Stuff reports:

The Government is stripping public service bosses of their performance bonuses, a move it expects will help save the country $4 million.

State Services Minister Chris Hipkins announced the end to performance pay on Tuesday, a day after Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced a year-long freeze on MPs’ salaries.

Until now public service chief executive remuneration packages have included the potential to receive a discretionary payment of up to 15 per cent for “exceptional performance”. …

Hipkins said research showed individualised performance pay was not an effective incentive for higher performance for complex roles.

Hipkins is sort of right. At CE level getting $550,00 vs $500,000 is not the motivator. It is being seen to perform well. If done well, performance pay can be a useful tool for employers. It allows you to clearly signal what you want the CE focused on, by tieing their at risk to it. But you can do that also without performance pay.

Performance pay tends to work best in organisations where profit is the main driver. If you make the company more profitable, you get paid more. In non-profits it is more challenging.

National MP Nuk Korako responds to a column by Simon Wilson:

It takes a lot to shock this Māori from Rapaki but I was shocked by the New Zealand Herald’s Leftist opinion writer Simon Wilson. In his opinion piece of 18 August, Simon Wilson referenced the Kahurangi National Māori membership group who attended the National Party conference and then bizarrely stated that we weren’t ‘…well represented’. 

The only way he could have made that assertion would have been by looking at the colour of our Māori people in attendance and then deciding some of us weren’t brown enough in hue to be counted.  How else do you explain well over 60 Māori in attendance as ‘not well represented’?

Nice calling out of Wilson for judging on skin colour. And conferences normally have 500 or so attendees so 60/500 is not under representation.

Simon Wilson’s assertion is a continuation of an unfortunate tendency by people who should really know better, that Māori must be measured either by blood percentage or by skin colour.  How else can Simon Wilson’s assertion that not many Māori were in attendance stand any measure of scrutiny.

Maybe Wilson did a survey?

I’d normally consider giving Simon Wilson a bit of a pass on this given his long history as a journalist.  But unfortunately Simon’s disregard for the Māori of National continued with his snide little dig at the word ‘Kahurangi’ likening it to ‘cheese’. And quite frankly we’re not there to have a left-wing political commentator try and score points off us.

Simon’s article had a tone.  He opened with an attack on Māori by refusing to count any who didn’t fit his measure of ‘dark enough’ and then continued the attack by mocking a Māori word in the article. On top of that he went as far to suggest an Opposition doing its job of holding the Government to account and pointing out the real flaws in the Government’s policy was verging on sabotage. 

Yep. It is now sabotage to oppose the Government.

I’m wondering therefore if it would be more helpful to Simon Wilson if those Māori in attendance at National party events could wear grass skirts and sing Māori songs at the same time to make his count a little easier?  Let us know what works Simon.  We’re here to serve, apparently.

Heh.

Stuff reports:

As Wellington’s Island Bay cycleway saga drags on, more dairy owners claim the debacle have put them out of business.

Mersey St dairy co-owners Sanjay and Jayshree Patel say they will be closing their business in November because of a lack of parking outside their shop.

Last year Chappies Dairy on Dee St closed, with the owners saying the removal of parking outside the store for the cycleway proved to be the “nail in the coffin” for their business.

Well done Wellington City Council. You’re slowing killing off the community’s shops.

The Mersey Street dairy was my local dairy as a kid. Lovely owners whom everyone knew. They even extended credit to an eight year old, knowing they’d see me tomorrow, if I had no money on me. Purchased many wine gums from that store.

Very sad to see it become a victim of the Council’s arrogance and incompetence.

Sanjay Patel said his business had plummeted by 60 per cent since the cycleway was built.

What business could survive that?

Daksha and Thakor Gopal, who own the Hy-Grade Dairy across the road from the Patels, said they sympathised with their plight and agreed the parking problem would have had a big impact on business.

Thakor said no-one was listening to dairy owners’ concerns and that within five years all Island Bay’s dairies would be closed.

The Council has just done over the Island Bay community.

