Stuff reports:

New Zealand First MP Clayton Mitchell is demanding an apology from security guards who booted him out of a Tauranga bar on Saturday night, describing them as politically-motivated “buffoons”.

So he thinks he was evicted because of his politics rather than being a dickhead?

Speaking to reporters at Parliament, Mitchell pushed back against allegations he and his friend had behaved badly, strongly denying claims he had accidentally hit a female staff member on the head with a glass and spilled his drink on her.
“That’s absolutely not true. That’s fake news. That didn’t happen,” he said.

In working out who to believe, it is worth noting Mitchell has convictions for assault and was found “unfit” to hold a bar licence.

The Tauranga-based MP also rejected claims that he or his friend had replied, “we are the law,” when it was suggested police could be called.
“I certainly didn’t say it. [My friend] didn’t say it. That’s just another fabrication,” Mitchell said.
“It’s politically motivated. We know the Young Nats are in behind, trying to stir something up here.”
In a brief statement, the National Party’s youth wing president Sam Stead said the issue had nothing to do with them.
“The Young Nats wouldn’t waste their time on an MP they’ve never heard of.”

God knows what Mitchell means by suggesting Young Nats were involved.

Standing alongside Mitchell, Peters encouraged reporters to watch video footage of the night before jumping to conclusions.
“We are so happy for you to see it that we ask you to turn up on Saturday night, have a good hard look at it, and then tell the public what you think,” Peters told media.
“It will show that your concerns and your alarmism is not justified in any way shape or form.”
Peters said he had not watched the video himself, but had been informed of its content by a person he trusted.

So Winston hasn’t watched the video but insists it clears Mitchell.

Numbers on the dole or jobseeker allowance were static for many years and then in the last two years have shot up by around 16%.

You don’t have to be a genius to work out that relaxing or removing sanctions and work tests have contributed to this.

Stuff reports:

The Government has shifted the goalposts in its promise to deliver more frontline police after what seems like a slip of the tongue by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.
It promised to “strive towards adding 1800 new police” over three years but in a game of semantics, it is now saying it will deliver 1800 new trained recruits by next month.
The move has drawn the ire of the Police Association who say it is not good enough and that the Government has broken its promise to police.

And to the public.

It will soon be easier to list promises the Government has kept, than those they’re dropped or changed.

Radio NZ reports:

Justice Minister Andrew Little is being bullish about new counter-terrorism legislation saying he’s not up for negotiating.

An interesting approach when you don’t have the numbers as the Greens oppose it.

In fact National has called Little’s bluff and said if he won’t even meet with them to negotiate, then they won’t vote for it at 1st reading.

Will Angry Andy stay angry and stomp and huff away or will he accept that in order to pass laws, you need to negotiate to get a majority

Radio NZ reports:

A high-profile Catholic woman says a bishop would not have had sex with a woman unless he loved her.

Does that mean that Cardinal Pell also loved his altar boys?

Joy Cowley, a celebrated children’s author of books like The Silent One and Nest in a Falling Tree, told RNZ the sexual relationship would have made Charles Drennan a better bishop.

If you have read The Thorn Birds, you might agree. One of the all time great novels on a Catholic priest who becomes a Cardinal but is more human and humane due to his failings, including his love for a woman.

She said she was defending clergy who acted on their sexual urges.
“How can you do this to a man for being human?”
The 83-year-old, who lives in Wairarapa and leads Catholic spiritual retreats, wrote an online post last week saying the case showed mandatory celibacy for priests should be dumped because it was unnatural.

I agree it is unnatural. Other Christian churches that allow their priests to marry seem to have far fewer sexual abuse cases.

“We know that a hungry man cannot be judged for stealing a loaf of bread,” she wrote.

Actually you can.

Ms Cowley wouldn’t say if she thought there was an appropriate age where a sexual relationship with a much older bishop would be okay.
“Probably early teens, I would say would be inappropriate,” she said.

Illegal would be the word you are looking for.

“You know, there’s one element you’ve left out, and that’s love. People fall in love. I don’t think this man would have had sex with anyone that he wasn’t in love with.”

I may be wrong on this, but I understand that some men have been known to have sex with people they are not in love with.

She said she was aware that the majority of priests had sex.

Remarkable if that is the Catholic Church.

Her hope was that Bishop Drennan’s case would cause a shift at the Vatican towards ending celibacy and being less judgemental of Catholics when it came to sex.

