Stuff reports:

Acting Prime Minister Winston Peters says an inquiry will be held into how Deputy Commissioner of Police Wally Haumaha was appointed following concerns raised by victims’ right advocate Louise Nicholas.

On Friday evening Peters said: “Cabinet will consider the matter on Monday to determine the specific details of the inquiry and its terms of reference,” said Mr Peters.

Nicholas says she went to police top brass with concerns about Haumaha, over his relationship with the former officers she accused of raping her, back when he was being considered for an assistant police commissioner role.

This will be very interesting. You see the Deputy Commissioner is not appointed by the Commissioner, but by the Prime Minister.

The process is run by the SSC, and they provide advice. However it is a Prime Ministerial decision.

UPDATE: And complicating the issue is the fact that the Deputy Commission was a candidate for NZ First in 2005. This shouldn’t disqualify him to be Deputy Commissioner, but it does make you wonder if this was a factor in his appointment.

Neil Irwin at the NYT writes:

The real question in analyzing the May jobs numbers released Friday is whether there are enough synonyms for “good” in an online thesaurus to describe them adequately.

So, for example, “splendid” and “excellent” fit the bill. Those are the kinds of terms that are appropriate when the United States economy adds 223,000 jobs in a month, despite being nine years into an expansion, and when the unemployment rate falls to 3.8 percent, a new 18-year low.

“Salubrious,” “salutary” and “healthy” work as words to describe the 0.3 percent rise in average hourly earnings, which are up 2.7 percent over the last year — a nice improvement but also not the kind of sharp increase that might lead the Federal Reserve to rethink its cautious path of interest rate increases.

Nat Torkington writes:

How do our startups fit into the R&D tax credit scheme? Short answer is: they don’t. Tax is a concern if you’re profitable. If you’re not profitable, tax is the least of your worries.

So the R&D tax credit does nothing for startups and high-growth firms.

Nothing.

Even worse, the proposal is half-baked. It’s clearly aimed at the kind of old-school physical product companies that dominated the 20th century in New Zealand: Gallagher, Fonterra, etc. It talks about R&D as following the scientific method, and there are lots of examples with dies and machine blanks.

Even weirder, the definition of R&D specifically excludes market research, design, and social sciences work. The iPhone is a UX innovation, and indeed Apple’s whole market distinguishing feature is R&D around Design. Facebook are doing R&D right now via social sciences, trying to understand the networks of conspiring bots and political actors (I know this as I went to Social Science Foo Camp at Facebook in January). Lean and agile software development starts with iterating with a customer, trying to design the feature or product that they want and will use. This is literally called The Design Process and it’s critical to building a new product.

The key point Nat makes is that tax credits are of no value to most startup companies – only to well established companies that are already profitable.

Nat concludes:

Early-stage startups are not profitable, are almost exclusively doing R&D, and are utterly unsupported by this policy.

Hopefully the final policy will be different.

A guest post by a reader:

It might make the cyclists feel warm but we know it is useless in terms of impact.

After a spend over 10 years of $640 million on cycling specifically, and presumably a good share of another $1140 Million from local transport and road safety budgets, and “in addition to the dedicated bikeway funding, ATAP is jammed full of benefits for cycling in many other areas”, Bike Auckland claims  https://goo.gl/cy3mcR :

“The aim: to raise biking from the Auckland-wide average mode share of 1% to 5% by the end of the ten-year programme. (Note: the central suburbs were already knocking on 4% at the last census; so if the average citywide mode share including even the far-flung rural areas hits 5%, you can be sure the core areas will have much higher rates of everyday biking).”

5% ? Pfffft.

Its simply a statement of hope based on self-delusion. And they have 10 years to make up more excuses and change the goal post when the aim is not met.

Let us look at the claim in a bit more detail.

The first and important thing is to look at real actual numbers from the last Census 2013 for Mode of Travel to Work statistics https://goo.gl/8A9MNp :

Total stated for Auckland local board areas (3)

Car                  364,257

Bus and train   36,978

Active mode    28,491 (cycling hidden here)

Other                6,486

That is 436,000 commuters across the whole of Greater Auckland area, and cycling at 1.5% of total is only about 6,500 cyclists. Even if the cyclists wildest pipe dream of 5% is reached in 10 years it will mean only 22,000 cyclists. So to increase cyclist numbers by about 15,300 taxpayers and rate payers are going to spend $640M + say 114M (10% of other transport and safety spending). That is $754M / 15,300 cyclists and works out to about $50,000 per extra cyclist. Excessive spend on a maybe 5% minority don’t you think?

