Richard Prebble is right on the money in this morning’s NZH.

A few key points:

“Chris Hipkins, the Covid Response Minister, has been in politics all his life. He joined the Labour party as a schoolboy. You have to be highly political not to have acted on the Simpson/Roche report. Last weekend he was even denying the MIQ booking system is a failure.”

“The Minister insists New Zealanders should have travelled when he advised there were MIQ places. He has yet to explain how we get cancer to obey his MIQ timetable.”

“The MIQ system is a shambles. The government’s Covid policy relies on luck.”

“Covid is not the only crisis Hipkins is presiding over. He is the Minister of Education.”

“After receiving a glowing independent report saying that Charter Schools “are meeting their learners’ needs using good and innovative practices”, Hipkins abolished Charter Schools.”

“In their NCEA results Maori and Pacifica pupils attending Charter schools exceeded the average achievement of all students.”

“The Minister assured us that he was going to introduce policies to ensure pupils succeed in state schools.”

“Where are these policies?”

“Under his watch education standards across the board have fallen. Once we led the world in English and math. Now we are near the bottom of the countries that participate in education comparison testing.”

“The failure of education standards will prove to be a far greater catastrophe for New Zealand than Covid. Without the next generation of well-educated school leavers we are destined to be a failed state.”

“For Maori and Pacifica students, it is already a tragedy. The majority are leaving school after 16,000 hours of tuition unable to read or do math at a level required by the modern economy.”

“While the taxpayer paid for 16,000 hours of tuition, these pupils actually received half that amount. Today approximately half of all Pacifica and Maori children are not at school. Nothing remarkable about today. Half of all Maori and Pacifica children are absent every day. Even before Covid absenteeism by all pupils under this Minister’s watch was increasing.”

“The Education Department has research that shows every day at school is vital. The data shows pupils who do not miss a day’s schooling pass NCEA. Pupils who are absent half of the time fail.”

“Attendance might be the reason Charter Schools succeeded. In their contracts the government required Charter Schools to have high attendance. The independent report noted that: “Student attendance: 7 out of 8 schools/kura met or exceeded their targets.”

“The government has just delivered a gesture apology for the Dawn Raids. I was the first Minister of Pacific Island Affairs. I held many meetings with the Pacific communities. No one asked for an apology. What the meetings said was “We came to New Zealand for a better education for our children”.

“Under Chris Hipkins our education system is completely failing those children. It is far more damaging than any historic dawn raid.”

My Comments

For the last two years the Villa Education Trust has offered the government a Designated Character School (you know – the ones they said we could have opened instead of Charter Schools) for 480 diverse learners near an Auckland transport hub. The Ministry refuse to allow it to even go to consultation and Hipkins has infamously said: “there are available supports for all learners in existing State schools.” The fall-out on that statement has only just started. No one believes it.

The Ministry processes and misrepresentation of our applications have been so bad that we have formally complained to the Minister about the Auckland head official, and complained to the SSC, Ombudsmen and NZHRC about the Ministry’s behaviour towards our Trust and outright bullying of one of our connected families by a specific official.

Hipkins has refused to meet with us for four years (last week he stated: “my current commitments make me unable to meet with you”.)

There is some light in the tunnel. I have been wondering why in 4 years the Ministry of Education staff has gone from 2800 to 3400 employees – and what they do. Yesterday there was a hint. To meet with one Villa Education Trust member (the frightening Karen Poole) on some pretty straight forward admin – they had 7 (yes seven) Ministry officials. The light in the tunnel was a torch coming back.

Our education system is in real trouble. Unlike Richard Prebble normally would – he is understating it. Nationally we have 35% of our students fully or partially disengaged and very little being done. When someone offers to do good (and the Ministry reports at least acknowledge our excellent and ongoing results for children otherwise failed) they get, at best, ignored.

An adult friend of mine once ended a bar-b-cue at night by tipping the hot embers over in his father-in-law’s hay field. An hour later the field was alight.

The father-in-law’s comment to my friend? “You need a damn good kick in the a%$e!”

Hipkins’ hay field is the NZ education system.

Newshub reports:

Human rights lawyers are lining up to take on the Government over the troubled managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) booking system that’s left thousands of Kiwis unable to get home.

The Chief Ombudsman revealed to Newshub on Tuesday he’s received a number of complaints, and is making it a priority to investigate.

Kiwi Bergen Graham is 26 weeks’ pregnant with her first baby and considered high-risk. She’s been trying for months to get home.

“We don’t need visas, we don’t need anything… all I’m asking for is a hotel room,” she said.

