Paula Bennett announced:

New Zealanders are benefiting from the Government’s continued focus on front-line services and restraint of bureaucracy, State Services Minister Paula Bennett says.

The latest report of the public sector cap shows a decrease of 190 to 35,917 full-time equivalent positions in the core public service compared to the previous year.

Currently set at 36,475 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions within core government administrative roles, the cap was introduced in 2008 and reset at the present lower level in 2012.

Overall, numbers are 559 under the present cap and 2,942 below the original 2008 cap.

“Back office numbers blew out to by 10,000 to over 45,000 under the previous Government, while families and businesses carried the cost with little to show for it,” says Mrs Bennett.

Keeping the number of back office staff down is a significant achievement. Labour saw the staff numbers skyrocket.

The numbers for the last few years have been:

• 2008: 38,859
• 2009: 37,379
• 2010: 36,973
• 2011: 36,475
• 2012: 36,081
• 2013: 36,410
• 2014: 26,107
• 2015: 35,917

Keeping staff numbers down is one the reasons why the Government has got the books back into surplus. Labour saw numbers grow 10,000 in four years. Another say 15,000 staff would probably cost almost $2 billion a year.

A great silver medal again to Valerie Adams in the shotput final.

Her first throw of 19.79 metres got pipped out by Michelle Carter’s 2nd throw of 19.82 metres.

Then Adams did a season best 20.42 metres on her second throw. Most other finalists are only in the 17 and 18 metre range. Her third throw of 19.80 metres matched the first one.

Carter’s 4th throw was better at 19.87 but still no one else over 20 metres. Then Anita Marton tied on 19.87 on her 5th throw.

But then Carter on the 6th throw did a massive 20.63 and won the gold with Adams silver. Adams was superb but Carter’s final throw was awesome. Well done Val for a great performance.

Tracy Watkins writes:

As if national politics wasn’t brutal enough, Andrew Little has turned the Wellington mayoral campaign even uglier by verbally attacking a high profile candidate.

Little has drawn a new battle line in the mayoral campaign by claiming one of the front runners, Nick Leggett, is a “right wing” candidate, backed by right wing funding. He also claimed Leggett’s campaign manager was a “leading identity” in the ACT party, which Leggett rejects, as he does the “right wing” label.

None of this would be particularly extraordinary except Leggett is the long time Porirua mayor and a former Labour Party member who only resigned the party when he entered the mayoralty campaign in opposition to its official candidate, Justin Lester.

And if you look at Leggett’s resign in Porirua, it could hardly be called right wing. He has a left wing Council which he generally governed well with, and his opposition tended to come from the right.

Little’s assault on Leggett as a right winger is revealing on two counts; it tells us the extent to which party politics is taking over local body elections. And it is an insight into the resurgence of Labour’s age old battle between the left and right factions of the party.

Helen Clark kept the factions united by being careful with her favours; Little’s approach hints at a purge, rather than a leader prepared to make allowances to keep the party’s right wing under the roof of the one broad church.

Damn the Judean People’s Front!

So what sparked Little’s assault on Leggett? The Labour leader found out a member of his caucus, Napier MP Stuart Nash, was due to share a stage with the Wellington mayoral hopeful at an Auckland pub opening.

How terrible.

I have awful news from Andrew. Last night at the Backbencher there were numerous Labour MPs having a drink at the Saunders Unsworth function. And shock horror, there were some right wingers there also.

If Little’s intention in taking on Leggett was to give Lester a leg up it could just as likely backfire. It exposes the extent to which national politics has crept into local body elections, something that may not sit well with all voters.

It also rips the scab open on Labour’s left right divide. And given the party’s brutal history on that front – think back to the Lange, Douglas years – he might regret going there.

If Leggett wins, how will Little work with him having attacked him like this?

But as Watkins suggests, being attacked by Little may help Leggett in Wellington.

Audrey Young writes:

There is increasing speculation that Jones will leave the diplomatic corps and stand for New Zealand First against National MP Shane Reti in Whangarei, an electorate in which New Zealand First has traditionally done well.

I’ve heard this also.

