Marilyn Waring writes:

Louisa Wall is an exceptionally strong local representative. Louisa doesn’t just make speeches, she makes things happen. Look at the examples: tackling period poverty, showers for the homeless and their access to primary health care, working with local churches for hospitality cafes, sight screening and glasses for children in Manurewa, introducing KidsCan to their first high school partnership, in Manurewa. She has a very good grasp of how the system works, how to access information and assistance for those who seek her help, and she responds quickly.

Louisa has been a distinguished Chair of the Health Select Committee. She has demonstrated significant leadership in the cross-party Women Parliamentarians group, and in teams working on marriage equality, abortion, female genital mutilation, mental health and addictions, wellbeing, and end of life legislation, a quality New Zealanders want to see more of in their elected representatives.

More achievements than some Ministers!

Stuff reports:

Waitomo’s six district councillors have filed a complaint against their mayor, alleging he breached the council’s code of conduct. …

On Tuesday, the council will meet to hear public submissions on its annual plan and rates increase.

It’s a key meeting because Robertson had been keenly pursuing avenues to reduce the district’s $40m debt ever since he was voted in as mayor in 2019.

He is a former National MP and former mayor for Papakura but now lives in Piopio.

In 2012 he was appointed to lead a group of commissioners to sort out governance issues at Kaipara District Council, and he was using that experience to change governance and policies at Waitomo.

He had been using online and print media to push his views around debt reduction and the arrival of Covid-19 provided put more pressure on all councils to look at reducing rate increases.

He promoted the idea of a “rates freeze” to keep the council’s rates collection at the same level as the previous year.

It’s possible some councillors disagreed with this approach and disagreed with Robertson’s outspoken commentary of the matter.

So the Mayor is campaigning for a rates freeze, and the six muppets on the Council with him have lodged a formal complaint against him for doing so.

How pathetic. They should be made to pay the cost of investogating their complaint.

And ratepayers should sack the six of them.

Stuff reports:

Treasury’s forecast for employment are unrealistically optimistic and would require bosses to hire 189,000 jobs in short order to get back to pre-crises levels of employment, economists say.

Evidence from the last financial crisis shows it actually takes many years to get unemployment back to pre-crisis levels — and the financial crisis was a much smaller shock than the one now facing the economy.

Infometrics economist Brad Olsen says the forecasts are wildly optimistic and don’t take into account vast structural changes going on in the economy, such as the end of international tourism. …

Olsen said during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) it took 14 quarters for employment numbers to fall back to pre-crisis levels. Treasury thinks unemployment rates can fall back to rough pre-crisis levels in just eight quarters, despite the Covid-19 shock being far more severe.

During the GFC, about 60,000 needed to be created to get the unemployment rate down. This time around, Treasury expects roughly 189,000 jobs to be found in a much shorter space of time.

Put like this, it seems very unlikely.

Stuff reports:

A nurse who was convicted of manslaughter after she fatally pushed her husband has had her nursing registration suspended for six months.

In a hearing in front of the Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal in Dunedin, the tribunal considered whether the woman’s conviction reflected badly on her fitness to practice as a nurse.

The woman, who has interim name suppression, will have to undergo six monthly tests to monitor her alcohol consumption over three years, register any employment with the Nursing Council and give employers a copy of the decision.

Ms L had been convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 11 months home detention. …

“A conviction for manslaughter is one of the most serious criminal offences and constitutes a significant departure from the standards reasonably expected of a registered nurse.”

She had 18 prior convictions, all but one of which occurred during their relationship.

So she has a drinking problem, she killed her husband while pissed and she had a total of 9 convictions and the Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal thinks she is fine to carry on as a nurse after a six month stand down!

And they suppress her name so we have no idea if the nurse treating us is a convicted killer!

  

Stuff reports:

The Government is promising to pay workers who lose their jobs due to the coronavirus crisis more than double the unemployment benefit, in a newly announced $1.2 billion scheme.

