Stuff reports:

The Censor’s Office was about to run out of money within three years. Chief Censor David Shanks said the Crown had not increased its funding over the last 20 years and in that time, with the rise of the internet, material that kept the independent Crown entity buoyant such as pornography, had all but disappeared.

The office was forced to make four redundancies. It also meant that the five staff remaining would take on more work.

While the office’s finances are now out of the red today, the future of its role after 2020 looks murky, Shanks said. …

“​In the nineties we had large volumes of adult DVDs coming through, huge volumes and there was quite a steady market in that industry and we were charging our standard fee for classifying these titles and that kept the office quite buoyant and built up reserves.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed by adult DVDs haven’t been a thing for sometime.”

Our classification and censorship system is cumbersome and silly. We have different rules for print, films, TV shows etc etc.

Any future system should have two underlying principles:

1. We do not need to classify anything if it has already been classified in say the US, UK, Australia or Canada. Their ratings should automatically apply here.
2. We should have a small body across all media that can deal with complaints about an imported classification or consider non classified material.

The Herald reports:

New Zealand has been named one of the world’s most gender-equal countries – but the new Minister for Women says progress has stalled and the Government needs to take a greater lead.

The World Economic Forum releases its Global Gender Gap Report 2017 today, which uses an index to rank 144 countries on where women are more likely to be able to participate fully in political and economic life and enjoy the most equal access to education and healthcare.

New Zealand was estimated to have closed 79 per cent of its overall gender gap – placing it 9th in the world, just ahead of the Philippines, and behind Ireland in 8th. …

New Zealand is the most gender-equal country in the East Asia Pacific region, and since the reports started in 2006 has closed its gap by four percentage points.

So 9th best in the world. It will be interesting to see where we are in three years.

News.com.au reports:

WHITE men need not apply.

Stuff reports:

Statistics New Zealand has defended its methodology and warned it may not implement any findings of a Government-ordered review into unemployment measures.

The Labour-NZ First coalition agreement promised to conduct a review of the official measures of unemployment “to ensure they accurately reflect the workforce of the 21st Century”.

This should ring huge warning bells. This is politicians saying they don’t like the official measure, and they want to invent one which better suits them.

Luckily Stats NZ is independent and won’t be bound by the review, but it at a minimum is an attempt to pressure them. Labour risks underminign the neutrality of Stats NZ with their review.

Although there has been no comment on the nature of the review, it appears to stem from Winston Peters’ often repeated criticism that someone working one hour a week could be considered employed.

While Peters’ claim is correct, the quarterly Household Labour Force Survey delves much deeper into the job market than his statements would suggest, including measures of the extent to which people want to work more hours than they currently do.

The definition used is used by every OECD country. It allows for comparisons between countries. And as quoted above the HLFS also provides data on how many people are employed part-time (say 5 hours a week) and want to work for longer. All the data is there.

Ramsay said Statistics NZ had no more information about the review apart from what was in the coalition agreement.

“Nothing at this point. No content at all.”

Asked if she was concerned the report could damage the organisations credibility, Ramsay said: “We do hold the independence of the Government Statistician very, very much at heart.”

Any review would be “open and transparent”, and Statistics New Zealand may not make any changes, she said.

“We do the review. We don’t necessarily have to implement anything that’s there. That’s the process we would work through.”

This is the Government Statistician asserting her independence, as she should.

Dr Eric Crampton, chief economist at the New Zealand Initiative, said the review was “a bit nonsense” because the concerns expressed by Peters about the unemployment rate were already covered elsewhere in the survey.

“They’ve already got a measure of underemployment in there, which counts people who are working less than full time who would like to be working more hours,” Crampton said.

“They’re already tracking this. If it’s something you care about, you should be tracking the underemployment measure.”

Crampton said it was important that the Government Statistician not be seen to be making changes at the request of her political masters.

“They shouldn’t be under any pressure to redefine measures with a change of government.”

Absolutely.

This article by the former interim Chair of the DNC on how the Clinton campaign controlled it is astonishing. Read the full article. Some extracts:

I at last found the document that described it all: the Joint Fund-Raising Agreement between the DNC, the Hillary Victory Fund, and Hillary for America.