That would be a good thing.

The Spectator reports:

Thames Valley Police is appealing for witnesses following a number of public offences in Oxford.
Officers are investigating a large number of offensive stickers that have been placed across Oxford city centre containing transphobic comments. It is believed they started appearing in March 2019 within the High Street, Catte Street and Parks Road area.
Investigating officer PC Rebecca Nightingale based at St Aldates police station said: “Behaviour like this is not acceptable and we take incidents of this nature very seriously.

So the Oxford Police are investigating these stickers. What terrible thing did they say? Were they advocating violence? Where they inciting riots?

The stickers said:

“Woman: noun. Adult human female”

And:

“Women don’t have penises”

My God. Those responsible must be found and jailed.

An excellent article in Stuff looking at the full life carbon emissions of electric cars vs petrol cars. They found:

The total life cycle emissions from a fossil-fuelled car and an electric car in Australia were 333gCO2/km and 273gCO2/km, respectively. That is, using average grid electricity, EVs come out about 18 per cent better in terms of their carbon footprint.

So in Australia using an electric car doesn’t result in zero emissions. It results in a modest but useful decrease of 18%.

Likewise, electric cars in New Zealand work out a lot better than fossil-fuelled cars in terms of emissions, with life-cycle emissions at about 333gCO2/km for fossil-fuelled cars and 128gCO2/km for electric cars. In New Zealand, EVs perform about 62 per cent better than fossil cars in carbon footprint terms.

In NZ the reduction is much greater – 62%. We are fortunate to have so much electricity come from renewables.

But it is worth noting that a 62% reduction is not 100%. Electric cars still produce significant carbon emissions. So when activists demand zero emissions, they are actually calling for electric cars to be banned also.

It is sensible and desirable to reduce emissions in some areas. But those who demand zero emissions are actually calling for a return to the days of no vehicles, no buses and no trains.

Stuff reports:

Auckland’s mayor Phil Goff said he knew nothing of bonuses paid to executives in council agencies, now known to total more than $1 million a year.
Four council agencies have now revealed they pay bonuses, with the largest total at the council water company Watercare Services, where $543,000 was shared among 20 senior staff.
Stuff had previously revealed 38 staff at the council property and development arm Panuku, received $451,156 in bonuses, while the event and economic development agency ATEED told Stuff it had paid $121,682 across five staff.

If Goff knew nothing, it is because the Council hasn’t done its job.

The Council could set a remuneration policy that is binding on CCOs, requiring them to take account of it. That is not to say they should set remuneration but it is very common to have a board level remuneration policy that tackles areas such as bonuses.

“I want that policy looked at, I’m not happy with it,” said Goff in an interview.

So who has been the Mayor for the last three years?

Stuff reports:

LGWM was thrown into doubt following the election of new mayor Foster, who has been critical of the proposal, in particular the decision to build public transport ahead of a second Mt Victoria tunnel – a traffic bottleneck between the airport and the CBD.
The Beehive is quietly confident that it still has the upper hand on any move to undo the current plan.

I can’t think of anything better than the Government refusing to budge on the Wellington transport plan. It will allow National to campaign at the election with a clear policy of fixing the Basin Reserve and expanding the Mt Vic tunnels and will be a great opportunity for National to gain party votes.

Labour and Greens will be stuck defending a plan that not only does nothing for roads, but at best is a pipe dream of maybe mass transit in 10 years time.

If National campaigned on a specific pledge such as work to begin within three years on the Mt Vic tunnel expansion, they’d be well positioned to pick up votes when the alternative is basically do nothing for ten years.

Jacinda Ardern said that 2019 would be Labour’s Year of Delivery. October marks two years since Winston chose Labour and Greens to form the Government. So it seems an appropriate time to look at how they have done.

I honestly can’t recall any other Government that has failed so miserably when it comes to actual delivering.

UPDATE: A Minister’s Office has said that there has in fact been 149 million trees planted. The official policy is to include trees planted by the private sector as part of business as normal. They are correct this is the official Government position today but neither the pre-election policy or the coalition agreement stated the billion trees would include other plantings. In fact the coalition agreement says:

A $1b per annum Regional Development (Provincial Growth) Fund, including … Planting 100 million trees per year in a Billion Trees Planting Programme

That very clearly implies they would find 100 million trees a year, and has nothing about including non-funded trees that would occur regardless of the Government.