USA Today headline:

51% of school violence incidents flared in just 10 states last year.

Sounds terrible. Which are these awful states?

Fifty-one percent of all incidents of violence and threats against schools took place in just 10 states during the 2017-18 school year, a report released Monday finds. 

California, Florida, New York, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Texas, Illinois, North Carolina and Virginia, which are ranked the top 10 “states of concern,” accounted for 1,851 threats and episodes of violence out of 3,654 nationwide, according to the Educator’s School Safety Network. 

Hmmn so what is it about those states which causes such violence and threats.

Hmmn, aren’t they all quite large states in terms of population?

Yes, those 10 states of concern make up 53.6% of the total US population so by comprising 51% of threats and violent episodes, they actually are slightly less than the average.

Though this year’s states of concern are located around the country and have varying gun-control policies, a few factors link them together, said Amy Klinger, director of programs at the ESSN, an education-based non-profit focusing on violence prevention in schools. 

I’d say one factor links them together – population.

This story is stupid. It would be like a story in NZ revealing that a third of school violence in New Zealand occurs in Auckland.

Stuff reports the PM:

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has removed Clare Curran from Cabinet and accepted her offer to resign her Government Digital Services portfolio and Open Government responsibilities, following a second failure to properly declare a meeting.

Dr Megan Woods will take over as Minister of Government Digital Services and Ms Curran’s delegated responsibilities in relation to Open Government will revert to Chris Hipkins, as Minister for State Services. Minister Curran will retain her responsibilities as Minister for Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media, and as Associate Minister for ACC, but will now sit outside Cabinet.

So covering up secret meetings is okay for a Minister outside Cabinet, just not inside Cabinet. That’s mighty low standards. A meaningful sanction would be removal from the Ministry.

The undisclosed meeting was just as improper as the Hirschfeld one, namely:

• It was a conflict of interest as Derek Handley was an applicant for the CTO job that the Minister appoints
• The meeting was not in the Minister’s diary
• The meeting was kept a secret from the Minister’s own staff and officials
• The meeting was not disclosed to a written parliamentary question

If that is not enough to be removed from the ministry, what is?

Bjorn Lomberg in The Australian writes:

Internationally, very few politicians have admitted the inherent failings of the Paris treaty, but the truth is that it was always oversold.

This begins with the treaty itself, which includes the fiction that pledges under the agreement will somehow keep the planet’s temperature rises to 2C or even 1.5C.

The 1.5C target is a fantasy. Studies show that achieving it would require nothing less than the entire planet abandoning the use of every fossil fuel by February 7, 2021. Given our reliance on fossil fuels, that would mean we stop cooling and heating our homes, stop all air travel, and the world’s farmers stop making half the world’s food, produced with fertiliser almost exclusively made from fossil fuels. The list goes on.

So keep that in mind when people demand a maximum rise of 1.5c. It means an end to basically all travel and farming by 2021.

As for the less stringent 2C target, keeping the global temperature rise below that requires a reduction in emissions during this century of almost 6000 billion tonnes. The UN body that oversees the Paris Agreement has estimated that even if every single country (including the US) were to achieve every national promise by 2030, the total greenhouse gas cut would be equivalent to just 60 billion tonnes of CO2.

I’d not seen this analysis before. So the Paris agreement will only see cuts by 2030 equivalent to 1% of the total needed by 2100.

The Paris treaty, fully implemented, would achieve one-hundredth of the reduction to 2C (a level at which there are still significant impacts), and hence achieve benefits worth perhaps only one-tenth of 1 per cent of global GDP 100 years from now.

So implementing Paris may boost global GDP 0.1% in 100 years!

The policy costs, often downplayed, can be vast. The EU is widely lauded by environmentalists for its bold carbon cut promises. Taking into account the total cost to the economy, the EU’s bill for cutting 20 per cent by 2020 runs to about €209 billion ($328.5bn). Its much more ambitious policy of cutting emissions by 40 per cent by 2030 will likely cost €574bn a year.

