Stuff reports:

Students who were told their private school would close may see it saved as negotiations begin to buy the Wellington campus.
Samuel Marsden Collegiate School, Whitby principal Narelle Umbers announced two weeks ago it would shut its gates by the end of the year, leaving 178 pupils without a school to go to and about 20 teachers without jobs.
However, parents who since formed a “parent action group” in an attempt to work to save the school met on Thursday night to announce a prospective buyer – The New Zealand Institute of Sport founder John Fiso.
​Fiso plans to partner with parents in a bid to keep the lower-North Island campus operating and will begin formal discussions with the board of trustees next week.

I do hope they can keep it open. We looked last year at moving to Judgeford (near Whitby) and one of the attractions was having such a high quality school such as Marsden Whitby nearby.

“We’ve indicated that we want to negotiate with them and we’re getting organised. The student roll has been increasing for the last 14 years. This partnership will enable us to secure that bright future for the school community.”
It was not certain at this stage how much it could cost Fiso and potentially parents to keep the school open, he said.  Iff the price was too much they may still have to look at closure.
“We have to go through a proper due diligence process. This is a positive step to pursue that opportunity. I’m confident that the Marsden trust board will want a successful outcome from this too.”
Green said the best case would be for stakeholders to move fast enough to secure the confidence of parents and students that the school had a future.

Great to see the community get behind efforts to keep the school open. It is obviously very valued.

The Guardian reports:

A former nurse fabricated claims about a murderous VIP paedophile ring in Westminster that prompted a multimillion-pound Scotland Yard inquiry that tarnished the reputations of innocent public figures, a jury has found.
Carl Beech, 51, alleged he was among the victims of an “establishment group” – including politicians and military figures – who kidnapped, raped and murdered boys in the 1970s and 1980s, triggering an ill-fated £2m police investigation that shut without a single arrest being made.
The former NHS manager, known under the pseudonym “Nick”, was found guilty after a 10-week trial at Newcastle crown court of 12 counts of perverting the course of justice and one count of fraud over a £22,000 criminal compensation payout.

What is appalling is how the deluded ravings of a fantasist were taken seriously by Police resulting in an 18 month witch-hunt.

His claims, pushed by the discredited Exaro news agency, were splashed across national newspaper front pages. The deputy leader of the Labour party, Tom Watson, met Beech to talk about his allegations, and the former health worker told the trial the politician was part of a “little group” supporting him.
The Metropolitan police officer leading the inquiry, Det Supt Kenny McDonald, had described Beech’s account as “credible and true” on TV news bulletins in December 2014. He retired on the eve of the trial.

Yes the officer in charge proclaimed to the media that the fantastical allegations were true.

Beech claimed the gang included the former prime minister Edward Heath, the ex-home secretary Leon Brittan, the former Tory MP Harvey Proctor, the D-day veteran Field Marshal Lord Bramall and the TV star Jimmy Savile. Others accused of abuse were the former head of MI6 Sir Maurice Oldfield, the late Labour peer Greville Janner and the ex-head of MI5 Sir Michael Hanley.
Beech alleged the offences had taken place in an array of locations such as Dolphin Square, the exclusive private members’ Carlton Club, Elm Guest House in London, Heath’s yacht, military bases and London zoo. He claimed he had been ferried from school by a driver to the “parties”, where boys were abused by a group of men.

The most ridiculous aspect was his claims that MPs from different parties attended these pedophile parties. Yeah, if you are that way inclined you really are going to publicly molest kids in front of your political enemies.

Beech informed Scotland Yard about three alleged child murders, including of his friend Scott who he said was deliberately mown down by a car in 1979 in a revenge hit-and-run. The murder occurred, Beech claimed, after he had been warned by Hanley not to have any friends.
Beech said he had tried to save another boy who he claimed was raped and strangled by Proctor. He alleged that, on a third occasion, Hanley had ordered Beech and three other boys to choose which of them was to die at an abuse session attended by Brittan and Proctor before a child was beaten to death. But the police could find no evidence to back up his claims.

Sounds like the Peter Ellis case!

Generally if someone claims they know about three child murders they are either a fantasist or the most unlucky person alive.