The weekly “income relief” payments, set at $490 a week for full-time workers and $250 a week for part-time workers, will be given to workers instead of the unemployment benefit, if they lost their job due to Covid-19 after March 1. …

The untaxed payments are more than double that of the jobseeker benefit for a single person aged over 25-years, which are currently set at $250, after tax. 

The scheme is expected to cost $1.2b, but will save the Government $635 million in paying unemployment benefits, meaning an additional cost of $570m. The money will come from the Government’s Covid-19 response fund. 

The payment will be available to people who lost their job after March 1, and will be available until November. After 12-weeks, any unemployed workers will have to take the jobseeker benefit. 

It seems bizarre that someone made redundant on 28 February gets $250 a week and on 1 March or later gets double that.

But what this is about is preventing an backlash before the election. So they give an extra $600 million for 12 weeks to keep those made redundant happier.

The Greens and others will no doubt demand that everyone on the unemployment benefit be paid $500 a week.

Todd Muller has appointed his Shadow Cabinet. The front bench are:

1. Todd Muller
2. Nikki Kaye, Education, Sport
3. Amy Adams, Covid-19 Recovery
4. Judith Collins, Economic Development, Shadow Attorney-General
5. Paul Goldsmith, Finance
6. Gerry Brownlee, Foreign Affairs, Shadow House Leader
7. Michael Woodhouse, Health
8. Louise Upston, Social Development

So three out of the top four are female, and I dare anyone to say they’re not there on merit. I remind people the Government’s Top 8 includes Winston, Kelvin and Phil Twyford.

Great to see Amy Adams unretire. She was a great Minister for Communications and then Social Investment.

The big movers in terms of rankings are:

• Nicola Willis up from 45th to 14th
• Shane Reti from 28th to 17th
• Andrew Bayly from 32nd to 19th
• Lawrence Yule from 43rd to 30th

All well deserved promotions.

Stuff reports:

Stuff Ltd chief executive Sinead Boucher has bought the company from its Australian owners Nine Entertainment, ending months of speculation about a potential takeover.

The management buyout led by Boucher is understood to have been planned and executed very quickly, with the chief executive buying the company for a direct price of $1, and returning the company to New Zealand ownership. The sale is expected to be completed by May 31.

Boucher has signalled plans to develop an ownership model that would give staff a shareholding stake in the business.

That’s a great outcome and far better than NZME buying Stuff.

Having the CE and staff own the media company is a great model. It helps align interests.

Boucher started her career as a journalist for The Press, initially as a branch office reporter in North Canterbury, before shifting to London and working for the Financial Times and Reuters. As Stuff’s first digital editor, she was instrumental in growing the website into New Zealand’s largest digital brand. In 2012 she was awarded the Wolfson Fellowship, New Zealand journalism’s top individual prize.

After four years as executive editor, she was appointed Stuff chief executive in August 2017, succeeding Simon Tong.

I know Sinead a bit. Many years ago she had me come in and talk to staff on digital issues and opportunities. She has always been one of those in the industry who got the impact of the Internet early on, and I thought her appointment as CEO was a smart one. And even better now that she is owner also.

This sale doesn’t mean Stuff will be immune from job losses, but it does set itself up well to continue. With a $1 purchase price the focus will be on sustainability, not dividends, which is what is needed for now.

Todd Niall writes:

Auckland Council pulls in nearly $5 billion in revenue a year, so does it matter where $1000 of it goes?

In politics, to quote an old cliché, it’s not the money, it’s the principle. And this is about $1000 spent by Mayor Phil Goff’s office in the past year to boost the audience of his social media posts.

As the council beavers away behind closed doors on the most difficult budget in its decade of being, behaviour with ratepayers’ money takes on a new meaning.

I agree. One should lead by example with belt tightening.

Here, though, is the test that should be applied to the $1000 spent by the mayor’s office over the past year on boosting his social media posts – especially in these fiscally-challenged times.