Reti got 56% of the vote and Paraone (NZF) got 8% so unlikely to be at risk. However Jones is well known up North and the NZ First brand quite strong there, so you can’t rule it out. After Northland, National can’t be complacent.

What is interesting is what this will mean if say Peters did hold Northland and Jones did win Whaangarei (again I regard this as unlikely) and NZ First hold the balance of power and have to decide between a National-led Government and a Labour led Government reliant on the Greens.

The party vote in Whangarei is 50% National, 18% Labour and 10% Greens. In Northland it is 49% National, 17% Labour and 11% Greens.

How likely is it Peters and Jones will put Labour and Greens into power, when their seats overwhelmingly don’t like them. If they did, then they could both risk losing them in 2020.

So Jones standing in Whangarei may be worse for Labour than it is for National as it ties NZ First to conservative seats.

Fergus Hodgson writes in the NZ Herald:

New Zealand has achieved the envy of many nations: stable, near-zero inflation. Yet both prominent commentators and the Reserve Bank’s mandate give the false impression that this is “bad news”.

I regard it as good, not bad.

Once we pierce the shortcomings of the CPI measure of inflation, we would also do well to remember that the Reserve Bank is governed by an Act of Parliament. The bank’s primary objective is to maintain price stability. The legitimate fear was and remains the destructive impact of inflation as a tax on savers and fixed-income earners, particularly retirees. Inflation also generates expenses as people have to adapt to and avoid rising prices, and it impedes planning and investment.

Price stability was originally defined in the first Policy Targets Agreement between the Reserve Bank Governor and the Minister of Finance as CPI inflation within 0 and 2 per cent. The Government widened that range to 0 to 3 per cent in 1996, before raising it further to 1 to 3 per cent in 2002.

There was little justification for the latest change, beyond the misperception that the Reserve Bank was excessively focused on achieving low inflation to the detriment of economic growth. Serious consideration should be given to lowering the target range back to between 0 and 2 per cent, since the Reserve Bank’s current mandate is placing undue pressure on it to cut the OCR.

I agree the original target band of 0% to 2% was a good target which meant a mid-point of 1% was aimed for.

Two more silver medals for Kiwi competitors in cycling and rowing.

Stuff reports:

Gold was their goal, but New Zealand’s sprint trio were still smiling as they tipped their helmets to Great Britain after missing the top level of the Olympic dais by an agonising 0.102 seconds.

The two-time world champion trio of Ethan Mitchell, Sam Webster and Eddie Dawkins proudly displayed their silver medals after riding the three fastest times of their lives at the Olympic Velodrome in Rio.

It still wasn’t enough in the gold medal ride as Great Britain defended their London 2012 title in a gripping, frantic three-lap battle. Philip Hindes, Jason Kenny and Callum Skinner scorched around in an Olympic record 42.440sec, with the New Zealanders clocking 42.542.

Great close race.

And Stuff also reports:

Patience and self-belief have powered Kiwi rowers Rebecca Scown and Genevieve Behrent to an Olympic silver medal that could so nearly have been a momentous gold.

Trailing the field through the first 500m in the women’s pair final, the New Zealanders knocked their opponents off one-by-one but ran out of time to catch defending champions Helen Glover and Heather Stanning of Great Britain on Friday (Saturday NZ Time).

An amazing finish by the rowers but credit to the GB team for holding on.

The Herald reports:

More than 12,000 Kiwis have repeatedly breached court orders to stay away from their victims, and one person has been convicted for doing so 14 times.

Ministry of Justice figures released to the Herald paint a disturbing picture of family violence in New Zealand, showing 12,157 people have been convicted for 20,864 protection order breaches in the 11 years to December 31, 2015.

A protection order is a court-imposed sanction to keep an offender away from their victims, and those at the front line believe the data is the tip of the iceberg as victims are too scared to report the crimes.

Released to the Herald under the Official Information Act, the data shows some offenders repeatedly flouting the orders.

One person in the Manawatu/Wairarapa area was convicted 14 times for breaching an order, and another in the Bay of Plenty/Coromandel area has been convicted for 13 breaches.

