Over 1,500 people have voted in the 2019 Kiwiblog Awards. The winners are:

• National MP of the year – Judith Collins wins with 31% followed by Simon Bridges on 28%, Shane Reti 22% and Chris Bishop 20%
• Labour MP of the Year – Grant Robertson wins this year on 53% followed by Jacinda Ardern on 38% and Trevor Mallard on 9%
• Minor Party MP of the Year – A two horse race and David Seymour gets his usual landslide majority of 90% with Chloe Swarbrick on 10%
• MP of the Year is also a big win for favourite David Seymour on 84% and Jacinda Ardern 16%.

Congratulations to the winners, and the runners up.

Newshub reports:

Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg has called out the New Zealand Government for its “so-called” climate emergency declaration earlier this month.

In a tweet on Sunday (local time), the 17-year-old linked to a Newsroom opinion piece, arguing the Government’s declaration is merely virtue signalling unless it’s backed by immediate action to reduce the country’s carbon emissions.

“‘In other words, the Government has just committed to reducing less than 1 percent of the country’s emissions by 2025’,” Thunberg tweeted, quoting an excerpt from the article.

On this issue, it is Greta in the right.

The Government has to date failed on almost every measure with reducing emissions. The renewable electricity share has dropped. They have managed only 0.9% of public sector cars to go electric. They are projecting an extra 15,000 kT of greenhouse gases and their carbon neutral public sector pledge is merely a repeat of the same promise they made in 2007/

The 538 members of the Electoral College met in their 50 state capitals and DC today and voted for their pledged candidates. There were no faithless electors. Joe Biden won 57% of the Electoral college vote and Donald Trump 43%.

The only remaining step now is for Congress to certify and count the votes. The electoral votes certified by each Governor can only be rejected by Congress if both the House and the Senate agree. So this would mean 50 out of 50 to 52 Republican Senators would have to sustain an objection as well as at least six Democratic members of the House (and every House Republican).

Voting is now open for the 2020 Kiwiblog Awards.

The contest for National MP of the Year is between

• Chris Bishop for getting the highest personal vote of any MP, relative to their party and for his work in transport and infrastructure
• Simon Bridges for keeping National in the mid 40s pre-Covid and for his social media game since losing the leadership
• Judith Collins for accepting the hospital pass and providing much needed strong leadership for the party
• Shane Reti for his competence and credibility in health, and now as deputy leader

The contest for Labour MP of the Year is between

• Jacinda Ardern for leading Labour to their best result since 1946
• Trevor Mallard for changes making Parliament run better
• Grant Robertson for steady economic stewardship through Covid-19

Note there were also nominations for Siouxsie Wiles, Ashley Bloomfield and Covid-19 🙂

The contest for Minor Party MP of the Year is between:

• David Seymour for leading ACT to their best ever election result and restoring ACT’s brand
• Chlöe Swarbrick for winning Auckland Central and almost single handedly winning the cannabis referendum despite the total lack of leadership from Labour

Finally for overall 2019 MP of the Year, it is between:

• Jacinda Ardern for her historic election victory and leadership during Covid-19
• David Seymour for his election victory and constructive criticism of the Covid-19 response

You can vote in the embedded survey below, or at this link.

As I expected, Sir Bob Jones has responded to the disgraceful and false smear against him by Green MP Ricardo Menendez March in his normal forthright style. The blog is titled:

A horrible Green Party little turd

He first addresses the false claim:

He protested at the simplicity of his film projection job involving pushing a start button and (again, I’m not making this up) being criticised by politicians for calling it a low-skilled job, despite just acknowledging that reality.

Then he moved on to fresh fields which is why people drew my attention to this abomination of a self-centred world class wanker’s maiden speech, saying,

             “I clearly remember seeing clips of Winston Peters and Bob Jones scapegoating immigrants for the housing crisis, for unemployment and for inequality in general. We were also blamed for bringing low-skilled, low wage labour that didn’t contribute to the economy- or so they claimed.”

So here’s a message to this little turd. First, you clearly remember no such thing. The only time I’ve had a TV exchange on immigration with Winston was brief.

