Graham Adams: Chlöe Swarbrick’s education in disaster management

Darleen Tana is only the latest chapter in an annus horribilis.

When she was recruited by the Greens in 2016, Auckland Central MP Chlöe Swarbrick probably never imagined that when she was finally promoted to co-leader it would mean a very public baptism in disaster management. Now having achieved her longstanding ambition to climb to the pinnacle of Green politics, her most immediate challenge has been to stamp out the smouldering fires among the ruins of the party and to somehow restore its battered reputation as its annus horribilis grinds on.

This year, the party’s ranks have been seriously depleted or damaged through death, defection and disgraceful behaviour.

Dieuwe de Boer: Judges Are Ruling by Psychobabble

Judge Michael Crosbie concocted a psychobabble explanation for why the paedophile did it.

The Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care in NZ from 1950 to 2019 was released this month. The Government issued an apology and made the usual promises to do things better.

The entire thing rings a little bit hollow when this Government is currently in the next phase of irreversible child abuse in this country through sterilisation drugs and chopping genitalia off mentally ill adults. One day in the not-so-distant future some hapless Prime Minister will be making another empty apology for his predecessors. ‘We didn’t know, we followed the science, we listened to the experts,’ and so on.

Dr Michael Johnston: Dr Reti prescribes a bitter pill.

Health New Zealand has been quite economical lately.

I don’t mean ‘economical’ in the fiscal sense, of course. This is the public sector we’re talking about. No, like any good government agency, Health NZ has been spending like a drunken sailor on shore leave. Indeed, when it comes to financial extravagance, the organisation is an overachiever.

Guest Post: Amy and Hamish Bielski - Our Research down on the Farm - Part Two

Hi. I am Amy. We are the regen farmers who shared a story on this blog of our research into whether methane emissions from our livestock are a real problem or whether it is something caught up in a phenomenon of hyped-up pseudo-science.

This is a sequel.

Breaking Views Update: Week of 21.7.24

Saturday July 27, 2024 

News:
Hapu fights back against Waiuku Wind Farm proposal
A Māori trust says plans to bring people back to their ancestral land have been put on hold as it fights to protect sacred sites, one more than 1000 years old, from a proposed wind farm development.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Andrew Coster not seeking a second term will upset almost no one

So Andrew Coster has revealed he will not be seeking a second term as Police Commissioner.  

Which will upset...almost no one. 

I think most of us will be happy to see the back of him. 

Because while he does seem like a decent and smart guy, he has been rubbish at the job.

Bob McCoskrie: Who is JD Vance and is he a social conservative?

Who is JD Vance

Ohio Senator JD Vance has been announced as the running mate for Donald Trump at the upcoming presidential election. He’s only been in the senate since 2022.

But this means he could be the next vice-president and replace possibly the worst vice president in history Kamala Harris. So who is JD Vance and is he a friend or foe of social conservatives.

Professor Ian Wright: Declining PhD student numbers are a warning sign for NZ’s future knowledge economy

The decline in the number of doctoral candidates at New Zealand universities is a worrying sign for the country’s effort to build a knowledge-based economy.

Aotearoa New Zealand’s economic trajectory has long been characterised by its reliance on primary commodities, such as unprocessed forestry exports, where high volume and relatively low value are common.

Successive governments have recognised the need to shift towards a more knowledge-intensive economy – one that fosters innovation, higher productivity and greater value.

Dr Bryce Edwards: NZ’s health system in crisis

As of today, New Zealand’s public health system – the biggest government agency in New Zealand’s history, which goes by the name of Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora – is being run by just one reforming bureaucrat – Prof Lester Levy, after the Government sacked the recently installed board. This is because the hospitals around the country that employ nearly 90,000 staff and have a budget of about $28b and assets of $25b are apparently in financial crisis.

JD: The Ex-Pollies at the Trough

JD writes on BFD as a Guest Post:

When you look at the rewards our politicians reap, it is patently obvious to whom their service was, and is, rendered.

As the miasma thickens around the John Tamihere, Te Pāti Māori, collusion case I wondered how JT got those highly paid chief executive jobs at Waipareira and Whānau Ora, with his wife Awerangi similarly ensconced as CEO of both operations.

