Stuff reports:

The National party thinks it’s time to move managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) hotels out of downtown Auckland.

The party’s Covid-19 spokesperson Chris Bishop called on the Government to investigate building dedicated quarantine facilities close to the airport.

Bishop said that with Covid-19 likely to be with us for some time, it’s time to move on from the ad-hoc collection of hotels-turned-quarantine facilities and create something purpose-built.

Based on previous experience Labour will condemn this idea, and then implement it in around three months time.

Bishop said both Government funding and private capital could fund the scheme; with the Government using fast-track powers to consent the facility and get it built. A private provider could build the facility and lease it back to the Government with some costs recouped from returnees.

The facility could become a permanent quarantine facility or be turned into social or private housing following the pandemic.

“Yes it will be incredibly expensive,” Bishop said.

“But firstly MIQ is expensive, and you have to compare it to the cost of lockdowns,” he said.

Each Auckland lockdown costs hundreds of millions.

The Washington Times reports:

A 12-year old boy who jumped to his grandmother’s defense during a North Carolina home invasion managed to kill one of two intruders.

The two masked suspects forced their way into 73-year-old Linda Ellis’ home Saturday, shooting her in the leg, her great-niece, Chiquita Coley Ellis of Goldsboro, told a local NBC affiliate.

“I just couldn’t believe she’d been shot because she’s a good person,” the niece said.

One of the suspects shot Ms. Ellis after he was informed there was no money on hand.

It was then that the young boy used a family gun to defend his grandmother. Khalil Herring, 19, died of his injuries shortly thereafter. 

If this was NZ, the 12 year old would probably be charged!

News.com.au reports:

Australia’s leading university has encouraged staff to use “parent-inclusive language”, such as “chestfeeding” instead of “breastfeeding” and “human milk” rather than “mother’s milk”.

Similarly, the terms “mother” and “father” should be replaced with “gestational” and “nongestational” parent, according to the Australian National University’s Gender-Inclusive Handbook.

I’m surprised with all this rush to have “inclusive” language, midwives are still called midwives!

The Herald reports on Dean Whakatau:

Just two months after being released from prison for kidnapping and sexual offences against a teenage girl, a Rotorua patched gang member started grooming another young girl.

Dean Wayne Whakatau, 41, is on the Child Sex Offender Register and has told authorities his disregard for the law is a “part of gang life”.

During the latest sexual encounter against a girl, he gave her cannabis and afterwards an unknown drug he called “crack”.

The former Black Power gang member and now Killer Beez member is back behind bars after he was jailed for seven years on 13 charges, including four charges of having unlawful sexual connection with a girl aged under 16.

Judge Greg Hollister-Jones said during sentencing in the Rotorua District Court last week, Whakatau would be jailed without parole or early release, meaning he had to serve the full term.

This is three strikes working as intended. Whakatau is obviously a recividist offender who has no regard for the law. So on his second strike he has lost parole eligibility and when he gets to his third strike he will go away for an even longer time, protecting the community.

Labour is going to change the law so that he is eligible for parole after just 28 months!

Whakatau has a chequered criminal background, with the court hearing he had 110 previous convictions.

Just needs some more hugs.

Stuff reports:

The first batch of Covid-19 vaccines has been administered at the Auckland quarantine facility, marking the “beginning of the end of the pandemic in New Zealand”.

Twenty-five health professionals were the first in the country to be given the vaccine on Friday afternoon. They also practised administering the vaccine.

This is good news but I would say it is the end of the beginning, not the beginning of the end.

It is likely Covid-19 restrictions of some sort will remain in place until 2024, from what I have seen. Even if we get 75% vaccinated by the end of 2021, that doesn’t mean borders will open fully.

On 13 March at Circa, there is a play written by Claire Robinson and directed by Ross Jolly about Michael Joseph Savage. I’m going along, as looks fascinating.

The backdrop from Claire:

The play centres on Michael Joseph Savage, Labour’s first ‘rockstar’ Prime Minister. For decades his iconic portrait hung on the walls of Labour supporter’s homes. Today it regularly beams into our living rooms, from a shelf behind Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern when she is interviewed at her desk in Wellington. Te Ara, the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, describes him as “the most loved of all New Zealand Prime Ministers.”

But, there is much about this complex man that people won’t know.

Australian born Savage is our only bachelor Prime Minister, a private man whose few close social relationships were with men. Was he New Zealand’s first closeted gay Prime Minister?