The agreement—signed by Amy Dacey, the former CEO of the DNC, and Robby Mook with a copy to Marc Elias—specified that in exchange for raising money and investing in the DNC, Hillary would control the party’s finances, strategy, and all the money raised. Her campaign had the right of refusal of who would be the party communications director, and it would make final decisions on all the other staff. The DNC also was required to consult with the campaign about all other staffing, budgeting, data, analytics, and mailings.

I had been wondering why it was that I couldn’t write a press release without passing it by Brooklyn. Well, here was the answer.

Now this might be understandable if Clinton was the candidate, but look at the dates:

When the party chooses the nominee, the custom is that the candidate’s team starts to exercise more control over the party. If the party has an incumbent candidate, as was the case with Clinton in 1996 or Obama in 2012, this kind of arrangement is seamless because the party already is under the control of the president. When you have an open contest without an incumbent and competitive primaries, the party comes under the candidate’s control only after the nominee is certain. When I was manager of Al Gore’s campaign in 2000, we started inserting our people into the DNC in June. This victory fund agreement, however, had been signed in August 2015, just four months after Hillary announced her candidacy and nearly a year before she officially had the nomination.

So Clinton had the DNC under her control from August 2015.

I had tried to search out any other evidence of internal corruption that would show that the DNC was rigging the system to throw the primary to Hillary, but I could not find any in party affairs or among the staff. I had gone department by department, investigating individual conduct for evidence of skewed decisions, and I was happy to see that I had found none. Then I found this agreement.

The interim Chair is using the word corruption. This is huge.

The funding arrangement with HFA and the victory fund agreement was not illegal, but it sure looked unethical. If the fight had been fair, one campaign would not have control of the party before the voters had decided which one they wanted to lead. This was not a criminal act, but as I saw it, it compromised the party’s integrity.

How can you allow one candidate to control the staffing and strategy a year before the nomination is decided?

I told Bernie I had found Hillary’s Joint Fundraising Agreement. I explained that the cancer was that she had exerted this control of the party long before she became its nominee. Had I known this, I never would have accepted the interim chair position, but here we were with only weeks before the election.

Cancer and corruption!

This revelation is going to have consequences.

The Herald reports:

Jacinda Ardern says she doesn’t support a new proposal by Ports of Auckland that would extend Bledisloe Wharf into the Waitemata Harbour.

Speaking after her first meeting as Prime Minister with Auckland Mayor Phil Goff, Ardern was asked about the port company’s draft 30-year masterplan for the 77ha of land it owns on the city’s doorstep.

“What I’m happy to say is that I have always opposed port expansion at its current site,” she said.

That was in reference to plans for a 13m piled concrete extension at the end of Bledisloe Wharf, which the company says is essential for a new berth and the success of the other wharf projects.

On this issue I agree with the PM.

NewstalkZB reports:

National wants the Iranian diplomat who delivered a “hate speech” against Jews at an Auckland mosque expelled from New Zealand.

Reports that Hormoz Ghahremani made the fiery anti-Israeli speech alongside Holocaust-deniers surfaced late last month.

Jewish community leaders and Race Relations Commissioner Dame Susan Devoy reacted strongly, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said it had “conveyed its concerns” to the Iranian Embassy.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Gerry Brownlee says the diplomat made what was effectively a hate speech, and racial disharmony offences under the Human Rights Act are quite clear.

“It raises questions as to why Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters hasn’t already required the withdrawal of the diplomat’s credentials and his removal from the country,” he said on Friday.

“Diplomats have a privileged position in most societies, allowing them to best represent the relationship between the country they’re from and the country they’re posted to.

“Inciting racial tension by making anti-Semitic statements is the antithesis of that important role, regardless of the context or setting in which the comments were made.”

The diplomat’s only defence seems to be he didn’t realise his speech would be put on the Internet. It was meant to be secret hate speech, nit public hate speech.

Diplomats are meant to be, well, diplomatic. Making fiery speeches alongside holocaust deniers calling for the destruction of another country is incompatible with that role. And it has real world consequences in terms of radicalisation towards jihad.

CNN reports:

 Air New Zealand gets regular kudos for innovating everything from in-flight services to safety videos, its funky films featuring Hobbits and other famous Kiwis.

