A guest post by Lucy Rogers:

It was with slight reservations that in November 2023 I laid a complaint to the Independent Police Conduct Authority about the police wrongfully arresting me. Literally everyone seemed to distrust the IPCA. At first I was cautious but kept an open mind. A few months later this progressed to extreme stress when someone purporting to have firsthand knowledge of the IPCA’s practices told me things about the IPCA that I later discovered to be factually untrue.

Why am I speaking up?

I don’t think anyone should have to go through the kind of stress I faced a few months into an investigation re: a life-defining event that threw me into the public sphere. I also do not believe that the IPCA deserves the distrust and hostility it seems to face from a significant proportion of the public. It is for these reasons that I want to do my bit to set the record straight here.

The IPCA are awesome

The staff members I was dealing with at the IPCA were exemplary people. On the one hand, Sarah Bullen and Warren Young (from whom I sought permission to name) did not approach my case with an ideological assumption that all police are certain to be evil and dishonest people. Having such people in a position to review police conduct would be a disaster for this country. On the other hand, neither of them were police cronies. 

Here is an example of the IPCA’ s commitment to truth

Sarah was professional, intelligent and at times kind. I would like to provide one example of her integrity. One of the police officers who arrested me was foolish enough to provide the IPCA with photos of my arrest taken by a member of the public which she had found on social media. She did not know that he also had footage of the incident. Sarah, however, contacted him independently and had the insight to ask if he might have footage, which miraculously he did.

The video was critical

Uncovering that piece of evidence has significantly impacted my life, because the police alleged that I was screaming at people in a state of “excited delirium” and that they thought I was a mental health patient. If I had not been able to prove that the police were lying, this would have destroyed my professional reputation and seriously impacted my career. I only had footage of the second half of the incident and the police knew that and exploited the fact. The truth is that I was silent and motionless: I did not say a single word to the protesters, let alone yell or act hysterically.

Further examples of ICPA professionalism

Sarah and Warren always took my calls, or if they couldn’t, they called me back promptly. They did not stonewall me. In fact, I called Warren once when he was on a ski field with his grandchildren on holiday. Despite not being at work, he was kind enough to take my call. (I hasten to add that I quickly assured him that it wasn’t urgent and he could call me back later.) When Sarah was interviewing me, I remember making an off-handed comment about an aspect of the evidence without intending to expand on it. Sarah prompted me for further information, which flagged to me that she was sincerely interested in the truth and the facts.

The causes of public distrust of the IPCA

There are lots of reasons for the IPCA’s reputation, but I think one of the problems it faces is illustrated by today’s events: in the face of the IPCA’s finding that the police arrested me and lied about me to justify it, the police nevertheless put out a press release maintaining that my arrest was justified. They reiterated alleged facts about my arrest which were in fact debunked in the IPCA report, without providing any reason for questioning the IPCA’s findings.

The IPCA unfairly takes blame for things

In other words, the police (I suspect) have a habit of getting away with it because the IPCA does not have the discretion to prosecute and that power ultimately lies with the police themselves. The IPCA then takes the blame for this. That’s not fair.

More thoughts on various matters including the IPCA report itself will probably follow in due course in a separate blog post. For now, I need a good book and a glass of wine. It has been a hectic day.

The Reserve Bank has dropped the OCR to 3.75%, which is good. However this is still higher than anytime from 2009 to 2021.

The OCR was 5.5% from May 2023 to August 2024. So it has dropped 1.75% from its peak, which will help home owners and businesses.

Floating mortgage rates are down from 8.6% average to 7.4% and fixed from 6.0% to 5.2%. But these are still high. In 2017 they were 5.8% and 3.3%.

The Taxpayers’ Union reveals:

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act request that The Arts Foundation Te Tumo Toi has received $1,180,300 of funding from Creative NZ since 2021/22.