Yet the benefit will be vanishingly small: my peer-reviewed, published analysis shows the EU’s Paris promises for 2030, in the most optimistic circumstances, fully achieved and adhered to throughout this entire century, would reduce global temperatures by 0.053C by 2100.

So 500 billion to reduce temperatures by 0.05C. The problem is not the science (which is sound), but the economics.

Nobel laureates for the project Copenhagen Consensus on Climate found we shouldn’t just double R&D but make a sixfold increase, to reach at least $100bn a year. This would still be far cheaper than the proposed Paris cuts and it would actually have the prospect of making a significant impact on temperature rises. It would do so without choking economic growth, which continues to lift hundreds of millions out of poverty.

Science is far more likely to provide solutions, rather than politicians.

Fixing climate change requires boosting innovation so green energy eventually will become so cheap it will outcompete fossil fuels — not making fossil fuels so expensive that everyone suffers.

Innovation, not bans on oil and gas exploration.

Scott Morrison is the new Prime Minister of Australia, beating Dutton 45-40 in the second round of voting.

He has some chance of uniting the party as Dutton and Bishop were both considerably disliked by the left and right factions. But the reality is he will probably be PM for just a year at most.

Morrison actually worked in NZ for two years as the director of our Office of Tourism and Sport. He is 1/4 Kiwi through his maternal grandfather.

The Herald reports:

Parliament’s Speaker Trevor Mallard has called off the inquiry into the leaking of Simon Bridges’ expenses.

Mallard has ruled it is a National Party matter and therefore not something Parliament needs to be involved in.

Mallard said he had told Bridges the inquiry was off and the National leader did not agree with the decision.

“He disagrees with it,” Mallard said.

“He wants the inquiry to continue. I have indicated to him that the Parliamentary Service will co-operate if he decides that he wants to proceed with an investigation and appropriate consents from MPs are in place.

“The general manager will make any relevant staff emails available.”

The National Party is expected to comment shortly on Mallard’s decision.

Mallard also said: “The existence of, and part of the detail of, a text both the Leader of the Opposition and I received last week has been reported on. It has now been confirmed to me that the person who leaked the details of the expenses and the texter are the same person.

“He or she has details of events that it is unlikely anyone outside the National Party would be privy to.

It’s curious that the Speaker says he has had confirmed the texter and the leaker are the same person. Who would know this and be able to confirm this? Newshub I guess.

It is worth noting that an inquiry can still go forward – but an internal inquiry by The Parliamentary Service, rather than an external one.

I don’t think it is tenable for the leaker not to be identified. It’s a slur on the rest of the National caucus to just let it ride. And also it is still not certain it is an MP.

The Herald reports:

The Government will cap clamping fees at $100 in a crackdown on predatory practices, with clampers who charge more subject to police enforcement

New measures to address “cowboy” wheel clamping and exorbitant fees were announced by the Government today.

Pressure has been mounting for tougher penalties on clamping contractors over the past year in particular, following a number of complaints from the public largely relating to one west Auckland retail complex.

Today Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Kris Faafoi and Transport Minister Phil Twyford announced that a maximum of $100 will be able to be charged for removal of a wheel clamp, enforceable by police if clampers try to charge more.

Infringement fees of up to $1000 for an individual and $5000 for a company will be charged by police, and a fine of up to $3000 for an individual and $15,000 for a company can be imposed if the matter goes to Court.

Faafoi said he had heard the concerns of the public who were being targeted by clampers charging as much as $700 for removal of a wheel clamp.

I think this is a very good move. The fee should be proportionate and reasonable.

I’m not even convinced one should allow clamping at all.  If someone is on your property, just get them towed.

Olivia Pearson writes:

I am now in the process of fundraising for an upscale forum to hold in-depth and entertaining debates in Auckland.  New Zealand speakers for a New Zealand audience.

Dear Cicero Debate Forum seeks to become New Zealand’s liveliest platform to debate ideas.  They will be intelligent debates to indulge in our democracy’s gift of freedom of speech and self-expression. A place where people can ride into battle, but only with their wits!