Three people were convicted for 12 breaches, two for 11 breaches and 10 for 10 breaches. The date show 129 convictions for six breaches, 237 for five breaches, 486 for four, 1075 for three and 2654 for two.

I regard a breach of a protection order as an extremely serious thing. Those who breach them often go on to kill or maim the people who have the order against them.

I’d support an automatic spell in jail for anyone who breaches a protection order. Maybe just a week even, but unless there is significant consequences to breaching one, they will remain not very useful.

Shine director Jill Proudfoot said it was widely accepted that many breaches went unreported. “It is very much the tip of the iceberg. Quite often people who have a protection order will not bother to report what might be considered a low-level breach because they are not responded to seriously enough.

“We have experience with a lot of women who report breaches and find that the response to that from the police or from courts puts them at further risk.

“There seems to be a view among police and judiciary that a breach of a protection order has degrees of seriousness and I think that completely goes against the intent of the original legislation.”

She said every breach should result in an arrest and an offender being taken into custody.

I agree.

Had an amusing evening at the Cavern Club watching Alexander Sparrow play Enigma – the world’s best pickup artist.

A couple of years ago I saw Sparrow’s production of De Sade, for which the highlight was Jadis whacking him with a crop, and him not realising she is a former provincial cricketer and can whack very hard.

As Jadis was in town this week, we want along to see Enigma, along with another friend.

Enigma, who is American, is a mixture of preacher and guru in a comic combination. He is wearing a grape emblazoned shirt, and steampunk googles over his beanie. His red snakeskin shoes also stand out (they reminded me of Ted’s boots in How I Met Your Mother).

This is a show with high audience participation, but nothing uncomfortable.  It is not just for the blokes either, as the women there get tagged as Future Ex-Girlfriends.

He gives out lots of advice during the show, and has a nice twist at the end. His first piece of advice is the counter-intuitive (but probably correct) that you should never ever approach a woman if you want to pick her up!

The audience wasn’t large, which dampened the environment a bit. It’s a performance that would work best in a packed bar. However it was a week night, so I expect larger crowds at the weekend. It’s on for two more nights for those keen.

Stuff reports:

New Zealand’s worst drink-drivers will soon be forced to have devices installed in their cars which stop them from driving over the limit – and they’ll have to foot the bill.

The Government says making the alcohol interlock devices mandatory for serious and repeat drink-drivers will makes Kiwis safer – and a former offender says the device kept him from having “blood on my hands”.

Alcohol interlock devices disable a vehicle from being driven if alcohol is detected on the breath of a driver, who must breathe into the system to start the engine.

This is a great idea.

Repeat drink drivers have a serious problem. You only get tested probably 1 in 100 times you are out driving. So those who have say three or four convictions may have driven drunk several hundred times.

Associate Transport Minister Craig Foss announced the devices will become mandatory for anyone convicted of two or more drink-driving offences within five years, as well as first-time offenders caught driving more than 3.2 times over the legal limit.

That sounds well targeted.

Stuff reports:

Sexologist Liz Walker is in New Zealand tackling kids’ toxic porn culture but says her Auckland parental workshops are filling up fast, while Wellingtonians appear much more hesitant.  

Walker, who says her exposure to pornography at six-years-old had devastating and ongoing consequences, is delivering her Counteracting Porn Culture workshops to parents, educators and youth professionals in Auckland and Wellington next week.

She was baffled that just three parents had signed up for the Wellington course, while the same seminar in Auckland had already attracted 30 and counting. 

Possibly because Wellingtonians are’t as stupid?

These are not brief one hour workshops, but all day events that cost you $190 to attend.

The capital’s low numbers were “just shocking” especially given the severity of the problem, which has seen a 1000-fold rise in porn-related erectile dysfunction among youths since the birth of the internet in the 1990s, Walker said. 

They are not shocking at all. The shocking this is that Fairfax thinks someone complaining that not enough people will pay her $190 for a workshop is news.

Just listened to a podcast about a true hero, Desmond Doss. Desmond Doss was a conscientious objector in WWII yet won the Congressional Medal of Honour for bravery.

He was a devout Seventh-day Adventist and took the sixth Commandment literally “Thou shalt not kill” and also the fourth “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy”.