This includes funding for lobbying/advocacy purposes, although The Arts Foundation was set up in order to raise private funds for the arts.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman, James Ross, said:

“Taxpayer-funded lobbying is rife with examples across the public sector. But it especially stings when taxpayers’ money is being given to a charity set up to seek private funding, just for it then to use the cash to lobby other bits of government.”

No Government agency should be funding any NGO for advocacy. It’s undemocratic and wrong.

The Independent Police Complaints Authority has an excellent report on the policing of public protests in New Zealand.

It recommends some thoughtful legislative changes to strengthen the right to protest and counter-protest. They also look at three case studies:

1. The Let Women Speak Rally. They found “The Operation Commander and the Forward Commander did not properly respond to unfolding events by deploying additional staff to protect LWS supporters.”
2. Mr N waving an Israeli flag near the Auckland Town Hall on the outskirts of Aotea Square at the same time as a pro-Palestinian rally was starting inside Aotea Square. They found “The arrest for obstruction was unlawful because there was no reasonable apprehension of a breach of the peace“
3. Lucy Rogers waving a sign by way of counter-protest a pro-Palestinian protest group marched along Queen Street

Lucy has blogged here previously on her experiences, which seemed outrageous. And the IPCA has agreed. In regards to Lucy they found:

• The use of force to push Lucy to the rear of the footpath was unjustified.
• Removing the sign was unjustified and aggravated the situation.
• The arrest for breach of the peace was unlawful because there was a very low probability that Lucy’s safety was at risk, so the interference with her right to protest is unjustified.

They also noted:

 We do not accept that Officer Q or Officer R could have believed what they have said in their reports.

This is a polite way of saying the two Officers lied to the IPCA. This is very serious.

Equally disturbing is the response from the Police, who have basically rejected the IPCA findings with regards to Lucy.

The IPCA has found the use of force to move the woman away was unjustified and the arrest was unlawful.

While Police acknowledge the IPCA’s view on this, we believe our officers were acting in the woman’s best interests to keep her safe due to their previous experience at pro-Palestine events which had turned violent very quickly.

It should be very concerning that despite the IPCA finding the officers made an unlawful arrest, and lied about it, the Police are backing the officers.

This should be a major story.

The Public Service Commission has released its report around alleged misuse of information by three entities and the findings are damning. Two major outcomes are:

• The Government Statistician has decided to not seek re-appointment and ends his contract on 30 March.
• the Commissioner has asked Stats, the Ministry of Health, Health NZ and Te Puni Kōkiri to temporarily suspend entering into new contracts, renewals and/or extensions of contracts with the three third-party service providers named in the report.

The providers are Te Pou Matakana, Waipareira Trust, and Manurewa Marae, who are all heavily inter-related.

Some of the findings include:

• Te Whatu Ora has not yet obtained satisfactory assurance from Te Pou Matakana and Waipareira that they have each complied with the terms of their respective DSAs. As a result, Te Whatu Ora and we are unable to conclude on how effective the safeguards and institutional arrangements have been for personal health information shared for COVID 19 vaccination purposes.
• The Ministry of Health and Te Whatu Ora had no safeguards in place for identifying and managing the possibility of conflicts of interest arising from the sharing of personal health information with the relevant service providers
• Several concerns about the management of personal information were raised with Stats, both by internal and external parties, including while the contract with Te Pou Matakana was being performed. The complaints raised by internal Stats employees were largely ignored. 
• Stats removed the requirement for Certificates of Confidentiality, a key requirement to ensure the protection of Census data.
• When concerns surfaced publicly about the relevant service providers using personal information, shared by government agencies, for improper purposes, the providers all swiftly refuted the allegations. However, none of the agencies were able to draw on their existing assurance systems to respond to the allegations. This is problematic.
• we received details of an allegation of unauthorised use of personal information by Manurewa Marae – collected at the point of vaccination – for a Te Pāti Māori text message campaign in the weeks leading up to the General Election. As these allegations are outside the Inquiry Terms of Reference, we have referred them to the Privacy Commissioner for his consideration.
• Te Pou Matakana and Waipareira have told us that the personal information they collected was entered into a database owned by Waipareira, and it was clearly distinct from Census data (i.e. the information entered into the Census forms by whānau). This distinction was not always observed at Manurewa Marae.
• Aspects of this matter are the subject of an ongoing investigation by New Zealand Police.
• We have heard conflicting accounts about what happened with completed Census forms at Manurewa Marae – we have been told that they were sent to Stats each day and that unused or partially completed Census forms were destroyed. We have also been told that the forms were photocopied and then posted to Stats or entered online and still retained. There is no unified view as to why Census forms were retained at the Marae, where they were kept and for how long.