Lushington D. Brady: They’re Not Even Hiding It

Is no one listening to what Muslims around the world are saying, loud and clear?

They’re not even hiding it – but is anyone in power taking notice?

History, as they say, repeats. Looking back on the inevitability of WWI,
H G Wells wrote, “Why did humanity gape at the guns and do nothing?” As it happens, he wrote that in 1933. In the same text he also foresaw the inevitability of war with Nazi Germany, even getting the location of the spark (Poland) right, if for the wrong reasons. Wells was also only a year off, guessing the outbreak of War in 1940.

Friday July 26, 2024 

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Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 26/7/24

Tax relief is on the way (hurrah), but help for the wine industry draws attention to the issue of corporate welfare

From one part of the Beehive comes a reminder that tax relief will be delivered next week.

From another comes a reminder that this government is no less willing than its predecessor to dispense the taxes it does collect to provide corporate welfare.

Jeffrey A. Tucker: During the Crisis, Free Speech Worked Brilliantly

There is only one major social media platform that is relatively free of censorship. That is X, once known as Twitter, and owned by Elon Musk, who has preached free speech for years and sacrificed billions in advertising dollars in order to protect it. If we don’t have that, he says, we lose freedom itself. He also maintains that it is the best path to finding the truth.

Dr Bryce Wilkinson: Replacing Health NZ board offers glimmer of hope

In a dramatic move this week, the government replaced the board of Health New Zealand (Te Whatu Ora) with a commissioner.

Dramatic but not much of a surprise. Last November, health expert Ian Powell wrote, “The health system is in a state of chaotic crisis (carnage is what it often feels like to those at the clinical frontline).”

He thought that if the new Minister of Health did not decisively change the board’s direction “nothing would change”.

Take a bow then on this first step, Minister Reti.

Ele Ludemann: Fundamental flaws in freshwater targets

An independent review has highlighted fundamental flaws in freshwater targets:

Beef + Lamb New Zealand (B+LNZ) is calling for urgent changes to the sediment and E. coli attributes and national bottom lines (NBLs) following the release of an independent review which shows the way they were determined was flawed, they are not achievable, and trying to achieve them will decimate farming and rural communities.

Professor Robert MacCulloch: Robertson's First Task as VC of Otago University.....

Robertson's First Task as VC of Otago University: stop competition & defund doctors by lobbying in Wellington to prevent Waikato getting NZ's third medical school

Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson officially became the Vice Chancellor of Otago this past 1 July. No longer does he need worry about homelessness along with his friend, Jacinda Ardern, who is similarly entrenched in gilded halls - in her case at Harvard, funded by America's billionaires. Robertson can now enjoy his $629,000 pay package, including a stately home thrown in for good measure. As a symbolic gesture of the total takeover of the University by the Labour Party, the Opposition Leader & former PM Hipkins attended his mate's swearing in ceremony. Asked what is his priority, predictably Robertson replied it was getting the University's finances on track. Not research, not teaching - its all about the cash. How's he going to do that?

Rodney Hide: On another planet

Prime Minister Chris Luxon during the election campaign: "You are on another planet if you want to have a conversation about bathrooms and make that an election issue.”

That’s me. On another planet.

I want my daughters safe.

And not just my daughters. All daughters. All wives. All mothers. All sisters. All women. All girls.

They are not safe now.

Mike's Minute: Military academies - let them give it a crack

At the end of the week the Government's much debated military academies for young offenders will be underway.

They are probably the headline aspect of this weird, overall scrap we seem to have been having post the election around ideas that are to be enacted and yet don’t have a level of acceptance from the opponents, despite the fact that what those opponents propose and support doesn’t, and hasn’t, worked.

Professor Jerry Coyne: Gods cause earthquakes....

The New Zealand government unites indigenous knowledge with “western science” by claiming that gods cause earthquakes

A comment by reader Chris Slater called my attention to this article from GeoNet, an organization described as providing “geological hazard information for Aotearoa New Zealand.” It’s also

Dr Eric Crampton: Fun antitrust application

David Harvey reports that AI scraping could wind up being part of the revised NZ Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill.