Further unbeknown to the New Zealand public and the Labour Party at the time, for his entire 4.5 years as Prime Minister, Savage actively avoided seeking the medical treatment that could have saved his prime minister-ship and his life, from his untimely death from colon cancer. He is also likely to have been addicted to the morphine he was taking to manage the pain of the disease.

Underpinning his reluctance to get treatment was his fear of being challenged for the party leadership by his ‘frenemy’, popular Labour MP John A. (Jack) Lee who, with the support of the Labour Party Caucus, repeatedly attacked Savage for his lack of socialist commitment in government. Savage’s Deputy, Peter Fraser, was also an ambitious man that stood to (and did) gain great power once Savage passed away.

Set against the backdrop of the turbulent events of the 1935-1940 period, THE LEE LETTER offers an at times surprising, yet sensitive perspective on the ruthless and ultimately deadly competition for political power that took place between some of New Zealand history’s most public men in the influential first Labour government.

It is an apposite play for our times, given the many parallels between the policy initiatives being undertaken by the current Ardern-led Labour government and the Savage-led Labour government over 80 years ago.

Again, very much looking forward to this.

News.com.au reports:

A World War I drama about Gallipoli produced for the ABC would be required to focus on “diversity” among Diggers, including a 50 per cent female cast and Indigenous lead actors, under new guidelines announced by the national broadcaster today.

TV production companies wishing to work with the ABC must now meet minimum “diversity” requirements both in front and behind the camera, with a focus on “under-represented people and perspectives”.

The ABC’s new “Diversity and Inclusion Commissioning Guidelines”, which come into effect from today, cover screen content across genres including drama, comedy, children’s, factual and entertainment programs.

The guidelines generally require that TV content must be “about under-represented communities, backgrounds and experience”, or include at least one main cast member who is Indigenous, from a “diverse” background, disabled or identifies as LGBTQI+.

What if one cast member is disabled, lesbian and indigenous? Do you get extra funding for that?

Additionally, at least half of the main cast and crew must be female or identify as “gender diverse”

Those WWII war dramas will be interesting!

Evan Mulholland, director of communications at free market think tank the Institute of Public Affairs, said the ABC’s “contribution to sense of national identity is exactly the kind of national identity you’d expect from people based at Ultimo and Southbank”.

“The ABC likes to promote every type of diversity other than diversity of opinion,” Mr Mulholland said.

“On every major issue, from the lockdowns to climate change to Australia Day, the ABC presents only one point of view. The ABC is too focused with what divides us, rather than what unites us. It is obsessed with identity politics.

Sadly where Australia goes, we may follow.

Joel Maxwell writes in Stuff:

Do Māori need a specific plan for vaccination roll-out? …

 I think that there needs to be a specific plan for rolling out vaccination into Māori communities.

Like the bogeyman of council Māori wards, which is being eased by urgent legislation under this Government, there are times when specific action for Māori is needed.

So what is the Government doing?

Initially, Minister for Covid-19 Response Chris Hipkins told media, when questioned about a specific plan for Māori, that the vaccine roll-out would be based on risk.

“And Māori are disproportionately represented in those [at risk] groups, who will receive the vaccine early.”

If we look at the infection stats for Covid-19, then Asian NZers should be the priority, not Maori.

Here’s the infection and population stats for Covid-19.

• Europeans – 60.6% of cases, 71.7% of population
• Asian – 19.6% of cases, 15.1% of population
• Maori – 8.4% of cases, 16.5% of population
• Pacific – 8.1% of cases, 8.1% of population

So the ratio of cases to population is:

1. Asian 130%
2. Pacific 100%
3. Europeans 85%
4. Maori 51%

So in fact Maori are the least likely ethnic group to be infected.

But I suspect facts and data will be meaningless when it comes to virtue signalling.

The Spinoff reports:

At 7.38am today a short email arrived from Facebook News Partnerships. It contained a total of five sentences, the most important reading: “I am writing to confirm that due to new laws in Australia, from today we will reluctantly restrict publishers and people in Australia from sharing or viewing Australian and international news content on Facebook.”

Despite its matter-of-fact tone and brevity, it could hardly be more consequential – this is the end (for now, maybe forever) of Facebook as a news distribution channel in Australia. Facebook says news represents less than 4% of content on its platform – but for publishers it can be the source of as much as half their traffic. And for Facebook, the risk is that even if it is only 4% of content, if users consider it critical, do they become less reliant on the platform?

The backdrop to this is the Morrison Government was planning to legislate to force big tech companies to fund media companies. This was of course very popular with media companies. Normally one would not expect this sort of attack on property rights from a centre right Government, but I suspect the power of the Murdoch press is responsible.

