Auckland Council released:

The Colmar Brunton survey was conducted independently to achieve a representative outcome from a cross section of Aucklanders and showed 89 per cent support for a rates increase, with 38 per cent of those surveyed supporting a 3.5 per cent general rates increase and 51 per cent supporting a 2.5 per cent general rates increase.

Any journalist who repeats this claim should be shot. Well not shot, but taught to check the source material.

The respondents in the survey were only given two options:

• 2.5% average general rates increase
• 3.5% average general rates increase

It’s no fucking surprise 89% picked one of the two options. There were no other options!!!

To claim 89% support a rates increase when you only gave them a choice of 2.5% or 3.5% is like claiming 89% of Aucklanders have said they support apartment buildings of at least 25 stories after asking them if they want 25 story apartment buildings or 35 story apartment buildings.

They misrepresentation of the Colmar Brunton research is appalling. It is basically a lie. You can not claim what the Council claimed.

Aucklanders should be angry that their Council lies to them, and treats them as idiots.

Meet Peter Atkinson. Late last year he drove while intoxicated. He drove at high speeds and weaving between lanes. He refused his passenger’s repeated requests to stop. At an intersection he hit a woman on a motor scooter, killing her. She leaves behind a husband of 45 years, three sons and grandchildren. He took off and tried to clean his car of her blood.

Atkinson is aged 42. He has 11 children to five women. He also has 40 convictions including drink driving, child sex offending and family violence. He’s been to prison five times.

He got just 56 months prison for killing someone. The only bright spot is that this be served without parole (otherwise could be out in 19 months) as it is his second strike.

Atkinson is the sort of recidivist that three strikes is aimed at.

Radio NZ reports:

The government has released a major new report which is touting Manukau Harbour as the preferred option for relocating the Port of Auckland. …

The report by economic consultancy Sapere considered five relocation options; Northport, Manukau, the Firth of Thames, the Port of Tauranga and a shared increase in capacity at both Northport and the Port of Tauranga.

Manukau Harbour was the highest ranked option, although consenting could be problematic.

I’d like Ports of Auckland to transition away from the waterfront, as I think the opportunity cost of having that prime land as a port is huge.

But having no Port at all in Auckland is basically bonkers. It’s our largest population centre and the idea that all the cargo should be dropped off two to three hours away is lunacy.

So Manukau Harbour has always seemed to me to be the preferred alternative.

Auckland Mayor Phil Goff has welcomed the independent Sapere report, published today, which shows that neither Northport nor the Port of Tauranga are viable options for relocating the Ports of Auckland in the long-term.

“The Sapere report completely backs up my concerns and concerns raised by Auckland Council since the start of the Upper North Island port study led by Wayne Brown,” Goff said.

“The Brown report started with a conclusion – wanting to move the Ports of Auckland to Northport – and worked backwards. It failed to engage with stakeholders and was quite frankly a shoddy opinion piece not based on facts,” he said.

Goff is right on this one. The Brown report was a conclusion seeking a justification. The Sapere report is a truly independent analysis.

Hamish Walker has resigned as National’s candidate for Southland. This is the right decision.

It is worth noting how quickly Muller dealt with this, compared to Ardern with her Ministers.

• Walker resigned two days after Muller made aware of what he did
• Meka Whaitiri – sacked 22 days after Ardern aware of assault allegations
• Clare Curran – sacked from Cabinet 150 days after Ardern aware she misled Parliament
• David Clark – resignation accepted 88 days after he breaches his own lockdown rules
• Phil Twyford =- still there!

One focus now will be on who will replace Walker as National’s candidate for Southland. I’ve written on Patreon on who I see as the three leading candidates.

The BBC reports:

Books by pro-democracy figures have been removed from public libraries in Hong Kong in the wake of a controversial new security law.

The works will be reviewed to see if they violate the new law, the authority which runs the libraries said.

The legislation targets secession, subversion and terrorism with punishments of up to life in prison.

Opponents say it erodes the territory’s freedoms as a semi-autonomous region of China. Beijing rejects this.

Hong Kong’s sovereignty was handed back to China by Britain in 1997 and certain rights were supposed to be guaranteed for at least 50 years under the “one country, two systems” agreement.