And now, for the fifth consecutive year, the carrier has come out on top in the annual Airline Excellence Awards, created by Australia-based aviation safety and product rating agency AirlineRatings.

Celebrating the best in the aviation industry — from budget operators to culinary champions — the awards named Air New Zealand as Airline of the Year for 2018.

“Air New Zealand came out number one — or equal first — in all of our audit criteria, which is an exceptional performance,” the AirlineRatings judging panel said.

The Herald reports:

The Government is giving assurances that industry-wide strikes will not be possible under its proposed Fair Pay Agreements, which would set minimum standards across entire industries.

The agreements represent a major change to the workplace and have been hailed by unions, but criticised by the National Party as taking industrial relations back to the 1970s.

Workplace Relations Minister Iain Lees-Galloway has assured businesses that the agreements – which could include pay rates, weekend rates, hours per week – would not allow workers to have industry-wide strikes.

“Business NZ was very concerned about industry-wide strike action, so there will be no mechanism for striking if you’re pursuing a Fair Pay Agreement.

 “The flipside is that if the parties can’t agree, there will need to be some form of arbitration to make a final decision.”

This is arguably worse than strikes. At least with strikes the employer still gets to decide whether to give in to the demands or not. What Labour is proposing is that the de facto national awards will be imposed on an industry against their will. Even if not a single employer agrees to the demands, the unions can then just go to a friendly arbitrator and get it imposed.

This is the most radical change in labour laws in a generation. The law is that all collective agreements must be agreed to by both employers and unions. This changes that – it means employers no longer need agree.

These changes are all about lining the pockets of unions, who can then increase their funding of the Labour Party.

Stuff reports:

Newly minted Defence and Veterans’ Affairs Minister Ron Mark threw the script out the window when he essentially promised the RSA government funding.

The NZ First deputy leader spoke to the Royal New Zealand Returned and Services’ Association (RSA) at the opening of its 101st National Council, following a speech by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.

At the end of his speech, Mark said he was confident the Government would be able to provide funding to the RSA.

Mark said he reminded the Prime Minister in 2007, following a discussion between Winston Peters and RSA executives at the time in a Koru Lounge, the NZ First-Labour Government of the time agreed to appropriate funds to the RSA.

“I understand now from my briefings, that appropriation was terminated. I did remind the Prime Minister of that, and I’m pretty confident that there will be discussions a little bit later on, which you might like the outcome of.”

Mark made the comments following a literal stage whisper to the PM, during the RSA president’s speech, where Mark reminded Ardern of the former Labour-led Government’s promises that were never seen through.

So this is how Government now works. NZ First Ministers promise funding to organisations off the cuff during speeches, forcing Labour to them do it.

The announcement by Bill English is here.

I have to say I find it a bit underwhelming. Most former Ministers have kept their portfolios. Sure this means they can be up to speed straight away in opposition but there are missed opportunities.

I hope this is not seen as too long-term and that midway through 2018 there is a more substantive shake up.

I think law and order is going to be a huge area next year with Labour’s plan to repeal three strikes. I would have moved Simon Bridges into a law and order portfolio, considering his background as a former crown prosecutor.

A global survey in 77 countries was done on issues around same sex relationships. One question was on whether same sex relationships should be criminalised (as in NZ pre 1986). The net agreement by region was:

1. Central Asia +11%
2. Sub-Saharan Africa +9%
3. North Africa +8%
4. South Asia +3%
5. Middle East -7%
6. South-East Asia -11%
7. Caribbean -25%
8. East Asia -25%
9. Eastern Europe -30%
10. South America -39%
11. Western Europe -39%
12. Central America -40%
13. North America -44%
14. Oceania -48%

Rather proud Oceania is the area least likely to think adults should be made criminals for consensual sexual activity.

The NZ specific data in the survey was:

• Support equal rights for people attracted to same sex 59% agree, 15% disagree
• if neighbour is a lesbian, 77% accept or affirm, 8% try to change her
• if neighbour is gay, 78% accept of affirm, 7% try to change him
• 54% know a gay/lesbian person, 30% say they do not
• 15% think same sex relationships should be criminalised, 59% disagree
• 55% comfortable socialising with gay/lesbian people, 16% uncomfortable
• 38% know someone who is trans-gender

The Herald reports:

New Education Minister Chris Hipkins, in an interview with the Herald, says Primary schools will still have to report to parents on individual children’s progress against the eight levels of the curriculum, which most children cover during their 13 years at primary and secondary schools.