Worse is no one, ever has or seem to want to, calculate the external costs the Auckland cycling plan imposes on the 95% of the people caused by the reduction in road lanes, various speed reduction measures, and huge loss of parking. The cost for the 95% due to increased use of fuel and loss of productive time due to longer commutes, the consequent cost of the environmental cost of increase in emissions, and the unavoidable cost of finding alternate private parking.

Bike Auckland claim of “Central suburbs knocking on 4% at last census” is a stretching of the truth (or a bombastic lie). Another Bike Auckland post states https://goo.gl/HjDxfV :

“A nice and very responsive staffer at Auckland Council provided some extra breakdowns of the cycling numbers when we asked about averages:

Auckland Region: Bicycle 2006: 1.01% Bicycle 2013: 1.22%

Legacy (circa 2009) Auckland City Council Area: Bicycle 2006: 1.55% Bicycle 2013: 2.00%”

This same post says “The greatest cycling percentage however is in Whenuapai West (over 10%) – but the more typical “high mode share” suburb in Auckland would be a place like Pt Chevalier South (official census name, actually the area is better described as “Mt Albert North”) or Narrow Neck on the Shore, both with 4.5% cycle mode share.

So one suburb in the city proper makes it to 4%. That does not make it “central suburbs” does it? What follows in the article is excuses and whinging about why uptake is generally low in central suburbs. By all means go and follow the interactive graphics link provided in the post if you know the Auckland suburbs in detail.

Cycling is huge a con job being perpetrated on the majority of tax payers and ratepayers by a small number of vocal cycling zealots. Unthinking, virtue signaling politicians at both the national and local level politics are falling for it.

Politicians would be better off spending most of this money on the 95% by making it efficient for the majority to get from point A to B. The benefits of providing expensive infrastructure for the few, that cycling delivers, is far outweighed by the economic benefits to the 95% majority in terms of time, money, efficiency for businesses and improvements to the environment.

Barry Soper writes:

The wheels might not be coming off the coalition Government but they’re certainly in need of a good oiling and the tyres need to be inflated.

We’re told to give them the benefit of the doubt that they’ve got a plan, even if the doubts continue to grow.

If they have a plan, it is very well hidden.

The Minister now in charge of the grand housing plan, Phil Twyford, was on Tuesday being confronted by his opposite number in Parliament’s bear pit, the sneering Judith Collins, who wanted to know what part of Kiwibuild is Kiwi.

Twyford assured her they weren’t planning on bringing in workers from overseas to complete the ambitious project but then the very next day that’s exactly what they announced, making it easier for building firms to bring in skilled foreign hired hands to make up the shortfall of thirty thousand construction workers.

So Twyford contradicted himself just a day later.

Here’s the interesting thing. If they need to import 30,000 construction workers to build the 100,000 houses, won’t those 30,000 workers also need houses to live in?

Kate Hawkesby writes:

One of the ministers nailing his new job, in my humble opinion, is Commerce Minister Kris Faafoi.

He got onto the Takata airbag recall, he’s talking butt kicking for wheel clampers, and now we hear the news he’s on to Visa and Mastercard over their fees. …

What I like about Kris Faafoi is that he manages to fire these broadsides at businesses without personal attacks or bully boy tactics. He’s grabbed his portfolio and is running with it, making a lot of noise, by being a voice for the little guys: the consumers, the small business operators.

He’s doing it without the loose lines and the throwaway insults that Shane Jones employs.

So although he may not always make the front page, he is quietly reassuring us mere mortal consumers, that he has our back. And that’s a good thing.

I agree. Faafoi is doing a good job.

The Herald reports:

New measures to stamp out loan sharks could include caps on interest rates and fees, and increased penalties for irresponsible lending.

They are part of a raft of measures recommended to Commerce Minister Kris Faafoi, in an MBIE discussion paper reviewing the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act.

The recommendations include increased licensing for lenders, and introducing “more prescriptive” requirements for affordability assessments.

Faafoi said it was becoming clear the 2015 amendments to consumer finance laws didn’t go far enough, and it was now time to “finish the job” to protect the most vulnerable.

He said the recommendation to cap interest at 100 per cent of the amount they originally borrowed, seemed common sense.

I am no fan of these predatory companies. In fact I stopped patronising a cafe that had one of them based in the cafe.

But good intentions can backfire. A 100% cap on interest may end up increasing interest rates for some borrowers.

At present interest rates will vary from say 30% to 300%. Now if you bring in a cap of 100%, what may happen is all these payday type lenders will charge 100%. Some people may be better off, but a lot may be worse off.