Jurors at the trial were also played a video of 95-year-old Bramall, who did not give evidence in person because of ill-health, thumping the desk as he told detectives he had no sexual interest in children.
In the interview in April 2015, seven weeks after his home had been raided by police, the former head of the British army told detectives: “I am absolutely astonished, amazed and bemused. I find it incredible that anybody should believe that someone of my career standing, integrity, should be capable of any of these things, including things like torture. Unbelievable.”
At one stage, Bramall was asked if he could swim as Beech had alleged some abuse had happened at “pool parties”. “I landed at Normandy and I jolly nearly had to swim,” he said.

The poor man having to endure that.

Beech should be jailed for a very long time.

A guest post from David Garrett:

Before and after his abortive attempt to repeal the three strikes (3S) law, Andrew Little’s only comment on it was and remains that it is “silly”, and “the high water mark of policy stupidity”. To the best of my knowledge, he has never actually explained what is “silly” about it, or explained why he thinks it is “stupid”. Perhaps he thinks  the voters are stupid, and will just take his word for it? So, do his  officials agree with him? It would seem not.
 
In a report on 3S released in December last year, Justice Department officials said inter alia  “the existing evidence is mixed and more robust research is needed to understand the true effects of these laws” and “Research in this area appears to be prone to political bias.” Aint that the truth.  However buried in the report is this:
 
“…in comparison with second strikeable offences committed before the law came into effect there has been a drop in the number of second strike offences since the laws implementation.”
 
That statement clearly states that specific deterrence is occurring. Leaving aside for a moment that deterrence was never seen as the primary purpose of 3S this is a crucial admission. Although Winston  Peters has never spelled out what he means when he says “it  [3S] doesn’t work, does it?”, the context suggests that he means there is no discernible deterrent effect. He cannot mean that 3S is not dramatically increasing the length of sentence for both third and to some extent second strikers, because that is clearly occurring. I doubt he means that it “doesn’t work” because the judges of the Court of Appeal have deliberately misinterpreted its meaning, and the judges of the High Court have enthusiastically taken their cue from our highest court.
 
It is important to record that a  key reason for 3S being promoted as a reform proposal was widespread public outrage at serious violent or sexual offenders repeatedly getting parole and going on to commit more serious crimes. Three strikes makes a huge difference to that progression, as parole is not available at 2nd strike stage, and maximum terms are imposed upon racking up  a 3^rd or subsequent strike.   Opponents of Three Strikes, like Peters, claim it doesn’t work.  That is patently false. Three Strikes works in two distinct  and quite different ways: those it can deter, it deters.  Those it can’t deter, it incapacitates for longer periods. Simple. Blunt. Effective.
 
While some of  my colleagues in Sensible Sentencing are unhappy with the report, I  look beyond the subtly biased language throughout it and see the nuance. An example of subtly biased language is that 3S is estimated to cost “over $2.7 million” without giving any context at all to that figure. In a Corrections  budget of over a $1 billion, 80% of which is spent on staffing and maintaining prisons,  $2.7 million is literally a drop in the bucket.
 
Put more accurately, the cost of 3S in terms of prisoner beds is miniscule, and there is no impact at all on staff numbers; strikers are treated exactly the same as any other sentenced prisoner. So what is the fiscal impact of 3S? There are now about 380 second strikers, and 9 third strikers. The second  strikers are serving whatever the judge gave them without parole, so those 380 odd effectively  take up an extra  prison bed only  for the period between when they would normally be paroled and the end of their judge imposed sentence.
 
The nine third strikers, who (aside from the murderers) are serving the maximum sentence for their crime, are for accommodation purposes at least in the same category: they are taking up a bed for the period between which they would have otherwise been released and the end of their sentence. This already miniscule impact is of course lessened still further by the fact that in every single case of third strike murder, the judges have magically found it would be “manifestly unjust” for these inevitably brutal killers not to be eligible for parole. However the third strike numbers are so small that whether they are paroled or not makes no practical difference to costs.
 