Having defined what an AI system and an AI service is the Bill goes on goes on to link an AI system to news content for the purpose of training the AI system.

Kerre Woodham: Thank heavens for the bravery of those who spoke at the Abuse in Care inquiry

For those older survivors of abuse in state and church care, I wonder if you ever, ever thought this day would come?

When you could tell your story without fear of being further beaten and abused and called a liar. When you would be listened to and believed and told that the fault for what has happened to you, the grievous hurt that you have suffered, is not your fault.

Lushington D. Brady: Still Think We Can ‘Coexist’ with Islam?

Islamic preachers in Sydney are at least honest: Islam and Western democracy are incompatible.

It’s equal parts amusing and exasperating to witness, time and again: Western chattering classes being exposed to the reality of Islam. To the horror of virtue-signalling ‘coexist’ types, Atlantic writer Graeme Wood pointed out that, far from Nothing To Do With Islam™, Islamic State is “Islamic. Very Islamic.”

Thursday July 25, 2024 

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Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 25/7/24

While media are focused on child abuse, the Govt signals legislation to clip judges’ wings and restore Customary Marine Title rules

The news media and political commentariat have feasted on the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care – tabled in Parliament yesterday – and the Government’s immediate response to its findings and recommendations.

Bryce Edwards listed a raft of the resultant media headlines on the Democracy Project website this morning.

Among them:

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Test for Customary Marine Title being restored

The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. 

“Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied an area from 1840 to the present day, without substantial interruption.

“However, last year the Court of Appeal in Re Edwards made a ruling which changed the nature of the test and materially reduced the threshold.

“The Government does not agree with this change, and wants to ensure the wider public has confidence these tests are interpreted and applied consistently.

Dr Oliver Hartwich: Europe is now on its own

In the wake of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, all eyes were on the Republican National Convention. While Trump’s formal nomination as the GOP’s presidential candidate was a foregone conclusion, his choice of running mate raised eyebrows: JD Vance, the author of Hillbilly Elegy.

Vance’s selection concludes quite a political journey. Once a “never-Trumper”, Vance has morphed into an arch-Trumpist. But from a European perspective, his nomination signifies more than a stunning political transformation. It is a harbinger of tough times to come for trans-Atlantic relations.

Cam Slater: The Hide of a Hippo

What’s the bet Tana will end up in Te Pāti Māori, and claim that the Greens are racists? I know who is advising her, and I know of their connections to Te Pāti Māori.

The Greens are wailing about Darleen Tana giving them the middle finger as she takes up an independent seat in the Parliament. Yet the situation is entirely of their own making and the solution to their predicament is also entirely in their hands.

Professor Robert MacCulloch: Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care

The World's Media Reports Horrific Headlines about NZ quoting numbers from the Royal Commission into Abuse that its own consultants told it "may never be known with any degree of precision".

A most awful, terrible report by a Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care in NZ from 1950 to 2019 has just been released. The PM & world's media reacted with horror. One case of child abuse is horrendous, but 200,000, which is the number featuring in national & global news headlines? Today one of the "Most Read" stories in the United Kingdom is that "Almost one in three people in NZ care was abused". CNN in the United States stated, "NZ enquiry finds 200,000 children and vulnerable adults abused in care". The Commission itself says “unimaginable” and widespread abuse in care between 1950 and 2019 is a “national disgrace”. It says Māori were disproportionately affected & subjected to overt & targeted racism & calls for apologies from the Government, Pope and Archbishop of Canterbury.

Rodney Hide: Blood Quantum

ACT Leader David Seymour posts on X:

“Today in Parliament, Rawiri Waititi referred to a Government MP's 'blood quantum'. That's the dangerous and divisive idea that how much ‘Māori blood’ a person has in their body should matter.

If any other political party behaved in this way, they would lead the 6pm news.”

Mike's Minute: After the Abuse in Care report, the next stage has to go well

The hopeful part in this Royal Commission into Abuse in Care seems to be that everyone who can now do something about it starts on the same page.

There seems universal agreement we have a national disgrace, it never should have happened and redress is needed as fast as possible.

Penn Raine: Give us a smile, darling.