This will be a platform for clear thinkers and strong speakers to engage in classy, civilised debates and discussions on matters which are important to New Zealanders, both culturally and politically. Two or three debaters on each side of a stated motion will be hosted by an objective moderator. Well known speakers will be sourced from New Zealand’s media, political landscape, academia and also from our speaking circuit.

The debates are to be filmed for internet & television (Face TV: Sky Channel 83), these will be in-depth debates with an interactive audience, created to enlighten, to inform and to entertain. They’re to be done in a similar style to Intelligence Squared Debates overseas. First one to be held in early 2019.

Money raised will be spent on: venue hire, expenses pertaining to the speakers and moderators, security, filming for internet and for Face TV screening, ticketing and front of the house ushering and also for sound/audio expertise and live streaming.

Money left over from crowdfunding the first debate will go towards the second debate.

So please head on over to my PledgeMe page, and if you can contribute via crowdfunding to help me get this forum off the ground and regularly running amazing debates, I would be most grateful!

Why the name “Dear Cicero?”  To find out more about who Marcus Tullius Cicero was, click here. 

This is a great idea. We need more debating of big issues, not less. A project well worth supporting.

About Olivia:

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

I value the principles which became the hallmarks of Western democracy, made possible by the Age of Reason; religious tolerance (a wall between religion and state), 

a commitment to scientific inquiry, the emancipation of women and children, a free and un-coerced media, and individual rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. 

These core ideas are the beating heart of our civilisation and what make it a place worth thriving in – and dying for, as so many of our recent forefathers took it upon themselves to do. – www.oliviapierson.org

d

Radio NZ reports:

RNZ revealed this morning a person who claimed to be the National Party leaker pleaded in an anonymous text for the inquiry to be called off. They warned they suffered from mental health problems in the past and said being exposed publicly could push them over the edge.

This may or may not be true. If the texter is the leaker, they may be just trying to close the inquiry down to stop their identity being discovered. Or they may genuinely be mentally ill.

Mr Bridges said the text made clear to him that it was from the leaker.

“The text stated that the leaker was in the National caucus.

“It also made quite clear that this person had a prolonged serious mental illness … and their very clear view in the text message that there would be significant harm to them if the investigation by Speaker Mallard proceeded.

The text has made things worse for them, if it is true. You’re not going to get an inquiry called off by sending anonymous texts. If there are genuine mental health issues, then you need to own up to what you did, and see if there is a way it can be resolved without naming you.

In terms of who it might be, there seems to be three broad options:

• A National MP, as claimed
• A National staffer
• Someone hostile to National

Radio NZ said:

In the message, the author said they had leaked the expenses because they disagreed with Mr Bridges’ leadership style, describing him as “arrogant”, and wanted him to be held to account for his spending of taxpayers’ money.

To me this seems a weird argument to make if they are a National MP. Having a new party leader do a tour of the provinces is pretty much exactly what any new leader should do.

And the tone of the text is without contrition. It is basically attacking Bridges further. If the text was along the lines of “I made a terrible mistake under pressure. I was angry about x, and gave the spending figures to Newshub, and regret it” then that is more plausible. But having a National MP try to screw over their party leader using data which is going to be public in a few days anyway is not a logical thing to do.

But if the person is mentally unwell, then you don’t always think straight.

It may of course not be a National MP. The Herald reported:

Newstalk ZB political editor Barry Soper has told Mike Hosking Breakfast that he understands it isn’t a National Party MP.

“It could be anyone with a burner phone,” Soper said.

“To me it’s a storm in a teacup.

“Some National MPs are on their way to Wellington today, but not for a spill. It’s a show of support for Bridges for when he speaks to the media this morning.

“It was quite a detailed text but, as I understand it at this stage, it isn’t a National MP – but we’ll have to wait and see.”

It is a mystery.

RNZ said it had not seen the text, which is believed to have detailed a number of conversations and pieces of information from National caucus meetings over a period of weeks in an attempt to prove the author was a National MP.

National MPs are known to talk to non MPs about what happens in caucus.

