Tonight’s One News Colmar Brunton poll is very different to the recent Newshub Reid Research poll. We seem to be seeing a significant divergence between the two polling companies as it is not just two polls that are different about all of their recent polls.

The five recent polls from the two companies are:

• 30 August Colmar Brunton Nat 41%, Lab 43% = Lab +2%
• 30 August Reid Research Nat 43% Lab 39% = Nat +4%
• 6 Sep Colmar Brunton Nat 39% Lab 43% = Lab +4%
• 11 Sep Reid Research Nat 47% Lab 38% = Nat +9%
• 13 Sep Colmar Brunton Nat 40%, Lab 44% = Lab +4%

The differences between the results for National and Labour are outside the sampling margin of error. Now both companies are very good companies that I often recommend to clients I can’t work for (I recommend UMR also). So it is puzzling that they have diverged not once (which can happen randomly), but consistently in the last few weeks.

Next week will be fascinating as either the two companies will converge with their polls (I expect one more poll from both of them), or they will remain divergent – in which case the election results will be good for one of them and bad for the other.

I will say that at this stage Colmar Brunton seems to be in a lonlier position. If UMR were showing Labour ahead by 4% I’m sure we would have heard all about it (Labour consistently reveal their internals when they are doing relatively well). And while historically Curia’s polls have aligned very closely to Colmar Brunton’s, I have found significant divergence in the last few weeks also. It is puzzling as there has been no methodological changes by either of us.

Now being in the minority doesn’t mean you are wrong. We saw that with the UK elections. So I guess we’ll see next week what the final pre-election polls say, and of course the result. Plus of course a lot can change in the last nine days. Worth noting the CB poll is done half over the weekend and half Monday to Wednesday so may not have captured the last two to three days fully, and their next one could be different.

In the meantime people will be saying, well what do we believe? My consistent advice is not to cherry pick the poll you like but look at the average of the polls. And taking this latest poll into account the size and time weighted average of the polls is:

1. National 42.3% 52 seats
2. Labour 41.1% 51 seats
3. NZ First 7.2% 9 seats
4. Greens 5.6% 7 seats

I expect a Roy Morgan poll out next week also. That is done over a two weeks period so will not be as up to date as the others which are done over four to five days.

No one will be affected by any tax changes arising from the outcomes of the Working Group until 2021 (just don’t mention the water, regional fuel or carbon taxes!).

Sources (unnamed) suggest National is considering a secret fuel tax to fund its controversial Roads of National Significance (RONS) programme.

On Labour: two taxes down, five to go.A re-elected National Government will strengthen biosecurity rules, toughen penalties for stock rustling and help exporters add value.

National Government will help young families into their first farms by allowing young farmers to buy state owned farms after they’ve worked the land for five to ten years.

Labour are terrified of their official position on charter schools. It’s not what their MPs really believe – it’s the teacher unions’ position, pushed by Hipkins as their primary parliamentary shill.

Today’s performance by Grant Robertson isn’t just incompetent, it’s dishonest. The backdown is a smokescreen – Robertson wants the headlines to read ‘no new taxes’, when Labour’s policy is still to bleed New Zealanders dry with a water tax, higher income tax, regional fuel tax, and more.

There must be proof Dr Yang is not a risk. National must act now and a full inquiry is required.  Meanwhile, Dr Yang must step aside.

Winston Peters should not be held to what is on the NZ First website [Radio NZ interview].

We will build teacher capacity and through a staggered approach implement universal te reo Māori learning for all students from Year 1 to Year 10 over a period of 10 years.

No Iron Lady: turns out Jacinda is for turning!

One News Colmar Brunton poll out at 6pm.

*Update* Labour (44%) and Greens (7%) can form a Government. NZF (6%) no longer kingmaker. National up one to 40%.

Latest update as of 9am Tuesday:

National Party $8.17b; Labour Party $22.91b; Green Party $13.28b; NZ First $27.53b; Maori Party $12.17b; ACT -$2.43b; TOP $13.69b. Full details here.