You have to wonder if any other contractors were allowed such lax access to government data, with few controls.

The Ministry of Culture and Heritage has five draft proposals for media reform. A couple are okay and a couple are terrible. My initial take on them.

Ensuring accessibility of local media platforms

The proposal is to introduce ‘must carry’ requirements to ensure ‘local TV services’ are pre-installed and receive a basic level of prominence in terms of positioning on the home screen on ‘regulated TV devices’ at no cost to the local service. Regulated TV devices would also be required to ensure ease of access to local free-to-air linear channels.

This could be okay, as it is merely requiring smart TVs to preinstall local TV apps. However this may have unintended consequences around price. It could mean that all smart TVs sold in NZ have to be specially configured for NZ, which could increase manufacturing and hence retail costs.

Increasing investment into and discoverability of local content

The proposal is that all professional audio-visual media providers including New Zealand TV broadcasters, New Zealand streaming platforms and global streaming platforms would have:

• Local content investment obligations:to invest a proportion of annual revenue in the creation or acquisition of local content.
• Discoverability requirements for local content:to put in place measures to promote and clearly display local content and enable users to find new local content.

This is a terrible idea. Basically it would force global streaming services you subscribe to, to fund NZ produced shows. It’s an indirect tax to prop up local content providers who already get a huge amount of taxpayer funding.

This will mean that Disney+ and Netflix etc will have to fund local woke TV productions that no one actually wants to watch.

Streaming services will provide content that their customers want. If NZ customers want to watch more Guy Williams comedy, then they’l have a commercial incentive to provide it. But having the Government force them to fund local content is wrong. Worse it could lead to trade reprisals from the US.

Increasing captioning and audio description (CAD)

The proposal is to create legislative obligations on TV broadcasters and streaming platforms operating in New Zealand to provide equitable access to their content.

The media are already struggle to survive, and MCH wants to impose further costs on them by mandating quotas for captions and audio descriptions!

Modernising professional media regulation

The proposal is to modernise the broadcasting standards regime to cover all professional media operating in New Zealand, not just broadcasters. The role of the regulator (currently performed by the BSA) would be revised, with more of a focus on ensuring positive system-level outcomes and less of a role in resolving audience complaints about media content.

This could be a good thing, if done well. It is silly to have some media regulated by the Government appointed BSA and others by the industry Media Council, based on whether their content is broadcast, or video on demand etc. The status quo is broken.

But what we should have is industry self-regulation as the sole regulator. Instead MCH is proposing a government regulatory body that would control all media. This is a very bad idea as the Government of the Day could appoint board members that would be more likely to rule against media critical of the Government.

Streamlining Crown content funders

The proposal is to establish a content funding entity that consolidates the Film Commission and NZ On Air. 

This is a good idea, and should happen.

However the combined entity should have a board that isn’t simply appointed by the Government of the Day. The legislation should require any appointments to have the agreement of political parties representing at least 75% of MPs.

Newsroom reports:

It can’t be much of a surprise that a relatively inexperienced Act MP, handed the workplace relations portfolio, doesn’t want to entertain the country’s biggest union in her office.

But it still astonishes the head of that union, the CTU’s president, Richard Wagstaff.

It shouldn’t be a surprise. If the CTU merely advocated for workers in the same way Business NZ advocates for employers, it would probably get lots of meetings.