Winston: “Walking down Queen Street is like being in Hong Kong”. Me: “Yes. Isn’t it wonderful. All those beautiful Asian girls”

Heh. So there was no TV clip of Sir Bob scapegoating immigrants. It’s something he invented.

After this was pointed out to Menendez March, he refused to back down:

So, waking to how utterly wrong he’s been in maligning me, how did Menendez March respond? An Apology! You must be kidding.

Instead he dug his hole even deeper responding with spectacular illiteracy, “the Bob Jones of the world see us as economic units, so yeah nah”.

It’s unbelievable this garbage is in Parliament with his snout in the taxpayer’s pocket. Now if I’m known for anything it’s my advocacy for the humanities.

For four decades I’ve ridiculed B Coms and Commerce degrees (success in business is basically common sense and energy, something alien to the fluttering Menendez March who from his utterances oozes a sense of entitlement).

I’ve forked out millions for history and philosophy students’ scholarships.

I think the real crime is that Sir Bob is wealthy. To a Marxist this is an obscenity. So he chose his maiden speech to smear him.

Stuff reports:

A law change that requires schools to be routinely warned if sex offenders move in to the neighbourhood would amount to “disproportionately severe treatment” of offenders, Ministry of Justice lawyers say.

National MP Matt Doocey, whose private bill seeks to make the changes, described the advice as “outrageous”, placing the rights of child-sex offenders above principals and parents’ right to know.

He said the suggestions that notifying schools would be disproportionately severe to offenders was similarly outrageous as there were many cases where schools were already notified, and his bill would only make notification routine.

The advice seems ridicolous.

If the bill required posters to be placed around the neighbourhood warning people, then I would agree it would be unfair.

But merely notifying schools that a paedophile has moved in down the road is the least we should do to keep kids safe.

A guest post by Simon Lusk:

The Alliance Group publicly released their annual results showing an impressive $1.8B of revenue, up from last year’s $1.7B. Despite appearing not meeting the criteria of the wage subsidy of turnover falling by 30% or projected 30% they are refusing to pay back the remaining amount they have retained.

Alliance were an essential service through lockdown, and while they may have incurred some additional costs, it appears they do not meet the criteria required to retain any of the wage subsidy.

Alliance may have legitimate grounds for refusing to return the wage subsidy. They may not have legitimate reasons. What is not in any doubt, however, is they are treating returning the wage subsidy as a negotiation. That is why I want their decisions tested by an independent referee in the form of a judge in New Zealand’s court system.

There is also an issue of fairness that appears to have been missed by Alliance, commentators & government ministers. If a poor brown beneficiary in south Auckland had claimed a few thousand dollars more than they were entitled from social welfare they would be pursued & punished. Our law is supposed to treat all equally. Alliance directors appear to think they can retain large amounts of corporate welfare and not face consequences, unlike the poor brown beneficiary in South Auckland.

This is why I have sought to extend my action to all Alliance directors. They are well paid, well educated and wealthy. They likely do not approve of the beneficiary struggling to make ends meet ripping off the benefit system. They should not be surprised that someone wants them treated the same way as the benefit fraudster. New Zealand is an egalitarian society where we pride ourselves on all being treated equally. That’s why I want to see the Alliance directors in court justifying their decision to keep corporate welfare. Let the judge decide and let the directors face up to defend themselves as the poor brown beneficiary would have to. 

There have been a few articles on the diminishing capacity of Senator Dianne Feinstein who is aged 87 and will be 91 when her term expires.

This got me interested in how many senators are over 60, 70, 80 etc.

Here’s the current breakdown:

• 80s: Seven
• 70s: 24
• 60s: 38
• 50s: 19
• 40s: 12

So around a third are aged over 70 and around two thirds over 60.

Term limits would solve the problem. A maximum of three six year terms should be enough to make a decent contribution.

The year is almost over, so it is time for nominations for the annual Kiwiblog Awards. The nomination categories are:

• 2020 Minor Party MP of the Year
• 2020 National MP of the Year
• 2020 Labour MP of the Year
• 2020 MP of the Year

Make your nominations in the comments (free free to say why) and then I’ll start a vote based on the most popular nominations.