Could the mayor look 11 average residential ratepayers in the eye and tell them that the extra they will pay this year, if a 3.5 per cent rate rise goes through, will be used to boost his own social media reach?

Political promotion should be on the “nice-to-have” list should the council find itself comfortably back in the black one day.

If you save a thousand here or there it starts to add up!

Act have announced an initial 49 candidates. Of course most will not get elected but on current polls it is very possible ACT would get between two and four MPs.

Their list ranking is at the end of June.

  

Hamish Price writes:

I first met Muller at a National Party conference in 1993. He had just completed a stint as President of the Waikato Students Union, and had joined Jim Bolger’s office as an adviser.

Muller was an imposing figure. He stood head and shoulders above most, but would lean in and hold your gaze and speak softly, and listen and engage respectfully even with lowly young trouble-makers.  He had an avuncular authority that defied his 25 years. I would not describe it so crudely as charisma, but his ability to make every person he met feel important, made him a person of unmistakable presence.

Muller was always at Bolger’s side, and invariably mistaken for the PM’s bodyguard.

Heh and in Dunedin he acted as one. Off memory (may be fallible) Sue Bradford burst into the church service Bolger was at, and Todd tackled her in the aisle and evicted her. Made him even more popular.

Over the years many those who have known Muller and recognised his leadership material came to write him off.  He had bottled his chance to succeed early, they said. He didn’t have the hunger, they said.  He had missed his opportunity, they said. When given the chance again, he wouldn’t have the mongrel, they said.

I was one of them, and I was wrong.  As events have shown this week, Muller has all those things.  The opportunity, a global pandemic that has thrown the New Zealand economy into a spiralling may-day call, has consumed the National Party leadership.  And it is the unique set of circumstances that has gifted it to Muller.

Muller has a unique set of attributes.  He exudes reassurance at a time when the country is in crisis. He has an optimism and confidence in New Zealand at a time when the public needs hope for the future. Conservative by nature, but not thumpingly so, he has an eye for pragmatism and results.

Todd Muller is no Jacinda Ardern.  He does not have her communication polish.  But before she was elected leader of the Labour Party, Jacinda Ardern was no Jacinda Ardern.

This election is now game-on.  And anyone who writes Muller off now risks making the same mistake that too many of us have over the last five years.

The fact the left are trying to create a controversy over the fact he has US political memorabilia in his office suggests they are keen to try and spike him.

The Washington Post reports:

Several California defense attorneys said Friday that they would attempt to overturn criminal convictions that relied upon testimony from Tara Reade, the former Senate aide who accused Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her in 1993, because she may have provided false information under oath.

During testimony in Monterey County court cases in which she was called as an expert on domestic violence, Reade said that she had received a bachelor’s degree from Antioch University, had never taken the bar exam after graduating from law school and had been a legislative assistant in Biden’s office. Those claims have since been documented as false or been called into doubt in stories published since she made her accusation against Biden.

Doesn’t mean she is lying about Biden, but a history of lying definitely harms her credibility.

The review of the cases, which was first reported by the Monterey County Weekly, came as the attorney who had been representing Reade in her claim against Biden said Friday that his firm decided to no longer work with her as a client.

Douglas Wigdor had represented several other plaintiffs during the #MeToo era, including victims who said they were harassed by Fox News host Bill O’Reilly and film producer Harvey Weinstein.

“Our firm no longer represents Tara Reade,” Wigdor said in a statement Friday morning.

That appears to be significant.

  

The Herald reports:

National’s new leader Todd Muller says if he leads his party to victory this election, he would be the Minister of Small Business as well as the Prime Minister.

He said this would help reinforce the fact that a Government he led would be about helping those people on the ground floor of the economy.

“Those small businesses need an advocate in Wellington and I’ll be their man,” he told the Nation this morning.

This is a smart decision. PMs if they choose a portfolio often choose one they see as critical to NZ’s future. Key chose tourism. Ardern chose Arts and Child Poverty Reduction and Muller, if elected, has said he will choose Small Business.