But at the last election it spent $300,000 campaigning against National. Not in a “We think their policies are bad” type of way but saying Luxon was out of touch and can’t be trusted.

BusinessNZ never runs election advertisements, let alone ones that personally denigrate leaders of political parties.

So it is no surprise that the Minister would see little merit in meeting with them.

If you don’t like drag queen story times, there are many things you can legally do. These include:

• Don’t have your kids attend
• Complain to the Police if you genuinely think the performance is illegal
• Protest peacefully outside
• Lobby Councillors to change Council policy allowing them in their libraries
• Lobby MPs to change the law so they are illegal

Things you can’t legally do include:

• Disrupting the event so those who have chosen to attend have their rights trampled on
• Using violence to force your way in

If you think it is okay for Destiny to prevent drag queen story time, then you think it is okay for activists to stop Posie Parker from speaking. In both cases those seeking to suppress an event are convinced that they are preventing harm from doing so, but in both cases they are acting like mini-fascists.

What upsets me isn’t that parents exercise their rights as parents to have their kids attend a drag queen story time, but that they appear to be taxpayer funded. Matua Kahurangi says that Hugo Grrl has received $1.1 million to produce an eight-episode series of drag storytime performances aimed at children which will air on TVNZ.

If this is correct, this is an outrageous use of taxpayer funds. I have no problems With drag storytimes (just as I have no problem with pantomimes) but they should be funded by the audience, not by taxpayers.

WCC does an annual survey of residents. In previous years they put the full results on their website but this year only did a summary which highlighted the positive. Someone requested the full report under LGOIMA, and it is here.

Some key trends:

• Wellington is a great place to live, work and play down from 95% to 72%
• I feel a sense of pride in the way Wellington looks and feels down from 85% to 50%
• The city centre is lively and attractive from 88% to 37%
• Satisfaction with Council decision making is only 20%
• Only 21% agree WCC mades decisions in the best interests of the city (was once 50%)
• Overall Council performance is 29% satisfied and 56% dissatisfied
• Feeling safe in the CBD after dark down from 76% to 43%
• Easy to drive around the city down from 51% to 34%
• Local roads are in good condition down from 73% to 54%
• Satisfaction with central city lighting down from 84% to 66%
• Only 29% satisfied with availability of car parks during the week
• Stormwater management satisfaction down from 68% to 35%

A good question to those standing for election would be what policies they would support to improve these.

I had the overwhelming privilege of watching 15 year old Sam Ruthe run the fastest 1500m for someone his age in the history of ever.

Form the time I was eight years old and saw Bayi, Walker and Dixon run incredibly well – I was hooked on the sport.

Sir John Walker blew my mind by being the first human to run under 3min 50 seconds for a mile. Then he won the Olympic 1500m gold medal in 1976 words genius, talent and giftedness need to be redefined, for the good of children, every field of human endeavour and the inspiration of adults.

Much of the theory on the development of “gifted and talented” children is problematic. Firstly the concept of talent, including IQ, as being fixed. Secondly the emphasis often not about the welfare of children but the gratification of their parents or the benefit of sports institutions, coaches, (or schools). There should also be huge concern about the effects of labelling – both on those included under the labels and those excluded. Most importantly, regardless of the starting point, I cannot find a single example of a human performing at an exceptional level in any field that has not worked extraordinarily hard to get there, been through many struggles, shown great sense of purpose and remarkable resilience.

I got to meet Sir Peter Snell in a trivial table tennis situation. Far more importantly I spent three hours with his coach, Sir Arthur Lydiard, in the late 1990s.

In recent years there has been significant change in our understanding of the human brain and the development of ability. To name of few influential thinkers there is Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck and her growth mindset work, Matthew Syed (Bounce, and now – a children’s book – You Are Awesome) and Malcolm Gladwell (Outliers, David and Goliath). Syed wove his first book, Bounce, around the 10,000 hours concept and has meshed his recent work into Dweck’s mindset concepts.