The Justice Department report includes a useful graph showing offending pre and post 3S in three categories of crime: sexual assault; Robbery/aggravated robbery; and “serious assault”. I was struck by how similar the shape of the  graph is for the same post-3S period in California, with sexual assault being the only category which appears to remain totally unaffected by the law change. I am not a psychologist, but I suspect this is because sexual offending is driven by very hard wired primal urges; if one is sexually aroused by young children, or by the power “buzz” of abducting and raping women, deterrence is very difficult if not impossible to achieve. It is notable that the first third striker – the so called “bottom pincher” – was convicted of indecent assault on a prison officer while he was serving his second strike offence. (The so called “bottom pinch” was much more serious than that, while still admittedly being a low level indecent assault). The crucial point is that the offender had so little control of himself that he was unable to resist his sexual urges towards a prison officer, while in prison. He is in fact just the kind of offender 3S aims to keep locked up for long periods, and I am very happy that he is in jail for up to seven years.
 
It is also fair to say – as the report does – that few changes are “easily attributable” to the new law. While there has been a sharp decline in serious assault since the law came into effect in June 2010, it is fair to concede that this decline began prior to June 2010.   There has also been a steady decline in the robbery/aggravated burglary category, but again arguably this decline began before June 2010.
 
As the report readily concedes, the almost complete lack of any research makes it very difficult to tell whether the continuing decline in the latter two categories of serious offending  is related to 3S or not. I suspect that this government will never commission any such research for the very simple reason that they are totally uninterested in whether the law is effective as a deterrent or not. It does not fit the Labour/Green ideological beliefs – encapsulated by Kim Workman’s ludicrous claim that “prison is not full of bad people; it is full of good people who have done bad things.” That is demonstrably false – those “good people” in prison have an average of 46 convictions – but that is a whole different discussion.
 
Greg Newbold tells me that prisoners are very well aware of both the existence and impact on them of 3S, and this accords with my own very limited experience of talking to “strike” offenders. What impact does the judges’ refusal to properly apply the law have on reoffending? Who knows, no research has been done. Once one accepts, as both Newbold and I do, that prisoners are not all morons who cannot understand cause and effect, it is logical to assume that the judges’ re-writing of the law has had at least some blunting effect on the impact of the law.
 
As I said earlier in this piece – and as I said many times in the House – the primary purpose of the law is protection of the public from violent offenders who will not change their behavior. As long as it survives, the law will ensure that there are no more offenders who are able to rack up dozens of convictions for serious violence on members of the public – they will be in jail, and unable to hurt Joe and Jane Citizen. Certainly they will be a risk to their fellow inmates, but them’s the breaks. Prisoners can avoid becoming victims of their fellows by not going to jail in the first place; prison officers choose  to work with what the Corrections Department euphemistically calls “some of our most challenging citizens.”
 
So, is three strikes “silly” as Little claims? Not according to his own officials it isn’t, although some solid research is required to show just what its impact is. The law is safe – for now – because the members of the New Zealand First caucus refused to back Peters on repeal of it. Hopefully the next National government will commission the research that is clearly sorely needed. Perhaps such research might even convince the 48% of Green voters who, in a Curia poll, supported the law.
 

Fascinating report at AJC:

A witness to a heated grocery store encounter between state Rep. Erica Thomas and a man she accused of uttering racist comments told authorities she didn’t hear him make those remarks, according to a Cobb County police report.

A Publix employee told a Cobb County officer that she witnessed part of the conversation and heard Thomas “continuously tell Eric Sparkes to ‘Go back where you came from!’” but did not hear Sparkes utter those words to Thomas.
In a tearful video, Thomas accused Sparkes of using that phrase, which echoes a tweet by President Donald Trump that sparked a national uproar. Her account quickly went viral and triggered a wave of support and backlash.

So this state politician got sworn at because she was trying to use the express lane at a supermarket despite having too many items. She then goes home and makes a video where she claims Sparkes told her to “go back to where you come from”, insinuating he was a racist motivated by Donald Trump.

In fact the witnesses say she is the one who said that (multiple times) in response to being called out for her improper use of the express lane.

Sparkes happens to be Latino Democrat!

It seems to be some sort of psychological condition for people to try and make themselves into a victim.

Chris Trotter writes:

THERE WAS A TIME when it was really quite hard to dislike the Greens. Back in the days of Rod Donald and Jeanette Fitzsimons; of Nandor Tanczos and Sue Bradford; of Sue Kedgley and, yes, even the rather dour Keith Locke. There was also that bloke who called himself the “Musterer” (instead of the “Whip”) whose name I have completely forgotten. [Ian Ewen-Street – thankyou Google!] When they first made their way up the steps of Parliament, back in 1999, I called them “The Magnificent Seven” – so perfectly did they cover all the bases of ecological politics.