It is a sign to voters that a Muller Government’s focus would be on rebuilding the economy and small businesses.

A guest post by KrazyKiwi:

It would be fair to say the number of leading doctors, epidemiologists and social scientists questioning the societal impact of the lockdown is starting to increase. At the same time there is an emerging appetite for the media to give these voices room to compete with what has to-date been a predominantly government-led narrative. Being something of a data junkie, I have approached the topic of accessing the lockdown harm by looking at raw mortality data. Most countries publish this material regularly, the best of which do so weekly. New Zealand does not publish on this frequency, so I have been analysing the UK’s Office of National Statistics weekly mortality records. These are published on a Tuesday night NZT, covering the current year’s weeks ending 10 days prior. So not real-time, but close. This year’s data includes analysis of deaths that ‘involve Covid19’. In the UK ‘involve’ can mean anything from a 60-year year old, diagnosed with Covid19 and with co-morbidities dying in hospital, through to someone passing away in a rest home with a local GP suspecting Covid19, and without any testing designating it as such on the death certificate. It is usual to consider the excess mortalities rate (‘EMR’) for this analysis, ie the deaths above some multi-year average. The ONS uses a five year average which includes a particularly lethal 2018-19 flu season. Even so, the UKs EMR currently exceeds the 5-year average by a wide margin. For example, in Week-17 the 5-year average number of mortalities is 10,457. In 2020 Week-17 21,997 people died giving us an EMR of 11,540. What is surprising however is that removal the loosely attributed and possibly overstated Covid19 deaths reveal a statistically significant excess of UK residents now dying without the virus playing any role in their passing. Week-17 saw 8,237 deaths attributed to Covid19, meaning that there were 3,303 excess deaths not attributable to the virus. So far this year there have been 13,245 excess, non-Covid19 deaths representing around 25% of the overall EMR. What could be causing this? Empty hospital beds are a clue, as are the number of people dying at home because they have been asked to delay seeking treatment, or they are unwilling to ‘risk’ going to hospital on account of Covid19. Social isolation coupled with anxiety resulting from job losses, business failures and loss of retirement savings have a well-documented impact on suicide statistics. Economic downturns impact the quality and availability of healthcare thereby increasing mortality. These factors will persist in contributing to untimely deaths long after Covid19 has become a stable diet of documentaries and of epidemiology case-studies. New Zealand and the UK have different population densities, different volumes of international visitors, dissimilar use of crowded public transport, different air quality and seasons. These factors will have been a significant in our rather different Covid19 death rates. But the environmental benefits we enjoy in terms of limiting Covid19s spread are of no help limiting the societal and economic consequences of the lockdown. Indeed, the New Zealand lockdown is expected to cause proportionally more economic damage than the UK, with the IMF observing:

New International Monetary Fund projections show the depth of pain New Zealand’s economy will feel due to the coronavirus, forecasting a contraction on 7.2 per cent this year. ::: The IMF believes New Zealand will see the biggest fall outside of Europe, except for Venezuela, an economy already in freefall.

On that basis we should expect an EMR profile similar to, or possibly worse than what is occurring in the UK. New Zealand’s population is 7.2% of that of the UK and where the UK is currently experiencing 3303 excess, non-Covid19 deaths each week, New Zealand can proportionally expect to be experiencing 237 excess, non-Covid19 deaths each week. This is simplistic analysis, and there are factors that could suppress or exacerbate this number, but one thing is clear: the number of non-Covid19 deaths in New Zealand will be many orders of magnitude greater than the number who will die of the disease. At a political level we have seen this government late to apply a brute-force lockdown, then extending it so as appear ‘strong’. This ill-founded strategy will without doubt be killing New Zealanders. A Royal Commission of Enquiry is desperately needed to assess the basis on which critical decisions were made, and to recommend how to prevent another government-led tragedy being visited upon current and future generations.