Facebook would have been forced to pay money to media companies when either the media company themselves or a user shared their news story on Facebook. So they have taken the entirely logical decision to block such sharing, so they don’t have to pay for promoting the media’s stories.

The timing is instructive – Google, which had previously held firm with Facebook on its own, far more consequential threat to withdraw search from Australia, yesterday capitulated and signed a revenue share deal with Rupert Murdoch’s Newscorp. Google has been doing deals with all major news providers in the lead up to the code passing. In total, Google will be paying at least $100m a year to evade the code.

Important to note Google is not paying the money for search, as the code was mandating. It is for a new product called Google News Showcase.

We as Internet users should be very worried about any precedent of search engines having to pay companies to be featured in search results. It would undermine the entire utility of search.

Lots of interesting and even alarming data in the latest birth and deaths stats.

• The fertility rate has fallen 26% since 2008, from 2.19 to 1.61 – well below the replacement rate of 2.1
• Deaths in 2020 were 4.8% lower than in 2019 and the death rate 6.7% lower.
• Infant mortality rate down from 4.53 to 3.96 which is excellent
• Teenage fertility rate continues to drop – from 33.1 in 2008 to 12.2 in 2020. It was going up prior to 2008.

Stuff reports:

The Pike River Recovery Agency has reached the roof fall 2.26 kilometres up the mine’s access tunnel, marking the end point of its journey and ending any hopes of recovering any bodies.

And it cost $51 million to find that out.

Sonya Rockhouse, who lost her son Ben in the explosion, said the end of the drift was another milestone on the way to justice.

“The drift recovery was always about retrieving evidence and, if they were there, remains.

“Now that the mining work is done the indepth forensics can be completed and the legal work can begin.”

The agency would now turn its attention to the detailed forensic work in the Pit Bottom in Stone area, which was required for the police investigation.

Pit bottom in stone is a 600m network of roadways about 1900m up the drift that holds vital electrical equipment that could provide data to explain the cause of the explosions.

The chance that any of the “evidence” will lead to a prosecution and a conviction beyond reasonable doubt is miniscule.

Meet Elim Tekotahi Emery.

• Sep 2011 – stabbed his 18-year-old partner and his uncle with a boning knife.
• Mar 2012 – sentenced to 65 months prison
• Oct 2014 – released on parole
• Nov 2016 – parole cancelled due to violence against a partner causing significant injuries to her face, including a fractured eye socket
• Feb 2020 – violent and prolonged assault against his latest partner, causing a miscarriage. He laughed as he hit her with a rock, stomped on herm, kicked her, punched her and gouged her eye. He also bit her in multiple places.
• Feb 2021 – given 56 month sentence with no parole as it was his second strike

Labour thinks Emery should remain eligible for parole. Once they change the law he will be able to get parole after serving just 19 months of the latest sentence.

Stuff reports:

The country’s median house price jumped $118,300 in 12 months to hit $730,300, the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand said on Tuesday.

That Kiwibuild is really making a difference, isn’t it.

Chris Trotter writes:

That wokeism will generate massive resistance is certain. Its assault on the traditional order will leave more and more people feeling unmoored and vulnerable. Inevitably, a political movement will arise to contest the wokeists’ claims and policies. This movement will not, however, be driven by the traditional Left, it will be the creation of an angry and radically populist Right. What’s more, the transformational ambitions of wokeism will provoke its opponents into advancing an equally comprehensive programme of revocation and reconstitution. The result will be a deeply divided society, with tolerance and empathy in short supply.

The backlash against wokeism will be made much more aggressive by the difficulties its opponents will encounter in making their voices heard. The mainstream news media – and especially the state-owned media – have become increasingly intolerant of ideas and opinions which directly, or indirectly, challenge the wokeists’ view of the world. Stuff, the largest newspaper publisher in the country has embraced wokeism wholeheartedly and set its face resolutely against the errors of “racist” New Zealanders. Even more significantly, citizens determined to spread “unacceptable” ideas can no longer rely upon the major social media platforms for their dissemination. Increasingly, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram are “de-platforming” individuals and groups (including a former President of the United States!) whose beliefs have been anathematised by the woke.

This de-platforming of dissenters by the woke media – often facilitated by threats from major corporate advertisers to withdraw their financial support – will complicate the mobilisation of wokeism’s opponents, but it will not prevent it. Inevitably, the sheer number of New Zealanders shut out of the wokeist discourse will persuade conservative investors to offer them a Fox News-like outlet for traditional views and values. As Rupert Murdoch knows well, there are big profits to be made out of alienation and anger. Those corporates hitherto persuaded to embrace (and enforce) wokeism may experience second thoughts when the enormous size of the traditionalist audience is revealed.

