Against the Current blogs:

GREEN PARTY candidate Chris Ford says he’s “reassessing” his membership of the Green Party in the light of the leadership shifting the party further to the right and signing up for Labour’s ‘Budget Responsibility Rules’. He’s also angry that this was done without any consultation with the party membership.

Ford, who stood for the Green’s in 2014, said: “I’m very disappointed with the party I belong to for doing this! In fact, I know that many other members -like me – are disappointed and angry. I am reassessing my membership. I knew that this statement (Labour and Greens’ joint Budget Responsibility Rules agreement) was being developed but party members seem to have been largely bypassed in doing so.”

NewstalkZB reports:

The Opportunities Party has pensioners in its sights calling for a radical overhaul of the superannuation scheme.

Party founder Gareth Morgan has concerns about how the benefit is allocated, saying people like him, who’re well off, don’t need the $40,000 a year they’re entitled to receive.

He said the trouble with New Zealand Super is it’s the highest of all the benefits – its level is way too high, and should be cut in half and taken away from people like him.

“If people need it, sure, then they get their top up- but it’s targeted, it’s means tested and then that money which is about three billion or about a quarter of New Zealand’s super gets spent on the most vulnerable.”

I agree that NZ Superannuation should be means tested, or more precisely income tested. Why should we tax people more to give it back to them when they retire. Better to let people keep more of their money while working, and only top up those whose earnings are below a certain level.

So one Morgan policy I am happy to support. Grey Power may be less happy though.

The Herald reports:

New Zealand First leader Winston Peters wants a referendum on smacking laws to go to the people.

Peters said in a speech on Friday the party’s policy was to hold a referendum on the anti-smacking law.

Umm there’s already been one. The result was massively against the current law. We don’t need another referendum. We just need to vote to change Section 59 in line with the Boscawen amendment.

Karl du Fresne writes:

I know what you’re all thinking. Lord, spare us any more comment on the SAS-Afghanistan controversy. But please bear with me here.

Yes, I think there should be an inquiry. But I have to hold my nose as I write that, because I don’t trust Nicky Hager. 

There are a number of reasons for this.

He insists on calling himself a journalist, but all the journalists I’ve worked with made it their business, before bursting into print with damaging allegations against anyone, to seek a response from the person or persons accused.

This is called balance, and although it has become unfashionable in certain quarters it remains a fundamental principle of fair journalism.

Hager doesn’t bother with balance. He and co-author Jon Stephenson didn’t approach the Defence Force for its side of the story before publishing Hit and Run.

This is consistent with Hager’s previous modus operandi. I don’t think he gave Cameron Slater a chance to respond to the claims made in Dirty Politics either, or Don Brash when he published The Hollow Men.

He likes to get in first with a king hit. It’s much harder for someone to fight back when they’re sprawled on the canvas with the wind temporarily knocked out of them. 

Hager would probably argue that the reason he doesn’t approach the subjects of his books is that it would give them an opportunity to obstruct publication, possibly with legal action.

But newspapers take that risk every time they run a potentially damaging story about someone. It doesn’t stop them seeking comment from the people or organisation they’re about to take a whack at.

All true.

My other reason for not trusting Hager is that he has an agenda. I’m suspicious of people with agendas, because they tend to frame their narratives to align with their agenda. 

To put it another way, there’s a danger that the agenda, rather than the facts, will dictate the narrative, and that any facts that don’t conform to the agenda will be ignored.

In Hager’s case, the agenda can’t be neatly summarised, but it’s there. It can be broadly categorised as an antipathy toward “the establishment”, capitalism and authority in general. 

Hager takes facts and fits them to his world view. Yes there may have been civilian casualties in the raid, and he interprets that as a blood thirsty vengeful SAS committing war crimes.  In fact we have learnt that they had a lawyer embedded in the command structure to advise second by second on the legality of any actions. Few defence forces do that, but this was inconvenient to his world view and narrative.

So given that I don’t trust Hager, why do I think there should be an inquiry? Well, partly because I don’t much trust the Defence Force either. 

I suspect they resent outside scrutiny. This may explain why they seem so bad at dealing with it. The military is an insular institution, not accustomed to having to explain itself to others. 