He took this to mean he could not kill, or even hold a weapon, nor work on a Saturday. However he became an Army medic as even Christ healed people on the Sabbath. He could have tried to defer or stay home, but wanted to help the war effort – so long as it didn’t violate his religious beliefs.

He got many hassles for his devout beliefs and refusal to train on Saturdays or hold a weapon. One superior even tried to get him discharged on the grounds of mental illness. He refused to take this way out, saying how could he agree being a Christian is a mental illness.

He served initially in 1944 in Guam and the Philippines. He received two Bronze Stars (for valor). He went on hundreds of missions through the dense jungles going out with patrols even when he wasn’t assigned as the Medic. For his work dragging wounded and dying men out of killzones and giving them aid, Doss earned his first of two Bronze Stars. His second Bronze Star was when he ran 100 metres through open brush to save two wounded soldiers who had been shot from two Japanese machine guns. Doss single-handedly carried the surviving man back to jungle, built a stretcher out of bamboo and dragged him past several snipers shooting at them.

Then in 1945 he served in the battle for Okinawa. A camouflaged Japanese counter attack saw 500 US soldiers killed and wounded out of 800. The remaining 300 US forces retreated but Doss stayed behind with the wounded and one by one carried wounded servicemen to safety using a rope supported litter to lower then 35 feet from the exposed ridge they were on to safety. All while under active fire. He spent five hours by himself moving the men to safety.

His CO estimated he saved 100 men that day. He modestly insisted it was “only” 50. They compromised and agreed on 75 to be the official record.

He carried on rescuing people over the next two weeks. He got wounded by a grenade and treated himself for five hours, insisting it was too dangerous for another medic to come out to where he was. When finally it was safe to come to him, he was being carried out on a stretcher. He saw another wounded soldier and jumped off the litter insisting it be used for the other soldier.

His service came to an end when he was shot in the arm which fractured it. For the first time he handled a weapon, turning a rifle stock into a splint. He then crawled 300 metres to safety. He was distraught that the Bible his wife gave him had fallen out of his pocket. Later when his CO visited him in hospital to tell him he was receiving the Medal of Honour, he brought the waterlogged, semi-charred pocket Bible to him. After the hill was taken, every man in the Company searched for it until they’d found it for him.

When asked about why he risked his life to help the wounded men, he said it was for the same reason a mother will run into a burning house to save her baby – she does it for love of her baby, and he did it for love of his brothers.

He spent five years in hospital (he also got TB) and then led a long life dying at the age of 87 in 2006. President Truman awarded the Congressional Medal of Honour to him in October 1945. He was the first ever conscientious objector to receive the Congressional Medal of Honour.

A film of his exploits called Hacksaw Ridge is due to be released this November. I’ll certainly be watching it. Hopefully it will do justice to an incredible man.

The Herald reports:

It’s a surprise silver for New Zealand. The Tauranga-born Luuka Jones has won the Olympic silver medal in the canoe slalom.

Jones was the slowest qualifier for the 10-person final this morning, but pulled out an outstanding run as the first paddler.

Her silver medal is the third at these games. After a dismal couple of days, it made for an encouraging Friday along with the gold that went to Hamish Bond and Eric Murray in the rowing.

An amazing performance in the final. What the Olympics is all about – pulling out 100% when you need it.

Has been interesting that half our medals have come from those thought unlikely to get one, while some of those regarded as dead certs didn’t even make the finals.

+Stuff reports:

Mayoral candidate Helene Ritchie will not seek re-election as a councillor and go all-in to become Wellington’s next mayor.

“I have decided to stand only to be mayor of Wellington and to withdraw from the ward election,” Ritchie said.

“This is a big one, of course… I am ready to be Mayor of Wellington. I have no Plan B.”

The representative for the Northern Ward said she will withdraw her paperwork to contest the seat by the deadline of August 12.

This means that three of the five Councillors standing for Mayor will not contest a Council seat also. This means there will be considerable new blood on the Council which is good.

Stuff reports:

An Indian man who forged a signature on an election enrolment form will not be sent back to his home country from New Zealand.