The latest spending update from the Taxpayers Union:

• National has promised $8.2 billion in new spending over the next parliamentary term. This equates to $4,736 per household.Transparency rating: 5/5
• Labour has promised $22.9 billion in new spending over the next parliamentary term. This equates to $13,287 per household. Transparency rating: 4/5
• The Green Party has promised $13.3 billion in new spending over the next parliamentary term. This equates to $7,703 per household. Transparency rating: 4/5
• NZ First has promised $27.5 billion in new spending over the next parliamentary term. This equates to $15,967 per household. Transparency rating: 0/5
• ACT has promised $2.4 billion in savings over the next parliamentary term. This equates to $1,407 in savings per household. Transparency rating: 3/5
• The Māori Party has promised $12.2 billion in new spending over the next parliamentary term. This equates to $7,060 per household. Transparency rating: 1/5
• The Opportunities Party has promised $13.7 billion in new spending over the next parliamentary term. This equates to $7,939 per household. Transparency rating: 4/5

Think what you could do with that money if politicians were saying that rather than spend more and more on your behalf, they’d give it back to you.

An extra $15,000 for the average household would go a long way.

Vanguard Letters by Stacey Kirk on Scribd

Stuff reports:

A visibly emotional Bill English has laid a direct challenge to Labour politicians; tell the students of Vanguard Military Academy to their face, that they would shut their school. 

On his first visit to a charter school – set up by the National-led Government as part of a promise to ACT under their support deal – English was welcomed by a stirring full-school haka; the All Black’s Kapa o Pango with a military flair and additional verses telling the school’s story. 

He was then handed a stack of letters – many handwritten – by each of the students, detailing how the academy had changed their lives. 

It is shameful that Labour will force charter schools like Vanguard to close, when so many students from massively disadvantaged backgrounds are having their lives changed for the better there.

Why is Labour putting placating the teacher unions ahead of giving these students the opportunity to turn their lives around and succeed?

English spoke to the school but had to steel himself partway through his speech – choking back emotion while he talked about Opposition parties wanting to shut charter schools down. 

“You know what changes individual lives, what changes a country, is trying something different if what we’re already doing doesn’t work,” he said. 

“That is why we’re campaigning hard for the ability to continue to with what’s lit your eyes up… what’s re-motivated you, what’s making fine young New Zealanders. 

“My challenge to the other political parties is this; I dare them to come down here, look you in the eye and tell you they’re going to take away your opportunity. 

“Not just say it in the media, or in the Parliament, or in their party meetings – but come here and say it to you. 

“Because I can’t see any reason why any adult would want to take away what’s created this family – what’s fired up your aspiration. because that’s what we’re here for you, each one of you matters.”

Schools like Vanguard could not operate under the state school system. It is the charter school model that has allowed them to be more flexible and make such a huge difference in their student’s lives.

Labour’s attempt to get a blank cheque for their tax policies has failed, and the inevitable u-turn was done this morning as poll panic sets in.

Labour are now saying that any CGT or land tax will not be implemented until 2021, so after the next election.

This is of course the policy they had up until six weeks ago, under Andrew Little.

The decision to change it and campaign on introducing new taxes without an election mandate was Jacinda’s Captain’s Call. And it has been just as big a disaster as Tony Abbott’s calls.

So if this is Jacinda’s one and only Captain’s Call to date, you have to look forward to her next one. And imagine her judgement if she is Prime Minister.

The urban dictionary defines a Captain’s Call as:

A decision made unilaterally by a team leader without consulting colleagues, often a massive clusterfuck.

And who labelled it a Captain’s Call? The media? National? Jacinda herself used the term. Why would you?

It is worth noting that Labour are merely saying that a CGT and/or Land Tax won’t happen in their first term. The water tax, tourist tax, fart tax and regional petrol tax are still all on, along with hiking the tax thresholds so that someone on $50,000 has a marginal tax rate of 30% instead of 17.5% and someone on $20,000 has a marginal tax rate of 17.5% instead of 10.5%. So they’re still going ahead with five tax hikes.