The ideas are important for every human. They have the ability to develop exceptional skill and knowledge sets but to do so requires guidance, many hours of purposeful practice and opportunities to attempt things and respond to both failures and successes.

At present there is huge concern about the mental well-being of young people and adults. The understanding that abilities are grown over time, that “talent” is developed and is available to us all in some form – is mind-changing for young people and for the enhancement of their opportunities in life. Classroom teachers change from being ability categorisers and brain fillers to genuine developers of aspirational humans. The length of time it actually takes to become good at a complex skill also changes the approach of sports academies. Instead of “talent identification” they can become developers of ability with a much healthier approach to young people. Above all – it gives young people hope about themselves.

If we understand that “genius” is a developed state schools and other institutions should still be providing for young people who already have a high degree of developed ability. There is no down side to this. But in doing so they need to emphasise to the need to keep taking risks, seeing failure as a stepping stone, and eliminate the negatives of labelling. It is about the child not the future of the school or sporting code.

These concepts are inspirational for adults too. If you were told as a child that you didn’t have a musical bone in your body – they were wrong – Syed’s book You Are Awesome tells your inner child so.

Sam Ruthe appears to have the perfect combination of great heritage and very good coaching. Every human has the opportunity to decide if they have done the best with their opportunities.

The High Court has dismissed on appeal the assault conviction against Liz Gunn. Now I’m not a fan of Ms Gunn’s stances on various issues, but the court decision makes clear how outrageous her arrest and prosecution was. From the ruling:

Whilst Ms Gunn was talking to her, C turned to talk to Mr Clark who was on C’s right. C asked Mr Clark to stop filming. At that point Ms Gunn, on C’s left, asked C to identify the legal basis for the request. To gain or regain C’s attention, Ms Gunn said “Excuse me”, and then reached out and touched C’s upper arm.

This is what she was convicted of assault for!

Ms Gunn’s touch was fleeting and to gain C’s attention. Ms Gunn used no greater degree of physical contact or force than was reasonably necessary for that purpose. Accordingly, on the face of Collins, what occurred in this instance was within the bounds of what is considered acceptable, i.e. was not unlawful.

The Judge further says:

What occurred between Ms Gunn and C was trivial. There was no dispute in the District Court, and there is none on appeal, that any offending was at the very lowest possible level.

The question that media should be asking then is why did the Police arrest and charge Gunn? It is hard not to conclude she was targeted for her political beliefs and activism. Has anyone else ever been arrested by Police for touching someone on their arm to gain their attention?

A guest post by Sir Roger Douglas:

Michael Littlewood’s ‘Guest Post’ for David Farrar on pensions, and his belief that our social welfare system is fit for purpose and doesn’t need change, reminded me of why New Zealand is currently well on the way to bankruptcy, and why our brightest young people are leaving the country in droves.

It all started in earnest when Sir Robert Muldoon and the National party in 1976, voted in one of the most generous retirement pension systems anywhere in the world, if not the most generous. They did so without voting in the taxes needed to pay for such a generous scheme.

They got the support of those who benefited in the immediate future (10-20 years) 

without any of the kickback they should have got from the majority of taxpayers.

It was a strictly a win-win situation as far the National party and their state welfare politicians were concerned. They simply did not care about future retirees, like today’s, who instead of retiring with the million dollars+ in investment capital they would have received under Labor’s NZ Superannuation scheme of 1975, retire with very little, if anything at all. 

It was and still is, a strictly lose-lose situation: for the country, and for today’s taxpayers, who are faced with an increase in government welfare expenditure of more than 8% of GDP over the next 40 years ($120,000 million or $40,000+ in extra taxes per worker). 

That this disastrous situation will come about, unless something is done about it, or NZ’s growth rate improves in a spectacular manner to overcome the inevitable, has been known for more than 30 years (See Act’s 1994 paper ‘Commonsense for a Change’ & Treasury’s unofficial 2004 paper on Health, for example).

