The Guardian reports:

Among the other government proposals that will be fleshed out on Tuesday is the appointment of a “free speech champion” who will investigate potential infringements of free speech in higher education and recommend redress.

In addition, a new free speech condition will be placed on universities in order to be registered and access public funding, and the higher education regulator in England, the Office for Students (OfS), will have the power to impose fines in the case of breaches.

Under the proposals, the government wants to introduce a statutory tort for breaches of the free speech duty, which would enable academic staff or students who have been expelled, dismissed or demoted to seek redress through the courts.

And for the first time the free speech duty will apply directly to student unions, which will be required to take steps to ensure free speech for their members as well as visiting speakers. The government is also looking at bringing student unions, which are currently governed by the Charity Commission, under OfS control.

Announcing the measures, the education secretary said: “Free speech underpins our democratic society and our universities have a long and proud history of being places where students and academics can express themselves freely, challenge views and cultivate an open mind.

“But I am deeply worried about the chilling effect on campuses of unacceptable silencing and censoring. That is why we must strengthen free speech in higher education, by bolstering the existing legal duties and ensuring strong, robust action is taken if these are breached.”

We’re not as bad in NZ as in the UK, but the Don Brash fiasco at Massey shows we are on the way. National should position itself as a champion of free speech, and propose similar legislation here.

Marie Dyhrberg QC writes:

Unfortunately, the bill crosses the line between assisting complainants and preventing accused men from effectively defending themselves. …

For instance, at the moment a complainant can record an interview with the police and have that played to the jury and only appear at the trial to answer the defence lawyer’s questions, out of view of the defendant.

What is proposed is that the defence lawyer would have to cross-examine the complainant in advance, say a year before trial. It is impossible for the defence lawyer to know what the issues are at that point. Cross-examination in advance is unworkable

And gets worse.

The bill also states that consent to sexual intimacy must be given every time, which no-one disputes, but then stretches logic to say the jury cannot hear about intimate encounters the same couple had previously. With a rape allegation, when the sex is not denied, the trial turns on whether the defendant had reasonable grounds for believing the complainant consented. Where a couple are in a relationship, that belief may well depend on what had been usual and acceptable between them before.

If the belief was unreasonable, let the jury decide, which they cannot do if the defendant is banned from telling his side of the story.

So a defendant can’t defend themselves.

While it is true that some victims do not come forward because they fear the trial process, it is also true that innocent men get accused, sometimes for very vindictive or perverse reasons.

Other areas of the criminal law, such as assault and fraud, have victims, including vulnerable ones. But we do not suggest that the conviction rate for these offences be unjustifiably or unlawfully bolstered by preventing accused persons from legitimately defending themselves with relevant evidence.

In some ways this law is no surprise. Before the 2017 election Andrew Little proposed that men who have sex with women be presumed guilty of rape unless they can prove they had consent. So Little wanted you presumed guilty instead of presumed innocent, upon accusation.

Stuff reports:

Government advice suggests the new Matariki public holiday will cost businesses between $377 – $448 million.

But that advice does not include any potential economic benefits from the new public holiday, set to be introduced from next year.

Labour campaigned on introducing Matariki as New Zealand’s 12th public holiday, arguing New Zealand had fewer public holidays than most other rich nations and should respect the Māori new year at Matariki.

The Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment estimated that this would cost the country’s 534,930 businesses up to $448m.

I’m all for Matariki as a holiday, but not as an additional one.

It should have replaced the rather daft Queen’s Birthday.

Edd Coomber writes at Stuff:

It’s high time for a ban. Conversion therapy is not only extremely harmful, but also another hurdle for LGBTQI+ equality and acceptance.

I’m calling on the Government to not only ban the therapy, but to ban all anti-gay messages in churches and organised religions to reduce the high number of rainbow youth attempting suicide because they are told they must change something they simply can’t.

So the call to ban conversion therapy is being pushed by some to go further and also ban what priests can say in church.

Why not go further and have the Government approve all religious teachings to make sure they conform.

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.