Besides, the NZDF has previous form. Several years ago, disgracefully, it tried hard to discredit Hager’s co-author Stephenson – a man for whom I have some respect – and ended up paying him a settlement in order to avoid a $500,000 defamation action.

In this latest case the NZDF came suspiciously late to the party with a story that was intended to shoot Hager down in flames, but which succeeded only in muddying the waters and creating more doubt and confusion in the public mind. 

The only way to clear this mess up now is with an open and independent inquiry that would clarify matters once and for all. To quote John Milton: “Let truth and falsehood grapple; whoever knew truth put to the worse, in a fair and open encounter?”

I’m relaxed about an inquiry, as it would be good to have independent assurance. We just need to be aware that Hager and Stevenson will never ever accept the results of an independent inquiry that doesn’t support them as they have said it is impossible for them to be wrong. But there are good reasons to have an inquiry anyway.

As for being impossible to be wrong, Whale Oil has a useful list of things they are wrong on, and also reveals their cover photo is a stock image unrelated to the raid.

Read this piece by Isobel Ewing about an effort by the Greens for a PR stunt that was a car crash, both figuratively and literally.

The summary is:

So, a river visit to a relatively clean stretch of river, no photo opportunities of school kids helping test the water, and a scientist questioning the efficacy of the prize gadget.

What a mess.

It should have been a cruise for a party that wants to be in Government, that identifies itself as a champion for the environment, that wants to engage the public on an issue.

Especially when New Zealanders care about the state of their rivers, lakes and streams now more than ever.

And yet the Green Party can’t organise a river visit at a river.

Boy going to be if they are ever in charge of something important.

Boris Johnson writes:

After nine months on the launch pad, Britain finally engaged the most famous ignition sequence in diplomatic history.

At 12.29 pm London time, the Prime Minister’s Article 50 letter was delivered in Brussels and the countdown began. After nine months of meticulous legal, technical and political preparation, the engines switched on and are today firing in an irreversible crescendo. 

The referendum result has now started implementation. It is going to be a fascinating two years of negotiations. But the one certainty is that the United Kingdom is leaving the European Union.

A press release from NordVPN:

U.S. Senate has just passed the most dangerous resolution for Internet privacy.

Last year, Federal Communications Commission had passed strict privacy regulations (not yet in effect), banning ISPs (Internet Service Providers) from selling their subscriber’s browsing data without consent. This week, these regulations were reversed in the Senate, allowing ISPs to collect all possible information about their subscribers. Such data includes precise geolocation, financial information, health information, children’s information and web browsing history.

This also means that from now on, an Internet provider can sell their users’ private data to third parties, such as ad buyers, ad aggregators, and anyone else who might want to use it for their purposes.

True, FCC’s regulations did not cover Facebook and Google that are able to collect data without any bigger restrictions. However, putting a brake on ISPs data collection/ and sharing powers would have saved Internet users’ Internet browsing privacy. 

This goes even further – the FCC is now also banned from passing even less strict regulations in the future. 

The key to me is consent – ISPs should have to get consent to share and sell data.

Nicky Wagner announced:

Associate Health Minister Nicky Wagner today announced the sale of nicotine e-cigarettes and e-liquid will be made legal with appropriate controls.

“Scientific evidence on the safety of e-cigarettes is still developing but there’s a general consensus that vaping is much less harmful than smoking,” Ms Wagner says.

Public Health England estimate they are 95% less harmful than normal cigarettes.

New rules for all e-cigarettes, whether or not they contain nicotine, include:

• Restricting sales to those 18 years and over

• Prohibiting vaping in indoor workplaces and other areas where smoking is banned under the Smoke-free Environments Act

• Restricting advertising to limit the attraction of e-cigarettes to non-smokers, especially children and young people.

Sounds reasonable, but devil will be in the detail.

“This is an opportunity to see if restricted access to e-cigarettes and e-liquid can help lower our smoking rates, reduce harm and save lives,” Ms Wagner says.

“The Government is strongly committed to achieving our goal of a smoke-free New Zealand by 2025.”

E-cigarettes may be the most effective measure left in the toolbox, to get the smoking rate down to 5%.