If you counted yourself among the Left of New Zealand politics, and you didn’t vote for the Greens, you needed to be able to supply yourself with a very good reason why not. The Party made not voting for them a lot harder by being so damn nice. They practiced politics in the way most people agreed it should be practiced: by sticking to ideas and to the policies those ideas gave birth to; by refusing to get down in the gutter with those politicians who seemed to regard politics as an excuse for being personally vicious and cruel.

And now they run attack ads against opponents mocking them for their accent.

It is still possible to catch an echo of the Magnificent Seven in the 2017 intake of Green MPs. Chloe Swarbrick, in particular, would not have been out of place in that special company. Sadly, however, Swarbrick is the exception. For the most part, her Green party colleagues have lost that tremendous likeability that made it so hard for the Left to vote for anyone else.

Chloe is very genuine and likable.

The great problem now facing the Greens is that Labour finds itself in possession of the most likeable political face New Zealanders have encountered for many decades. When set against “Jacinda”, the Greens’ James Shaw comes across as a low-energy compromiser. Meanwhile, his co-leader, Marama Davidson, strobes identity politics in a fashion calculated to make a sizeable majority of the electorate feel decidedly queasy.


Neither Shaw, nor Davidson, is likely to hold in place many voters not already completely sold on the Greens’ brand of identity politics. The party is fast taking on the character of a political cult: filled with zealots determined to enforce their policies on what we should be permitted to drive; what we should be encouraged to eat and drink, what it is acceptable for us to think; and what we should be allowed to say.


It’s a long way from Rod’s beaming optimism, Jeanette’s grandmotherly wisdom, Sue B’s and Keith’s commitment to social justice and peace, Sue K’s safe food, and Nandor’s illegally resinous dreadlocks.

The good old days.

Radio NZ report:

RNZ has crunched the numbers the latest annual reviews to Parliament from two dozen major government departments and agencies, and three district health boards.
The 2017/18 reviews show some have doubled the numbers of communications staff in a single year, some are stable, and overall the trend is up.
Overall, annual reviews show public sector communications staff numbers rising 60 per cent since 2013.

A 60% increase over five years is huge.

Public Relations Institute (PRINZ) chief executive Elaine Koller said these were signs the government was listening more, not spinning things more.
“Spin is a really unfair description of what public relations is,” Koller said.

Actually I thought the PRINZ response was wonderful spin – the more communications staff you have means the more listening you are doing. Just wonderful spin.

The Herald reports:

The Government will not intervene in the Ihumātao stoush as it is not its place to get involved in the saga, according to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.
This comes as hundreds have turned out across the country to protest a housing development being built at Ihumātao, near the sacred Ōtuataua Stonefields Reserve, in Auckland.
Despite the Government saying it won’t intervene, Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson has vowed to continue pressing Ministers on the issue.
She told Parliament today that what is happening at Ihumātao was a “continuation of colonisation”.

That’s an interesting perspective.

My understand is that the local Iwi is strong full support of the housing development, and in fact have agreed with Fletchers that 25% of the land is returned to mana whenua.

The vast majority of the protesters are not mana whenua. In fact you could arguing they are acting as colonisers as they are trying to force their views onto the mana whenua.

Stuff reports:

Peter Ellis is fighting to clear his name some 26 years after he was convicted of sex offences against seven children at the Christchurch Civic Creche.
Supporters say Ellis – who has served his prison sentence and lives quietly in rural Canterbury – hopes to clear his name before he dies.
He has filed an application for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court. He lost his case in the Court of Appeal nearly 20 years ago, in October 1999.

I hope he succeeds.

Not only do I think there is no way he could be found guilty beyond reasonable doubt, I would go further and say I think he is innocent beyond reasonable doubt.

It was alleged the children were violated with needles and forced to perform bizarre and violent sexual rituals, drink urine, and were defecated on.

All at a busy childcare centre with multiple staff.

O’Mara was elected in 2017 as a Labour MP who was a member of Momentum and supported Jeremy Corbyn.

Stuff reports:

New Zealand’s law for dividing property on separation is out of date and needs to change, the Law Commission says.
It has tabled its final report for its review of the Property (Relationships) Act in Parliament today.

