentencing on Friday. They detailed the suffering and medical treatment they had undergone in the years since the 2019 attack.

Soper, then 23, had been at their pub, the Sprig and Fern in Thorndon, on a Sunday night. After a minor argument where a friend of his was asked to leave, Soper threatened to hit Ray Cullis, 72, with a pint handle before punching him three or four times and stomping on his head.

Sue Cullis had her hand broken when she tried to intervene. Others had to drag Soper away.

Ray Cullis had his jaw displaced and had to have a head scan to see if any bones were broken in his skull. He has been left with permanent damage to his left eye and needed surgery to correct it, while his wife had to have multiple surgeries on her left hand after it was rebroken several times during treatment.

My God, the poor bar owners. It’s a lovely little bar I’ve been to often. Someone in their 20s beating up a couple in their 70s is despicable.

Judge Davidson sentenced Soper … to seven months’ home detention, ordered him to stay away from alcohol, and to pay $4000 emotional harm reparation.

Seven month’s home detention seems far too light, for such an awful assault – even if he is a first time offender.

NB: Only discussion of the assault and sentence will be on-topic – anything about the family of the assailant will be deleted as not relevant.

The Government has said that government departments can no longer hire unvaccinated staff, so the vaccine mandate applies to pretty much the entire state sector as well as retail and hospitality sectors etc.

This raises interesting questions. What happens in a few months when the vaccines reduce in effectiveness? Will public servants have to get a third booster shot or lose their jobs? Will cafe workers? Will teachers?

And what if annual booster shots are needed for years to come? Will people have to get an annual booster or have say 80% of jobs in New Zealand made off limits to them? And what will this do to social cohesion?

A guest post by Jackie Foster:

Greg King was a well known lawyer and dubbed “one of this country’s finest legal brains”. He was tenacious, fearless and had all the attributes that any criminal barrister would want. He was known for his commitment to each case he picked up, his ability to befriend those he met including those with opposing views and his ever strong fight for justice – even if it meant meticulously picking apart every aspect of a Crown’s case.

To King, it didn’t matter who you were, you deserved a fair trial and if you ignored standards and rules for one case, where would i t end?

The idea of everyone deserving a fair trial is one spoken about and believed by many to happen. It’s a fundamental principle of our justice system and is a right outlined in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. But, from our experience and what I ’ve heard from others’ experiences since Jamie’s trial, this simple standard is not always adhered to in our justice system.

I’ve spoken before in Part 2 about evidence that was withheld by the police. With suppressions in place, it’s impossible to share with you the extent of this error. It’s also why mainstream media wouldn’t touch Jamie’s side of the story.

However, what I can expand on is that the documents the police withheld from the court, the defence counsel, the judge, and the jury were documents pertaining to conflicts of interest. Police Instructions around Conflicts of Interest are viewable online.

Investigating officers on a case must disclose actual, potential and perceived conflicts in cases they work on to ensure a
Police employee’s ability to be impartial, objective and independent. It is important that conflicts of interest are recognised and properly managed. Conflicts of interest that are hidden, or poorly managed, create the risk of misconduct (or the appearance of misconduct), and could undermine public trust and confidence.
In Jamie’s case, 8 forms were signed by 8 officers.

7 of them disclosed a conflict of interest.

The conflicts were raised with two senior officers of which neither signed a conflict form themselves. But, despite nearly all of the officers disclosing a conflict of interest, all officers remained on t he case.

The forms were later stamped DO NOT DISCLOSE and withheld from everyone. It was later found that more officers who didn’t sign forms t o disclose a conflict, had a sure fire connection. Use of nicknames in job sheets was a clear giveaway t here were personal connections. These purposely hidden documents were later discovered by defence counsel, 5 months after the trial and requested from the police who finally handed them over.

At that point we’d hoped the Court of Appeal Judges might see a problem – they didn’t. They danced around the issue in their judgement and their final decision was “Having reassessed the trial Judge’s ruling in light of the additional information, we accept that it may have been appropriate to have allowed further cross-examination regarding the conflict of interest issue that was only raised for t he first time in re-examination. However, having assessed the material ourselves and its potential influence, we are satisfied there is no real risk of it having affected the outcome of the trial.”