There is a huge opportunity here for a media outlet that is not woke.

The key insight of the world’s most successful populist leaders is that the voters will not punish a politician for farting in the wokeist church: someone who simply refuses to be daunted by charges of racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia, or any of the many other “thought crimes” promulgated by the woke. The politician who responds to all such accusations with a straightforward “Yes, I am. And if you expect me to apologise for it, you’re going to be bitterly disappointed!” That sort of politician: Trump, Duterte, Bolsonaro, Orban; receives as many cheers as jeers – probably more.

The next anti-woke leader will not be a gentleman like Don Brash. It will be a fiery authoritarian – probably a cross between Brian Tamaki and Billy TK.

While New Zealand waits for that perilous person to appear, the woke supremacy will continue. Hate speech will be outlawed. The nation’s history will be re-written. Even the country’s name will be driven relentlessly towards the memory hole. Were these assaults upon tradition to be offset by decisive governmental action making rents and homes affordable, forcing the rich to pay their fair share of tax, and restoring a rough balance of power in the workplace, then they might be forgiven. If the democratic rights of New Zealand citizens were being beefed-up – instead of being whittled away – then wokeism might have a future. But, they aren’t, and it doesn’t.

And this week, despite New Zealand being in a Covid-19 emergency, Labour is rushing under urgency a law to repeal the right of local residents to determine what type of local electoral system they have.

Stuff reports:

A wanted Isis terrorist from New Zealand with two young children has reportedly been detained near the Syrian border by Turkish authorities.

Turkey’s national defence ministry issued a short statement late on Monday evening, saying three New Zealanders were caught trying to enter the country illegally from Syria.

“A 26-year-old woman named S.A. among those caught was identified as a DAESH [Isis] terrorist,” the statement, issued on Twitter, read.

I do hope the children are well looked after and can be given a good future, as opposed to running around Syria.

It seems the women has lived in Australia since she was six, but Australia has cancelled her citizenship, which means she will probably retirn to NZ.

Too many maiden speeches for me to cover them all, but Karen Chhour’s stood out, as she has first hand experience of the child welfare system.

This is when a social worker told me, “I’m sorry, none of your family wants you.” I asked whether I could go back to my grandmother and was told, “Your grandmother can’t take you again—it’s too hard for her.” I spent years resenting my grandmother for this, and it was only when I got older that I found out she had begged social services to have me, only to be told she was too old. Can you imagine being a child and hearing from a social worker that nobody—not even your family—wants you? I have lived with these words my whole life.

Beyond awful.

 It is high time the Government stopped the lip service and did something that actually helps the people that need it the most. Governments past and present have spent years avoiding making any real meaningful decisions, but at least we can now say we’ve had an inquiry into abuse in State care.

The royal commission report is a good thing. It brings some closure to the victims and I am grateful that these people have been given the opportunity to speak up and finally have a voice. But does this report really tell us anything we did not already know? Now we need more than just words. Apologies only go so far and cannot be taken seriously when what we apologise for is still happening.

I stand here today not only as a survivor of abuse as a child but a survivor of our system’s abuse. It is time we said what needs to be said: enough is enough and we won’t tolerate it any more. We must focus on our most vulnerable, our children. Parents are grownups. They can make their own choices and decisions. Our children don’t have the ability to make big choices yet, and they shouldn’t need to. They deserve our guidance and protection.

ACT thinks this can’t really take place while there’s such a focus on race and culture in an organisation delivering that protection. As I recently said, when Grainne Moss stood down as Oranga Tamariki chief executive, ethnicity and culture should not be how we decide what’s in the best interest of our children. Oranga Tamariki should be colour-blind and open to whatever will ensure a child’s wellbeing and safety. It is not a one-size-fits-all thing, and having legislation that tries to make it that way doesn’t work for our children.

Incidentally Karen is Maori.

If that means placing a vulnerable child into a home of a family who desperately want to love and care for them, rather than doing everything possible to place their child back into a family that made them vulnerable in the first place, then that should be the solution. As someone who has experienced three elements of placement—non-family who wanted me, family who didn’t, an extended family who did—I can tell you, as a young person you’ll take love, compassion, stability wherever you can find it. 

Sadly if the immediate family is dysfunctional, the wider family often is also.