Mandeep Singh was convicted in 2013 of using a forged document, after he signed a voting form on behalf of a friend and put down his address as his own.

The action was an attempt to help Labour Party member and Sikh leader Daljit Singh in his bid for a seat on the Otara-Papatoetoe local board in Auckland.

Several other people were also convicted on similar charges.

After being sentenced to 200 hours’ community work, Mandeep Singh was issued with a deportation order.

But he appealed the decision to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal, claiming it would be traumatic for his family to have to uproot their life and return to India.

They tried to steal a local board election. Absolutely they should be deported. It would be a great deterrent for others considering doing the same, if they are not NZ citizens.

The IPT has been making some appalling decisions of late.

Richard Harman at Politik writes:

Little’s move has raised questions among some party members and MPs as to whether the ban is part of a wider move to swing the party to the left.

Leggett shares that view.

He says that’s why he will not rejoin the party.

“Not this Labour Party, not one that is clearly looking to purge in the way this one clearly is,” he told POLITIK.

But Little is sticking to his guns.

He says Leggett’s campaign is a right wing campaign; funded by right wingers and managed by a right winger.

Except Little is making things up. The Herald reports:

Leggett said his campaign manager was Michael Gregg and he was not a member of any political party.

Little explicitly said Leggett’s campaign was being managed by an ACT party member.

He takes issue with Labour leader Andrew Little’s description of him yesterday as “right wing” and says he is a “moderate.”

“I supported and continue to support a capital gains tax as a policy. Andrew Little doesn’t. Who is more right wing?” he said.

“I believe I’m of the centre-left, however within Labour I have always been a moderate,” Leggett told the Herald.

He said he was “pro-enterprise” but as mayor of Porirua, he had also been a strong advocate for social issues in the city.

“It’s a sad day for a party that once regarded itself as a broad church. It shows that a purge of the few party members left (and MPs) regarded as “right wing” is well under way.”

It seems Labour no longer wants moderates.

Stuff reports:

Peerless men’s pair Hamish Bond and Eric Murray have claimed back-to-back Olympic gold medals at the Rio Games.

The Kiwi pair, now undefeated in 69 consecutive races, pulled away over the second half of the course to claim New Zealand’s first rowing medal at Rodrigo de Freitas lagoon on Thursday (Friday NZ Time) and the country’s first gold medal in Rio.

Winning 69 races in a row. Wow. Very deserving of the gold medal. Last defeated in 2009.

A nice graphic put together by Stuff.

The New Zealand Men’s Olympic 7’s team had what can only be described as a shocking outing at the Rio Olympics winning only against Kenya and exiting in the quarter finals. Going down in pool play to Japan was also one of the major upsets of the men’s tournament. Sadly, the NZ Men’s 7’s team has been struggling for a while; now the struggle is very public. I write this assessment as a high school rugby coach of boys who play 7’s and 15’s and a referee of both versions of the game. So what happened?

International rugby 7’s is very different from 15’s

The code is the same and the rules have only minor variations (aside from obvious ones like the numbers on the field and the time of each half) but they are very different games. Success at modern 7’s comes mostly from speed, fitness and passing. Whilst those skills are an important part of 15’s, the bigger version of the game needs physicality, tactical and goal kicking skills, more superior scrum/maul/lineout abilities, positional awareness and institutional knowledge on best tactics. It is much easier to find and train players who are fit, can run fast and pass the ball in the wide open spaces of a 7’s game. This makes it significantly easier for the newer rugby playing Tier 2 and 3 countries (without the player base and history of the game like in the Tier 1 nations) to build a half way decent 7’s programme. If you take the nations who play on the IRB 7’s circuit, the gap between the top and bottom teams is much smaller than the gap that exists between the countries who send teams to the Rugby World Cup (15’s). Whilst some nations have definitely made great improvements in 15’s (e.g. Argentina and Japan), the base of players in the home country, numbers of players with upper level time in the game and institutional experience to be able to run Australia, NZ, South Africa or England close takes decades and many Tier 2 countries struggle to grow the 15’s game big enough to achieve this (e.g. Italy whose global ranking has moved in a narrow band now for a long time).

