This means it has been 85 days since she stood down on full pay. It is inconceivable it has taken that long.

Also of interest is that over two weeks ago a key witness changed their mind about giving evidence, but was refused on the basis it would delay the report. Yet two weeks later it still isn’t completed, which undermines the rationale for not allowing the late evidence.

Interest.co.nz reported:

The Tiwai Point aluminium smelter in Southland will continue to operate until at least 2044 after striking a deal with Kiwi energy companies to supply renewable electricity until then. 

New Zealand Aluminium Smelters (NZAS), which is owned by multinational mining group Rio Tinto, has often talked of closing due to low commodity prices and high electricity costs.

In 2019, Rio Tinto announced a strategic review of the smelter after a year of losses and eventually decided it would halt operations in 2021.

NZAS says it employs 1000 workers, indirectly supports another 2200 and makes up about 6.5% of Southland’s gross domestic product. 

The potential closure became an election issue in 2020, with various parties pitching plans to rescue the important regional employer, but ultimately aluminium prices came to the rescue. 

Rio Tinto were masters at bluffing the Government and threatening to abandon the smelter unless they got a sweetheart deal. Great to see the probable end of that, with a commercial 20 year deal struck for electricity.

Stuff reports:

A charitable law organisation that assisted survivors of abuse in faith-based institutions is standing by its decision to hire a former Anglican dean as its head despite an array of concerns from staff, saying “perception has clouded reality”.

Community Law Canterbury (CLC) hired Lawrence Kimberley in October. Kimberley was previously the Anglican dean since 2015, telling The Press he stood down as he was looking for a new job before retirement to buy a house.

Following the appointment, a letter was sent to CLC’s board outlining concerns including how survivors of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into abuse in faith-based institutions, which the organisation assisted, would feel about the appointment. …

It stated 29 staff members had expressed concerns about Kimberley’s appointment that they wanted communicated to outgoing chief executive Paul O’Neill and the board, including the process used to select him.

So 29 snowflakes signed a letter protesting the new CE, because he used to be a Bishop in the Anglican Church.

Most staff held “no personal ill will” towards Kimberley, and were “conscious” they had not met him. However, they believed the board had not considered that there were 11 members on staff who openly identified as being part of the LGBTQIA+ community.

“The fraught and complex relationship between religious organisations generally and LGBTQIA+ communities is well documented,” the letter said.

If a senior Muslim cleric has been appointed, I wonder if the 29 staff would have written a letter opposing the appointment on the basis of how many rainbow staff they had?

Kimberley told Stuff that since he was appointed, 10 employees had left for various reasons. CLC had also appointed seven people and one contractor to various roles. Two interns were about to move into solicitor roles.

“Some of the staff who left did so before I started so I didn’t even get the chance to meet them.” …

I believe it’s so important to treat every human being with reverence and respect.” …

He believed anyone at CLC should feel safe, adding it was his job to ensure that.

“My role in working for the Anglican Church’s response to the Royal Commission into the Abuse in Care was to help revise the approach to policies and procedures on the various boards on which I served. I worked really hard in a policy sense to make sure that it was survivor focused.”

There is no suggestion in any way that Kimberly has ever acted inappropriately. It is purely because he was in the Anglican Church. It is religious bigotry.

Stuff reports:

When Chlöe Swarbrick first won a seat in Parliament at 23 years old, she was the youngest MP to do so since 1975.

Yet, the Green Party co-leader admitted on Stuff’s new podcast, Kiwi Yarns, that she never intended to be a politician.

“I never intended to go into politics or parliament to fight for drug law reform,” she told Kiwi Yarns host Brodie Kane, an award-winning journalist and broadcaster.

Once again media repeat this claim with credulity. Its the sort of thing that makes sense for someone who has say pursued an alternative career for a decade or two, but is inane nonsense when referring to someone who at the age of 22 first stood for elective office.

Liam Hehir skewered this claim here.