This dire situation has happened because politicians like Muldoon (Pensions), Clark (Health & Education), Key (Pensions, Government Debt), and Ardern (who simply left it to her Minister of Finance to spend as much as he could), all believed winning power for themselves was more important than looking after NZ’s future. They never asked themselves the one simple question that really matters “Why am I in politics?”

Unlike squirrels, who have the good sense to store nuts so they have food when they need it, New Zealands’ politicians over the last 60-70 years have encouraged people to spend everything they have without looking to the future, because ‘we will look after you’.

THE TRUTH 

For the last 50 years we have effectively set NZ on a path to bankruptcy, beginning with Muldoon’s unfunded super scheme, continued by Clark with her policies on health (which increased spending by billions of dollars and reduced productivity dramatically at the same time), and accelerated by Ardern, whose well-meaning but poorly thought-out solutions to poverty, and inexcusable centralization of power, led to the spending of billions of dollars with nothing to show for it. 

This abject mismanagement is perhaps seen most clearly in the welfare state, where, for at least 80 years, the poor in NZ have been used as an excuse by politicians of all parties to increase their power, rendering those in need more dependent upon them instead of lifting them up, treating them with respect, and empowering and enriching them.

We urgently need to move away from our current welfare system – one that traps people into dependency – to one that makes people independent, and in the process creates a better society. 

To achieve this, we need to cast aside the widely held assumption that if the government spends more of tax-payers money on healthcare, welfare and education, things will get better. Sadly, the evidence of the last 80 years, not only in New Zealand but across the western world, is that this approach generally makes things worse.

People like Michael Littlewood, who want social welfare pensions and other programs to stay the same, should instead heed the words of Thomas Sowell, the respected American economist and economic historian, who advises us to direct our anger at those politicians and their advisors, “who were irresponsible enough to set up costly programs without putting enough money aside to pay for the promises that were made—promises that now cannot be kept, regardless of which political party controls the government.”

Sowell further notes, “Someone needs to say to those who want social security and Medicare to continue unchanged, ‘Don’t you understand? The money is not there anymore’…The way social security was set up was so financially shaky that anyone who set up a similar retirement scheme in the private sector could be sent to prison for fraud. But you can’t send a whole congress (parliament) to prison, however much they deserve it.”

In my view, Sowell is telling people the truth, while Littlewood merely tells people what they want to hear. In so doing, he and his supporters are robbing the young of their futures in New Zealand. 

Little wonder then, that so many of so many of them are packing up and leaving our shores.

Learning Math is Wonderful.

Alwyn Poole

Feb 10, 2025

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I am not easily good at Mathematics. I withdrew from the subject after the very mediocre few years at high school. I can blame all manner of things but the basic truth is that I did not know how to learn in this are and was not committed to it. I believed the perpetually trending – “when will you use this in the real world?”

So … when I was choosing my University courses I chose the “descriptive” Economics. I then discovered that my second year papers were pretty much all calculus or statistics.

I had to go back to the very basics and build from there.

These are the basics:

Mathematics is “do-able” (not necessarily always easy but you CAN do it).

1. There are only four functions to master (+,-,/,x) similar to tennis only having 5 shots.
2. There are rules to follow like sport has rules e.g. BEDMAS as order of operations.
3. Attack the language! Mathematics is like any language and the words/symbols can appear daunting but all are understandable and have purpose. Parents can do this every moment of every day. Measures re cooking, Money items – e.g. change from spending. One true key …. NEVER be negative about the subject!!
4. Do significant purposeful practice and ALWAYS get HELP when stuck. Don’t stop practicing until the fog clears and you go “AHA!”. Don’t worry about the person ahead of you – he/she has done more practice – play the long game with confidence.
5. Always get 100%. This might not be in the moment but review, get help and correct all problems & tests. Making mistakes is no big deal – not fixing them with understanding is.

Always happy to help with individual circumstances.

This method is not theoretical. I have always applied it to the learnng of my own children and those that I have taught. Those that have followed it have become incredible at the subject – reragless of their “natural ability”.