Duncan Grieve writes:

“There’s been about a trillion dollars that has left China in the last year or so,” intones the voiceover ominously, over flowing strings while spreadsheets roll past. We see images of hanzi characters flash up in cutaways to real estate signs, to bank signs, to shopping districts. There’s talk of “Chinese investors”, “trade missions to China”, “Chinese buyers”, “multi-millionaires” from China.

All in service to a question: Who owns New Zealand now? The hour-long documentary, which screened on Three last night, positions itself as a sober attempt to find an answer, to have a “grown-up” conversation about our housing crisis.

This is clearly a laudable goal, and one many journalists have been grappling with these past few years: The Nation’s reporting on families living in cars. The Hui on the work of Te Puea marae. The Spinoff’s own Unsettled.

Unfortunately, along with neoliberalism, which functions as origin story, the answer to the titular question appears to be China and the Chinese. This would be tense enough even if he had perfect data, able to prove convincingly that our rampant house price inflation was unequivocally attributable to Chinese capital.

 

Only, as Bryan Bruce rightly points out, our data collection has long been awful. One of this Government’s many failings on housing has been a stunning lack of curiosity – we know far too little about what has been driving the precipitous inflation of house prices.

Yet, absent knowledge, Bruce persistently infers that it is speculative Chinese money. This makes Who Owns New Zealand Now? functionally a deeply unpleasant echo of Labour’s “Chinese-sounding names” fiasco of 2015.

What a surprise. Bryan Bruce makes another documentary that gets run just before the election.

Who Owns New Zealand Now? was written, directed, produced and line-edited by one man: Bryan Bruce – whose production company Red Sky has been NZ on Air-funded 18 times in 18 years, totalling just shy of $4.5m.

Railing against neoliberalism pays well. What else could earn you almost $5 million?

Among those have been titles of merit and importance – but this is not one of them. Instead it’s an indulgent, cheaply-made and presented travelogue with through lines of old-fashioned nostalgia and scaremongering. It should not have been made.

Yet NZ on Air keep funneling our taxes towards them.

Richard Prebble writes:

What has happened to the Jacinda tidal wave? Jacinda who started the wave is the person who stopped it.

Labour’s policy under Andrew Little was to have a tax review. Labour would take any recommendations to the voters at the next election. Kelvin Davies set out the policy on TV only to be publicly slapped down by Jacinda.

In a “captain’s call” Jacinda changed the tax policy to say that a Labour victory was a mandate for Labour to introduce any new tax and at any rate that a nameless committee of “tax experts” recommended, just the family home is off limits.

Any tax? What about land tax? Yes. Tax on the family bach and boat? Yes. Water? Petrol? Nothing is off the table. Will the capital gains tax be 33 per cent? Maybe. The petrol tax 10 cents a litre? Probably. Water tax. Guess a figure. “Trust us” says Jacinda.

No party has ever asked for so much power.

 

It is too much power for any government to have.

What was Jacinda thinking?

It is and was arrogance of Labour. They thought that the public would give them a blank cheque and allow them to introduce whatever taxes they wanted.

A Capital Gains Tax is not a minor tweaking of the tax system or a relatively insignificant tax (like the tourist tax). It is as fundamental and major a change to the the tax system as you can get.

New Zealanders deserve to know in advance whether voting for a party will lead to such a fundamental change in the tax system.

They also deserve to know how much extra tax they would pay under a Labour-led Government. Would a Capital Gains Tax be at 15% (bringing in $3.7 billion a year more) or at 33% (bringing in $8.1 billion a year more).

Will your parents family home have the Capital Gains Tax applied to it when they die?

Will your start up small business be whacked with CGT when it has an initial growth spurt.

New Zealanders deserve and need to know this stuff when they vote. Otherwise they can’t make informed choices.

A guest post from Nick Kearney who is an Auckland property lawyer and holds a Masters degree in law from Auckland University.  He is also a candidate for the Act Party in this year’s election:

After a bit of a kerfuffle, Jacinda Ardern has strongly stated that her government’s land tax will not include “the family home or the land that a family home sits on”.