Stuff reports:

Air New Zealand staff are “absolutely devastated” by news the airline will cut more than 1300 jobs across all routes it operates, a union says. …

One E tū cabin crew member, who wished to remain anonymous, said they were “absolutely devastated.”

“Having seen first-hand the work done by our union members, and still having this result, is crushing. Air New Zealand values its staff less than its profit and shareholders, which so sad to see unfold.” 

What part of of a 90% revenue drop can’t they understand?

Its insane to be complaining about Air NZ valuing its profit and shareholders more.

There is no profit. Even with these staff cuts Air NZ is making a loss in the hundreds of millions.

Shareholders have had the value of their shares drop by 67% or so – from $3 to just over $1. Also they will not be getting any dividends for probably years to come.

Air NZ has burnt through most or all of its cash reserves. It will be literally unable to pay its bills if it doesn’t reduce the number of staff it has. Even the Govt loan of $900 million only gets you so far.

Air NZ spent $2.4 billion in the last six months of 2019. Their six monthly revenue is now probably $300 million so they run out of money in weeks, not months unless they cut staff numbers.

Apart from the fiscal issues, it is also an insanity to have the union insist staff be kept on as employees when there is literally no work for them. There are no international flights and domestic flights are minimal.

Don’t get me wrong. It is devastating for so many great Air NZ employees who are losing their jobs. But to blame Air New Zealand for making decisions that keep it solvent is stupid. Air New Zealand would actually go bankrupt if it doesn’t reduce costs to match revenue.

  

The Taxpayers’ Union sat down with Todd Muller for a podcast interview just a few days before he announced his leadership bid. He described himself as “broadly socially conservative, and from an economic perspective reasonably liberal”, and discussed his upbringing, career, and the political challenges of bridging the urban-rural divide.

Prior to the NewHub poll which lead to Todd Muller making the sucessful challenge for the National Party Leadership, the Taxpayers’ Union’s Islay Aitchison sat down with Todd to learn about his political philosophy, goals and background as part of the Union’s MP’s in Depth podcast interview series.

You can subscribe to the Taxpayers’ Union’s podcast via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, iHeartRadio and all good podcast apps.

New Deputy Leader Nikki Kaye is one of National’s most electable politicians.

She beat Jacinda twice in Auckland Central. There is no other MP who could have won that seat for National in 2008 and held it against Jacinda in 2011 and 2014. Jacinda went off to Mt Albert rather than risk losing to Nikki again in 2017.

Nikki has an enormous work ethic. As an electorate MP she is constantly fighting for her constituents. She takes special pride in her two islands – Waiheke and Great Barrier, and even fought the Auckland Council over keeping the recycling contract for Waiheke with a local company, even though that company was run by the husband of the Green MP trying to take the seat off her. She is hugely ethical.

The Muller/Kaye team is very well balanced in the best traditions of National being a broad church.

• Nikki is urban, Todd is rural
• Nikki is socially liberal, Todd is socially conservative
• Nikki is Generation Y and Todd is Generation X
• Nikki is of course female and Todd male

So the choice in September will be between Jacinda Ardern and Kelvin Davis vs Todd Muller and Nikki Kaye. The campaign will basically start next week.

Those who have known Todd Muller for a long time will not be surprised he has become Leader of the National Party. He was talked about as a future leader when he was in his 20s. I even blogged in 2014 that he would be Prime Minister one day, when his candidacy for Bay of Plenty was announced.

Todd, like many Ministers in Labour, was a parliamentary staffer in his 20s. He could have become an MP in his 20s. He was almost literally offered numerous seats in the Waikato Region. Todd had been an extremely popular staffer for the local party, and also a staffer to Jim Bolger.

Bolger was and is incredibly fond of Todd. Todd probably ended up spending more time on the road with Jim than anyone else. I think it would be fair to say he saw Todd as his political protege, so no surprise he endorsed him this week.

But Todd turned them all down. He didn’t want to be someone whose only job had been in politics. He left Wellington and went to work for one of our largest exporters, Zespri.