Alwyn Poole
https://alwynpoole.substack.com
[email protected]

For those who don’t know, Michael Dell is the founder, chairman and CEO of Dell technologies. He started the company as a 19 year old and is now worth US$130 billion.

Don Brash submitted the below to the Herald as a response to the column from Lady Moxon. They declined the column, but I am happy to publish it here.

Surely, in a liberal democracy, there are few words more chilling to read written in earnest than the “flawed concept of ‘equality’”. But there they were, in print, in an opinion piece by the National Urban Māori Authority’s Lady Tureiti Moxon published in the NZ Herald on Tuesday last week.

The Treaty Principles Bill has done exactly what its champion David Seymour intended; it has sparked a national conversation. And that conversation has been eye-opening to say the least. Never could I have ever predicted that ‘equality’ would be treated as such a dirty word. 

The immortal words of Dr Martin Luther King Junior’s I have a dream speech, treasured for decades after his death, are now out of fashion according to certain sections of our society and Nelson Mandela would today perhaps be condemned for the ideals he said he would die for: 

“the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities.”

In fact, I am old enough to remember when Te Pāti Māori President John Tamihere was himself a champion of equality in our Parliament. I daresay he would prefer if his speeches about the Foreshore and Seabed legislation were disappeared. Nowadays he leads the party that ran Lady Tureiti Moxon as a candidate at the last election.

Equality is not simply flawed in Te Pāti Māori’s dystopian idealised future of our country, it is irrelevant, unimportant, and an obstacle to overcome. Lady Moxon deplores that the Regulatory Standards Bill “mirrors the identical flawed thinking that was in the Treaty Principles Bill by placing undue emphasis on “equality”.”

One of the greatest triumphs of the twentieth century was the West’s determined shift to place human rights and equality at the very heart of governance and democracy. It is our commitment to equality and the simple idea that we should be treated the same before the law and have access to the same opportunities that has allowed for the dismantling of discriminatory systems and laws.

No doubt there will be those who read this and quibble about the definition of ‘equality’ in order to excuse Lady Moxon’s disdain for it. Helpfully, she herself included her own definition of the word in her article. This is the equality she considers the government to be placing “undue emphasis” on:

“Equality = being treated the same, having the same opportunities, rights, or resources, regardless of any differences. It implies that everyone has access to the same resources and opportunities, regardless of their race, gender, financial position or background.” 

Lady Moxon referred to Māori life expectancy being lower than other New Zealanders’ as evidence of the failings of equality. Context tells a different story.

In 1891, the life expectancy for Māori was 25 for men and 23 for women. In the century and a bit since, this expectancy has steadily climbed so that 2019 statistics have Māori men at 73.4 years and Māori women at 77.1. Statistical trends show a trajectory of continued improvement in Māori life expectancy can be expected.

Notably, Statistics New Zealand says “increases in [Māori] life expectancy were highest in the late 1980s to early 2000s.” This period was one of intense focus on equality in New Zealand. Our Human Rights Act was passed in 1993 and Bill of Rights Act in 1990. It was a time of progress for women and minority groups. 

I have been advocating for a New Zealand that treats each of us equally under the law for decades now and I know better than most how aggressively this concept has been resisted by those who promote a system where who one’s ancestors are determines their rights. Racial separatism is explicitly advocated for by Te Pāti Māori, and its proxies, and some of the ugliest of their messages have sadly gained traction with a new generation of activists if social media is anything to go by.

The idea that anyone who does not have Māori ancestry is merely a visitor to these lands can be seen in videos online, in the comment sections of articles, and in vox pops in the media. No matter if a person is a sixth generation New Zealander, according to the new Māori activist doctrine, they are manuhiri (a visitor) and Māori are only allowing their presence out of reluctant goodwill.

This way of thinking is a recipe for disaster. It is a sure way to destroy social cohesion and distract us all from the immense economic challenges that we all face. We must start with equality as our baseline.

It is extraordinary that needs to be said, but equality is not racist.