Voters might rest assured.  Certainly a further tax on mums and dads who own a home to raise their family is difficult to sell.  But we have no detail.  None whatsoever.  And the statement by Ardern about the family home not being taxed seems fine, but there are still problems. 

Last week I looked at a leasehold unit title in Auckland for a client.  The land was owned by Ngati Whatua, and leased for 150 years to the body corporate.  Many of the apartments were Labour’s so-called family homes.  They were ideal first homes for those unable to afford soaring Auckland land prices, as the entry level for leasehold units is much less.  The very nice apartment I saw was only $325,000.  It had two bedrooms, a nice pool and gym complex, tennis court, air conditioning, sauna, spa and security CCTV.  It is modern and spacious.  It is a great first home option for a young family or a young couple starting out.  Indeed, it is exactly the type of first home that those on the left of politics have been championing for a while.

I read the lease.  It contains a provision requiring the lessee (the unit owners) to pay the ground rent, but also any “rates, taxes…paid or payable, or otherwise incurred in respect of the Land…”. 

If Labour’s land tax was in place, it would be levied against Ngati Whatua as the landowner, but under the lease it is charged to the unit owners.  Is Labour going to demand Ngati Whatua not to on-charge the land tax to the unit owners that are family homes?  Or will Labour’s desire not to penalise family homeowners not be realised with leasehold units? 

Many of these units in this complex are investment properties.  Is Labour proposing that only those properties pay the land tax, and not the family units?  If so, how does Ngati Whatua recover all its costs under the tax it is charged as it is entitled to do under the lease?

When I started thinking about this more deeply, I then thought of a good friend’s situation. 

She has a small retail shop on the North Shore held under a commercial lease.  It is her first venture of this type, and it is going really well.  I am proud of what my friend has done.  But as with all start-ups, the first couple of years are tough.  You have to get yourself known.  And to maintain a strict budget your costs must be kept to a minimum.  It’s very tough in fashion retail, with the internet providing stiff competition.  My friend’s lease doesn’t require her to pay the landlord’s land tax, but that’s only because there isn’t currently one.  It does require her to pay all rates, which of course she does.  Naturally any landlord is going to recover a land tax from the tenant, which will undoubtedly add a cost to my friend’s business.  That cost will have to be passed on to her customers – the consumers in our society.

I also act for a very successful retail chain tenant.  They have purchasing power and brand recognition.  Building owners are pleased to have them as tenants.  Because of its name, this client manages to negotiate much more favourable lease terms.  On many occasions, it doesn’t pay a lot of the usual outgoings payable under a commercial lease.  I am certain this client, and other large retail tenants, will negotiate out of paying any land tax under any lease, but the same almost certainly won’t be available to my friend’s very small business.

In 2009, a tax working group put together by John Key’s government assessed the taxable land base at $460 billion.  If the land tax was 1% of this, it would raise $4.6 billion in revenue.  That sounds a lot, and it is to a government keen to spend it.  But if one excludes Labour’s exemptions, it’s possible that only half of that amount is available.  Although a land tax is very efficient, as land cannot be moved, it would also be highly disproportionate because of highly inflated Auckland land values when compared to land values in other parts of the country.  It would hit Aucklanders hard.  Using my examples in this article, the family that owns the unit on the leasehold Ngati Whatua land will pay about $700 per year in land tax, based on that unit’s share of the land value of $7,000,000.00.  Yet, my friend’s small retail shop would face a tax of $4,000.00 per annum, based on an underlying land value of her leased building of $400,000.00.  My friend doesn’t yet earn $4,000.00 per annum.  She’s also the sort of person who votes Labour.

I started off this article by repeating what Jacinda Ardern said last week.  Ardern also said that she wanted the country’s tax system to be “fair”.  For my friend’s sake, and for the sake of the young family in the leasehold apartment, I hope she follows through on this promise.

Nick  offered this op ed to the Herald which decided not to publish it. A pity as I think it makes excellent points, regardless of Nick’s background.

This shows what happened to the NZ dollar after the Reid Research poll came out on Tuesday night.