Is the demand that women smile for men still a thing? Are females still instructed by strangers in the lift to ‘Cheer up, it might never happen,’? This pervasive requirement for women to display performative amiability had, I thought been largely swept away in the roiling waters of last century’s feminism.

That feminist struggle that today sees female students outnumbering men at our universities, notably at medical schools. That sees 38% of parliamentarians as women, the highest ever percentage since we were first admitted to the chamber in 1919. Ideally, I suppose this figure should be higher - if the job could be seen as estimable, which is moot.

Ian Bradford: How Cosmic Rays Affect the Earth’s Climate

In 1911 and 1912, Austrian physicist Victor Hess made a series of ascents in a Hydrogen balloon to take measurements of radiation in the atmosphere.  He was looking for a source of ionising radiation that registered on his electroscope.  (An electroscope is a device that detects charged particles.)  The prevailing theory was that the radiation came from the rocks of the Earth. 

Clive Bibby: “Money is for nothing”

That old Dire Straits favourite is a “tongue in cheek” parody of what we all know from personal experience.

However, one of our enduring problems is that a large percentage of the world’s population actually believes it has a place in society which they refer to as either “affirmative action” or welfare expenditure.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Health NZ needs to scrap time-wasting measures

Listen, I agree with the ACT Party that Health NZ needs to drop this nonsense of encouraging staff to incorporate a prayer into their daily routine.

What is this? Are we living in the 6th century with the height of Christianity? This is very unmodern.

Now, the reason we know about this is because the ACT Party's been leaked an email that was sent to staff that says: 

"We encourage everyone to incorporate Karakia daily. To help support you with this, we have created some pre-recorded videos to learn Karakia."

Chris Lynch: “This is a dark and sorrowful day in New Zealand’s history”

The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care.

The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament today.

David Farrar: Shane Jones compared Te Pati Maori to Harry Potter Death Eaters

The Herald reports:

New Zealand First deputy leader Shane Jones is calling out Te Pāti Māori for its “racist” rhetoric and says their continual use of “racism”, “genocide” and “Pākehā supremacy” is driving a divide between New Zealanders.

Jones told Radio Waatea host Dale Husband that a new ideology emerged in Te Pāti Māori in the three years when New Zealand First was out of Parliament, and its relentless blood shaming of Māori or others who don’t believe in their philosophies was inciting racial disharmony.

Kerre Woodham: Exactly what kind of work will Darleen Tana do now?

So there she was yesterday, 2pm House of Parliament, one Darleen Tana.

Bold as brass as Sister Mary Claire would have said, sitting up the back in the naughty girl's seat lonely as Herb Alpert’s bull.

Well, until the leader of Te Pati Maori came by and dropped a hongi on her, or them sorry, she's now a they/them, because she never walks alone.

Lushington D. Brady: One Con Job after Another

For all their blatherskite about “saving democracy”, the Democrats are stomping all over it.

Politics is rarely without irony, if not staggering hypocrisy. Take, for instance, “independent” MP Zali Steggall demanding “truth in political advertising” laws. But, should such laws have existed in the US, the Democrats would be out of a job, if not their very name.

Mike's Minute: Darleen Tana - time for more professionalism

This has been the battle of the psycho babble and cliches.

Parliament returned yesterday and with it, the return of Darleen Tana: political disgrace and reprobate.

She was back to "do the mahi" whatever that means. She is not in a party and she doesn’t have an electorate. Who is she "doing the mahi" for?

David Farrar: The dud deal that was never needed

The Post editorial:

In February this year, Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau told her fellow councillors it would further “kill” Courtenay Place if they didn’t back a $32 million deal with a multinational company.

The deal was to buy the land under the Reading Cinemas complex so the international owners could use the money to finally fix the quake-prone building and get it back open.

Wednesday July 24, 2024 

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Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 24/7/24

Online lotteries for charitable purposes are among the beneficiaries of govt’s assault on red tape

A raft of measures designed to make it easier to do business, or to encourage greater competition, or to run lotteries on-line for charitable purposes, has been posted on the government’s official website in the past 24 hours.