Given the Court of Appeals’ limited ability to investigate Police policies and procedures and specifically the conflicts themselves, we were encouraged to take this task to the organization whose role was to investigate Police and keep them accountable. The IPCA or Independent Police Conduct Authority.

We compiled a comprehensive and detailed complaint to them numbering 62 pages with proof from documents, job sheets, letters and emails. We clearly stated the questions we sought answers for. I t was not a matter of proving Jamie’s innocence or with intention of overturning his conviction because the I PCA can’t do that. We simply needed answers on what we believed to be clear errors and mismanagement of this case. I t should be of huge concern for the public, that dishonesty and misconduct within the force can be overlooked or worse, covered up so easily without consequence.

It is important to reiterate again, the fact that there are suppressions in place that prevent me from being able to fully explain the magnitude of these conflicts and why they were hidden. We believed that because of these conflicts, specific witnesses were bullied into changing their statements and choice of wording.

Some witnesses (serving police officers at the time) were pressured, told to be careful what they say and served employment investigation notifications minutes before making statements. It’s not a new idea that there is bullying within the Police Force. A review done earlier this year in March showed about 40 per cent had personally experienced poor behaviour towards them over the past year.

Initial statements taken directly after the alleged incidents were later changed and reformatted. One witness, in fear we believe, left out crucial evidence of asking Jamie what was happening with him and the complainant and Jamie telling him that she had told him to meet up later. He later made a third formal statement mid-trial to include this evidence – the day before taking the stand.

The judge ruled out this evidence under section 21 of the Evidence Act and a jury never heard it. Section 21 rules that if a defendant in a criminal proceeding does not give evidence, the defendant may not offer his or her own hearsay statement in evidence in the proceeding. However, this wasn’t Jamie’s evidence as the defendant. It was the evidence of the witness and therefore shouldn’t have come under this ruling.

Additionally, the Crown were allowed to offer some parts of words uttered by Jamie (if it helped their case) but the defence were prohibited from offering other parts of words uttered by Jamie, because section 21 prohibited it.

When we submitted our complaint to the IPCA, we received the standard reply of thanks and the added notice that the investigation could take between 2-4 months to carry out. Not 10 days later, we received a substandard and frankly disappointing response from the IPCA stating that they had ‘carefully considered the issues outlined in the complaint, material submitted and reviewed police records and court judgements’. All of that….apparently….in ten days.

They then discarded their own role as an Independent authority to actually be independent, do their own investigation into the police conduct and fell back on the response of the Court of Appeal – who also never did any sort of investigation.

Greg King is quoted saying “At the end of the day when the state comes against you, you’d better hope there’s someone in your corner who’s prepared to f ight for the underdog because, believe me, you are the underdog.”

“We have a system of justice that values finality of verdict higher than correctness of verdict. People are interested in having cases closed and the door nailed shut on them…..and change will only come with t he exposure of serious miscarriages of justice – more of them – the ones we’ve had aren’t enough obviously”

From the Police mishandling and hiding documents, to a Judge ruling out crucial evidence, to the Court of Appeal who agreed to errors and then definitively somehow knew decisions a jury would have made and even an organization who stands to be independent, failing…I can’t help but agree with Greg King. Instead of anyone standing to do the right thing, they all fell back on each other to uphold a facade of ‘Justice’ when it is anything but.

Greg King was one of the few who stood against adversity, for truth. To do the right thing, to bring true justice. He believed that there’s no greater sin that a state can commit than to wrongly convict and imprison an innocent person. The enduring sense of injustice that a person must go through sitting in a prison cell in the middle of the night when they are innocent – is too sickening to even contemplate. That’s why he worked so tirelessly – he believed ‘we have to get it right’.

He believed that i n NZ, people get convicted for crimes of which they were innocent on a far too regular basis.

Unfortunately for him, he stood mostly alone in his battle for true justice in a broken system. And that ultimately became the one thing that took his life.