That’s a huge gain.

The Labour Party is misleading New Zealand workers by trying to suggest they won’t increase income taxes.

It is time for Bill English and Steven Joyce to stop the scaremongering and lies, and front up to New Zealanders about the impact of their tax cuts.

New Zealanders should be very concerned that a principal National Party fundraiser and a list MP, highly placed inside the party, was a member of the Chinese intelligence service. The National Party either spectacularly failed to check out this candidate, or were totally naïve about what his background meant. In China, once a spy always a spy.

With the polls closing in just ten days The Opportunities Party has launched a strategic voting campaign designed to remove Winston Peters and New Zealand First from their position as monarch makers in the New Zealand election.

The Green Party will provide genuine support for students by bringing in a universal post-graduate student allowance and increasing allowance rates for all students.

Today’s decision by the Electoral Commission clearing Māori Party candidate Wetex Kang of a bribery allegation which the New Zealand Herald “beefed up” on its front page last week, shows that Wetex is the victim of a smear campaign led by a troublemaker angry that he didn’t want her as his campaign manager.

ACT would increase the period that young people can be sentenced to youth justice facilities to 1 year, to remove them from the situations they were in when they were offending. Currently, youth justice facilities are available for young people on remand or sentenced to the youth court for 3-6 months.

Legalising prostitution has been a dismal failure. In 2003 our Government used the dubious process of Conscience Votes to legalise prostitution. There was no mandate from the population to do so and it was based on a false premise of making sex work safe.

National 10-points ahead in Reid Research poll, Jacinda under pressure, and Nats launch new attack ad.

Newshub Reid Research: National 47.3%, Labour 37.8%, NZ First 6.0%, Greens 4.9%, Maori, ACT 0.6%, TOP 1.6%, Maori 1.1%

Latest update as of 9am Tuesday:

National Party $8.17b; Labour Party $22.91b; Green Party $13.28b; NZ First $27.53b; Maori Party $12.17b; ACT -$2.43b; TOP $13.69b Full details here.

Newsroom has a story alleging that National List MP Jian Yang was a Chinese military intelligence officer trained by Chinese spies and is being investigated by the SIS.

The story seems to be the modern day equivalent of reds under the beds. No proof, and unnamed sources. Jian Yang has denounced the story as a smear campaign out to damage him and National, just because he is Chinese.

Maybe anyone with a Chinese sounding surname is in fact a spy!

An excellent ad from National.

Stuff reports:

A Labour Party proposal to boost Radio New Zealand’s role in the media market and pay for it to launch a television channel has copped criticism from Fairfax New Zealand.

Labour leader Jacinda Ardern announced on Tuesday morning that the party would provide funding for Radio NZ to set up a new non-commercial television channel if elected, with the radio broadcaster morphing into a multi-media “public digital media service”, which it has dubbed “RNZ Plus”.

The plan would likely see Radio NZ get the bulk of an additional $38 million a year that Labour would allocate to public broadcasting, said Labour broadcasting spokeswoman Clare Curran, who denied the plan was a snub to Television New Zealand.

Fairfax NZ chief executive Sinead Boucher said it was “great that Labour recognises the importance of high-quality journalism to a sound democracy”.

“But I would question their approach of piling more money into state-owned media, and their plans to turn Radio NZ into a super-media platform and broadcaster.

“Whilst Radio NZ is a great organisation, it has just had a big funding boost and I am not convinced New Zealanders have much appetite for more of their journalism to ultimately flow up to government control,” she said.

Labour is going to set up a Public Media Funding Commission which they claim will be free from political influence. Yeah, right. You can just imagine who will be appointed to this!

The Canterbury Star reports:

An ailing Jim Anderton was presented with an insignia for his services to Parliament at a special investiture ceremony on Sunday.

The long-standing politician was awarded the insignia of a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit by Governor-General Dame Patsy Reddy, after being named on the Queen’s Birthday Honours List in June.

A small group of family and friends, former Prime Minister and Labour Party leader Helen Clark, and Mayor Lianne Dalziel, were at the ceremony.