Hamiona Gray spent almost a year working as a Communications Manager for John Tamihere, so his insights should be treated as reasonably insightful.

He writes:

What became increasingly clear during my first week’s working there was that Te Pou Matakana, the Waipareira Trust, Hapai Te Hauora, and all the other ‘brands’ under this umbrella existed only on paper. In practice, they were (and remain) all the same organisation. If you worked for one, you worked for all of them. 

This is important because it is the fiction of them all being legally seperate bodies that allow them to get massive chunks of money from the Government to hand out as part of Whanau Ora, and also get massive chunks for welfare and health services.

There were other chief executives, there were several elected boards, but behind all of them was John – He was the ultimate authority. 

Now this is messy enough when they are just NGOs, but here is where it really gets conflicted.

This model gave him and them a level of plausible deniability around his involvement – Stats NZ want to get more Maori to respond to the census, but know they can’t employ an organisation led by the infamous president of a political party to do so? Contract Te Pou Matakana/WOCA to do it. 

So the same person presides over a political party and also gets large government contracts to work on behalf of the Electoral Commission, Stats NZ etc.

You may have had a contract with WOCA, but the people doing the work could be from any one of a half dozen organisations and there was no line between where and who did what. 

I must point out that this was before Tamihere merged Te Pati Maori into this mix, but it is my understanding based on conversations I’ve had that they too are just as involved in everything that happens inside the rest of the fiefdom.  

So the Maori Party is staffed and funded by the Tamihere Empire. We know this because they made illegal loans to the Maori Party. After many years of asking they were paid back, but of course it is quite possible (and legal) that they merely increased Tamihere’s salary by $500,000 a year and he used that to pay back the money.

Here’s how the ANC has done in every post-Apartheid election.

• 1994: 63%
• 1999: 66%
• 2004: 70%
• 2009: 66%
• 2014: 62%
• 2019: 58%
• 2024: 40%

This is a good thing for South Africa. With the possible exceptions of Japan and Singapore, parties that constantly stay in power become corrupt. If you can’t lose, your incentives are different. And the ANC has been very corrupt.

The ANC will remain in Government but for the first time ever will need coalition partners. Who might they be:

• Democratic Alliance 22%
• uMkhonto we Sizwe 15%
• Economic Freedom Fighters 9%
• Inkatha Freedom Party 4%
• Patriotic Alliance 2%
• Freedom Front Plus 1%
• ActionSA 1%

The DA is a centrist liberal party, mainly supported by non-blacks. It emerged from apartheid era anti-apartheid parties. Their policies include 60,000 more police officers, and they are broadly pro-Western.

uMkhonto we Sizwe is led by former President Jacob Zuma, who makes other corrupt politicians look like amateurs. It is socialist, populist and socially conservative. It supports land confiscation without compensation.

The EFF is led by former ANC Youth President Julius Malema. It is a communist party that supports land confiscation, nationalising mines and banks, doubling welfare benefits and the minimum wage.

The IFP is a Conservative Party mainly supported by Zulus. It is anti-immigration.

The PA is a right wing party, mainly supported by Coloureds. Also anti-immigration.

FF Plus is a right wing party mainly supported by Afrikaans.

Action SA is a classical liberal party.

The DA would be the best choice for moderate policies. But far from clear who the ANC prefers. An interesting time.

Very illuminating.

Stuff reports:

The E tū union’s bill for fighting a wrongful dismissal case against one of its own staff is likely to top $200,000 – in a case one union heavyweight has described as a “woeful litany of mis-steps”.

The country’s largest private sector union last week lost an Employment Court appeal over the sacking of union organiser Sher Singh – and must now pay him a compensation package which includes a year’s salary, $25,000 for hurt and humiliation and, most likely, two sets of legal fees.

It is ironic that often some of the worst cases that go before the Employment Court involve unions as employers!

Scoop reports:

Today’s council announcement says there’ll be a rates increase of 17 per cent – in March the increase was to have been 16.4 per cent. The announcement fails to mention the extra sludge levy that has already been announced and which will mean ratepayers are paying over 18 per cent more.