As soon as she learned she was pregnant in El Salvador, she’s been hitting refresh on the MIQ website.

“All I’ve been told is I have a rare blood type. I need to be seeing the same doctor the whole time so I can be monitored at 28 weeks. I need to get a test done… and that’s scary, you know?”

With no MIQ spots, she and her husband are now stuck in transit in the US.

Even though she has a specialist’s letter confirming she needs to get home, our Government won’t make a special case. She’s been told “you’re not sick enough”. 

If you sat 20 people in a room and asked them to design the worst possible booking system possible, they would come up with our MIQ booking system.

There is no ability to prioritise. There is no waiting list. There is no certainty of getting a spot. If you follow the rules you will miss out. The system forces you to book more rooms than you need and on any day around 40% of rooms are empty. I am quite serious when I say you really would struggle to design a worse system.

Hamish Rutherford writes:

Monday night’s rolling blackouts were far from the first sign that New Zealand’s electricity system is struggling to cope, but it does take the issue to a whole new level.

With the Government squarely blaming the problems on commercial decisions of the electricity generators, the sector faces increasing risk of a shake-up.

“If we are going to have a market-oriented system providing security of supply, then that market must deliver,” Energy Minister Megan Woods told Parliament.

“The market failed in this respect.”

For months, major industrial users have been warning that the industry was under such strain that thousands of jobs are at risk.

Already Taranaki’s Methanex has idled one of its plants, the Norske Skog pulp and paper mill in Kawerau has closed, other paper plants are said to be precarious and even New Zealand Steel has dropped hints about the future of its operations at Glenbrook.

As well as low hydro lake levels, the system does not have nearly enough gas to provide the resilience needed to keep the system at capacity.

Not enough gas, so we banned exploring for any more!

When Act MP Simon Court asked Woods in June about whether the Government may intervene in the gas market to try to prevent power outages, Woods responded with reference to the NZ Battery Project, a massively ambitious project that is unlikely to be built before 2030, if it is progressed at all.

To be fair taking nine years for Labour to develop a solution would be fast for them.

Between the decision to rip up the rules on the gas market, to the difficulty consenting renewables projects, to the threat to build hydro storage at Lake Onslow, the market is simply responding to the signals that the Government is sending it.

I’m not sure you will ever be able to get a major hydro dam consented again.

One of the biggest disappointments of events early on Sunday morning at the National Party conference was that some excellent policy sessions were not reported. The media chose instead to focus on perceived disunity.

As good as the sessions which included Cameron Bagrie on the economy, James A. Brown on technology and Prof Des Gorman on health and Covid were, the highlight was far and away the session on mental health and suicide.

National has given Matt Doocey the spokesmanship for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention, and Judith Collins announced on Sunday that, when National is elected in 2023, Doocey is likely to hold these specific roles in a newly-created ministerial portfolio. I personally believe that is a fantastic idea.

You may have heard of Grace Curtis. This is an excerpt from the transcript of the speech Grace delivered to the conference late on Sunday morning:

Grace’s speech held conference delegates spellbound. I would urge you to read the entire transcript, and even if you’re a cynical old fart like me, have a hankie or tissues handy. There was barely a dry eye in the conference venue. The silence at the end of the speech was broken by a prolonged standing ovation.

At 22, Grace has her whole adult life ahead of her, but her father won’t be there to pour her a beer, or give her the benefit of his farmer’s wisdom. Instead of wallowing in her grief, Grace and two other young women, Tori Wheelans and Georgie Harris, both of whom have also lost their fathers to suicide, have formed Cool Change NZ, an organisation to provide support and just an outlet to their peers who too have been bereaved by suicide.

After the conference ended, I was privileged to speak to Grace, and commend her on her bravery in talking about events which must still be incredibly raw. Talking with her was an experience I will remember for a long time, especially when I ponder the dark days in my not-too-distant past when I could have left my own children in the same space as Grace.

I was fortunate; I got help almost immediately after my breakdown. But hundreds of Kiwis are not getting the help they so desperately need when they have mental health crises. It’s simply not good enough, and neither the current Government or its National-led predecessor have done enough in the mental health space. It’s time that New Zealand took mental health and especially suicide prevention seriously. I’m sure that Grace Curtis wouldn’t mind having to wind up Cool Change NZ because there was no demand.

In the meantime however, I have nothing but deep respect for this courageous young woman and her equally brave friends, who are trying to salvage something positive from their own personal tragedies.