We need to unite against injustice, against a ‘system’ which claims to govern. Our sons, fathers, uncles and friends rely on us to stand up and do what’s right. It’s why nearly 2 years later, I’m still standing, still writing, still hoping for someone to do the right thing – push through the fear or consequences.

Alone we can do little, but together we can achieve a lot.

Business Desk reported:

The Three Waters television ad campaign that used taxpayers’ money to influence the opinions of ratepayers was cut short after intervention by the Public Service Commission, BusinessDesk has learned.

When the first of the adverts was aired around the middle of the year, the commission “raised concerns” with the sponsoring Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) on “how the government advertising guidelines had been considered”, the commission said in a statement.  The guidelines require publicly funded campaigns to be accurate, factual and unbiased, but the cartoon-style adverts are notable for their lack of factual information.  They portray a dystopian future in which taps run dry or are full of sludge. As if by magic, a smiling cartoon plumber – presumably the alter ego of a post-reform three waters agency – fixes problematic pipes with a single tap of his spanner.

The ads were so one sided and terrible, they probably backfired on the Government with their attempts to portray a complex issue as good vs bad. I’m not surprised that they were seen as advocacy, not information, as that is obviously what they were.

A guest post by Tripewryter:

Back in the 1990s my children and I lived in a state house.

Thirty years later they and I still feel gratitude for what we were provided.

My private sector landlord had jacked up the rent by a fifth. It was beyond my means to pay.

I went to the-then Housing Corporation. A nice woman offered me a three bedroom house on a large section. The rent was way lower than what I was paying and would be paying.

The neighbourhood was private housing. It was quiet and safe. On one side my neighbour was a retired air force officer and his wife and teenage children. On the other were an ancient couple in their 80s and 90s.

Along the road was an official who worked for the governor-general. Across the road was a senior manager in the city council.

It was a beautiful neighbourhood. I could not believe my luck. My kids were not going to be living in a solo parent ghetto.

I had to furnish the house myself and buy the curtains and the carpets. I was able to do that because my share of my mother’s bequest had arrived at the right time.

The house was a 1940s-era structure. It was basic, uninsulated but otherwise dry and solid and safe.

We lived in it for six years.

I’ve been thinking about that house in recent days because of the furore with Kainga Ora and some of its violent, anti-social tenants, whom it appears not to know how to deal with.

The government is trying to cast these tenants as ‘vulnerable (mispronounced as ‘vunribbul’) people with complex needs’.

Maybe they are. But what about their neighbours whom they terrify?

It is misplaced compassion to allow bullies to continue with their behaviour because they have children and if they are evicted they will go back to living in cars.

No-one else is responsible for the children but the parents. If the parents behave anti-socially and that results in the family being made to live in cars then that is on the parents. Their behaviour got them into this. No-one else.

This problem is not going to be molly-coddled away. Kainga Ora has to make the neighbourhood bullies in their tenancies responsible for their behaviour. They owe it to the terrified and exasperated neighbours, to the taxpayers who pay for the houses – and to the tenants who are grateful for the digs they live in and call home and respect that. 

The NY Post reports:

Jussie Smollett was convicted Thursday of staging a hate crime nearly three years after he claimed two Trump-loving bigots beat him up, tied a noose around his neck and doused him in bleach in a misbegotten bid to raise his public profile. 

Twelve jurors in Chicago criminal court found the disgraced actor guilty of five of six counts of felony disorderly conduct for filing a false police report following testimony from 13 witnesses and more than nine hours of deliberation. 

There are actual hate crimes in the US, and because of Smollett actual victims are more likely to be met with scepticism.

There is a sniff test that is usually right with alleged hate crimes. Is the alleged crime too perfect?

Smolleet alleged that his two assailants were:

• White
• Had MAGA hats
• Used racial slurs
• Used homophobic slurs
• Poured bleach on him
• Tied a noose around his neck
• Said the attack was probably due to his criticisms of the (then) Government

From his viewpoint this was the perfect story. Both bleach and a noose. MAGA hats. It would be the hate crime attack to beat all other hate crime attacks. It would be like a hollywood script. And it was a script. The assailants were hired by him.