So we are having an 18% rates increase in the only city in NZ which has a shrinking population. I wonder why? The 18% increase is because of choices the Council has made – renovating the Town Hall, a new large central Library instead of the perfectly good three inner city ones we have, a loss making convention centre, massively expensive cycleways etc etc.

A rare occasion where the Mayor and Deputy voted on the side of ratepayers. There is no sensible case for owning a minority share of the airport. You have no control of it, you get poor returns on the shares, and it creates a conflict with your regulatory role.

What I find somewhat ironic is that the vote would have been tied if it were not for the two Iwi representatives voting in favour of selling.

Thomas Cranmer reports:

In 2019 Green co-leader James Shaw defended his high international travel expenses, explaining it’s offset by planting trees and informing the public that the Green Party offsets all travel through tree-planting, something he said he’d “recommend people do”.

So earlier this week I asked the Green Party how much each Green MP had offset their air travel by way of tree-planting or other means for each of the years 2021, 2022 and 2023. The party’s response was to direct me to a parliamentary press release from 2020 which stated that Parliament would be installing solar PV on the roof of the historic Parliament House and that the savings made through this initiative would be used to offset MP’s travel.

However, the project was delayed and the panels were only finally installed in stages on the roof of Parliament House over the last six months of 2022!

So the reality is that the Greens were not offsetting their carbon emissions, despite insisting everyone else must move to be carbon neutral.

Auckland University has a draft free speech policy. There are some good parts to it, but also parts that will allow significant censorship.

We take our role of critic and conscience seriously and welcome and encourage dialogue and debate including on topics which may be contentious and controversial. It is inevitable that different perspectives will sometimes be in tension with each other. It is important to remember the foundation of our academic community: respect for diverse viewpoints and a commitment to civil discourse.

That’s good.

Every staff member and every student has the same right to freedom of expression on University premises or otherwise in connection with the University as any other person in Aotearoa New Zealand subject only to the constraints imposed by the reasonable and proportionate regulation of conduct to enable the University to fulfil its Duty regarding the wellbeing of staff and students

This is a huge weakness. This means that any snowflake staff member or student can claim that someone else’s speech is a threat to their wellbeing, and hey presto that speech is against the code of conduct.

However, the University may express an institutional position or view.

Harvard have just learnt this is a bad idea. Individual staff and students should take positions. The institution should not.

Academic staff members are not precluded from including content in a course solely on the grounds that it may offend or shock a student or class of students.

That’s good.

The University may refuse to permit a visitor or visitors to speak on University premises where the content of the speech is or is likely to prejudice the fulfilment by the University of its Duty regarding the wellbeing of staff and students

This is a licence for censorship. We know from experience that wellbeing is used as a weapon to censor views people disagree with. They did it at Massey to stop Don Brash from speaking.

involve the advancement of theories or propositions which fall below scholarly standards to such an extent as to be detrimental to the University’s character and its performance of the functions characteristic of a university.

This is also a licence to censor. Who decides what meets scholarly standards? On this ground the Deputy PM of NZ could be banned from speaking if he has a view on something which a university administrator disagrees with.

There is no right for outsider speakers to speak on campus without an invitation. But if an academic staff member or an affiliated society decides they wish to hear from someone one, that shouldn’t be a decision for the institution.

General Practice NZ released:

General Practice New Zealand (GPNZ) welcomes Dr Lester Levy as the new chair of Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora.

“General practice and primary care are central to a functioning, robust health system and GPNZ looks forward to working with Dr Levy to address the critical issues we face,” says Porirua-based Specialist General Practitioner and Chair of GPNZ, Dr Bryan Betty.

Labour’s DHB merger into Health NZ has been a near disaster. However going back to DHBs is not the answer (a smaller number of DHBs was probably best as Heather Simpson recommended) and the sector can’t handle further reform. That means one has to try and get Health NZ to function well.