Mr Anderton, 79, is frail and was in a wheelchair at the ceremony. It was held at Nazareth House, where he is now living.

Sad to see Mr Anderton so frail. He was one of the most energetic politicians of his time, and carried this energy into retirement. I agreed with him on little, but admired his tenacity and energy.

An good ruling from The Press Council:

On July 23 Stuff NZ published an article headed ‘Bath bombs cause painful reaction among females’ about a painful skin reaction suffered by two girls, in separate incidents, after they had bathed in water infused with bath bombs sold by nationwide retailers.

The story identified and quoted the mothers, who described their daughters’ vulvas as “red and irritated” and ‘red raw, raised and sore’ after their baths. Both children, one a toddler and another a preschooler, were named in the story.

Ms Woods complained that it was inappropriate for Stuff to have mentioned the names of the children particularly when the state of their vulvas was being described.

“This is on the internet, which as everyone knows, means it can be around forever,” she said.

She quoted Press Council Principle 3, Children and Young People, which states: “In cases involving children and young people editors must demonstrate an exceptional degree of public interest to override the interests of the child or young person.”

Naming the girls in this case was not necessary for public interest, she said.

Can’t agree more.  No kid wants to google their name in 15 years time and find out that there was a story about their inflamed vulvas.

The Council found:

The editor’s response that the mother of one of the girls approached Stuff with the information, and that both parents agreed to have the children’s names published, and were happy with the story after it was published, offered the Press Council a compelling argument against upholding the complaint under Principle 2, Privacy, in that the parents are the legal guardians.

The Press Council finds that the circumstances of this case however did not warrant naming the children. Principle 3, Children and Young People, states:“In cases involving children and young people, editors must demonstrate an exceptional degree of public interest to override the interests of the child or young person.” We see no public interest in naming the children, let alone the exceptional degree required by the Principle.

The thrust of the story is a warning that bath bombs can cause an allergic skin reaction in children. In our opinion, naming the sufferers of that reaction does not add to the validity of the story in any way other than to provide a human element. Given the explicit and highly personal nature of the details published, it is likely the children would be embarrassed if they found their names linked to such details in the future.

A good reminder that just because the parents consent is not sufficient reason in itself to publish the names.

Barry Soper writes:

Bill English, who’s essentially been pulling the public purse strings for the best past of a decade, has been doing his best to rattle the loquacious Jacinda Ardern, who for the most part’s been hiding behind the taxation working group she’s planning to set up after the election, if she gets the chance.

But she does herself a disservice by continuing to declare what’s hot and what’s not when it comes to tax, with her group’s options being diminished by the day.

The latest tax to come off their drawing board’s inheritance and that follows capital gains on the family home and the land that lies beneath it, even if the property’s owned by a trust. 

Possible increases to the top income tax rate were canned after the Government’s books were opened, and even though she said it’d take days to analyse the figures on that one, it took a couple of hours.

Then there’s the wishy washy water tax that’s as popular as a wet, mouldy blanket down on the farm.

The more taxes she takes off the table, the greater the impression is that she knows exactly what she wants to do with the system and that creates the uncertainty.

Voters have the right to know how much tax they will be paying if the vote for a particular party.

There are two acceptable options for Labour and one unacceptable option. The options are:

1. Be upfront with New Zealand and tell us that there will be a capital gains tax and/or a land tax and how much they’ll be. That is an acceptable option. Voters can them make an informed choice.
2. Give a commitment that any tax changes recommended by the Tax Working Group will not be implemented until after the next election. That is an acceptable option.
3. Their current policy of refusing to say what they will do, but reserving the right to implement billions of dollars of new taxes if elected. That is unacceptable

Been trying to add up the costs of Labour’s various taxes so people can get an idea of the cumulative impact on families and businesses. The ball park estimates for when taxes are fully implemented are:

• Capital Gains Tax $3.7 billion/year if at 15% (Labour’s own estimates in 2014)
• Canceled changes to tax thresholds $1.9 billion/year
• Imposing ETS on Agriculture $830 million/year
• Water Tax $200 million/year
• Regional Fuel Tax $160 million/year
• Tourist Tax $75 million/year

So in total the extra tax cost in New Zealand will be a massive $6.9 billion a year. Think about that for the size of our population. And that is leaving out any land tax or wealth tax which they have also not ruled out.