Stuff reports:

The Government will ban young people from ever being able to purchase tobacco in their lives under world-leading plans to make New Zealand smokefree.

This will make NZ smoke-free only in the sense that NZ is cannabis free or America was alcohol free in the 1920s.

It seems bizarre that a Government which told us (correctly) that prohibition is the wrong strategy for cannabis, thinks it will work for tobacco. They wanted to legalise cannabis and ban tobacco!

“We want to make sure young people never start smoking, so we will make it an offence to sell or supply smoke tobacco products to new cohorts of young people,” she said. “People aged 14 when the law comes into effect will never be able to legally purchase tobacco.”

It’s nice that the Government is so keen to help gangs diversify their revenue stream, so they don’t have to apply for $2.75 million government grants so often.

We have already seen the black market in tobacco explode in the last few years. What this move will do is allow drug dealers to also sell tobacco.

Eric Crampton writes:

If you’ve ever had concerns about economists’ ethical commitments, relax.

It could be worse.

Just consider medical ethics.

Pfizer recently stopped its trial of anti-Covid treatment Paxlovid, currently in international approval processes.

The pill was just too good.

It became really obvious really quickly that Paxlovid is really effective. Patients given the drug shortly after infection were 89% less likely to go to hospital or die, compared to those given placebos.

Continuing to give placebos was obviously unethical. It condemned the control group to a massive increase in the risk of hospitalisation or death.

That all sounds eminently reasonable. The drug proves effective, so just give it to everyone.

But that’s where medical regulatory ethics give us all a nice kick in the pants.

The drug is still in the American approval process – as well as new Zealand’s. It is deemed unethical and actually illegal to provide it until it is approved. Except as part of a clinical trial. But the trial had to end because it was unethical not to provide the drug to the control group.

If the trial had continued, people registering for the trial would have had a 50/50 chance of getting Paxlovid. Now they have a 0% chance of getting Paxlovid until the bureaucracy stamps some forms.

A modern Kafka could have written the story. But it’s sadly not fiction.

This is beyond crazy.

The Herald has some useful stats on cases and hospitalised cases in NZ, by vaccination status:

Based on the cases in the last fortnight, unvaccinated people are 13 times more likely to get Covid-19 than people who have received two doses, and 65 times more likely to be hospitalised.

Also of the 475 cases who have been hospitalised, 308 are aged under 50. Only 32 of the 475 were fully vaccinated.

Of the 51 cases that went into ICU, 19 are aged under 50.

Of the 44 deaths, 11 are aged under 60.

I’m very pleased I am vaccinated. I don’t think people should be coerced into vaccinations, but I think the risks are minuscule compared to the benefits.

The Australian Government announced:

The Morrison Government continues to keep Australians safe from terrorism and violent extremism, by announcing today the intention to list The Base and the entirety of Hizballah as terrorist organisations under the Criminal Code.

Minister for Home Affairs Karen Andrews said the Government is sending a strong message that Australia condemns the use of terrorism to achieve political, ideological or religious objectives.

“The Government has zero tolerance for violence, and there is no cause – religious or ideological – that can justify killing innocent people,” Minister Andrews said.

“The Morrison Government is committed to ensuring Australia has the right tools and legislation in place to combat the enduring threat of terrorism. As recent events in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and elsewhere around the world have demonstrated, we cannot be complacent.

“Australia is a nation of rich cultural backgrounds. Our community is built on a broad fabric of many and varied experiences and cultures, and our nation’s character is better off for it. The views of violent extremist groups such as these are a stain on that rich cultural fabric. There is no place in Australia for their hateful ideologies.”

Hizballah’s External Security Organisation has been a listed terrorist organisation since 2003. The group continues to threaten terrorist attacks and provides support to terrorist organisations such as Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas’ Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades.

New Zealand is an outlier in not designating Hezballah as a terrorist organisation. The Arab League and the Gulf Co-operation Council designate them as terrorists, as does Canada, Germany, Australia and the UK and the US.