But National Standards, which set out levels of literacy and numeracy for Years 1 to 8, will be abolished and schools will be free to choose their own ways of assessing children’s progress.

So back to the days of school reports that don;’t actually tell you objectively how your kids are doing.

School Trustees Association Auckland chair Ebony-Rose Andrews said she unsure how she would know how well her two primary school-age daughters were doing without the standards.

“For me, National Standards have always been a good thing because we understand where our kids are tracking,” she said.

It is more important to Labour that schools are not judged by parents, rather than that parents know how their kids are doing.

Axing national standards may be unpopular with parents. A Herald poll when the standards were introduced in 2010 found that 73 per cent of parents with school-age children supported them.

Would be even more than that now.

Gwynn Compton has done this graph showing the turnout by age for 2014 and 2017. There was no big youthquake. Some increase with 25 to 29 year olds but also 70+ year olds.

The overall turnout was 79.0% which was a significant increase from 76.8% in 2014.  The lowest turnout group was 25 to 29 year olds at 67.6% and highest 65 to 69 year olds at 88.2%.

The turnout for those of Maori descent was 71.1% and 80.4% for everyone else.

But turnout stats only give part of the picture as not everyone enrols. We only have an estimate for the eligible population for each age group but this allows us to estimate the number of people who voted in each age group as a percentage of adults who could vote if they enrolled. The percentages are:

• All: 73.1%
• 18-24: 50.0%
• 25-29: 54.2%
• 30-34: 63.9%
• 45-39: 72.5%
• 40-44: 75.3%
• 45-49: 78.4%
• 50-54: 80.3%
• 55-59: 83.9%
• 60-64: 85.4%
• 65-69: 87.0%
• 70+: 85.2%

Politik reports:

What is thought to be a massive gas find — as big as the Maui field – off the east coast of the South Island is likely to test the pragmatism, of the new Government and the relationship between the Greens and Labour.

New Zealand Oil and Gas wants to start drilling in the Braque, field, 60 km off Oamaru, by April next year.

In an economic impact study released yesterday, the company claimed the field had the potential to generate $15 billion in GDP and $32 billion in royalties and taxes over its life and could  create up to 5,700 jobs annually during the construction phase.

The Greens will say that we must never drill anywhere for anything. NZ First will be keen to drill. So what will Labour do? Do you say no to that many jobs?

Stuff reports:

Abortion law reform advocates are keen on the new prime minister to act on her call to take abortion out of the Crimes Act as soon as possible.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern publicly stated that she didn’t believe abortion should be in the Crimes Act, as it is currently. But the issue doesn’t feature in Labour’s 100 day plan or official Health Policy.

Abortion is currently a crime if not approved of by two specifically certified medical consultants, who have to have to believe that carrying the child to term would endanger the physical or mental health of the mother, or the child is the result of incest, or the mother is “severely subnormal”, or the child is at risk of being “seriously handicapped”.

It will be interesting to see if she lives up to her rhetoric and moves on this.

Right to Life spokesman Ken Orr said in a statement that any moves to legalise or decriminalise abortion would be met with “fierce opposition.”

“She wrongly believes that the killing of our unborn children should not be a crime and that this killing should be a core health service. The proposed legislation will encourage further exploitation, coercion and abandonment of women, disguised all in the name of choice.”

He also criticised Ardern for living with a man who was not her husband.

LOL. This is so funny. Back to the 1950s we go.

Daniel Latter writes:

The numbers reported by recent studies are pretty bleak:

– 82 percent of articles published in the humanities are not even cited once.

– Of those articles that are cited, only 20 percent have actually been read.

– Half of academic papers are never read by anyone other than their authors, peer reviewers, and journal editors.

So how much money goes on research that is never read, let alone cited!

So what’s the reason for this madness? Why does the world continue to be subjected to just under 2 million academic journal articles each year?