He had a number of senior roles at Zespri and then took up a role as Chief Executive of Apata, which provides post-harvest services to Zespri. This was a reasonable significant mid sized company with around $30 million turnover. So Todd knows what it means to be in business, to have to provide good services to clients so you can pay the bills. To have positive cashflow. To lead a team.

After a spell as CEO of Apata he was hired by Fonterra and shot up the ranks to become a member of the Executive Team reporting to the CEO. He was reportedly on an $800,000 salary there and took a huge paycut to become an MP.

This is what he brings to the leadership. An extensive background and understanding of business that is lacking in Government. And not just any sector of business but the primary industries sector. Our two major export earners have been agriculture and tourism. Tourism is dead for at least a couple of years, so our export earnings are more reliant that ever before on our primary industries.

I’ve personally known Todd for around 25 years, from when he was President of the Waikato Students Union. Waikato is a pretty lefty campus so it is quite an achievement for a then member of the Young Nationals to be elected President.

Todd was on the Young Nationals Executive with me and as you would expect in the early 90s there was quite a battle between the drys and the wets on economic policy. Todd was always the moderate voice in the middle, so we nicknamed him “Moistie – a little bit dry and a little bit wet” 🙂

Taking over the leadership four months before an election with a 30% deficit in the polls is daunting. His challenge is to connect with New Zealanders and convince them that a Government led by him will be better at providing jobs to New Zealanders than the incumbent Government.

I first met Paula Bennett around 20 years ago when she was Murray McCully’s Electorate Agent. I think it is fair to say that working for Murray takes a special form of endurance and talent. Murray does not tolerate fools, and the fact Paula worked for him says something.

Paula became a List MP in 2005 and in 2008 cracked Labour’s hold on West Auckland and won Waitakere off them. She is probably the best known Westie MP. What I love about Paula is she is so authentically herself.

She was one of National’s best performing Ministers, seeing through welfare reforms that saw a huge decrease in welfare dependency. Her office had some of the best staff around, and her office parties were quite legendary. Paula’s sense of humour was awesome.

When Bill English became PM, she became his Deputy PM and it is a shame she only had a year in the role. I ended up attending a couple of CEO meetings with her and she was one of the few MPs who could take questions over pretty much all of Government. She made a good team with Bill, and I think if they had carried on in 2017 they would have made a real difference with their social investment programme of early interventions.

Paula’s tenure as Deputy Leader of National has finished but I think we should consider how remarkable it is that someone who was a solo mother at age 17 should become the Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand. Can’t think of a better example of National’s values in promoting equality of opportunity.

Simon is a good mate of mine. I’ve known him since he was in Young Nationals and used to stay at his place when I was visiting Tauranga. His wife Natalie is one of life’s great people, and they have a great family. He has a great sense of humour, and as is often the case the public don’t get to see the person behind the politician.

Being Opposition Leader in a Government’s first term is tough, yet despite that just three months ago Simon had National polling ahead of Labour and well enough to be able to form Government.

By contrast in February 2002 National was 16% behind Labour and in February 2011 Labour was 18% behind National.

His first six months of leadership saw National outpoll Labour and gain real momentum. Then Jami-Lee Ross went rogue and those gains dropped away. But Simon recovered and in early 2019 National was again competitive.

Then we had the terrible Mosque massacre and the PM’s excellent response to that saw National drop well behind Labour again. But then once again as that faded, National recovered and led Labour in every One News Colmar Brunton poll from June 2019 to February 2020.

But once again events intervened and Simon became a casualty of Covid-19.

This is not to say he has not made errors along the way. Of course he has, as does every opposition leader. But I do think he should get credit for his quite remarkable job of keeping National competitive with Labour for the first two and a half years of opposition.

My hope was Simon would become New Zealand’s first Maori Prime Minister, but it has not happened. I hope Simon enjoys more time with Natalie and the kids as he decides what to do next.