Stuff reports:

The Government is urgently investigating how 87 unvaccinated port workers were allowed to board a ship that carried 11 Covid-19-positive crew members.

Health authorities were urgently testing 98 Tauranga port workers on Monday, after they were involved in the unloading the container ship Rio de la Plata, which was cleared to dock at the city’s port last week.

Crew members on the boat have tested positive for the more-transmissible Delta strain of Covid-19, and the port workers who unloaded the ship spent days out and about in Tauranga before being asked to self-isolate.

It was confirmed after a Cabinet meeting on Monday afternoon that 23 of the 98 workers had tested negative, and the remaining tests were outstanding. Nine of these workers were fully vaccinated, and two had a single dose of the vaccine.

This is a level of incompetence that makes Kiwibuild look like a stunning success.

Border workers should have been the highest priority for vaccination and every border worker should have been vaccinated by 30 June or moved to a different role.

Vaccines have been available for nine months, and only 10% of port workers have been vaccinated. It’s crazy.

Stuff reports:

Cities and towns across the North Island were plunged into darkness on one of the coldest nights of the year, after nationwide demand for electricity reached an all-time high.

Power generation failed to meet demand across New Zealand on Monday evening. Tens of thousands of households were affected by mass power cuts as a result.

The national grid operator Transpower declared a “grid emergency” at 7pm and asked local distribution companies to reduce load on their networks, a spokeswoman for the organisation, Deborah Gray, said.

It was the first time in 10 years that such an emergency had happened.

Banning gas exploration was such a great idea, eh.

Newshub reports:

Former Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters says the Government’s gone back on its word at Pike River and he’s fighting to prove it in court.

Newshub Nation has obtained an affidavit from Peters backing 20 Pike River families who say the Government hasn’t delivered on what was promised. …

Minister Responsible for Pike River Re-entry Andrew Little says exploring 2.4km into the tunnel known as the drift is what was promised and what was delivered. Peters calls it “one of the most disappointing things” he’s ever seen in politics and is adamant Little is wrong.

“That’s preposterous – there’s no way we’d spend that sort of money just to recover the drift.” 

So who do you believe – Winston or Little?

The Herald reports:

Farmers took to the streets to protest against the tax last month, many upset with the impact it would have on rural New Zealand.

And it’s not just the farmers who aren’t happy.

A Newshub/Reid Research poll showed 52.6 per cent of those polled disagreed with the policy; just 37 per cent supported the scheme.

Labour is seriously in the minority on both the ute tax and the billion dollar bike bridge. The bike bridge looks to be terminal. Will they kill the ute tax also?

CNN report:

Seventy percent of New York voters said Cuomo should resign, according to a new poll released on Friday by Quinnipiac University. That number included 57% of registered Democrats, 76% of independents and 88% of Republicans. Among Democrats, the figure has jumped a staggering 34 percentage points since Quinnipiac last asked the question back in March.Cuomo’s approval rating is down to an all-time low of 28%.

I’d say he’ll be impeached in September and gone by October.

“We unequivocally condemn this and all sexual harassment and urge Governor Cuomo to resign,” George Gresham, the union president, said in a statement. The decision marked a stark reversal — emblematic of the changing political tides across the state — from just a little more than a month ago, when Gresham attended and spoke glowingly of Cuomo at a $10,000-a-ticket fundraiser in New York City, according to CNN affiliate Spectrum News, citing a person familiar with the event.

There’s an old saying that if you want a friend in politics, get a dog. Politicians will always turn on you once you are no longer politically useful.

Something I have learnt over many decades in National is to never underestimate regional factionalism. Members and delegates often get parochial and will vote for people from their region where possible. This makes sense from a regional perspective as the more people from your area on the board, the more likely it is your local candidates will do well with list ranking etc.

So the key takeaway in terms of the board elections was that three of the four elected were from Auckland, which is where the conference was hosted. Hosting the conference is an advantage as your delegates can attend without travel or accommodation costs so local electorates will all have full delegations.

And this was probably also an influence in the vote for President – board members are more likely to vote for someone from their own region as President.

This is not to suggest someone’s region is the only influence on the vote. Of course not. Those elected to the board all all good capable people. But it would be silly to pretend there wasn’t a regional influence on the voting. If the conference had been in Dunedin, there may have been a different outcome.

The job of the board now is to unite behind the President they have just elected and work towards ensuring National has lots of members and money by 2023, and that we select some excellent candidates.

The Herald reports:

Director general of health Ashley Bloomfield should explain just how much former Labour prime minister Helen Clark was involved in the medical evacuation of a UN staffer from Fiji to New Zealand, National’s Covid-19 spokesman Chris Bishop said.