For many years, due to the depth of the game in NZ, we were able to dominate the world 7’s scene. The ability of countries to find and train speedsters who can be taught to pass makes it harder for NZ to stay on top.

Tietjens stayed at the top too long

It’s hard to say this but I’m afraid it’s true. Tietj has relied on the services of a particular type of player where physicality at the breakdown (often to counter the big Fijian players,  the other dominant 7’s nation) has been paramount. The game has grown past that style with speed, agility and more frequent passing (in the mode of touch rugby) becoming a bigger feature of the game. This reduces the frequency of bruising physical encounters at the breakdown and thus turnovers provoked by the NZ strongmen. Our opponents just try and run around us and have gotten better at the running game. Whilst NZ 7’s teams are still excellent runners of the ball, the gap with that skill set between where the NZ team is at is now negligible with many teams. Tietjens has not been keeping up with this trend and has stuck mostly with a formula that worked against less experienced teams who had not yet mastered the running/passing game. 22 years at the top is a long time particularly when most of that was as a winner often a dominant winner so I’m sure the internal pressure to modify what he saw as a winning formula was low.

Tietj also was very clever at playing the IRB 7’s points system which rewards teams with an only slowly diminishing level of points. The points awarded for an outright finals win are not that much higher than a 3^rd place finish. Over the last 5 to 8 years, Tietj has been happy with NZ making the semis of every tournament on the circuit and only winning the odd tourney because he knew that the team that might pip NZ at any given 7’s circuit tournament was often different each time. When NZ didn’t win a final, it was Fiji then South Africa or England or Australia that did win. With the exception of Fiji, none of those teams were consistently in the top 4 at every tournament as NZ would invariably be and so were rarely a long term threat on the points table. This meant NZ would amass enough points to take out the overall championship whilst not winning every individual tournament. Unfortunately, those sort of tactics don’t work at a one-off tournament like the Olympics. Exiting the quarter finals is something that has happened to NZ before but at the next tournament on the circuit, they’d win the final. Having a bad tourney because of injuries or the rub of the ref calls could be made up at the next stop on the global circuit. In Rio, NZ faced a perfect storm of injuries AND ref calls not going their way AND playing poorly. Relying on the results of other teams in other pools to make it through to the quarters always meant we’d be in a ‘best team vs worse team’ scenario in the quarter finals hence meeting Fiji. Had we topped our pool, we’d have faced a weaker quarter final opponent.

Tietjens has had a great run but it’s time to pass the torch to a younger coach more imbued and experienced in the faster paced running game that has become the international 7’s norm and select players accordingly

 7’s refereeing is a lottery

Reffing top levels 7’s is actually not easy. The game moves at lightning speed in terms of the actual movement around the field and the speed at which contact occurs. You have to make decisions at the breakdown in a split second and the decision as to which team infringed is not as clear cut as it is in 15’s. There’s enough controversy in 15’s over ref calls at the breakdown and these are amplified dramatically in 7’s. There are a number of contact events where calls can go either way or where there can be a wide disparity between refs at certain key game events. Common amongst the 50/50 calls are things like the player in possession not releasing the ball in the tackle and the defending player at the ruck being on or off their feet. That contact point can be over in seconds and the ref has to decide between the two penalty options and it is often a 50/50 call that literally can go either way. Common among the disparity of calls amongst refs is the tackler release situation and side entry. One ref will penalise a defending player for not releasing the tackled player where another ref will allow play to continue. Most side entries are obvious but others aren’t and the gate is not as easily seen and defined as it is in 15’s and a pedantic ref will rule a penalty for side entry and others won’t. It is what I call the 7’s referee lottery. Incorrect (or marginal) referee decisions have a far greater impact on the outcome of a 7’s game than in 15’s because a turnover in possession has far more serious consequences to the team who lost possession because passing and running by the team in possession can run out the short clock. In 15’s you don’t have the space to avoid contact and there is time to claw back the impact of a bad ref call. Had the first Australian try in the women’s final been sent for TMO review (the Aussie player lost the ball before grounding) and had some very marginal penalty calls gone NZ’s way, the outcome may have been different. Australia were the better team both through the year and on the day but my point still stands, refereeing decisions affect the outcome of a much larger number of 7’s games. It is why there are so many more upsets than in 15’s. Add to that the bounce of the ball at kickoffs and the impact of a small error like knocking on a simple pass or catch and a team that may have traditionally always beaten a particular opponent is 2 tries down and playing catchup footie against a short clock.