NewstalkZB reports:

Kim Dotcom has been ordered to pay more than $26,000 in unpaid wages to former staff.

Three of Dotcom’s former employees claimed they were unfairly dismissed by the internet entrepreneur, and took their cases to the Employment Relations Authority (ERA).

In the ruling released Monday, ERA member James Crichton upheld two of the complaints and dismissed the third.

Pan Filo Orduna, John Tactaquin and Ruth Relleve worked for Dotcom from 2010 onwards.

The authority upheld Orduna and Tactaquin’s cases but dismissed Relleve’s.

Orduna was employed by Dotcom as a butler six days a week. …

Crichton said he was satisfied that Orduna and Tactaquin had been unfairly dismissed and so awarded each three months’ salary of the difference between what they were earning when working for Dotcom and what they were earning in their new jobs.

This equated to $8850 for Orduna and $17,526 for Tactaquin.

Will the Mana Party be commenting on this court ruling?

Hager and Stephenson on Monday said:

In a statement sent to media on Sunday night, the authors say it’s “actually impossible that the story is wrong”.

On Wednesday media reported:

English’s comments come on the back of the two authors, earlier on Wednesday, conceding the attacks were at a different location from the position given in their book.

How can this be? They said it was actually impossible for them to be wrong. Not implausible. Not unlikely. Not improbable. But actually impossible.

Now of course because they were wrong on the location doesn’t mean they are wrong on everything. But they should show some humility after the arrogance of their statement on Monday.

Just noticed this August story:

University of Otago students have rejected a controversial ban against offensive costumes.

Before the March 2016 Hyde St Keg Party the Otago University Students’ Association told Dunedin students they were not to dress “offensively”. It issued an extensive list of costumes to avoid, including like Arabs, Nazis, Bill Cosby or Caitlyn Jenner.

The costume ban sparked outrage from some would-be participants.

In a binding referendum, 61.67 per cent voted to reject OUSA regulating costumes for the annual party.

Well done Otago students for rejecting the costume police.

Politik reports:

With Ngati Paoa members sitting in the gallery, Labour’s Tamaki Makaurau MP, Peeni Henare said the bill offered an opportunity not just for Tāmaki-makau-rau but, in particular, for Ngāti Paoa, “and for that reason, I am extremely excited.”

“This particular opportunity at Te Tauoma is a fantastic one—one that will allow Ngāti Paoa, in partnership with the council and, of course, with central government, to provide for housing not just for their people but also for the people of Tāmaki-makau-rau,” he said.

“This particular bill provides an opportunity and a start and the platform for Ngāti Paoa, for which we are grateful, and I am sure the people of Ngāti Paoa are, too.”

Mr Henare was in Sydney last night and was unavailable for comment, but Mr Twyford dismissed his comments as a typical first reading speech.

He said first reading speeches were not based on research but almost always were in a situation where the MP had had to take the Government’s Bill at face value.

What a stunning admission by Labour that they don’t do any research on legislation facing its first reading.

Note that the first reading was six days after the Bill was introduced. And it is basically a one page bill.

The reality is that Labour are being NIMBYs. They spend years calling for more housing and then time after time oppose any actual housing development.

From the .nz Domain Name Commission:

The reservation period finishes at 1.00 pm on 30 March 2017. Domain names are unable to be reserved for a further period of time. If you have a reserved name you must register this before the above date, or the domain name will become available to register by anyone on a first come, first served basis. More information about registering reserved domain names can be found below.

So if you have a reserved name, the reservation ends at 1 pm tomorrow. If you do not register by then, it becomes generally available.

The ODT reports:

A Dunedin satanic organisation’s campaign to collect warm clothes for disadvantaged people across New Zealand is being welcomed by some and leaving others hot under the collar.

Satanic New Zealand recently launched a ”Soles for Satan” online page, which aims to buy new socks, hats, and warm clothing for people in homeless shelters and children living in poverty.

Can just imagine the scene in many family homes. “Oh where did those lovely socks for Jimmy come from” … “Those nice Satanists dropped them around”.

”We’re not in any way anti-Christian; we’re just pro-Satan,” she said.

I wonder how well a pro-Satan group would do in the Middle East!