I hope the issue can be resolved quickly. If the leaker does have mental health issues, they need to get help. But they also need to understand there are consequences for actions. The public hate disunity, and if this is someone within National they are screwing over all their colleagues and friends.

Garth McVicar writes:

I was born in 1951, a time when New Zealand’s crime and prison numbers were incredibly low — in fact, the country was averaging one or two homicides a year until the early 1960s.

So what went wrong? How did one of the safest countries in the western world end up spiralling to a totally unacceptable level of crime? Why is it that even locking people up doesn’t stop new criminals emerging? What is different about our country now that is creating this new breed of criminal?

The one common denominator that Little and his colleagues won’t dare talk about is the traditional family. I’m talking about a stable family unit — two parents and the children they bring into a loving, cherished relationship … where the child grows up being taught right from wrong to become a law-abiding, contributing citizen.

Criminals are made, not born. Of course some people do commit crime despite growing up in a loving family. But most of those in prison did not have a good childhood.

In 1961, 95 per cent of children were born into a traditional family with married parents. By 2015 only 53 per cent of children were brought into the world by parents who were married.

A child that grows up without a father is five times more likely to commit crime.

The evidence shows more children are abused in de-facto-type households and a child who has been abused is 20 times more likely to end up in prison when an adult.

I don’t think the focus should be on married, as much as the parents being in a committed relationship. The problem is kids that grow up with no Dad.

The evidence is clear that a child needs a father who wants and loves them. This is the best way to raise a child to become a law-abiding, contributing member of society.

Little’s justice summit won’t dare say anything like that. They fear they might offend the left-wing liberals who have been at the forefront of breaking down the family unit.

These liberals would rather focus on the problem of prison numbers than face the reality of what their social ideology has created.

We have a lot of people in prison because we have a lot of criminals. Reducing crime should be the focus, not reducing the prison population. If you reduce (serious) crime and reoffending, then the prison population will fall.

Sorry for the delay

Auckland VC Stuart McCutcheon writes:

New Zealand is rare in having academic freedom and university autonomy enshrined in legislation. Part of our role as leaders of the universities is to protect those values, which are fundamental to free speech in a democratic society. And, as the leaders of the largest research institutions in the country, we can encourage debate that is informed by facts rather than unsubstantiated opinion.

However, the right to free speech is not absolute. Speakers may not, for example, defame others, nor incite violence, nor engage in activities that breach Human Rights legislation. Similarly, the Education Act provides for academic freedom, but only “within the law”.

I agree that some of the limits on free speech are defamation, not inciting violence and not breaching the law. I also note Don Brash has done none of these things, or come close to it. His advocacy against race based seats is advocating one one side of a current political issue.

Even where a speaker is operating within the law, we are seeing increasing claims from some groups that a university has a duty to protect them from what they regard as “hate speech” (which it may not be in a legal sense). As institutions that seek to create opportunities for members of under-represented groups, we certainly work to provide environments in which they can flourish, succeed and be safe. However, the view by some that any speech they deem offensive or threatening should be prohibited from campus would essentially eliminate most debate from the university environment.

Good to see McCutcheon conclude that you can’t allow groups to censor speech they find upsetting as it would eliminate much debate on campus. I would go further and suggest that if staff at a university can’t handle people saying things they dislike, they are in the wrong job.

From the perspective of university leaders, it is almost impossible to reconcile the rights of those who demand “free speech” (particularly at the more extreme ends of any issue) with the rights of those who demand to be protected from what they see as prejudice and a cause of mental distress.

You don’t reconcile them. You follow the law set out in The Education Act.

Finally, and most relevant in the Massey case, vice-chancellors as chief executives of the universities have an obligation to the health, safety and wellbeing of staff, students, visitors and any other person on campus. The challenge here, of course, is in assessing the credibility of threats to particular events.

Thomas has been criticised for cancelling an event because she believed there was a significant risk of harm to participants. 

No she has been criticised for cancelling it because she didn’t like what Don Brash says, and labelled it close to hate speech. The security concerns were a transparent ruse, as evidenced by the fact she didn’t even talk to the Police before cancelling.