Jonathan Sumpton writes:

In many ways, the biggest threat to democracy is not oppression by the state, but the intolerance of our fellow citizens.  …

The deliberate campaigns of suppression conducted by pressure groups against politically unfashionable or “incorrect” opinions on, for example, race, gender reassignment, or same-sex relationships; the attempts to impose a new vocabulary which implicitly accepts the campaigners’ point of view: these things are symptoms of the narrowing of our intellectual world.

The tests recently imposed on freshers at the University of St. Andrews and the campaign against Kathleen Stock at the University of Sussex suggest that intellectual persecution is alive even in our universities, for the first time perhaps since Thomas Cranmer was burned at the stake just 200 yards from here. Demonstrations, such as those organised by Extinction Rebellion and Insulate Britain, are based on the notion that the campaigners’ point of view is the only legitimate one. It is therefore perfectly acceptable deliberately to bully people and disrupt their lives until they submit, instead of resorting to ordinary democratic procedures. This is the mentality of terrorists, but without the violence.

So well said.

Democracy can only survive if our differences are transcended by our common acceptance of the legitimacy of the decision-making process, even when we disagree profoundly with the outcome. This implicit bargain breaks down if a society repeatedly finds itself resorting to coercion to enforce the majority view about controversial moral issues. It breaks down if people feel more strongly about the issues than they do about democratic procedures for settling them. The result is the abandonment of political engagement and a growing resort to direct action of one kind or another.

Direct action is an invitation to authoritarian government, because it implicitly rejects diversity of opinion. It assesses the value of democratic institutions by one criterion only, namely the degree to which the activists’ program has prevailed. Those who engage in direct action instinctively feel that the end is so important that it justifies the means, but they rarely confront the implications of their acts. What holds us together as a society is precisely the means by which we do things. Since we are never likely to agree on controversial issues of principle, what holds us together is not consensus, but a common respect for a method of resolving our differences, whether or not we approve of the resulting decisions.

This is so true. I regard democracy as more important than whether or not I agree with the decisions made by a democratic Government. But for many democracy is merely a means towards and end.

The transition from democracy to authoritarian rule is generally smooth and unnoticed. It is easy to sleepwalk into it. The outward forms, the language of politics, are unchanged. But the substance is gone. These things do not happen with a clap of thunder. Democracy is not formally abolished but quietly redefined. It ceases to be a method of government, and becomes instead a set of political values, like communism or human rights, which are said to represent the people’s true wishes without regard to anything that they may actually have chosen for themselves.

Sadly I think democracy is losing in many places. We had a golden era from 1980 to around 2010 where the trend was towards democracy and (classic) liberalism. But now the trend is going the wrong way.

Newshub reports:

One major change would be to lower the threshold at which political parties have to disclose the identity of donors from $15,000 to $1500 – to bring it into line with the regime for individual candidates.

This is a stupid comparison. The maximum you can spend on a candidate campaign is $28,200. So the $1,500 donation disclosure threshold is basically 5% of the spending limit.

The maximum a party can spend on a party campaign is $3,229,400. The $15,000 donation disclosure threshold is already just 0.46% of that and the proposed limit would be 0.05% of that.

ACT leader David Seymour says a law change will not solve the problem of politicians trying to game the system.

“If people think it’s a problem that people who break the law are being taken to court, then they don’t understand what it is for a law to not be working,” Seymour says.

“The law is working – that’s why people are being prosecuted… we aren’t talking about changing the laws around murder because people have been charged with it.”

He has accused Labour of seeking to use its “own political advantage so it can replace the system with taxpayer funding”, which he says could also make it harder for parties like his to raise money through donations.

This is absolutely the end game. Labour want an excuse to bring in (greater) taxpayer funding for political parties.

Stuff reports:

National has elected second-term MP Chris Penk to the senior whip role, while keeping Maureen Pugh in the junior whip role.

Whips essentially act as party disciplinarians in Parliament, making sure MPs are in the House to speak and vote when needed and allocating leave.