So I stand by my position that the Government promised to fund one billion trees and has only funded 2.5% of that to date.

Stuff reports:

Newly-elected Greater Wellington regional councillors will choose their new chairperson within the next couple of weeks, with the competition reportedly down to two frontrunners.
It’s understood returning councillors Daran Ponter and Roger Blakeley are in a two-way battle to take over from outgoing chair Chris Laidlaw ahead of the council’s first meeting on October 30.
Ponter and Blakeley both retained their Wellington City seats in Saturday’s election, in which six first-time councillors were voted in.

My preference would be Ponter, even though he is Labour.

Personally I hoped all the incumbents would be dumped, so there would be accountability for the busatrophe but Ponter was arguably the least bad Councillor of those standing again. He was one of the few to constantly front up and listen.

Blakeley said he would also focus on fixing Wellington City’s bus network, with possible initiatives such as ensuring bus drivers were paid a minimum of $25 an hour.

How much would regional rates increase to fund that? Already increases of 15% are rumoured. 20%? 25%? No politician should propose a policy without telling us what the cost would be.

Unlike new Wellington Mayor Andy Foster, he was sure the business case for a mass transit system would stack up.

Few things worse than confidence unsupported by facts.

The Regional Council has already costed a light rail system. The BCR (benefit to cost ratio) was a miniscule 0.05. Not 0.5 but 0.05. So every $1,000 spent would produce $50 of benefits.

Even if you could come up with some magic route that say tripled the benefits, you’d still have a BCR of 0.15 at best.

Richard Harman writes at Politik:

What we have seen in the past is that when NZ First believes its survival is at stake it becomes an unpredictable and potentially destructive force as it seeks to define itself in its traditional role as an anti-establishment party.

The last time they went to an election as part of a Government, they ended up out of Parliament.

POLITIK understands the party’s leader, Winston Peters, has sounded out friends about whether he should withdraw from a full coalition arrangement to a confidence and supply agreement which would give him more freedom to oppose some Labour policies but which would paint a picture of disunity within the Government.

Harman is well connected so if he says Winston is consulting on pulling out of the coalition, then it is a serious possibility.

One senior National MP, looking at this, speculated that Labour could lock NZ First’s support in by doing a deal over an electorate seat with them which would ensure their return to Parliament.

They can try. But voters often make up their own mind and if voters realise a vote for NZ First is a vote for a Labour/Greens Government then voters in seats such as Northland and Whangarei will be very wary.

MSN reports:

President Trump’s acquiescence to Turkey’s move to send troops deep inside Syrian territory has in only one week’s time turned into a bloody carnage, forced the abandonment of a successful five-year-long American project to keep the peace on a volatile border, and given an unanticipated victory to four American adversaries: Russia, Iran, the Syrian government and the Islamic State.

Really hard to think of a move you can make the benefits both Islamic State and Iran and Syria but Trump managed it.

Rarely has a presidential decision resulted so immediately in what his own party leaders have described as disastrous consequences for American allies and interests. How this decision happened — springing from an “off-script moment” with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, in the words of a senior American diplomat — likely will be debated for years by historians, Middle East experts and conspiracy theorists.
But this much already is clear: Mr. Trump ignored months of warnings from his advisers about what calamities likely would ensue if he followed his instincts to pull back from Syria and abandon America’s longtime allies, the Kurds. He had no Plan B, other than to leave.

The Kurds were one of the few “good guys” around that have been loyal allis to the US, and Trump abandoned them to be slaughtered.

If she was President Trump, the Washington Post would classify her statement as “Four Pinocchios”.

Next the PM will claim she has never met him!

Rather sad that Justin was such a fanboy of the PM and she is now denying he even stood for Labour.

The One News Colmar Brunton poll out tonight has the party vote as:

• National 47% (+2%)
• Labour 40% (-3%)
• Greens 7% (+1%)
• NZ First 4% (+1%)
• ACT 1% (nc)

This poll would see the Government out of office and a National/ACT Government. It is, off memory, the first public poll since the election to show a National-led Government, so this is significant.

This poll is actually quite similiar to the Newshub poll the night before. They both show:

• National ahead of Labour
• National up
• Labour down
• NZ First below 5%
• Greens over 5%

And even on the seat projection they are close. Newshub has CL with 62 seats and CR 58. ONCB has CR 61 and CL 59. This is well within the margin of error.

What both polls say is that an election at the moment would be a very very close result, either way. And they both say that Labour is losing support and National gaining.