If Thomas had not spent most of her press release blaming Brash and labelling his advocacy against race based seats as close to hate speech, then one might believe her concern was purely security. But it is obvious it was the content of what Brash might say that concerned her, not a couple of posts on Facebook.

Amused to get an e-mail today from DIA telling me that they are releasing some information to Nicky Hager, showing records of any phone, text or e-mails between myself and staff in the PM’s Office over a period of four years.

It’s like someone is trying to resurrect the Dirty Politics zombie.

Anyway what did searching four years of communications find.

Well based on my quick tally, it shows the following number of phone calls to me from the staff OIAd (excluding one minute ones which will be missed calls).

• Jason Ede 20 (one every two months)
• Wayne Eagleson 11 (one every four months)
• Phil de Joux 10 (one every four months)
• Kevin Taylor 3 (one a year)

It also reveals four text messages from Wayne Eagleson over four years. Quick someone impanel a grand jury!

I’d say on an average day I get 10 or more phone calls so over four years that is well over 10,000 phone calls which puts a couple of dozen calls into context.

And a total of five e-mails over four years, being:

1. Me asking Wayne if the PM would be free to meet Tim Berner-Lees, the inventor of the World Wide Web
2. Wayne e-mailing me a press release about staffing changes
3. Me e-mailing Wayne (and several other staff) asking for examples (good and bad) of dealing with ministerial advisors, for use in an IPANZ workshop
4. Me e-mailing Kevin Taylor inviting him to Kiwiblog’s 10th birthday party
5. Me e-mailing Wayne after the 2014 election asking to meet up to discuss the flag change campaign (readers may enjoy the NB at the bottom of my e-mail)

Such an evil conspiracy – trying to get the PM to meet the guy who invented the WWW, and being sent a copy of a press release.

Below is the e-mail from DIA:

Good morning David,

This email is to advise you that the Department of Internal Affairs has received an OIA request from Nicky Hager for:

• correspondence between Jason Ede and Mr Slater and Mr Farrar from January 2008 to December 2011, including texts;
• the same information between Phil de Joux, Kevin Taylor, Wayne Eagleson and Mr Slater or Mr Farrar from January 2011 to 11 March 2015; and
• correspondence between DIA employees [in the Prime Minister’s office] and Jason Ede from January 2011 to 11 March 2015.

 

This request was originally made to Rt Hon Sir John Key’s office in 2015, and was subject of a complaint to the Ombudsman in 2016. The complaint had not been resolved at the time of the change of Government last year, and the Ombudsman accordingly advised Mr Hager that he could renew his request to the Department, which he has.

I have attached for your information the documents that the Department has determined as being in scope of Mr Hager’s request and which contain your name. The Department has made the decision to withhold the names of those staff that are not named in Mr Hager’s request, and the phone numbers of all parties. We do not consider that there are grounds to withhold any other information from these documents.

We will be indicating in our response to Mr Hager in relation to the extracts from Vodafone invoices that the Department does not hold any records that indicate the nature of the communications i.e. if any calls or texts between individuals were made in a private capacity or in an official capacity as an employee in the office of the Prime Minister. We will also be indicating that there are no records of any emails between yourself and Jason Ede or Phil de Joux.

The Department is planning to send the information to Mr Hager tomorrow (Friday 24 August 2018).

And the attachments are here:

• Phones
• E-mails

The NZ Specialty Coffee Association recently e-mailed their members to say:

We have been contacted by the Trading Standards regarding compliance within the coffee industry as per the Weights and Measures Act 1987. 
 

The NZSCA has attempted to assure the Ministry of Business Innovation and Enterprise that this is not standard practice in the New Zealand coffee industry and have suggested that they would receive better traction by contacting these companies directly.  
 

While we believe using ounces is an easy communication between coffee suppliers and the customers, we’ve discovered that identifying a 236ml vessel as “8 ounces” is not legal in New Zealand.  Our recommendation is that you read through the link below and we all look to change our language around the size of beverages.