In my opinion World Rugby should’ve insisted on playing refs in their strict internal assessment ranking (i.e. the current No. 1 ranked 7’s ref to control the centre of the gold medal match, Numbers 2 and 3 to control semis etc.) rather than be swayed by any IOC guidelines on regional sharing. A mid ranked Spanish referee should never have been controlling a gold medal match as happened with the woman’s final. Also, for the IRB 7’s circuit, World Rugby really needs to have two on-field referees like the NRL now have at all top level league games or use the Touch Rugby system of a rotating three on-field referees on and off due to the pace of the game. Either change would ensure refs in the centre would be just that little bit fresher and closer to the action to assist in improving on marginal calls.

 7’s isn’t as much of a priority with our top players

International 7’s for many countries like Spain, the US, Kenya etc. is a massive step into a large and growing world stage. I know some boys we’ve coached here in the US (or boys I’ve reffed their team) who made the USA 7’s team. They push and train and dream for their moment on the world stage and for the chance to take down a traditional top tier team (as the US has managed to do). Contrast that with the NZRFU struggling to get 7’s suitable Super Rugby or All Black players to consider being part of the NZ team to Rio. 7’s is not the glamour sport in NZ that it is in the up and coming rugby countries. While developing countries’ 7’s programmes are doing little to immediately build 15’s, the US for instance sees 7’s as an entry level attraction/marketing tool to lure football mad kids into the game. Maybe the humiliation of Rio will jolt NZ players to change their priorities. The Men’s 7’s should’ve been a shoe in for a kiwi gold medal. When 7’s was announced as an Olympic sport we were. The global audience for rugby has never been bigger than at Rio and I’ve read a number of US sports writers who’d never give rugby a second glance who have become transfixed by the game in Rio. I get that winning the Super Rugby title was job one for the Hurricanes hence for example Ardi Savea’s decision to pass on Rio but this is the consequence – national humiliation. The All Blacks can still dominate 15’s AND we can remain strong in 7’s, it’s not an either-or situation. Unfortunately, the international 7’s circuit has lost its attraction for top NZ rugby players. I get that but the Olympics is a whole other league and ought not be treated as the 12^th leg of  IRB circuit.

Finally, it must be said: New Zealanders are more bored with 7’s than other countries. Witness the decline in popularity of the Wellington 7’s (although there are other factors contributing to this decline). Wellington struggles to sell half their seats now where as the Las Vegas 7’s is getting bigger and bigger every year. It is hard to get around this fact. I like 15’s way more than 7’s. I enjoy reffing 7’s but it is really only a fitness challenge, reffing 15’s is more technically challenging. I am bored with 7’s and don’t get the thrill that Americans get from watching it. Our boys play in a pre-season 7’s session for 3 weeks. For brand new players it’s a flashy fun intro to rugby but frankly we find it really does little to prepare them for the main 15’s season as the skills sets are so different. Our head coach (also a kiwi) loathes 7’s and is reluctant to support it and we do so more to support the local youth union than anything. The attitudes that us kiwi coaches have here regarding 7’s are shared by high school aged rugby coaches in NZ. High School touch rugby is more intensely followed and played than HS 7’s and HS 7’s in NZ is massively overshadowed by 15’s. 15-year-old boys in NZ dream of being an All Black not playing in the Hong Kong 7’s. Somehow we have to overcome that. I see Steve Hansen has ordered a review of the NZ 7’s team performance and in particular his concern over the lack of enthusiasm for 7’s amongst top players. It will be interesting to see where this goes.

The NYT reports:

Fifty of the nation’s most senior Republican national security officials, many of them former top aides or cabinet members for President George W. Bush, have signed a letter declaring that Donald J. Trump “lacks the character, values and experience” to be president and “would put at risk our country’s national security and well-being.”