The winners in 2019 were:

• National MP of the year – Chris Bishop
• Labour MP of the Year – Kris Faafoi
• Minor Party MP of the Year – David Seymour 
• MP of the Year – David Seymour

Was very saddened to read that Michael Tull died last week. Michael was one of the funniest and nicest people around.

I met Michael at Otago University, as we were both involved in student politics. Michael was successful, while I was not. He was a larger than life presence even back then.

Michael was on the exec for three years, edited Critic, the orientation mag and the capping mag, plus had the most popular show on Radio One. Last year OUSA made him a life member.

Michael had a sense of humour that was unparalleled. Not only did he edit the official capping mag, but frustrated with what jokes he couldn’t publish in there, he also edited the anonymous unofficial capping mag that was a sensational hit for several years.

This was in the late 1980s and even the official capping mag of that period would today find you before half a dozen disciplinary bodies for its off colour jokes. But the unofficial capping mag was exponentially worse. The jokes in there were so appalling (yet hilarious) that the Gore District Council banned it three years in a row. This was especially ironic as the Gore District Council were unaware that it was actually printed in Gore.

Michael was also a superb and entertaining debater.

I didn’t see much of Michael in the early 1990s. Off memory he was a professional comedy writer for some TV shows.

But in the late 1990s I was delighted when he popped up in Wellington as a press gallery reporter for IRN and even happier when he got hired by Jenny Shipley to work for National in opposition with me. Michael quickly became Chief Press Secretary and he was a popular figure with MPs, journalists and staff.

Working with Michael was great fun. I can’t believe the shit we got away with. I recall after a National MP gave birth, Michael edited the photo of her with her baby to make the baby look like me, and sent it to most of the staff and caucus.

There were regular “flame wars” between around eight or ten of the staff who were good friends, and the level of insults between us could reach heights or depths that would have sent anyone from the HR department into cardiac arrest.

After Parliament Michael went on to be a comms manager for Capital Coast Health, NZ Post, Ministry of Justice and more until his health declined in recent years. Michael was also a devoted father of four kids.

Michael has many many friends who will miss him, as well of course as his family. Go well Michael.

Stuff reports:

Professor James (Jim) Robert Flynn, an internationally renowned psychology and politics professor and free speech advocate, has died.

The University of Otago Emeritus professor died on Friday, aged 86.

He developed what is now known as the “Flynn effect” which to describes the sustained increase in IQ test scores in populations from one generation to the next.

His work led to national attention. He has been profiled by Scientific American, Newsweek and written about in the New York Times.

I studied at Otago University, where he was of course very well known. He stood for New Labour and the Alliance several times. A charming and intelligent man.

His academic work is regarded highly internationally. Ironically his final publication called In Defence of Free Speech: The University as Censor was itself censored by the publisher who reneged on publishing it due to concern about liability from hate speech laws.

Condolences to his family and friends.

The 538 members of the Electoral College will meet on Monday 14 December 2020, which will be Tuesday 15 December 2020.

They do not meet as one body. They will meet in the 50 state capitals and DC. The times they meet range from 10 am to 3 pm local times. So I’d expect most to be over by midday Tuesday NZDT.

There are 306 electors pledged to Biden and 232 pledged to Trump. It is not uncommon for there to be one or two faithless electors who may not vote for the candidate they are pledged to. In 32 states and DC the law requires an elector to vote for the candidate they are pledged to.

Each elector will write the name of their preferred President and VP on a piece of paper and each state will total up the votes and sign six certificates with the results.

The six copies go to the President of the Senate, the Archivist of the US (2 copies), the state’s Secretary of State (2 copies) and the chief judge of the district court covering the state capital.

Then it is all over, bar the counting of the votes by Congress on 6 Jan.

The US has hit 300,000 Covid-19 deaths. Recall a certain person claiming early on only a handful will die.

And these are not deaths that would have occurred anyway, as some claim. The estimated excess deaths this year is 275,000 to 380,000 above normal.

Also while Covid-19 is far more dangerous to the elderly, they are not the only victims. Over 50,000 of those who died are aged under 65.