So MBIE is wasting taxpayers money on telling coffee suppliers that they can’t call an 8 ounce vessel, an 8 ounce vessel and instead it must be called a 236 ml vessel.

What madness.

Alwyn Poole writes:

If New Zealand is to avoid a genuine crisis in education provision for our young people in the near future, a few things need to happen. As a start, the bar to entry for primary school teaching needs to go much higher in terms of prerequisite qualifications in maths, science and English. Lift the entry requirements and create a genuine bar for aspiring teachers to strive for, thus lifting the intake quality and enhancing the reputation of the profession in the eyes of Kiwi families.

This is what they do in Finland.

Teachers and their unions need to stop whingeing about their jobs. Seriously, nowhere else on the planet does a profession have 12-14 holiday weeks a year. If you have to do some work in those holidays – woolly-boolly – you still have huge choices about how you go about that while in Fiji or Bali.

Yes teachers work during the holidays. But to not have to turn up to an office for 40 hours a week is a huge advantage. I know. I work from home, and it is way superior to being in an office.

13 weeks a year away from the “office” and $76,000 a year isn’t terrible. That’s probably why there is a 94% retention rate.

Schools and principals need far more employment choice to meet their local needs. I was stunned when former PPTA president Angela Roberts stated to the world that “of course South Auckland Middle School is successful, it is bulk-funded” when the unions have made it game priority No 1 to stop schools from having this opportunity. Give teachers the ability to negotiate their own pay and conditions – they are big boys and girls – and let principals and boards make some genuine resourcing decisions.

Bulk funding would see a huge increase in salaries for the best teachers.

The Herald editorial:

Every supporter of the New Zealand First Party ought to be embarrassed by the “waka jumping” bill. No respectable political party in a democracy needs a law to keep its elected legislators loyal to it.

This is a bill to benefit just one person – Winston. His poodles are voting to give him the power to expel MPs he falls out with.

Labour and the Greens are real political parties. That is, they are organisations of like-minded people who can channel their values and views into a coherent political programme to put to a public vote. They choose their candidates for Parliament through internal votes that produce competent and usually reliable MPs.

New Zealand First is different, as it has effectively declared with this bill. It cannot rely on its MPs to remain loyal to the party that put them in Parliament and needs a law that will allow its caucus to expel a member from Parliament who will not go along with something the party intends to do.

I blogged in January on how Peters has fallen out with half the 38 MPs who have been NZ First MPs. Now considering he basically hand picks them all, that suggests he is either an awful judge of character or he is unable to work with others.

Though the party recently celebrated 25 years of existence it remains a one-man band.

It has not developed a body of principles and people larger than allegiance to its founder. It remains difficult to imagine the party existing without Winston Peters.

A party such as this is not good for democracy or stability of government. Allegiance to a person rather than a party is shallow, as we have seen in NZ First over the years. Peters has fallen out with a number of his MPs and his need for this legislation suggests his latest caucus is no more reliable.

A few days ago we learned they have all been obliged to sign an agreement to pay the party $300,000 if they resign from its caucus or are expelled and do not leave Parliament within three days. It is an abject disgrace that Peters can require that of those he brings into Parliament with him but it is their business, it is less of a public concern.

Legislation to impose the same sort of rule on all MPs, minus the fine, is of most serious public concern. It offends our deepest political principles. We elect people to Parliament, not stooges.

Stooges is exactly what Winston wants.

Mathias Corman has announced five Ministers who voted for Turnbull will now vote Dutton, so it is all over.

Peter Dutton will be the 30th Prime Minister of Australia.

And Malcolm Turnbull will be the 4th Prime Minister in a row to get rolled in their first term after winning an election.

Recent tenure of PMs has been:

1. Malcolm Fraser 7.5 years
2. Bob Hawke 8.5 years
3. Paul Keating 4.5 years
4. John Howard 11.5 years
5. Kevin Rudd 2.5 years
6. Julia Gillard 3 years
7. Kevin Rudd 3 months
8. Tony Abbott 2 years
9. Malcolm Turnbull 3 years

Hard to see any outcome but Labor winning the next election, and a long spell in opposition for the Libs.