Well, the main reason is money and job-security. The goal of all professors is to get tenure, and right now, tenure continues to be awarded tenure based in part on how many peer-reviewed publications they have. Tenure committees treat these publications as evidence that the professor is able to conduct mature research.

This is global or US research. It would be interesting to analyse NZ produced research and see how much is and is not ever read or cited.

Stats NZ reports:

The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell to 4.6 percent in the September 2017 quarter, down from 4.8 percent in the June 2017 quarter, Stats NZ said today. 

There’s a huge amount of good data in the HLFS. It includes:

• 56,000 more jobs in the quarter which is 4,300 net jobs created per week or 860 more jobs per working day or 108 net jobs created per working hour
• 104,000 more jobs than a year ago – 89,000 FT and 15,000 PT
• Unemployment down 0.3% from a year ago
• Labour force participation rate up from 70.1% to 71.1%
• Manufacturing jobs up 9,000 over the year
• Total hours worked up 4.5% (a key indicator for the economy)
• Our employment rate of 77.4% in 3rd highest in OECD.

So Labour, Greens and NZ First have been gifted this (as opposed to National in 2008 who were gifted a recession and the GFC). I can’t imagine their policies are going to lead to an economy where employers are creating 100,000 new net jobs a year.

Also on wages:

• Average FT earnings increase to $61,249 – up 2.5%
• Average hourly earnings increase to $30.51 – up 2.2%
• Average female earnings are 88% of male earnings, up from 87% a year ago

Newshub reports:

Former Prime Minister Helen Clark’s top advisor, Heather Simpson, has returned to advise the new Labour Government.

Ms Simpson has a three-decade working relationship with Ms Clark, working as chief of staff to the Labour Party before spending eight years advising Ms Clark at the UN.

Ms Simpson was given the moniker ‘H2’ to signify her proximity to H1 – Ms Clark.

Her return is seen as a sign of Labour’s move to strengthen its management team behind the scenes.

She is assisting with the staffing of minister’s offices and ‘reviewing the review’ of the campaign.

All the senior former Clark staffers are returning, to work for Jacinda and Grant (who used to work for them). It’s like the band is getting back together.

NewstalkZB reports:

The three strikes law is itself to be struck out.

Justice Minister Andrew Little said it has had no impact on making the country any safer.

That’s absolutely not true. Justice stats show that fewer people who get a first strike are committing second strikes, compared to before the three strikes law.

Little plans to start the three strikes repeal by the middle of next year.

I predict huge opposition to this.  If NZ First vote to repeal this, they’ll suffer for it.

Stuff reports:

The Government will end foreign buying of existing houses by classifying them all as “sensitive” under the Overseas Investment Act, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says.

This “clean solution” would effectively ban foreign speculators without affecting the TPP or most free trade agreements, Ardern said.

Anyone who was not either a citizen or resident of New Zealand would not be allowed to purchase existing homes.

It’s not quite as simple as that, but if this allows Labour to do a u-turn and support TPP, I’m in favour. They also could have used stamp duty to achieve their goals. I don’t care too much what mechanism they use, if it means we don’t walk away from TPP. I suspect Jane Kelsey is furious though.

Foreigners would still be able to buy land and develop housing on it for on-sale. Australians would have a special carve-out to still be able to buy homes – as Kiwis do in Australia.

So it doesn’t affect some foreigners, and foreigners can still buy up land – they just can’t buy an existing house. A bit daft as land is what is in short supply.

So don’t think this will impact house prices. The best estimate is only 3% of sales were to foreign taxpayers.

National’s finance spokesman Steven Joyce said the amendment wasn’t actually a ban and raised many questions.

“The first and strangest thing about Labour’s announcement is that it isn’t an actual ban. Putting houses through a sensitive land purchase criteria is definitely bureaucratic but does not constitute a ban on such sales,” Joyce said.

The current criteria for sensitive land sales requires the buyer be a resident, citizen, or get a special ministerial signoff.

“There are also all sorts of definitional questions. Is an apartment on the fourth floor of a building ‘sensitive land’? Is a two hectare property with two houses on it that’s being sold for development able to be sold to an international investor?” Joyce said.

The devil is in the detail. As I said I don’t think it will achieve anything much, but if it allows Labour to do a u-turn on TPP that is well and good.