The key recommendations include changing how the family home is shared.
At the moment, the home that a couple lives in is usually “relationship property” and divided equally on separation.
The Law Commission said, if it was already owned by one partner before the relationship began, or received as a gift or inheritance, only the amount it increased in value during the relationship should be split.

This looks to be a very sensible change.

It has seemed bizarre to me that one person could own their own home, and if they meet someone who moves in with them, then bang after two years their partner gets half the house if they split.

Having only the increase in value during the relationship being the basis for calculating who pays how much is much more sensible.

As expected Boris won the members vote by a 2:1 margin and will later this week become the 77th Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He will be the Queen’s 14th Prime Minister.

He really has only one task – to deliver Brexit. A failure to do so will see the Conservative Party wiped out.

Some of Boris’ more memorable quotes:

• She’s got dyed blonde hair and pouty lips, and a steely blue stare, like a sadistic nurse in a mental hospital. (on Hillary Clinton
• Voting Tory will cause your wife to have bigger breasts and increase your chances of owning a BMW M3
• Yes, cannabis is dangerous, but no more than other perfectly legal drugs. It’s time for a rethink, and the Tory party – the funkiest, most jiving party on Earth – is where it’s happening.
• No one obeys the speed limit except a motorised rickshaw
• I don’t see why people are so snooty about Channel 5. It has some respectable documentaries about the Second World War. It also devotes considerable airtime to investigations into lap dancing, and other related and vital subjects.
• I have not had an affair with Petronella. It is complete balderdash. It is an inverted pyramid of piffle. It is all completely untrue and ludicrous conjecture. I am amazed people can write this drivel.
• I have as much chance of becoming Prime Minister as of being decapitated by a frisbee or of finding Elvis.
• In 1904, 20 per cent of journeys were made by bicycle in London. I want to see a figure like that again. If you can’t turn the clock back to 1904, what’s the point of being a Conservative?
• The President is a cross-eyed Texan warmonger, unelected, inarticulate, who epitomises the arrogance of American foreign policy. (on George W Bush)

The fact both Labour and Greens have launched attack ads against Simon Bridges suggests his campaign against their car taxes is worrying them.

Stuff reports:

The Green party has deleted an ad attacking Simon Bridges because its members were not happy.
The ad paints National Party leader Bridges as a used car salesmen at “Simon’s Imports”, using old footage of the National Party leader dubbed by an impersonator highlighting Bridges’ thick accent.

So the party that once claimed they don’t go negative, launched an ad attacking a political opponent – for his accent.

Imagine if National ran an ad attacking Green Party MPs for their Australian or American accents.

Stuff reports:

Statistics NZ, as it tried to develop a marketing campaign for the 2018 Census (which has been beset by other problems with the findings yet to be released) asked the public to tell it: How would you describe your current level of positivity towards the Government?”
Initially, officials at the Department of Statistics proposed asking about “positivity towards the new Government”. The surveys were undertaken in late 2017 and again in early 2018.
As the “Government Chief Data Steward”, Statistics NZ chief executive  Liz MacPherson is meant to offer guidance to other parts of the public service to ensure surveys are free of political bias.
She said the organisation had learnt from its mistake. Although an external review found the intent of the question was reasonable, the wording was inappropriate. “I regret this mistake and have taken steps to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

This is quite shocking. Of all the agencies, Stats NZ is the one you most need to be seen as totally impartial when surveying people.

And Stats NZ proposed asking people how they feel about the “new” Government which is nakedly partisan.

Stuff reports:

A new Washington Post-ABC News poll paints a decidedly less grim picture of US President Donald Trump’s 2020 re-election chances than previous polls. One question, in particular, suggests one of his main arguments could bear fruit next year. …

But there is one match up in which Trump actually leads: When voters have to choose between him and a candidate they believe is a “socialist,” Trump led 49 per cent to 43 per cent.

This is why the choice is so important. Trump will call whom ever the Democratic candidate is, a socialist. But that won’t wing true for Joe Biden, Kamala Harris or Pete Buttigieg.

However if the candidate is Bernie Sanders or even Elizabeth Warren, then the label may well stick – and a socialist is unelectable as US President.