National’s former senior whip was Matt Doocey, who rose considerably up the ranks into the front-bench in new leader Christopher Luxon’s reshuffle. Whips do not typically serve on the front bench.

Luxon said the pair were elected unopposed.

Good to see Chris Penk that on this very important role, supported by Maureen. I am sure he will do a great job.

Whips get paid slightly more than other Opposition MPs.

More than slightly more. The salaries are a backbench MP and whips are:

• Backbench MP $163,961
• Junior Whips $179,713
• ACT and Green Whips $185,433
• National Senior Whip $213,252
• Govt Senior Whip $222,460

So Chris Penk has just had a “slight” $50,000 pay rise 🙂

Stuff reports:

Staff employed at takeaway food and drink businesses no longer have to be vaccinated against Covid-19 despite the Government earlier saying they did.

Two weeks ago Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Michael Wood said all staff working in hospitality needed to have their first vaccination injection by the time the traffic light system came into effect on Friday.

But on Friday night, official food and drink service guidelines were changed to say if a business is solely takeaway food and drink, then workers do not need to be vaccinated. Also, if they opt to not ask for vaccine passes, they can operate as takeaway.

A national takeaway chain owner Stuff spoke to, who wished to remain anonymous, said the Government’s original advice had resulted in her having to terminate the employment of two unvaccinated full-time staff members, and it couldn’t open one of its stores due to a staff shortage.

All up the mandate cost the business about $20,000 and resulted in emotional distress for the two workers, she said.

“The emotional impact on them has been huge.”

I don’t think the Government at all comprehends what it is like for small businesses trying to cope. Changing the rules every two weeks results in people losing their jobs and incomes etc.

Under the updated guidelines the chain is allowed to employ unvaccinated staff.

The staff who had been let go were too distraught to return to their jobs, she said.

“Even though we have reversed the termination, the girls are emotionally broken.”

The owner, who wanted to remain anonymous out of fear of public backlash, said the mental health impacts stemming from the Government’s actions were outweighing the damage caused by Covid-19.

“This is meant to be about Covid and keeping healthy. The mental health distress that they have caused far exceeds any Covid concerns.”

She said she felt untrusting of the Government now.

Sadly there is no end in sight. I can’t imagine the Government is going to put any region into Green in the next year. They’re ignoring their own guidelines as to when a region should be green or orange.

A guest post by Clive Bibby:

I have written about this before but up until now, nobody in authority seems to be listening or worse still, is hoping that it will just continue to happen and no body will notice. 

In fact it appears that the “one way” transfer of our productive grazing land into the fast expanding exotic forestry estate is all part of the government’s plan to achieve its ill advised zero carbon emissions target. More about that later. 

The upcoming sale of 6200 hectares of prime East Coast hill country (Huiarua and Matanui Stns) with a combined carrying capacity of over 45,000 stock units and the probability that it might all end up in trees is more than just a little bit worrying.

In the NZ context this is the classic example of what is being allowed to happen to our most precious asset and worse still- it is promoted as being in the nation’s best long term interest. What a sick joke. 

 We are witnessing our government selling the family silver with little more justification than it makes our Prime Minister and her cabal of ideologues look good on the world stage, footing it with the big boys with an extraordinary, disproportionate contribution aimed at rectifying a problem that is not of our making. 

It wouldn’t be so bad if Kiwis were the ones who would benefit from this drastic nonsensical sale of these “jewels in the crown” to those, many of whom owe no allegiance to our country and who offer no guarantees of a commitment to manage these assets in the best interests of future generations who may well decide to buy them back. 

This is the sort of betrayal that l have railed against for such a long time yet for my trouble l am accused of using emotive hyperbole to describe what is in simple agrarian  terms, the crime of the century. 

I am used to the insults although don’t care much for this type of pathetic defence against my criticisms by local body politicians and others who should know better. It goes with the territory but what l will not tolerate is the apparent indifference to this tragedy by those who have the power to stop it happening. 

And the reason l say that is because there are perfectly reasonable options available to central and local governments that would limit the transfer of this pastoral realestate to the parts of our hill country where it makes economic and conservation sense to do so.