Since the security law came into effect on Tuesday, several leading pro-democracy activists have stepped down from their roles. One of them – one-time student leader and local legislator Nathan Law – has fled the territory.

At least nine books have become unavailable or marked as “under review”, according to the South China Morning Post newspaper. They include books authored or co-authored by Joshua Wong, a prominent pro-democracy activist, and pro-democracy politician Tanya Chan.

On Saturday, Mr Wong tweeted that the new law “imposes a mainland-style censorship regime” on Hong Kong, calling it “one step away from … actual book banning”.

I thunk this shows how repressive the regime has become. I once had hopes for China moving along the path of greater economic and personal freedom. But they have clearly become more authoritarian in the last few years, and we need to recalibrate our policies towards them.

Newshub reports:

Air New Zealand is going to “put a temporary hold on new bookings” to align with the Government’s managed isolation facilities which are currently housing thousands of people. 

Housing Minister Megan Woods, in charge of managed isolation facilities, said she met with Air New Zealand chief executive Greg Foran to discuss ways to jointly manage the big growth in Kiwis coming home. 

“Air New Zealand has agreed to put a temporary hold on new bookings in the short term, as well as looking at aligning daily arrivals with the capacity available at managed isolation facilities,” Dr Woods said on Tuesday. 

The Government is choosing to align this the wrong way.

Citizens have a right to return home.

The Government should be ensuring we have enough isolation facilities to match the demand from Kiwis returning home.

Instead they are restricting the right of Kiwis to return home, to match the isolation facilities.

The Herald reports:

The National Party board is meeting today to decide the fate of the MP who leaked Covid-19 patient details and leader Todd Muller wants Hamish Walker out.

Muller has written to the party’s board asking them to remove Walker from the party, RNZ reports.

Mullers says there needed to be consequences for the leak and his advice to Walker was to “think deeply about what the honourable next step is”.

Muller told Newstalk ZB’s Mike Yardley that he was informed Monday lunchtime that Walker was the leaker and after the inquiry was announced, made it clear Walker had to co-operate.

He then sought legal advice and once receiving that, made it public.

Last night, Walker and former National Party president Michelle Boag confessed to being behind the massive privacy breach of Covid-19 patient information.

Muller wrote to the National Party board last night outlining concerns about Walker’s judgment and it was meeting today.

“He’s displayed some serious lack of judgment.”

“I’ve made it very, very clear how unacceptable his behaviour was and there was an expectation that this information was to be made public and that he co-operates with the inquiry,” Muller said.

Walker hasn’t given Muller any indication yet whether he will step aside as National’s Clutha-Southland candidate, he told Newstalk ZB.

Muller said he couldn’t be precise around when the board would release their decision as it was their process.

Muller said he’s lost confidence in Walker.

It’s good to see Muller acting strongly on this. There is huge anger within the party at what Walker did.

Sadly for Walker, I don’t think he can recover from this. All MPs will make mistakes, and we should tolerate human error. For example his release on the potential housing in the South Island of returning NZers was clumsy, but that was clearly recoverable from.

But to leak health details of patients to the media is intolerable. And to also be undertaking such an activity as a lone agent, rather than seeking advice from senior colleagues and staff (who would have told him not to do it), means a fatal loss of confidence.

And allowing the leader and health spokesperson to condemn the leak, without telling them he was the leaker, was beyond the pale.

So Muller is right in seeking the board to consider voiding his candidacy (which the board can do).

The Herald reports:

The Government has promised not to hike ACC levies for businesses and motorists until at least 2022, in a bid to cushion the Covid-19 blow for New Zealanders.

ACC Minister Iain Lees-Galloway said this was a “prudent decision,” given the uncertain nature of New Zealand’s economic outlook.

“It provides some certainty to businesses and other levy payers and gives ACC more time to reliably assess the impact of Covid-19 on its finances.”

Work and earners’ levies will remain at the current levels until March 31, 2022; motor vehicle levies won’t be adjusted until June 30 the same year.

This is a very good decision. It is madness to increase taxes and compulsory levies during a recession. This is why rates and petrol tax shouldn’t increase either.

On the other hand we have the Greens proposing the largest tax hikes in history, during a recession.