News.com.au reports:

A BILL enacting Britain’s decision to leave the European Union has become law after months of debate, the House of Commons speaker announced today, to cheers from Eurosceptic politicians.

Stats NZ for the last year has been consistently reporting around 3% of house sales appear to be to non residents.

The Herald ran a story quoting ASB saying they have calculated that actually up to 20% of sales are to non residents.

But the story was misleading, as Stats Chat highlights.

The ASB research was that between 11% and 21% of sales were to non citizens. That is very different to non residents.

You can have lived here for 30 years and not be a citizen. In fact we are one of the few countries that provides almost no incentives for residents to become citizens. Residents can vote etc. They just can’t stand for Parliament.

Newshub reports:

A Ministerial Advisory group met once, noted its meeting minutes were subject to the Official Information Act (OIA), then stopped taking minutes in further meetings.

Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media Minister Clare Curran set up the Ministerial Advisory Group in February to investigate establishing a Public Media Funding Commission.

Documents released to Opposition MP Melissa Lee under the OIA show the group decided to “not keep minutes for its further meetings” after meeting for the first time on 27 February.

The minutes for that February meeting show early on in the meeting, “The MAG (Ministerial Advisory Group) noted it is subject to the Official Information Act.”

This is pretty amazing. They have a first meeting and note they are subject to the OIA. They then resolve to not keep any minutes of further meetings, to avoid anyone asking for them under the OIA!

And this is all happening in the portfolio of the Minister for Open Government!

A competent Minister would instruct them to follow the OIA and keep minutes of their meeting. Especially as they are working in such a sensitive area as broadcasting funding.

15

I’m no fan of Labour’s desire to remove some or all sanctions against benefit fraud. But some of the changes announced by Sepuloni seem reasonable and welcome. Let’s take them in turn:

1. Security guards at MSD offices are no longer required to check people’s names off a list or to ask for ID and they are no longer dressed in security uniforms. What they will do now is welcome people warmly and ensure people feel safe coming in for support

Sounds good. Uniformed guards sounds very off putting.

2. All MSD offices now have the new MSD client commitment up in their offices – in English, Maori and sign language (other languages are also provided).

I presume some service level obligations. Fine.

3. Water is now available

Amazed this was not the case in the past,

4. Where possible accessible toilets are being made available (with baby changing tables)

Baby changing tables are a great idea. Especially many clients will be parents.

5. The new layout (being piloted at 4 new sites initially) has more private spaces, a kids play area, more clearly marked areas

Also a good idea. Kids get bored.

6. An eligibility guide has been launched and is now available online nation wide and

Understanding eligibility is good. All too often media report families saying they can’t make ends meet, and it transpires they could be getting more support.

7. Today we were able to report that as a consequence of changes I asked for a month ago that led to manual benefit sanctions and cancellations requiring an authorised 2nd person to approve the decision, we have seen a daily reduction of 23% in actual manual benefit sanctions and cancellations.

A 2nd staffer to approve seems sensible. But important to remember that there are responsibilities with welfare, and sanctions are the only way you can enforce those responsibilities such as actually trying to get a job.

But overall these changes actually look quite positive.

Dan Moskovitz blogs on why he doesn’t support a republic. They’re valod points but I thought I would respond with my views:

It risks giving a political party too much power. If a president is aligned to a political party, they will have every reason to block bills that their party does not support. This could result in political deadlock.

The easy way to prevent this is to require the appointment of the President to have a 75% majority in Parliament. This would ensure non-partisan appointments.

It makes sure we still have good ties with the UK. The fact that we are still technically under the control of the crown means that the UK and us will still have good relations. As the UK is still absolutely a world power, this is very advantageous.

I think we will have good ties regardless. We will remain members of Commonwealth and still have royal tours etc. We will still be in Five Eyes. We still will have a shared cultural heritage and language. And nothing will change that the UK founded the modern New Zealand (recognising Aotearoa existed before that).

It reminds us of our history. Both the good and the bad when New Zealand was a colony was done under the name of the crown. While the Queen is our head of state will be forced to both confront the bad and embrace the good of NZ history. If there was a president, there would be an easy excuse.

I don’t think having the Queen as head of state has any significant impact on us confronting our history. The US no longer has the British Monarch as head of state and they know their history.

The Treaty was signed between the Maori tribes and the crown. The treaty is what makes sure we treat both Pakeha and Maori equally. If we get rid of the monarchy, what happens to that agreement?

There is no change at all. The NZ Government many years ago become the Treaty partner to Maori, replacing the British Government. The Crown has always been symbolic, not actual.