At the same time we could satisfy the government’s commitment to its tree planting target without consigning some of our most productive pastoral land to a martyr’s death in the process. Somewhat ironic don’t you think. 

When we brought our young family to the East Coast 41 years ago in order to fulfil a long held dream of owing our own property, there was a local authority by-law on the Council statute books (duplicated across the country) that limited the planting of exotic forests to what was described as “Class 7” land.

Virtually all of that country was highly erodible and it made good sense to plant trees in an effort to stabilise the steep slopes and as a consequence – protect the rolling and flat, highly productive pastoral and cropping land at its base. 

There is still an enormous amount of this class of land throughout New Zealand, as yet unconverted to forestry which would be easily its best end use even from a purely conservation point of view. 

Why are the politicians not using this compromise method to achieve their objectives which would be a win/win for all? 

It is unfathomable although we should have learned by now that rational thinking isn’t one of this crowd’s most endearing qualities. 

We deserve better. 

Sir Ian Taylor writes:

The missteps on the technology front, as far as the Covid response has been concerned, are becoming too numerous to count, but here are some to consider as your advisers continue to turn down offers of help.

An MIQ booking system that meant that someone who wanted to go to a cricket match in Australia has the same chance of getting a spot as someone who hadn’t seen their family for two years! An MIQ system that people with money could pay someone else hundreds of dollars to jump the queue for them. An MIQ system that came up with a Virtual Lobby that allowed you to make up as many passports as you liked because it wasn’t actually linked to the passport database.

A Vaccine Passport system that allows people to download a pdf that can be altered using standard editing software. A Vaccine Passport system that does not require a photograph to confirm you are the person holding the passport to help make the job of overstretched staff at vaccine mandated venues easier.

The vaccine passport system is totally insecure and is basically just a psychological con job. Unless they are asking for photo IDs to accompany it, anyone can use it.

And now, the acknowledgement from our PM that you are happy for them to launch sites that they expect to crash. Really! This is our money you are spending – where is the accountability?

I don’t profess to be an expert on many things, but I think I have earned the right to have a voice when it comes to technology. We have built and launched a number of websites over the years. One of the latest was an interactive golfing platform called Tourcast which launched flawlessly with hundreds of thousands of simultaneous users accessing video, real time 3D graphics and data, for any player, on any hole, for every shot in a golf tournament.

When we launched it, to a global audience, we did not “anticipate” that it would crash. Our client did not “anticipate” that it would crash, and our users definitely did not “anticipate” that it would crash. Nor did we ‘anticipate’ that it would win an Emmy Award – but it did.

With the government site that crashed on Wednesday we are talking about a reported user base of 15,000 people accessing a site that you had two years to get ready!

I used to be on the board of a company that had a requirement to meet at least 99.9% uptime. This meant that any outage of over 40 minutes was treated so seriously it would be discussed at board level.

The front bench is:

1. Christopher Luxon, Leader, National Security & Intelligence
2. Nicola Willis, Deputy Leader, Housing and Social Investment
3. Simon Bridges, Finance, Infrastructure
4. Chris Bishop, Covid-19 response, Shadow House Leader
5. Shane Reti, Health, Maori-Crown Relations, Pacific
6. Louise Upston, Social Development, Child Poverty
7. Erica Stanford, Education, Immigration
8. Matt Doocey, Mental Health, Youth
9. Simeon Brown, Transport, Public Service

Pleased to see Erica, Matt and Simeon get promoted to the front bench. They have all done excellent work in their portfolios and have been very effective MPs. This is a front bench based on performance.

So what are the match offs:

• Luxon vs Ardern on running the Government
• Willis vs Woods on housing
• Bridges vs Robertson on Finance
• Bishop vs Hipkins on Covid-19
• Reti vs Little on Health
• Upston vs Sepuloni on welfare
• Stanford vs Hipkins on education
• Doocey vs Little on Mental Health
• Brown vs Wood on Transport

Looking forward to the final session of the House this year.