Stuff reports:

Under-fire National MP Hamish Walker has admitted to passing on the private details of Covid-19 patients to media, which were leaked to him by former party president Michelle Boag.

Walker said he did this to expose Government shortcomings and he has been advised that what he did was not criminal.

But he has apologised to those involved and National leader Todd Muller has stripped him of his portfolios.

Former National Party president Michelle Boag said in a statement on Tuesday that she had passed the information to Walker, which she had received in her role as the acting chief executive of the Auckland Rescue Helicopter Trust.

“I very much regret my actions and did not anticipate that Hamish would choose to send it on to some media outlets but I am grateful that the media involved have chosen not to publish the 18 names that were contained within it,” Boag said in a statement.

She has resigned as acting chief executive of the trust as a result.

I’m astonished by the staggeringly bad judgment shown by both Michelle and Hamish.

Under no circumstances should Michelle have sent that spreadsheet to Hamish, and under no circumstances should he have sent it to the media. It has private health information in it, being the names of people with Covid-19.

If the desire was to highlight that this information was being sent around in an insecure manner, then they could have done that without actually passing on the actual spreadsheet. You could take a screenshot of it, and black out any personal details.

Again this is really really bad judgment and reflects very poorly on those involved.

The Government keeps saying they just need more time to achieve their goals. Well one of those goals was to end homelessness and you can see what they have achieved in two and a half years. Just imagine what they could do with three more years!

I’ve now done all 17 South Island electorate races profiles on Patreon. The summary of my profiles are:

• Safe National: Southland, Waitaki, Rangitata, Selwyn, Ilam, Waimakariri, Kaikoura
• Leans National: Invercargill
• Too Close To Call: Banks Peninsula, Nelson
• Leans Labour: Taieri, Wigram
• Safe Labour: Dunedin, Christchurch Central, Christchurch East, West Coast-Tasman, Te Tai Tonga

So on election day the two most competitive seats should be Banks Peninsula and Nelson. Also worth keeping an eye on Invercargill, Taieri and Wigram.

Tomorrow I’m going to start doing the North Island seats, starting with Rongotai.

The Herald reports:

An increasing tobacco black market saw the Government miss out on $287.4 million in tax last year, a report reveals. …

But one expert told the Herald the controversial policy of continually hiking up tobacco prices is “feeding organised crime”. …

Customs investigations manager Bruce Berry told the Herald the illicit tobacco trade has seen “the emergence of more organised criminal groups” and a move away from opportunism.

“We’ve also seen more and more crossover with other forms of criminal activity, particularly in the drug environment. We’ve seen the money laundering that goes with all of these illicit ventures … they’re using the same routes as the drug syndicates.”

Again this should be a good lesson learnt. If you increase the price too much, then you turn it into a commodity for organised crime.

Rohan Pike, a former Australian Federal Police officer and founder of the Australian Border Force’s tobacco strike team, said high prices remained the key driver for smugglers in Australia and New Zealand.

“The profit margin is so high and the risk is so low,” he told the Herald. “They don’t care if there’s a policy of seizure, they’re just going to bombard the border.

“The governments created the policy to tax and that’s created the crime environment,” he said. “At the moment all we’re doing is feeding organised crime.”

High tax leads to high crime!

The Telegraph reports:

The Bad Boys of Brexit are back! Arron Banks and Andy Wigmore have been hired by New Zealand’s version of the UK Independence Party to help fight September’s general election in a move bound to infuriate their Left-wing critics.

A team from Mr Banks’ Leave.EU campaign is advising Winston Peters’ New Zealand First party on its social media campaign in a deal said to be worth a six figure sum.

Now there is nothing wrong with hiring political advisors from overseas. National and Labour at various times have had people from Australia or the US helping them.

But the mention of a six figure sum (that means between $100,000 and $1,000,000) is fascinating. Who is paying that bill? Does NZ First have that sort of money just to spend on foreign consultants?

If someone else is paying, then that should be declared as a donation to NZ First. And it would be illegal for that someone else to be a non-resident.

A six-strong team from Leave.EU have been dispatched to Auckland with an instruction to increase New Zealand First’s vote share to as high as 12 percent.

It would be remarkable to increase a vote share from 2% to 12%.

What is more interesting is that a six strong team has been dispatched. How are they being allowed in the country? Is the Immigration Minister declaring them to be essential workers?