Rural NZ will be hit especially hard. Based on Labour’s previous CGT policy the rural sector would be hit with $1.3 billion from the CGT, plus the ETS change and the water tax for a total of $2.3 billion. This will significantly impact the competitiveness of the export sector.

It may of course be far worse than this. Labour refuse to reveal details of their planned Capital Gains Tax. We should not assume it would be at 15%, like their previous policy. This may be why they refuse to give details. They could well decide it should be at 30% or 33%, to match the main income tax rates. Is Labour likely to decide capital gains should be taxed less than income? So if they go for a 30% Capital Gains Tax (and again they refuse to reveal their tax plans) then the CGT revenue from families and businesses would be $7.4 billion and the total tax cost of Labour would be over $10.6 billion.

Jacinda was asked this week if Labour would reduce other taxes to compensate for the new taxes (as National did in 2010 with the GST and income tax switch). She wouldn’t say. So taxpayers are facing the greatest take hikes in history with Labour being the first party in recent history saying they reserve the right to impose new taxes if elected, but won’t give details before the election.

The latest Newshub Reid Research is at Curia.

It shows National up and Labour down, with the Greens at 4.9% and NZ First at 6%.

Hell if we got a result with both Greens and NZ First at 4.9% I’d be so happy and drunk I wouldn’t care who actually forms Government!

This is obviously different to the One News Colmar Brunton poll last week. As always I suggest looking at the average of the polls when they diverge.

On the time and size weighted average, National is at 43%, Labour 30%, NZ First 7.7% and Greens 5.2%. The Greens are in great danger of being wiped out.

Ironically if the Greens were wiped out it would help Labour form a Government. With the Greens there the poll average is:

• Nat + NZF = 62 seats
• Lab + NZF = 59 seats

But if the Greens get 4.9% then it is:

• Nat + NZF = 65 seats
• Lab + NZF = 62 seats

So if the Greens make 5%, then NZ First less likely to go with Labour. But if they drop below 5% then a Labour/NZF Government is possible.

Going to be a very interestign next 10 days.

400 people showed up in Ashburton to hear from English and to protest Labour’s tax plans.

Jacinda Ardern and 39,444 have already voted – up by more than 20,000 since 2014. 88 per cent of CEOs see Ardern as the lightning rod which could catapult Labour to power.

We want Kiwi not iwi – ditch the Waitangi Tribunal.

Green Party in government will put $5 million of funding into LGBTQIA+ school support services.

Federated Farmers will protest Labour’s tax plans in her home town of Morrinsville next week. Hundreds turned up today down south.

Newshub Reid Research (Update):  National could govern alone 47.3%, Labour on 37.8%, Greens out on just 4.9%

Latest update as of 9am today:

National Party $8.17b; Labour Party $22.91b; Green Party $13.28b; NZ First $27.53b; Maori Party $12.17b; ACT -$2.43b; TOP $13.69b Full details here.

The SMH reports:

It was easy news, if not exactly news based on fact. It all began on Saturday, when Australia’s Prime Minister went to see the Sydney Swans play, and posted on social media a photo of himself cuddling his baby granddaughter, planting a kiss atop her sweet head.

In his non-baby-cuddling hand, Malcolm Turnbull held a beer in a plastic cup. …

One Facebook commenter, it was reported, asked “When was drinking while holding a child OK?”

Another, displaying contempt not just for the Australian PM but also for the proper use of apostrophes, said it was “disgusting to see people breathing grog all over baby’s but sadly I’m not surprised by Malcolm doing it”.

One Australian tabloid referred to an “online meltdown” over the photograph, and duly sought comment from properly Australian Australians, who could be relied upon to reaffirm Australian values regarding the appropriate co-mingling of beer and babies.