The Queen doesn’t have a political opinion. Ok, well she probably does, but she probably doesn’t have a political opinion relevant to New Zealand. A president will. Especially if they are a party based, their political views may influence their actions.

Prince Charles has plenty of opinions and shares them widely. But regardless the Queen is represented by a Governor-General and the GG does sometimes express some political (not partisan) views.

At present the GG is appointed on the sole discretion of the PM. In a republic the President would need the support of 75% of Parliament (in my preferred model) so would be less likely to be political.

Finally, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!

I prefer to look at it this way. Why not have a New Zealander as the Head of State of New Zealand, instead of someone born into a German-Greek family that lives in the UK?

Stuff reports:

A Wellsford superannuitant says he will refuse to pay Rodney’s targeted transport rate, saying he has “lost faith” in local government.

On May 24 the recommendation to introduce a targeted transport rate in Rodney of $150, or $2.90 per week, was passed and put in the hands of the Governing Body who approved it on May 29.

James McNabb, 89, says he will refuse to pay the rate and urges other ratepayers to do the same thing despite it appearing in their rates notices on July 1.

“I have no faith that any work will get done. Mr Goff promised on his election to maintain rates at 2.5 per cent, add on all target rates such as this and I would suggest the increase is well 8-10 per cent or more.”

McNabb said he has lost faith in the council and asks how do it expects low income or fixed income citizens to find the finances to meet the demands.

Mr McNabb is quite correct that the effective rates increase is well over 2.5%. A targeted rate is still a rate. Goff has broken his promise big time.

Sadly he does have to pay the rates. What he can do though is make sure next time only Councillors who will keep rates to an affordable level are elected.

Audrey Young writes:

At no point during the election campaign last year did Labour or its coalition partner campaign to get rid of national health targets.

So the decision Health Minister David Clark to drop national health targets came like a bolt.

Like the oil and gas ban. I see a pattern!

They have never been particularly controversial, not like national standards.

There has been no raging debate about any harm they do.

In fact for the past six years Labour and Jacinda Ardern in particular have insisted there is value in having specific targets in the area of child poverty in order to measure progress.

Ardern won that argument. There has been wide buy-in to that argument, which makes Clark’s decision when it comes to public health the more bizarre.

I think New Zealanders want to know that they can get speedy cancer treatment, they will wait no more than six hours at an emergency department etc.

National health targets are means by which to hold a government accountable to voters and set priorities in a sector which received more than $17 billion in the May Budget.

This is the key thing – the targets make the Government accountable. Merely judging a Government on inputs (how much it spends) is silly. You want to judge them on outcomes, or at least outputs. Having all cancer patients start treatment within four weeks is an outcome that you can judge on. Merely saying we will spend $20 million more on cancer treatment without an associated outcome or at least output avoids accountability.

This is a massive re-distribution of public funds to the aspiring middle class. Uni students are overwhelmingly from professional and managerial backgrounds, and end up in those self-same jobs. Those who need the help are from less advantaged backgrounds.

— Peter Byard Davis (@PeterByardDavis) June 28, 2018

A very astute analysis by Peter Davis on how Labour is spending billions of dollars and it is not redistributing from the rich to the poor, but is a massive subsidy to the aspiring middle class (who will earn on average $1.6 million more over a lifetime).

Everytime Labour claims they don’t have enough money for something, one should remind them of the billions they are wasting here.

I filed OIAs with DMPC and the PMO about the powers of the Acting PM, and any related documents around the letter outling these.

DPMC basically did a blanket refusal on the grounds of free and frank advice.

The PMO withheld some info, but has released some correspondence which is interesting.

One amusing part is when a staffer e-mails Mike Jaspers saying the PM thinks the letter should start with “Dear Deputy Prime Minister” and Jaspers responds “It feels like a Dear Winston moment really”.

If I had the time, I’d appeal the refusals and redactions to the Ombudsman. Hard to say that there isn’t legitimate string public interest in this.

Readers may note an advertisement on the right sidebar calling for broadband volunteers. This isn’t an advertisement to sell anything, but an advertisement from the Commerce Commission seeking 3,000 volunteers to take part in broadband monitoring.

Many readers will know there is a huge difference between advertised connection speeds and actual download and upload speeds.

Well the Commerce Commission has this nifty “whitebox” that you can install at home, and it will perform automated tests on your home Internet performance at different times of the day.

This will allow the Commission to publish actual hard data on what sort of speeds users get from different ISPs at different times of the day.

So not only do you help all NZ consumers understand which ISPs are delivering the best speeds, but you also get access to your own data, so you can see what speeds you are actually getting.