ENDS

Sources: 

https://www.stats.govt.nz/news/growth-in-life-expectancy-slows

https://teara.govt.nz/en/death-rates-and-life-expectancy

A new IRD employee did the following:

• Arrived late 77% of the time over an 11-month period.
• wore inappropriate attire
• spent time on personal call
• had trouble completing tasks
• abused colleagues
• went to sleep while at work more than once
• reduced a manager to tears over dealing with her

Despite all that she won an injunction putting her back on the taxpayer payroll.

A guest post by a reader:

David Seymour obliquely referred to the pervasion of a social justice agenda in New Zealand in his first interview of 2025 on The Country, with words to the effect, Government officials (and universities) have gone rogue implementing identity ideology (with private enterprise following suit!)

(Washington Examiner reported on the Goldwater Institute’s investigation: ‘DEI ‘s obscene price tag’ of $1.8 billion dollars with U.S. University students forced to waste 40 million hours fulfilling mandatory DEI initiatives over the past 4 years. Government departments are just as bad, FBI in particular affecting performance outcomes not to forget the LA fire department… but I digress!)

Stats NZ has cleared Whanua Ora of a data breach. One government department investigating another, how cosy.

They also mentioned, disturbingly: ‘The statistician must give effect to the principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi. The statistician must engage with Māori on Māori interests in data and maintain capability and capacity to engage with Māori about the collection of data’.

They don’t actually. Where is this referenced in the Treaty?

There is NO reference in their press release to The Data and Statistics Act 2022, an actual law not some DEI dogma dreamed up by activist public servants, and deeply embedded during

Ardern’s government, loyally reported and never questioned, by the media.

We elected Luxon to address this.

Luxon repeatedly says he would prefer to deal wth issues on a case by case basis.

Well I have a case for him to ponder.

Does he agree with the latest findings on the Whanau Ora data breach query that Maori had to be consulted due to obligations under the Treaty? And is giving them $100 food vouchers to bribe them to fill in the census acceptable in a democracy, where everyone else did it for free? ($1 million was put aside for the vouchers out of  $5 million for ‘consultation’ and bribery).

I have another question for the PM who strongly opposes the Treaty bill, with his recent comment ‘kill the bill’ putting him on the back foot with thousands of National voters who support clarification of this issue.

(In retrospect)  Would Census staff have had your full approval to overlook the Data and statistics Act 2022 which requires everyone to fill out a census form on census day; with individuals or agencies who don’t do this or provide incorrect information being fined $2,000 and $12,000 respectively?

There is no mention of ‘Treaty obligations’ or ‘consultation on Maori interests in data collection’, 
which has a very discriminatory ring about it.

The Former Key National government and Labour before them did not use bribery to get results for the census. Maori filled it in without a $100 food voucher dangled under their nose. Census workers wore out shoe leather finding Maori living in isolated areas, helping with their forms if necessary, to fulfil their responsibility. 

National’s last census in 2013 had a higher participation rate than the 2018’s (James Shaw’s debacle) and the latest 2023 one, where government officials gave permission to workers to bribe Maori with food vouchers to participate.

So when did consulting with Maori on every damn thing become set in stone?  Under the tyrannical governance of Jacinda Ardern (and Chris Hipkins).

Will PM Luxon given his case by case preference for dealing with tetchy racial issues, question aspects of this inquiry or take his usual cowardly way out saying he can’t interfere with the outcome of an official inquiry. (of an activist public service agency seeking to protect its own skin).

Prime Minister Luxon is the Houdini of fast get aways when problems loom. Leaving a lonely minister to front, you can’t see him for dust. Actually you can’t even see the dust.

And a thought for the new minister for economic growth. If she and Luxon addressed the enormous taxpayer funded rort of  ‘consultation with Maori’ due to mythical ‘Treaty obligations’ there are millions to be saved.

Having a public mandate to do this through the Treaty Principles bill and/or a referendum seems pragmatic.

The PM seems to have forgotten his campaign cry:

NEED NOT RACE