Mr. Trump, the officials warn, “would be the most reckless president in American history.”

The letter says Mr. Trump would weaken the United States’ moral authority and questions his knowledge of and belief in the Constitution. It says he has “demonstrated repeatedly that he has little understanding” of the nation’s “vital national interests, its complex diplomatic challenges, its indispensable alliances and the democratic values” on which American policy should be based. And it laments that “Mr. Trump has shown no interest in educating himself.”

“None of us will vote for Donald Trump,” the letter states, though it notes later that many Americans “have doubts about Hillary Clinton, as do many of us.”

Among the most prominent signatories are Michael V. Hayden, a former director of both the C.I.A. and the National Security Agency; John D. Negroponte, who served as the first director of national intelligence and then deputy secretary of state; and Robert B. Zoellick, another former deputy secretary of state, United States trade representive and, until 2012, president of the World Bank. Two former secretaries of homeland security, Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff, also signed, as did Eric S. Edelman, who served as Vice President Dick Cheney’s national security adviser and as a top aide to Robert M. Gates when he was secretary of defense.

Trump’s abandoning of NATO is what has caused so many to turn on their own party’s nominee. They understand NATO is not about what percentage of GDP is spent on defence, but about upholding democratic values and countries from aggressors that are not democratic.

From the NZ Herald.

So the five degrees most dominated by women are:

1. Nursing
2. Teaching
3. Radiography
4. Librarianship
5. Human Welfare

The five most dominated by men are:

1. Engineering
2. Computer Science
3. Physics
4. Building
5. Maths

Mike Yardley writes:

Last year, National arrogantly blocked some legislative moves to pragmatically embrace private healthcare.

If Labour really wants to help reconnect with middle New Zealand, they should jettison their traditional leftie nostrums of private health representing a two-tier system, and campaign for change.

Promise a 25 per cent health insurance rebate for the over 65s, axe fringe benefit tax from health cover to incentivise employers to cover their workforce and force parent category migrants to self-insure for their first 10 years in New Zealand.

Enabling greater use of private health surgery will help unlock consider able more capacity in the public system, easing the strain on overstretched resources and changing lives in a more timely fashion.

The trouble is that tax rebates for health insurance had a minimal impact on how many people take up health insurance. It just becomes a way for wealthy people to avoid tax.  It is a very costly policy that won’t achieve its aim of reducing pressure on the public health system. It just complicates a relatively clean tax system.

The Dom Post editorial:

Term caps might sound all right – the breathless, perk-busting Taxpayers’ Union lobby group wants them for all local councillors – but they are an anti-democratic move.

Consider what might have happened if New Zealand had term limits for the role of prime minister. In 2014, John Key, still exceedingly popular after two terms in office, would have been forced out in favour of one of his caucus. The voters would have been cheated.

The Dom Post uses a silly example. No one is proposing a term limit which is shorter than the average tenure in a job.

Term limits are not anti-democratic. In fact most democracies have them.

To be sure, advocates of term caps do have one strong argument – the presence of certain councillors around the country who have been in the job for generations. On the face of it, many of these people would be doing the electorate a favour by taking voluntary retirement. It seems as though many are returned to office simply because they are familiar.

90% of success at local elections is name recognition.

A Members’ bill ballot will be held at noon today. Three bills will be drawn.

The bills entered in the ballot are listed below.

The bills by party (Ministers excluded) are:

National – 26/34
Labour – 26/32
Greens – 13/14
NZ First -12/12
Maori – 1/1
ACT – 1/1
Total – 79/94

Good to see more National MPs will a bill in the ballot. Last year only 13 National MPs had a bill in. Now as many National MPs (Ministers are ineligible) as Labour MPs have a bill in.

I’ll update the post after midday with which three bills were drawn.

UPDATE: The bills drawn were:

1. Residential Tenancies (Safe and Secure Rentals) Amendment Bill Metiria Turei
2. Airport Authorities (Publicising Lost Property Sales) Amendment Bill Nuk Korako
3. Land Transfer (Foreign Ownership of Land Register) Amendment Bill Mahesh Bindra