On Friday, Bloomfield apologised and corrected an answer he had previously given to Parliament’s Health select committee about how the UN worker was allowed into the country for treatment.

Bloomfield had originally said he had no direct conversations with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) about the transfer.

But on Friday, he wrote to the committee saying he had actually been texting MFAT secretary Chris Seed about it.

The texts, which were released to the committee, show Seed telling Bloomfield that Clark had talked with both himself and Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta about the transfer.

As well as being a former prime minister, Clark is the former head of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Seed said that his ministry was “doing the right thing and staying well away”.

Bloomfield replied saying “we’re all over it. I think we will get resolution”.

This was followed by a text saying the issue was “[a]ll sorted”.

So the official line is that this was a decision made bu the DHB without interference, and they just happened to reverse their decision.

A former Labour PM lobbying the Foreign Minister had no influence.

A former Labour PM lobbying the Secretary of Foreign Affairs had no influence.

The Secretary of Foreign Affairs and the DG of Health texting on it had no influence.

The DG of Health just two hours later saying it was all sorted was unrelated to the above.

Stuff reports:

Greens co-leader James Shaw has comfortably seen off a leadership challenge at the party’s annual general meeting on Saturday.

James Cockle thought he was the man for the job, saying the traditionally left-leaning party had moved too far to the centre.

But the Dunedin software developer and environmental activist captured just four delegate votes to Shaw’s 116 at the meeting in Upper Hutt. Twenty delegates abstained from voting.

The Greens would have been mad to dump Shaw. So nice to see that they’re not.

Stuff reports:

Health officials are “in the market” for annual Covid-19 booster shots for emerging variants of the virus.

In the market? That means we have ordered none so far.

Have they learnt nothing from our slowest in the OECD rollout of the main vaccine? You need to order quickly, not after months of bureaucratic blungling.

We’ve known for four months that a booster vaccine after six to 12 months is recommended.

Germany is starting booster shots next month, and we’ve yet to even order any. Israel has already started the booster shots.

The UK plans to start boosters in September and the US has just ordered 200 million of them.

And we’re just talking about it.

Stuff reports:

A senior police officer in the Hawke’s Bay Organised Crime Unit has let rip at the government’s funding of a meth rehab programme being run by Mongrel Mob members, which was approved by the prime minister.

The Kahukura programme, which serves up to 10 participants over eight weeks on a marae in central Hawke’s Bay, has received $2.75m from the Proceeds of Crime fund.

The programme sees participants working in a ‘’community garden’’ at the home of the president of the Mongrel Mob’s Notorious chapter, Sonny Smith. …

Stuff has spoken to numerous officers who were stunned to hear of the funding.

In a letter to the editor of the Police Association magazine, Detective sergeant Mark Moorhouse, a supervisor in the Hawke’s Bay Organised Crime Unit has put into words how he and his colleagues feel.

He said claims by politicians that Hawke’s Bay police supported the programme was “BS”.

There is no way local frontline police who battle the Mob’s drug empire supported funding them to do drug rehabilitation from the very drugs they sell.

What will have happened is the District Commander would have been consulted by the Commissioner’s office and he or she would have said, we don’t object. There is no way this would have been the view of officers on the frontline.

“My gang-focus staff have for the past two years fought tooth and nail to confront the violence and insidious harm the Mongrel Mob, in particular, have unleashed in our community. More than 30 gang-related shootings in the year to date, and they openly flaunt the wealth they generate from the poison they infuse our communities with,” he wrote.

Imagine the risk those local officers have in dealing with 30 gang shootings and then finding out the Government has given $2.75 million to the Mob.

“We are undermined by the courts and poorly served by a justice system. Corrections is a mess and we’re not sure any more who runs the prisons.

The gangs seem to. If they cause enough trouble they then get given their own block, which becomes their fiefdom.

“The only job satisfaction I have had this year is the fact that the people who work around me have seized huge amounts of firearms, drugs and assets and had an impact on these groups. While it might be a small ripple in a big pond, it is the only ray of light we have had. I am encouraged by the professionalism and tenacity of these awesome people.

“Now you want to tell us that nearly $3 million worth of our blood, sweat and tears is going to be allocated to a scheme that only allows the individuals who are responsible for causing the harm to be enrolled in it, to the detriment of more worthy causes, and then tell the country that the Hawkes’ Bay Police support it. I need to call BS on this because the bulk of us don’t support it,” Moorhouse wrote.

Poor bastards who have to endure this.