The Herald reports:

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro carried out one of the greatest currency devaluations in history over the weekend – a 95 per cent plunge that will test the capacity of an already beleaguered population to stomach even more pain.

One likely outcome is that inflation, which already was forecast to reach 1 million per cent this year, will get fresh fuel from the measures.

Prices are currently rising at an annualised rate of 108,000 per cent, according to Bloomberg’s Café con Leche index.

A massive exodus of Venezuelans fleeing the crisis to neighbouring countries will likely increase and with it, tensions and restrictions like the ones seen over the past few days.

The official rate for the currency will go from about 285,000 per dollar to 6 million, a shock that officials tried to partly offset by raising the minimum wage 3500 per cent to the equivalent of just US$30 a month.

A 3500% increase in the minimum wage. So wonderful. This will mean no one in Venezuela will be living in poverty.

The Herald reports:

Little said he had heard commentary that victims were not being adequately heard and wanted further opportunities to engage.

He said victims were an important part of the justice summit and work was needed to provide better support for those affected by crime.

Little later signalled a special victims’ conference would be held after hearing from those who felt the summit did not address those worst affected by crime.

The event in Wellington was always intended to be the government’s first step towards reforming the criminal justice system.

Feedback has extended the pathway to reform, paying heed to those who spoke during the summit.

The Labour Maori caucus has also pushed for a summit which would focus on Maori issues with the criminal justice system, a reflection of Maori over-representation in prison and among those who are victims of crime.

Further regional summits are also planned.

This news story sums up the Government almost perfectly.

They spend what is probably millions of dollars on a huge summit with 700 people. And what is the outcome:

• A further Maori issues summit
• A further victim’s summit
• Regional summits

This is almost beyond parody.

Stuff reports:

The Government may be getting more in dividends from its 51 per cent holding in three major power companies than when it owned the companies outright, a new report claims.

This is no surprise. The discipline of being a listed company with shareholders is significant.

Throughout the sales process, National claimed the partial privatisation would improve the performance of the listed companies, and the report shows the returns to shareholders since the sales have been extremely strong.

TDB estimated that total annual shareholder returns for the companies from the day the companies’ respective shares began trading on the NZX was 26 per cent for Meridian, 22 per cent for Genesis and 12 per cent for Mercury, well ahead of the 7 per cent seen by Contact and Trustpower, two private electricity companies.

Excellent.

However, TDB acknowledged that part of the exceptional returns for Meridian and Genesis was not due to improved performance, but instead the risk of New Zealand Power, an electricity policy announced by Labour and the Green Party days before Mercury was due to go to market.

The policy, which amounted to a major overhaul of New Zealand’s wholesale power market designed to cut prices for consumers, depressed the sales prices of both Meridian and Genesis, largely because shares in Mercury sank after listing, as investors fretted about the risk of the policy.

Labour tried to sabotage the policy. They tried to scare off investors. To some degree it worked. Taxpayers got less for the shares than would have been the case. But people like me who still invested have done really well. So thanks Labour and Greens for the attempted sabotage.

And in case anyone claims the partial privatisations in 2011 led to higher power prices, here is the annual level of electricity inflation since 2007:

• 2007: 6.5%
• 2008: 7.6%
• 2009: 2.1%
• 2010: 5.8% (GST increase)
• 2011: 2.5%
• 2012: 5.3%
• 2013: 3.0%
• 2014: 3.7%
• 2015: 0.3%
• 2016: 2.3%
• 2017: 2.0%

So electricity prices have gone up only 11.7% in the last five years. In the five years before the partial privatisations they went up 26.9%.

So overall:

• Consumers have faced smaller power prices increases
• Taxpayers are getting the same level of dividends
• Taxpayers are paying less interest on the $5 billion of proceeds from the partial sales
• Investors are benefiting from their investments

It’s been a win-win-win.