Barry Soper writes:

Trevor Mallard should resign from The Speaker’s job, I believe, before he faces a vote of no confidence when Parliament resumes sitting in February.

National’s lost confidence in him and Labour, the party that preaches wellbeing and kindness, surely will have no choice but to vote against his continuing in the role.

It’s been confirmed that the almost $334,000 in legal costs have been paid out by the taxpayer. Why? Well Mallard had the rules changed after he made his outrageous comment to protect him from having to pay the bill for something he should have known would go against him.

The tragedy in all of this is that the man he accused of a terrible crime, who spoke exclusively to me after the Mallard allegation last year, has suffered serious health issues since he was sent packing and it looks as though he will get nothing from the settlement.

The rule change is significant because it allows MPs to not just cover their own costs of a lawsuit, but also any settlement.

Jacinda Ardern, who is close to Mallard, has so far kept the issue at arm’s length.

She was asked in what other workplace in New Zealand would someone be able to falsely accuse a person of being a rapist and keep his job.

Ardern simply referred the questioner to the apologetic statement Mallard had made.

She may not be able to remove him from office, that’s Parliament’s job. But she at least should say whether the Speaker’s behaviour is acceptable to her.

I’d say the chances of Labour voting to remove Mallard as Speaker is somewhere between 0% and 0.000001%

Labour in the 2017 Coalition Agreement with NZ First promised to relocate government functions into the regions.

You often hear this from political parties – that too many public servants are in Wellington.

In 2018 and 2019 Labour went backwards. The proportion of public servants outside Wellington didn’t increase but fell – from 58.3% to 57.6% and then 56.4%.

The PSC has just released the 2020 data. And again all bad news for the promises. Another drop to 55.7%.

I’m sure this term though it will all turn around!

Stuff reports:

Speaker Trevor Mallard has cost the taxpayer more than $333,000 after a parliamentary staffer he accused of rape pursued legal action, and the National Party now says it can no longer support Mallard in the job.

The figure, revealed to the National Party in a written parliamentary question, includes a $158,000 settlement payment from the Speaker to the staffer, $171,000 to cover legal fees, and $4641.70 for Crown Law advice to the former deputy speaker.

Sometimes defamation suits are unavoidable in politics, especially for Ministers.

But this case seemed highly avoidable. The Speaker over-stated the case massively against a Parliamentary Service employee, and it has cost taxpayers $333,000.

It’s good that the information on cost has been released.

The latest REINZ data shows Auckland median house price has gone up $145,000 in 12 months.

In 2017 Labour campaigned on abolishing the rural urban boundary which artificially restricts land supply. It was one of their best policies. In 2020 they quietly announced that they had reneged on the policy.

So the increase in house prices is not an accident. They have deliberately decided to renege on a policy which would have lowered the cost of land.

Stuff reports:

All 31 staff at one of Wellington’s most well-known cafes have been made redundant weeks out from Christmas.

The cafe started operating out of Wellington Central’s Midland Park on Lambton Quay in 1996, meaning next year would have been its 25th in operation, making it one of the oldest cafes in the capital.

Very sad for the staff, and customers.

Astoria is my default meet up place in Wellington. I would have had coffee there several hundred times. I’ll miss it.

Staff were informed that wage costs had risen, however the price of coffee had not. The cafe was not making enough money, staff were told.

Many employers can’t afford to increase prices to cover cost increases. That is why it is important to have low inflation and have the market set wages.

Stuff reports:

An Auckland Council employee has died in a suspected suicide amid allegations of harassment and bullying.

According to her LinkedIn profile, Gargiulo had worked at the council since May 2017 following nearly five years at a healthcare agency.

She was responsible for implementing the council’s weed management plan, of which the most controversial aspect was the use of the chemical weedkiller glyphosate.

Stuff understands Gargiulo came under a great deal of pressure from elected members and members of the public over the issue, which came to a head at a climate change and environment committee meeting on November 12.

She died a few weeks later.

Very sad for her family and colleagues. Thoughts are with them.

While suicide is never something you can tie to one event, it is disturbing to read that pressure from Councillors may have played a part.

No doubt this will be looked into by the Coroner.