All clothes collected would be donated to KidsCan, Women’s Refuge and homeless shelters.

It seems Satan works in mysterious ways!

Stuff reports:

Lester also signalled that the average rates increase for the city would be 3.3 per cent, done from the original forecast of 5.1.

It was possible residential rates could drop further, but that depended on revaluation of buildings and homes in late May or early June.

The lower rates rise was the result of saving $11 million, by re-prioritising and re-phasing capital expenditure, better use of council office space, building consent processing in-sourcing from Auckland, increases in energy efficiency, and improved procurement processes.

This is going in the right direction but the Mayor said he would not vote for an average rates increase of over 3% over the next three years. So if it is 3.3% this year then needs to be no more than 2.85% the next two years to remain within the promise.

Also other Councillors who made a rates pledge in terms of maximum average annual increase were:

• Nicola Young – no more than inflation
• Andy Foster – 3%
• Diane Calvert – 2% to 3%
• Simon Woolf 4.5%
• Sarah Free 3%
• Chris Calvi-Freeman – no more than inflation
• David Lee – around 4.6% (said 30 cents a day for a $500,000 RV)

So that is five Councillors who have said a maximum of 3% on average is acceptable.

I’ve blogged the latest One News Colmar Brunton poll at Curia.

Last month the Maori King said Maori should support the Maori Party. Andrew Little said the Maori Party have achieved nothing and Maori should vote Labour.

The ONCB poll sees the Maori Party go from 0.7% to 4.0%. This is a significant increase in support for them – well beyond the margin of error.

So I guess we know who wins in a contest between Andrew Little and the Maori King.

Little is in 4th place as Preferred Prime Minister behind English, Peters and Ardern.

Liam Hehir writes:

Hit and Run, a new book by Nicky Hager and Jon Stephenson, was the dominant news story last week. The book accuses the SAS of participating in illegal killings in Afghanistan. It also suggests that officials have covered up these possible war crimes.

Needless to say, few civilised people would consider this acceptable. If there is anything in them, the claims are troubling. …

The accusations in Hit and Run will blight the reputation of the SAS for too many New Zealanders. We cannot shrug that off.

There is a national interest in giving the public the reassurance of a fresh look at the matter.

The investigations of the time,  no matter how robust or sound, are not enough. Citizens at home are not equipped to evaluate competing narratives about faraway battlefields. We do not have the time, skills or resources to determine what version of events is closer to the truth.

Only a fresh look at the events in light of the accusations will suffice. The person in charge must be of unimpeachable character and the process transparent. It will take  nothing less to persuade Hager’s admirers that crimes were not concealed.

Like Liam I think there is merit into an inquiry – not into war crimes (as that is up to the Police) but into which version of events is correct.

However I have one reservation to this. Stuff reported:

In a statement sent to media on Sunday night, the authors say it’s “actually impossible that the story is wrong”.

Now with such a stance from the authors that it is “actually impossible” that their story is wrong, what use is an inquiry. Unless the inquiry agrees 100% with the authors, they will decry the inquiry as a cover up, biased, wrong etc etc. They have stated it is impossible they are wrong, so implicitly they can not accept any other outcome from an inquiry.

It would be like the 9/11 Commission – no matter what the official inquiry found, there are those convinced it was a conspiracy organised by George W Bush, not Osama bin Laden.

If Hager and Stephenson were open to the possibility that they could be wrong on significant details, then the merits of an inquiry are much stronger.

But their stance suggest an inquiry into their allegations will be no more useful than the inquiry the Greens demanded into Genetic Modification – they rejected the outcome because it didn’t deliver what they wanted.

So there are only two possible outcomes from an inquiry at present:

1. The inquiry backs the Hager/Stephenson book, and they are vindicated
2. The inquiry doesn’t back the Hager/Stephenson book and they remain adamant it is impossible they are wrong and the attack the inquiry as a cover up

Can you see why an inquiry isn’t looking so appealing.

Now if Hager and Stephenson made an unequivocal statement that they would accept the findings of an independent inquiry, well then you might be making progress.

One News reports:

Former Environment Minister Simon Upton is all but confirmed as the new Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment.