“Social researcher” Mark McCrindle said Australian had become a “nation of judgers”. Dick Smith said people could “go and live somewhere else” if they didn’t like the photo, and Ita Buttrose was very ticked off indeed.

Nothing brings a people together like a public shaming on social media, and in this case it was the original  Australian Prime Minister-shamers who were being shamed, bringing about an awe-inspiring shame-cycle that could well stay alive in the media for weeks, if properly stoked by an Andrew Bolt column or an Alan Jones editorial.

There is only one small problem, and it is a small problem indeed in the era of post-fact news. So small it barely warrants noting, except by pedants.

That is, the number of Facebook commenters who were “outraged” by the Australian PM holding a beer while cuddling a baby, numbered two.

On Monday morning, the post had been “liked” by 17,000 Facebook users, and 1500 people had commented on it. Because I value my mental health I did not read all the comments, however I couldn’t find a single one that wasn’t sticking up for the Australia Prime Minister in the face of the moral outrage he provoked, even though that moral outrage was not in evidence anywhere except in two comments quoted in the tabloid media and now, presumably, buried under an avalanche of nice comments.

So two people out of 1,500 didn’t like it, and the media turn this into a major story and fake controversy. No wonder trust in media keeps plummeting.

Stuff reports:

Auckland Council is unconcerned about the growing scrutiny over councillors’ eligibility to hold office. …

Government requirements state that in order to be a councillor, one must be both a New Zealand citizen and enrolled as a Parliamentary elector – which also means being 18 or older.

However, despite more than half of its councillors choosing not to respond to the eligibility inquiry, Auckland Council were not ready to hit the panic button.

General manager democracy services Marguerite Delbet said council would not look internally at staff citizenship, electing to instead trust the information they were provided with at the time members were elected. 

“No, we don’t plan on looking into staff citizenship. When a candidate lodges his/her nomination for an election, it is done on an official, prescribed nomination paper,” Delbet said.

“The candidate is required to consent to be nominated and to certify that they are qualified to be a candidate. Certifying they are qualified is done by ticking two check boxes, and then signing the nomination paper.” 

The council’s electoral officer then checked each nomination paper when they were lodged to ensure both criteria (NZ citizen and Parliamentary elector) were ticked and accepted the information contained on the paper as correct, she said. 

I’m sorry but this is appallingly slack. The returning officers have a responsibility to verify that someone is eligible for election and someone ticking a form declaring they are eligible does not count.

If someone ticked a box on a form declaring they are a deity and immune from rates, would they accept that.

It would presumably take around five minutes for a Council to check with Internal Affairs if someone is a citizen. There is no excuse for them not to do so.

Christoper Niesche writes in the Herald:

A capital gains tax was introduced in Australia over three decades ago and since then house prices have roared out of control.

But does this mean that capital gains taxes can’t help control house prices?

Not necessarily. It depends on why they were introduced and how they were designed.

As New Zealanders contemplate casting their vote in a couple of weeks’ time and voting for a party that may or may not introduce a capital gains tax (perhaps things are clearer on the other side of the Tasman than they are from this distance) there are some lessons from Australia.

 

The capital gains tax was introduced in September 1985 by the Labor government of Bob Hawke and Paul Keating.

In 1985, the median Sydney house price was just A$92,000 ($102,000), compared with A$1.1 million in 2016.

But before we jump to the conclusion that capital gains taxes can’t limit property prices, we should look a few of the reasons that it hasn’t done so in Australia.

The first reason is that it was never intended to limit house price growth. In Australia, the CGT was intended to raise money for the Government and to ensure that those people who were lucky enough to have investable assets paid tax on those gains, in the same way others pay tax on their wages.

There is a case for a CGT in NZ, which is to broaden the tax base. But Labour are selling it as something that will lower house prices. It’s a fallacy.

To maximise the amount of money raised, the tax was applied to any investments, be they houses, other property, shares, bonds, works of art, or whatever. Thus it did nothing to divert investments away from property.

And Labour are saying they will exempt the so called family home, which means again it will have almost zero impact on house prices.