And a team of six would cost a lot. The average London salary for data analysts is 35,000 pounds or NZ$66,000. Take six of them and that is $400,000. Assume three months salary and that is $100,000. Add in airfares, accommodation etc and you are heading over $150,000. Also presumably these are people who are really good and on more than the average salary.

So again the question is who is paying for them, and how are they being allowed in?

Mr Banks continued: “We have deployed our top social media team and data experts to do all the creative work, Andy and I are giving Winston strategic advice.”

He added: “Since 2016 we have known Winston, he is a huge supporter of the Commonwealth and watched first hand the referendum campaign.

Is it possible they are funding this themselves, because they like Winston? If so, then they have a real problem as that is a donation in kind and donations of more than $50 from non residents are banned.

So the Electoral Commission should be very interested in this.

Mr Wigmore added: “I’m going to be on ground in New Zealand causing trouble – mischief, mayhem and guerrilla warfare in the New Zealand election – the bad boys are back.”

Unless Mr Wigmore is already in NZ (as Mr Banks is) then he may find his description of his proposed activities here won’t help him gain essential worker status!

The Herald reports:

An urgent Government inquiry has been launched to uncover “exactly who” did it and why Covid-19 patient details were leaked.

State Services Minister Chris Hipkins has appointed former solicitor general Mike Heron, QC, to lead the probe into the massive Covid-19 privacy breach.

The Herald revealed on Saturday that the personal details of 18 active cases had been leaked in a spreadsheet, including their names and dates of births. Two other media outlets have also reported seeing the document.

Hipkins expected the urgent inquiry to report back by the end of the month. It will also examine how the information was stored and whether that could be improved.

As I blogged previously the data should never have been in a spreadsheet, let alone one with no password protection. You don’t need a QC to work that out.

Hipkins said there were a number of theories about how the sensitive information came to be released but he didn’t think it was human error.

“I don’t think that information tends to accidentally be sent to multiple media outlets at the same time.”

Hipkins is making an assumption, that may be unsafe.

It is fair to assume that the person who sent the info to the media did it in purpose.

But what is very possible is that person was themselves sent the information by accident – ie they were not someone meant to have it.

If you use an insecure spreadsheet, then it is very easy to send it by e-mail to the wrong person in your e-mail contacts. Possibly an official sent it to someone outside the public sector, and that person was so shocked that the data had been so insecure, that they whistleblew by sending it to the media.

I don’t know of course, but hopefully we’ll find out.

A guest post by New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union Economist Karan Menon:

There is no greater job creation programme for accountants than the introduction of a new tax scheme for the wealthy.

But the Green Party’s proposed wealth tax has some key flaws. First, it would be ineffective at raising money. Second, it would be incredibly economically destructive, undermining the Government’s current efforts for economic recovery.

In short, the policy is an annual tax of 1% on net wealth over $1 million, and 2% on net wealth more than $2 million. The money would be used to dramatically hike benefit levels for the unemployed and sole parents. The Greens claim the tax will bring in about $8 billion per year – approximately a third of the total tax revenue of GST.

But as the Prime Minister has pointed out, the Greens’ revenue assumptions are ‘heroic’. It is notoriously hard to forecast tax revenue – especially for taxes on assets, which can be easily shifted out of reach of the Kiwi tax man. With international borders closed, it appears the Greens assume none of the ‘rich’ they want to target will rearrange their affairs, alter behaviour, or move overseas.

But just because a tax won’t bring in as much as the politicians want it to, it doesn’t mean we are safe to support it. For New Zealand’s best and brightest – think Peter Jackson and Peter Beck – running international business and investing here in New Zealand, a wealth tax could change the preferred destination. International entrepreneurs need only spend a few more months of the year elsewhere to obtain tax domicile outside of New Zealand. This means they could avoid the tax entirely.

And the experience in France, which introduced a new wealth tax on real estate in 2018, suggests that many of our best would move. In fact, there was a noticeable effect in the London property market due to French elite moving across the Channel.

Public support for these taxes may be high, but, in private, most people change their behaviour based on tax policies, with the costly assistance of those aforementioned accountants – especially when a lot of money is at stake.