The current top polling candidates are:

1. Joe Biden 28%
2. Bernie Sanders 15%
3. Elizabeth Warren 15%
4. Kamala Harris 13%
5. Pete Buttigieg 5%

Liam Hehir writes:

This was going to be the Government’s “year of delivery”. If you had ordered a pizza, instead of a transformed society, you would be asking for your money back by now.

I can’t recall a year in which a Government has delivered less except maybe 1974.

When the Government changed, the median rent in the country was $400 a week. Now, it’s $450. That the Ardern ministry has continued to sock it to landlords during the ongoing rental property shortage is no coincidence.
While having to scrape together more for their rent, many have also seen their petrol costs increase through new and increased taxes. Partly levied to fund more boutique transport options, these taxes are regressive. For one thing, battling families have less money to spare for such things. The fact that older, more affordable cars use more fuel just rubs salt in the wound.
So, it’s no surprise that Work and Income has had to issue almost half a million hardship grants in the past year. Photos of long queues stretching outside WINZ offices have been in the news, providing an illustration of the problem that should alarm the Government. And while ministers might protest this is a result of their comparative kindness, that’s not how it saw things in Opposition.

If kindness results in people having to queue up at 2 am for hardship grants, then maybe one should focus on effectiveness instead.

In 2017, following a much smaller increase in hardship grants under the old Government, Labour said it was a sign that Bill English had to go. According to the then leader of the Opposition, Andrew Little, the statistic was “a damning indictment of how Bill English’s Government has let things get worse for those most vulnerable in our society”. Ardern has been prime minister longer than English was.
The knock against Ardern has always been that she’s more about empathy than solutions. Time and time again, voters have rewarded the ability to understand and share feelings. The question is whether it will be enough.

Empathy doesn’t pay the bills.

Stuff reports:

The Government has extended an income tax exemption for oil rigs for another five years until 2024, despite leading a worldwide push not to subsidise fossil fuel companies.
It says the tax break is necessary to stop the oil rigs and seismic vehicles “churning” in and out of New Zealand waters every 183 days to escape all tax liability, and means that they will still pay other taxes to the Government.
Revenue Minister Stuart Nash simply told Stuff the decision was “the right thing to do” when asked on his way into caucus.
But Greenpeace head and former Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said the exemption was clearly a subsidy for oil exploration.

So the Government is going to make most motorists pay thousands more in car taxes but also is extending a tax break for oil rigs.

And it says climate change is their biggest priority!

Mike Hosking writes:

The Greens hate GE. They hate GE as much as they hate a 6.75-litre V12 in a Rolls-Royce. And yet driven, I am assuming by common sense and a desire to see outside what those around him would be preaching, James Shaw is calling for our laws to be looked at. Good on him.

I missed Shaw saying that. That is huge. Hopefully he means it, and it wasn’t just platitudes.

And in that, hopefully, is political gain. The chance for what I would guess is a not insubstantial group of New Zealanders who are into the environment, have broad-based green principles, but have been turned off over the years by the nutters who are the dangerous mixture of social engineer-come-communist.
A true Green party protects the environment – but not at the cost of jobs and progress. GE is progress. Yes, it’s got issues. Yes you need to be careful. But what we are being to this point is unengaged. And like technology, governments are woefully behind the big brains in the sector.
If GE can help farmers it can help all of us. Taxing our way to unemployment is a very blunt instrument to save the planet. Thank God a green like Shaw gets that – and given his position is prepared to show a bit of backbone and do the right thing.

Genter says climate change is her generation’s WWII moment. Well trying to reduce emissions and banning the use of genetic technologies is like trying to win WWII without an airforce.

Here’s the change in the number of people on the job seeker support (DOLE) benefit for the last five years:

• June 14 to June 15 -3,059
• June 15 to June 16 -118
• June 16 to June 17 +822
• June 17 to June 18 +3,737
• June 18 to June 19 +13,720

So in the three years to June 17 the numbers fell by around 2,000 and in the two years since they increased by over 17,000 or a massive 15%.

Now unemployment remains at a record low. So why such a huge increase in people on the dole? Could it be related to Labour getting rid of or watering down sanctions for stuff such as not turning up to job interviews?