If anyone can do it, it probably is Lester Levy. He has a rare mix of medical and business skills. He has been a CE of a public hospital, a private hospital and the blood service. He’s been the Chair of three different DHBs, and of course is a doctor also. I hope he succeeds.

Recent media from teacher unions in NZ has said that the idea of schools being failures is subjective.

We have approximately 460 high schools in New Zealand. This is a relatively small number and we ignore many of the solutions so as not to upset the adults in the room.

Here is a listing of the top 45 schools – and the bottom 45 schools – ranked by the percentage of their leavers with University Entrance in 2022.

While there will be many leaders and teachers trying hard in the bottom 45 they are locked into collective contracts and Ministry protocols that prevent genuine innovation. The unions – as well as denying failure – claim that parents have massive choice in NZ. You will notice that many schools in the bottom 45 are in single school locations where the “choices” available to parents are to homeschool or send their kids to boarding schools.

Codes are:
– EQI – The Ministry’s equity index – which applies risk factors to students and provides marginal extra funding to schools with more “at risk” students (i.e. a high EQI).
– To 17Yr – This is the retention of students within a school to 17 years of age.
– To degree – This is the percentage of students who leave a school and go into degree level study.

As so many say UE and degree study may not be the best for a student but school by school it is a good indicator of quality of outcomes for their students.

Alwyn Poole
Innovative Education Consultants
alwyn.poole@gmail.com
www.innovativeeducation.co.nz
alwynpoole.substack.com
www.linkedin.com/in/alwyn-poole-16b02151/

Newshub reports:

Labour is asking Kiwis to hand over their tax relief to the party after heavily campaigning against the cuts. 

In an email to its constituents, Labour continued to slam the size of the tax cuts as “just a few dollars”, before asking for donations. 

“Friend, will you donate some of your tax cut to Labour?” the email from Rob Salmond, the party’s general secretary, said.

“That way, the tax cuts really can help create a better future for Aotearoa New Zealand – by getting Labour back into Government.”

So Labour is against there being tax cuts, when there are tax cuts says they are too small, and also wants people to donate them to Labour so they can ensure no one ever gets a tax cut again!

Andrea Vance reports that there are now allegations that Te Pati Maori used information collected for Covid-19 immunisations to target voters.

They are just allegations, but they need to be investigated. As the allegations go across four or more different agencies (Electoral Commission, Stats NZ, Health NZ, MSD) I don’t think they can investigate properly.

However arguably the Privacy Commissioner could. Section 79(b) of the Privacy Act allows them to initiate an investigation. That would seem the best bet, but failing that a government inquiry led by a KC.

The Manurewa Marae polling place is in Clendon Park, like two other polling places. As they are in the same suburb, you might expect them to be in the same ballpark for how people voted.

Here is the margin between the Maori Party candidate and the Labour candidate in each polling place:

• Manurewa Marae (advance): +39%
• Manurewa Marae +16%
• Clendon Community Centre (advance): +6%
• PAK’nSAVE Clendon -6%
• PAK’nSAVE Clendon (advance): -10%
• Clendon Community Centre -40%

This doesn’t prove anything, but it certainly suggests that it is a very bad idea to have a polling place at a Mara, where one candidate is the chief executive.

Meet Labour’s next Finance Minister!

Newshub reports:

Te Pāti Māori has issued a Declaration of Political Independence, Te Ngākau o Te Iwi Māori, beginning the process to establish its own Māori Parliament.

This is a great idea. I’m all for a Maori Parliament and Government, funded by Maori (its not Tino Rangatiratanga if you are dependent on others funding you).

Let every NZer of Maori descent decide whether they want to come under the auspices of the Maori Parliament or the NZ Parliament.

If they choose the Maori Parliament, they can pay taxes to it, and can only access health, education and welfare services funded by the Maori Parliament.

Nice to know the Supreme Leader is backing the US college students in their fight against Jews having a safe homeland.