The Offices of Parliament committee has recommended that he be appointed for a five year term, beginning October 9.

He’ll replace outgoing commissioner Jan Wright.

Now with the Paris-based OECD group, Mr Upton, a former National Party minister, was in Wellington last week to launch a progress report on New Zealand’s environment.

Bryce Edwards writes:

Does New Zealand still have political parties on the left in parliamentary politics? Do the poor and working classes have anyone to vote for this year? These are some of the key questions being asked in the wake of the Labour-Green announcement that they will restrain themselves in government from any significant deviation from the economic status quo.

The hardest hitting response has come from former Green MP Sue Bradford, who gave an extraordinary interview on RNZ’s Morning Report today. Bradford rounded on her former party, saying “The Greens have completely sold out on where they started from in my generation of MPs in 1999” – you can listen to her seven-minute interview with Guyon Espiner: “What Price Power” Former Green MP Sue Bradford slams Greens’ deal with Labour.

Bradford explains that the new rules adopted by the left parties – which she calls a “totally business-friendly policy” – will constrain them in being able to depart from the National Government’s main economic settings.

She despairs of what this means: “So what you see here is the Green Party deciding to go after votes on the centre and the right of the New Zealand political spectrum. It wants business in its corner. It wants your National blue-green voters in its corner. And completely abandoning the huge number of people who are in desperate need in the areas of housing, welfare, jobs, and education”.

To Bradford, it’s about political opportunism by the Greens, in order to get into government. She asks: “At what price power, if you sell out everything that your party was originally set out to achieve? I mean, this Green Party here is following the same trail as green parties all over the world – some of who have ended up in coalitions and alliance with really rightwing governments”.

She suggests that some Green Party supporters “are going to end up like some of us already, who have no one to vote for this year. The Greens was perhaps the last hope. This is the death knell for the Greens as a left party in any way, shape or form. They are a party of capitalism. They’re a party that Business New Zealand now loves”

Bradford also expressed her protest on Facebook. This led one Green Party activist and candidate at the last election to comment: “Frankly, I’m very disappointed with the party I belong to for doing this! In fact, I know that many other members (like me) are disappointed and angry. I am reassessing my membership. I knew that this statement was being developed but party members seem to have been largely bypassed in doing so.”

Also on Facebook, Laila Harre, who has now rejoined the Labour Party, questions the apparent assumptions behind the announcement: “Who says voters won’t buy into tax increases on high incomes? I’m sad that our redeemers are capitulating to that rather than making the case for it. Elections are an opportunity to win support for ideas. Not just frame ideas around putative support.”

In a unique move, the Council of Trade Unions has also come out against the announcement, with president Richard Wagstaff giving a CTU perspective: “We support higher levels of Government activity and investment than these rules permit. There is an urgent need. Many countries who are more successful than us socially and economically have much greater government activity” – see Isaac Davison’s Higher spend needed than under Labour/Green rules: Council of Trade Unions.

Wagstaff elaborates: “If an incoming Labour/Green Government is serious about fixing the problems we have in our education, health, housing and other public services, if it’s going to correct the imbalances we have in terms of pay equity, if we are going to really tackle income inequality and our environmental challenges together as a nation, then it will need to be prepared to invest significantly. That will test these rules as they stand.”

This is the biggest political shift in a generation and the media have almost missed the significance of it. The fundamental divide between parties on the right and left tend to be on the size of the state and tax. Right parties are for a smaller state and lower taxes and left parties for a larger state and higher taxes.

It is remarkable enough that Labour have come out and said they will keep the size of the state to the same as National has it after eight years, but even more remarkable that the Greens have said the same.

Add to that Labour have said no tax increases.

Bradford and Harre get how big a deal this is.

A guest post by Anne Hunt:

If you don’t like the school rules, choose another school seems to be the approach taken by most people who have become embroiled in this latest ‘long-hair’ debate.

What seems to be overlooked is that this was a case of a parent trying to get a response from the principal and board of trustees before a child was enrolled at his in-zone school.

Any child living within the home zone is entitled at any time to enrol at that school. That is the law, not some personal sense of ‘entitlement’.

The fact that this school happened to be Auckland Grammar has fuelled the latest frenzy.