In France, for those who stayed, many under reported the value of their assets. Even former French President François Hollande has been accused of undervaluing his property to evade taxes.

With the economic ruin of COVID-19, capital investment is required more than ever. A wealth tax would see much needed capital investments disappear. Economists call this ‘capital flight’. This would be especially painful right now, where money supply is increasingly unresponsive to decreases in interest rates. We want wealthy investors coming into New Zealand – not to chase them away. We want the James Camerons of the world to choose to live (and invest) here – so their skills and capital can rebuild our economy and create jobs. 

And as we’ve seen overseas, when forecasted revenue from the ‘rich’ doesn’t materialise, the tax burden is shifted onto the middle class.

A politically profitable attack on successful New Zealanders is one thing, but to promote a tax that would chase away the very capital New Zealand needs right now to get back to growth is anything but fair – not on the rich, the poor, nor the unemployed who would pay the most.

The Herald reports:

Newly appointed Health Minister Chris Hipkins said a leak of confidential patient details off all active Covid-19 cases in New Zealand was “totally unacceptable” and potentially criminal.

The information included the patients names and dates of birth.

The massive breach of privacy contains the details of 18 confirmed cases, ranging from a 30-year-old woman in Auckland to a 70-year-old man in Canterbury.

It includes the personal details of the man in his 30s receiving care in Auckland City Hospital.

The leaked spreadsheet, seen by the Weekend Herald, also shows which border facility the Covid-positive people were staying in when they tested positive and where they were moved for quarantine.

This is a major breach of privacy, revealing which people have Covid-19. It should never have happened.

The best practice for sensitive data is to not have it in a spreadsheet at all. You should have it in a database where only authorised people can login to it. That also allows you to audit access.

If for some reason you do need to export it into a spreadsheet or other document, then the least you should do is stick a password on the file.

Stuff reports:

A candidate has been removed from the Labour’s Party list following anti-Islamic tweets he made seven years ago.

Kurt Taogaga was at number 68 on the list.

But he is no longer on the list after it was revealed he had supported the then NZ First MP Richard Prosser’s “Wogistan” article in 2013.

Taogaga called it brave and said “we need to see Islam for what it really is”.

A statement from Labour Party president Claire Szabó said the tweets from 2013 do not represent the views of the party.

“The Labour Party is committed to inclusion of all religions, and stands against intolerance. 

The Wogistan article was not a good article. Readers may recall that I broke the story into the media. While there are legitimate criticisms you can make of Islam, the article called for anyone who “looked Muslim” to be banned from flying.

But whether you sack a candidate for a tweet from seven years ago, is another issue.

I’m somewhat surprised the tweets were not picked up earlier. Taogaga was a candidate in 2017 for Labour also. I would have thought/expected all the major parties would trawl through the social media history of candidates as part of background checks.

Stuff reports:

There are now more than 200,000 New Zealanders receiving either JobSeeker Support or the Covid-19 Income Relief Payment.

New data released from the Ministry of Social Development on Friday showed that 56,000 of those people had requested support since March 20.

This will rise again of course when the wage subsidies end.

One News reports:

The latest 1 NEWS Colmar Brunton poll asked: Do you think you will vote for euthanasia to be legalised?

Sixty three per cent said yes, down two on our poll from February.

Twenty four percent said no, they want it to remain illegal, down one, while the rest were unsure or said they wouldn’t vote.

That’s a very solid majority at this stage.

Stuff reports:

MPs are on notice after a new employment law has placed them directly responsible for their staffers.

Politicians have previously been somewhat insulated from employment matters, as staffers are technically not employed by MPs, but by Parliamentary Service, the administrative arm which runs services at parliament.

But a new law designed to allow contracted employees, such as labour hire workers, to allege personal grievances against the business or organisation controlling them has rewritten the employment boundaries in Parliament. …

Under the new law, staffers could apply to the court to include the MP in any personal grievance complaint

“Technically MPs are now considered a ‘controlling third party’, and if they treat their staff poorly and a personal grievance is pursued – whereas in the old days, you could have only ever taken it up with Parliamentary Service – now an MP can be brought into that mix.”

This is a move in the right direction. While most MPs are very good employers, a few are not. Having Parliamentary Service just pay staff to leave isn’t the best way to fix the problem.