David Seymour Talks Treaty Principles Bill Fundraising

Sean Plunket talks to ACT Leader David Seymour on the Platform about their Treaty Principles Bill fundraising campaign.

Click to view

Sir Bob Jones: Government agency corruption

Nearly five years back White Island erupted with the loss of 25, mostly foreign tourist lives.

At the time, commenting on this, I wrote about a lunch I’d had a decade earlier with the then but now deceased volcanologist, Professor Clark of Victoria University. He’d told me that at some time, albeit possibly hundreds of years in the future, White Island would inevitably explode to such a degree as to take out a fair portion of Auckland.

Brendan O'Neill: Elon Musk has revealed the pain of losing a child to the trans cult

Musk has broken the final woke taboo by speaking about the grief felt by parents of ‘trans kids’.

It’s not often one feels sorry for a billionaire. Yet it was hard not to sympathise with Elon Musk as he told Jordan Peterson about the time he was ‘tricked’ into allowing his son to become a ‘girl’. His voice crackling with emotion, he said he was hoodwinked into ‘signing documents’ for one of his older sons, Xavier, to go on puberty blockers. What he didn’t realise at the time, he says, is that puberty blockers are ‘actually just sterilisation drugs’. The end result? ‘I lost my son’, he says, the grief for his boy who was turned into a ‘girl’ clearly etched on his face.

Dr Bryce Wilkinson: Are flying Kiwis fleeing?

The record net outflow of New Zealanders migrating to Australia and further afield should be seen as an "orange light" rather than a red light, according to a research note by The New Zealand Initiative.

The report, Are Kiwis fleeing?, examines recent migration trends and finds that while the net outflow of 60,100 New Zealand citizens in the year to May 2024 is significant, it is currently offset by a near-record inflow of migrants who are likely more highly qualified than the average New Zealander.

Ele Ludemann: Baby formula isn’t tobacco

Suggested changes to infant formula packaging would be treating it like tobacco and sabotage exports:

French multinational Danone has warned 441 jobs in Auckland and Otago and $1 billion in annual exports could be lost if the Government doesn’t block or secure changes to a trans-Tasman plan that would change the way infant formula can be labelled.

It is understood the issue, which will be discussed at a meeting between New Zealand and Australian food ministers on Thursday, has been high on the Government’s radar.

David Farrar: Critical minerals

Newsroom reports:

In a Cabinet paper about the critical minerals list and broader strategy, publicly released last week, Jones said the development of a critical minerals list was an important part of work to “secure access to essential minerals needed for our economic functions”.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Luxon's right to skip some sessions with the Press Gallery

As you might have heard earlier, the Prime Minister is copping a bit of flak because he’s going to cut one of his regular media opportunities on Tuesdays from here on in.

It's been a convention for years now that the Prime Minister stops on the way to Parliament’s Question Time on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday if he's there and he'll let the Press Gallery ask him questions. That's now going to stop on Tuesday.

Michael Reddell: Treasury wanting to use fiscal policy more

Government departments are now all required by law to write and publish a Long-term Insights Briefing at least every three years.

Dr Guy Hatchard: Short and Sweet - The Appalling Decline in Mainstream Journalism

The lead article in the New Zealand Herald on 21st July entitled “Wellington company director Finlay Thompson loses 30kg taking Ozempic, wants medication funded” was written by youthful journalist Ethan Manera. Ethan, who began his career in 2023, is described by the newspaper as a multimedia journalist bringing us premium expert opinion.

Sir Bob Jones: The ludicrous Green Party

The Greens have not exercised the Waka jumping option against Darleen Tana which would enable them to have their entitled 15 MPs, as per their last election percentage vote under MMP.

This they argue is because historically they never supported that provision on the grounds that it would lead to ending opinion diversity within a party. That was silly. There’s a rich variety of opinions on every topic in any group of people and democracy resolves debated issues, plus compromise is part and parcel of politics.

Vance Ginn: The Economic Folly of a Carbon Tax

The push for a carbon tax has regained popularity as the fiscal storm in 2025 and climate change debates intensify. Advocates claim it’s a solution to pay for spending excesses while reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. But a carbon tax is a misguided, costly policy that must be rejected.