Newshub reports:

In the latest Newshub-Reid Research poll, voters were asked: Is the Government doing enough to address the mental health crisis?

An overwhelming majority, 70.7 percent, said no, while just 18.2 percent said yes. 

Its not that I’m defending the Government’s performance in mental health (which has been no results for lots of money), but this is a very leading question.

First of all by using the term crisis, that in itself is a subjective term that will affect the results. A more neutral question would be “How satisfied are you with the Government’s management of mental health”.

The second aspect that is designed to gather a large percentage saying no is asking “Is the Government doing enough”. One can always think the Government can be doing more in an area, even if you think overall they are doing okay.

So while I do think the Govt’s performance in this area is lousy, this question by Newshub is designed to produce a large number saying no.

The Herald reports:

Stricter residency rules for entitlement to New Zealand Superannuation will be a step closer when Parliament votes to change a member’s bill on Wednesday.

The bill will require people to have been in New Zealand for a minimum of 20 years since the age of 20, instead of the current 10-year minimum (including five years since the age of 50).

This is a good change. People should have paid tax for an lengthy period before they are eligible for NZ Super.

The bill, the New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income (Fair Residency) Amendment Bill, has the support of all parliamentary parties, except for the Greens.

It is in the name of National MP Andrew Bayly. It was New Zealand First policy originally announced by leader Winston Peters and then promoted in a bill by former New Zealand First MP Mark Patterson. With New Zealand First out of Parliament, it was picked up by National.

The phased-in proposals set to be passed are as follows:

Age as at June 30, 2021, and Residence requirement (after age 20)

64 and over … 10 years
62–63 … 11 years
60–61 … 12 years
58–59 … 13 years
56–57 … 14 years
54–55 … 15 years
52–53 … 16 years
50–51 … 17 years
48–49 … 18 years
46–47 … 19 years
45 and under … 20 years

The phase in periods look sensible. We should of course also phase in an increase in the age from 65 to 70.

Newsroom reports:

Andrew Little is visibly annoyed by the problems he’s encountered in the health system since taking on the portfolio following last year’s election.

“We’ve put so much extra funding into the system since we’ve been in Government and the same pressures that were evident three years ago are evident now.

“So, what I’m saying is how can we possibly have pumped in billions of extra dollars, and it not appear to have made a difference?’’

A very good question. The answer is a mixture of incompetence and abolishing the health targets.

One is having funded over the last three years an additional 3000 full-time nurses to take the pressure off a stretched workforce.

Half of those roles remain vacant, so instead DHBs are paying overtime to already over-worked nurses and paying expensive bills for agency nurses to fill the gaps.

Well the Government is making near impossible for qualified nurses to get residency in NZ.

“After having made the decision in 2019 that we’re going to spend $235 million on these five (mental health) facilities – two years on we are still in so-called planning stages and in some cases a site hasn’t even been identified yet as to where a particular facility is going to go.

“It’s just ridiculous,’’ exclaims Little.

It is ridiculous and the role of a good Minister is to ensure things don’t die under bureaucratic blankets.

Stuff reports:

New Zealand’s labour market is running hot – but workers aren’t yet seeing the benefit, the Council of Trade Unions says.

Stats NZ revealed on Friday that the unemployment rate had plummeted in the year to June, to 4 per cent.

CTU economist and director of policy Craig Renney said the labour market looked to have largely recovered from the shock of the global pandemic.

Average wage inflation was at 2.1 per cent, Stats NZ said, which was up from 1.6 per cent the quarter earlier but still less than the 3.3 rate of inflation.

An average wage increase of 2.1% is fine if inflation is 1%. The problem is that inflation is at 3.3% so anyone who gets less than that is going backwards.

The answer isn’t to make inflation worse by increasing wages faster (which increases prices) but to stop printing money and get inflation down.

The Herald reports:

The Government’s communications spend has jumped more than 50 per cent in four years, and is now costing the taxpayer close to $90 million a year.

So it will be well over $100 million by the next election.

The biggest spender was the New Zealand Transport Agency/Waka Kotahi at $8.2m over 2020/21, up from $2.6m in 2016/17.

The number of staff there in communications roles has increased from 32 to 68.

To be fair NZTA probably does need many more comms staff. The agency used to build roads to reduce congestion. Now they are doing things to increase congestion (such as traffic lights and a pedestrian crossing on SH1 rather than an overbridge) so they have so many more people angry at them.

Over those four years, more than $300m has been spent. The number of full-time staff increased from 564 to 845.2.

280 more comms staff. Yay.

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