The Whitebox is simple to install (basically just plug into your router) and doesn’t record any personal info or browsing history.

Data and reports from the programme will be available from
October 2018 at www.measuringbroadbandnewzealand.com

So you can read more about the project at www.comcom.govt.nz/broadbandvolunteer and register as a user at either link.

I’m signing up. I like the idea of being able to see my own data speeds at peak and off peak times. And I’ll be really interested to see the comparison between different ISPs and even different plans at the same ISP. A great way to help other Kiwis make informed choices on broadband.

An extraordinary reprimand of Phil Twyford by Speaker Mallard in Parliament:

Replies to some written questions to the Minister of Housing and Urban Development have been drawn to my attention. In particular, I have considered the answers to written questions Nos 12234, 12225, 11652, 11710, and 11715. The answers are an abuse of the written question process. In my view, they show a contempt for the accountability which a Minister has to this House. The Minister knows that they would be completely unacceptable as answers to oral questions, and the same rules apply.

Ministers are required to endeavour to give informative replies to questions—Speaker’s ruling 177/5. While the Speaker is not responsible for the quality of answers, I do expect Ministers to make a serious attempt to provide an informative answer. These questions do not come close to meeting that standard.

As a result of these answers that I have seen, I rule that: (1) the Minister will provide substantive amended answers to the questions concerned by midday on Tuesday, 3 July; (2) since the Opposition has been denied an opportunity to use written questions to scrutinise the Government in a timely manner, they will receive an additional 20 supplementary oral questions, to be used by the end of next week.

I have also written to the Minister indicating a form of reply he is using to avoid giving substantive answers is unacceptable, and that he has until next Thursday to provide corrected answers.

As No Right Turn reminds us, this is a Government that promised to be the most transparent ever. Yet just a few months in, Twyford is demonstrating such arrogance it is shocking. Written questions are there so MPs can get factual information. Electorate MPs are also being frustrated at being unable to find out about transport projects in their seats.

Here’s an example of a Twyford question:

28 year old bartender Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pulled off a huge upset beating House Democratic Caucus Chair Joseph Crawley for the Democratic nomination for NY14. This is a very safe district so she will become the youngest member of Congress and youngest ever woman elected.

Crawley was in line to be the next Speaker if the Democrats won, so she has taken out a big beast. She campaigned effectively against his ties to corporate donors etc.

But the trouble for the Democrats is that she is hard hard left. One of her policies is to basically abolish the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service. So that is saying open borders to the whole world. It will get her elected in NY14, but not help the Dems elsewhere. Her other policies are:

• Guaranteed jobs
• Medicare for all
• Free tertiary fees

They’ll double the US deficit by themselves.

David Seymour has listed this outfit on Trade Me:

Since I failed to make the final of Dancing with the Stars, the fundraising team at Kidsline have told me I have to raise more money.

This is where you could benefit by acquiring your very own authentic twerk suit. The suit not only brings back Richard Simmons’ 1980s in glorious fluoro colour, it allows the flexibility of movement that a true twerk requires. Sequins, strategically paced on the waistband, ensure your twerking action, far from unnoticed, will be accentuated to perfection.

This twerk suit is truly powerful. It saw off the nation’s adorable mother Suzy Cato. New Zealand’s biggest and most serious newspaper, the Herald, ran a picture of it for seven days in a row. You are potentially purchasing the most powerful power suit in Aotearoa.

Kidsline is a great cause. I hope it goes for a great price.

Stuff reports:

A sharply divided Supreme Court on Tuesday (Wednesday NZ Time) upheld US President Donald Trump’s ban on travel from several mostly Muslim countries, rejecting a challenge that it discriminated against Muslims or exceeded his authority. A dissenting justice said the outcome was a historic mistake.

The 5-4 decision is a big victory for Trump on an issue that is central to his presidency, and the court’s first substantive ruling on a Trump administration policy. The president quickly tweeted his reaction: “Wow!”

Politically it is a useful victory for Trump, but it actually achieves little. It is also a reminder of the awful incompetence involved in the earlier bans. The first version of the bans were done by a WH staffer with no involvement by agencies. They were insanely broad and took effect immediately which meant people already on a plane were suddenly told they could not disembark etc.

One can be very much in favour of more secure borders for the US, but not in favour of what is basically a symbolic ban. Banning all travel from a handful of countries does little. This affects just 1% of travelers.

A sensible policy would target immigration rather than travel. Banning all travelers from Iran is silly. The main impact is that no global body can now host a conference in the US.