Let’s be clear: James was not breaking any school rules because he is not even enrolled at Auckland Grammar as yet.

Heidi had lived in the Grammar zone for at least a decade before James was born.

On his behalf, Heidi was simply taking the precaution of checking out well in advance whether James would be facing the risk of expulsion if he attended his Auckland Grammar as his in-zone school.

Her father who was already a well-established musician had been expelled from Freyberg High School shortly before he was due to sit University Entrance, affecting his future employment.

Obviously, she did not want James’ education disrupted by similar issues.

So she took the responsible course of action by writing to both the School Principal and Board of Trustees.

In this letter, she stated that James is not prepared to cut his well-groomed hair and therefore realises that he might sacrifice an education at Auckland Grammar if Auckland Grammar adheres to the same rules that cut short the education of his grandfather fifty years beforehand.

She also said that James was prepared to tie his hair back to keep it off his collar.

So James was not seeking preferential treatment.

Heidi pointed that a school’s board must perform its functions and exercise its powers in such a way as to ensure every student at the school is able to attain his or her highest possible standard in educational achievement.

And she also referred to s75 of the Education Act 1989, which says that except to the extent that any enactment or the general law of New Zealand provides otherwise, a school’s board had complete discretion to control the management of the school as it thinks fit.

Obviously Heidi mentioned the Bill of Rights Act 1990 and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

But more importantly, she reminded the school principal and board of trustees that even taking into consideration the sporting and cultural activities James will engage in, he will come under the management of the school for only about forty hours per week.

What about the remaining 120 hours each week when he is not under the management of the board?

Is the board exceeding its authority by imposing a rule that affects a student when he is no longer under the jurisdiction of the board?

James cannot re-attach his hair when he takes his school uniform off.

Heidi could have quietly enrolled James at this prestigious school, and then taken the school to court to test this issue if the school disciplined him for having long hair.

Instead, she wrote to the school principal and the board so that she would be able to make an informed choice on the school James will attend in 2019.

The school did not have the courtesy to respond so she sent her letter to a reputable newspaper.

Fortunately, James is a well-adjusted child and will take the cyber-bullying in his stride.

But by approaching the media, she discovered that the school principal did not see the need to take her letter to the Board of Trustees.

That, as far as Heidi is concerned, is not professional enough when she had also sent a copy of her letter to the board who could access the legal expertise to evaluate the issues she had raised.

When she eventually enrols James at a school, I am confident it will be a school that cares as much about complying with the law as the principal is about enforcing the school rules imposed upon their students.

Anne is the grandmother of James. She is also the author of a book on David Collins, the Judge in the Lucan Battison case.

The Herald reports:

Goff is pinning his hopes on the targeted rate to replace ratepayer spending by Auckland Tourism, Events and Economic Development (Ateed) to attract visitors and fund major events. It would free up $28 million to fund transport and housing infrastructure and help Goff’s election pledge to hold rates to 2.5 per cent.

If the accommodation providers are forced to fully fund ATEED, they should then get to decide what level of funding it gets. Allow them to appoint a majority of the board and you’d soon get better value for money.

Goff said 75 per cent of the feedback so far on the draft budget supported the targeted rate.

Of course it is. You are proposing a tiny number of ratepayers pick up the bill for the other million ratepayers.

Last night, Tourism Industry Aotearoa chief executive Chris Roberts said the targeted rate would be a disaster for Auckland and should be withdrawn.

He said visitors to Auckland spend $7.5 billion a year, of which the accommodation sector only accounted for 9 per cent but which is being asked to pay 100 per cent of the targeted rate.

I’m all for user pays, but it should be on all tourism businesses, not just hotels and motels. And they should then get to decide what level of funding for ATEED is deemed worthwhile.

Last week, motel owner Troy Clarry told councillors his Whangaparaoa 14-room motel’s rates would rise from $13,600 a year to just under $40,000.

In 2015-16 he made $529,000 from the motel on 65 per cent occupancy and after taking a $52,000 salary for two people net profit before tax was $27,000.
Much of this was reinvested in the business but the new rate would swallow nearly all of this.

So Goff’s tax will mean the motel is no longer profitable.