Individual polls are not as important as the trend. So the next public poll (probably December) will be fascinating.

This is Shane Jones shooting an AR15, which his Government just banned. Enter your captions below. Best one to date from Twitter suggests his target is the Cabinet Manual!

I predict the PM will express sincere concern that one of her Minister is using a gun her Government has banned, and as usual do nothing more.

Kate MacNamara at Stuff writes:

Reserve Bank governor Adrian Orr would like to see the big and very profitable Australian banks, which dominate the New Zealand market, put up more of their own money to safeguard against shocks.
In order to protect the public from financial crisis he’s hit on a large and possibly expensive number. The “systemically” important banks should hold additional shareholder capital against the loans they make, significantly boosting the level currently required of them.
The move has plenty of critics but that debate must be put aside for now. The extraordinary way in which Orr has conducted the process to solicit opinion on his proposal raises this question first: does the end justify the means? …

It would be an open process, the bank said, welcoming all views. But that characterisation was soon at odds with the governor’s behaviour.
Numerous parties involved in the submission process described a pattern of behaviour by Orr of belittling and berating those who disagreed with him.

Orr has penned his critics letters and threatened to broadcast them. He has confronted submitters on the sidelines of industry conferences. Sometimes he called them up at odd hours to tear a strip off them for their views.

If this is correct, this is appalling bullying behaviour. I can’t imagine any previous Reserve Bank Governor acting in such a way.

On the contrary, Orr appears to be unrivalled among central bankers in the developed world for the tempestuous and personally directed venting of his views.
Annelise Riles of Northwestern University’s Buffett Institute for Global Affairs, who’s studied the behaviour of central bankers and has even written a book about them, couldn’t think of a single comparator in contemporary times.
Central banks certainly use many channels to communicate with banks, she said. And it’s not uncommon for central bankers to let banks know how they feel.
“But berating them publicly is just not seen very much,” she said. And though private exchanges are less visible, she couldn’t think of any examples of bald incivility or hostility.

I can’t think of a position where it is more important the holder is restrained, considering how powerful they are.

Orr’s chequered behaviour is not something on which the Reserve Bank chairman, Neil Quigley, is prepared to act.
“I have not received a formal complaint from any party about the governor’s interaction with them,” he said. “The Board has full confidence in Adrian Orr’s leadership.”

Of course no one has done a formal complaint. It would be professional suicide for them. But a good Board should be in touch with stakeholders enough to know if the reported allegations are true.

Some in Wellington are saying that Andy Foster only won because of the backing of Peter Jackson. Now while it is true Jackson’s backing helped Foster, it overlooks that Lester had gone from a position of strength to weakness.

In 2017, Lester’s first year of office, he had a net favourability of +28% (Curia polls once a year on major city mayors). He was a popular new Mayor. In 2018 it had declined to +12% and in 2019 had gone negative to -11%. So in two years his net favourability declined a massive 39%.

What matters isn’t so much the level, but the trend. Lester was more popular than Goff but had an equally bad trend.

This is why Foster was able to win. Lester failed to deliver on major projects and with the transport package looked more like the Government’s representative to Wellington rather than Wellington’s representative to the Government. He blew it.

Jackson’s backing of Foster provided a clear and acceptable alternative to Lester, which is why Lester lost.

Auckland had a similar issue, but a different outcome. Goff in 2017 had a net favourability of +13% – quite respectable. But then as his Council rebelled against his divisive management style his net favourability fell to -27% in 2018 and slightly lower to -29% in 2019. A massive 42% decline in two years.

Goff won re-election not because he is at all popular, but because Tamihere was not seen as a better alternative. A different candidate could very well have won. Goff is very lucky.

So both cities had unpopular Mayors. The difference in Wellington is Foster was seen as a safe alternative.

The latest Newshub Reid Research poll is:

• National 43.9% (+6.5%)
• Labour 41.6% (-9.2%)
• Greens 6.3% (+0.1%)
• NZ First 4.0% (+1.2%)
• ACT 1.4% (+0.6%)

Seats on this poll has CL 62 and CR 58 so a 2% further swing would see this being a one term Government.

By contrast the same poll in October 2010 (National’s 1st term) had National at 54% and Labour at 33%.

Also Key in October 2010 was at 51% Preferred PM. Ardern has dropped 11% to 38% Preferred PM, well below Key at the same period.