A guest post by a reader:

Chlöe Swarbrick argues that our current treatment of cannabis as illegal is equivalent to an unregulated market for cannabis. In fact, prohibition is about as regulated as a market can get! What we actually
have is excessive and ineffective regulation. What Swarbrick is really
proposing is less and more effective regulation. She has a strong case that we can do better, but it seems that her mistaken view that she’s addressing an absence of regulation rather than improving upon existing regulation has led her to be complacent. Her proposal doesn’t just face the low hurdle of being better than nothing, but rather the higher hurdle of being good regulation. Where is the evidence that we will have good regulation before the nation votes in 2020?
 
We are being asked to trust that good regulation will be developed in the few remaining months. Why should we give that trust when the Greens did not develop detailed regulation during their many, many years of opposition? And when progress has been so meagre during the 20 months that the Greens have had access to all the resources of government? In May, a few brief bullet points of regulatory outline were released. But where is the detail on how cannabis will be taxed to encourage responsible use and to fund the costs of wellbeing programmes for those who use to excess (in the way other vices are e.g. cigarettes)? Where is the detail on how cannabis strength will be regulated to minimise the risk of harm (in the same way other vices are e.g. alcohol ABV)? Where is the thinking on how regulation will address the fact that cannabis is relatively unique in that it can be effective whether ingested or inhaled? One of those methods is vastly less unhealthy than the other. Are we voting for a new smokable product at the same time as we’re trying to achieve Smoke Free 2050 or will cannabis be legalised for ingestion only? How would that sit with our existing regime for all ingestible products (shared with Australia) that prohibits, for example, nicotine drinks?
 
We elect politicians to dedicate their time and intellect to understand issues better than we can. We elect them to delve deeply into the implications of potential laws and regulations and to optimise them. Punting to a referendum is an abdication of that responsibility no matter how much effort a politician puts into developing a draft law and educating the public on it, but that abdication of responsibility is vastly compounded with every day that passes. If we, the public, are to make the cannabis reform decision then we must have the time and information to do so.
 
Swarbrick’s lack of progress belies a perspective that anything will be better than nothing. We deserve the opportunity to require drug reform to be good for New Zealand. Will we get that chance?

Stuff reports:

Correspondence released under the Official Information Act show staff at Porirua City Council raised several issues about Mike Tana’s spending before he voluntarily handed his expense card back on March 27.

This is significant, if he ended up effectively having his card rescinded.

More than $120,000 of ratepayer funds were also spent on communications and strategic advice for Tana.

Did any previous Mayor spending $120,000 on PR advice?

Tana called his expensing “normal accounting” and explained cash withdrawals overseas as “the way that you have to do it when you go to China”.

What bullshit. If you need cash for a trip overseas, you get it issued to you in advance, and then account for it when you return. You don’t use your employer’s card as an ATM.

“I’ve been very frugal. I blag rides, get people to buy me coffees, stay at friends’ houses – I do all those things to keep my costs down.”
Tana reimbursed several expenses after council staff queried them.

If you were being frugal, you wouldn’t be reimbursing expenses. By definition they were things he should not have charged up.

Also getting other people to buy you coffee is not being frugal. Paying for your own coffee is being frugal.

“When you’re working at the level that I work at, it’s not just me – that’s anybody that works with receipts – there’ll be a certain level of receipts that go missing.”

Really? What level? 5%? 10%?

My policy when travelling on behalf of someone else is to not claim an expense if I can’t find a receipt for it.

Also I never ever asked for an expense card (except a taxi one). I would charge expenses to my personal card and claim back at the end.

Many were honest mistakes caused by him juggling three or four different bank cards in his wallet, he said. 

Yeah it is so difficult to tell the difference between four cards. So complex.

Others went through a “process” then reimbursed if they weren’t business expenses, he said.

In other words I would have the Council pay for personal stuff for me, and reimburse them if they noticed and asked.

After a withdrawal in August,  council chief financial officer Roy Baker emailed Chief Executive Wendy Walker and said: “This is a further withdrawal – and not what was agreed with Mike. I have withdrawn the ability to withdraw cash from the card.”

So the Council were so concerned they switched off the cash access of his card.

Tana said he withdrew the cash because it was difficult to use credit cards in China.

Really? I’ve never had any problems. To be fair, outside tourist areas they are not always accepted. But again the solution is to have the organisation you travel for arrange foreign cash in advance, which you reconcile when home.

Matthews suggested the solution was to organise cash before travelling overseas. “Cash transactions on your credit card are not the appropriate way of doing it.”

Exactly.