Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: New Zealand's corruption problem is growing rapidly

For anyone still labouring under the impression that New Zealand is an innocent little place like it was 50 years ago, those prison busts should absolutely shatter that delusion.

What happened was the single biggest bust in our prison system: 20 people arrested and charged across three different prisons - Mount Eden, Spring Hill and Auckland South.

David Farrar: More taxpayer funded union corruption

The Taxpayers’ Union reports:

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union can reveal through an Official Information Act requestthat staff at the Ministry of Education were paid $414,119.68 by taxpayers to do 8,528 hours of union work.

This includes organising and advocating on behalf of the New Zealand Educational Institute Te Riu Roa (NZEI), the Public Service Association (PSA) and the Association of Professional and Executive Employees (APEX).

Professor Alexander Gillespie: NZ report card 2025 - how the country fared in 28 key global and domestic rankings

Standardised testing and regular progress assessment became key features of the education system this year, so why not apply those same principles to New Zealand as a whole?

There’s an important difference here, of course. This exercise is about prompting discussion and debate, and should be read with a degree of caution. The metrics tell us only so much – but it’s still possible to trace the nation’s ups and downs.

Richard Prebble: When Everything Is Called Corruption, Democracy Suffers

I admire Dr Bryce Edwards. Our universities like to proclaim themselves the “critic and conscience of society” while remaining silent on almost everything. In contrast, Dr Edwards is industrious. His daily email round-up of commentary often alerts me to articles I would otherwise have missed. For that, I am grateful.

His larger venture — the so-called Democracy Project and the accompanying “Integrity Institute” — is less admirable. Both portray themselves as experiments in democratic renewal. In reality, they are sustained polemics premised on a single idea: that politics, business, and the interaction between them in New Zealand are fundamentally corrupt.

Ananish Chaudhuri: Rule-breaking by the police and why it matters

A look at how everyday rule-breaking creates the conditions for police scandals and public distrust.

The World Bank has long defined corruption as the abuse of public office for private gain. Transparency International defines it as the abuse of entrusted power for private gain. Many commentators and politicians are shying away from referring to the current scandal engulfing our police as corruption. Regardless of what label we apply to this behaviour, dishonest conduct by powerful people carries broader societal implications.

Ross Meurant: Spot the Difference - or the Similarity

Drug Cartels in Central & South America, have massive influence on who stays alive and who dies. Anyone who stands against or interferes in the commercial operations of suppling drugs to the major market i.e. America, is in serious danger of death. Such is the power of fear imposed on populations where these parasitic elements operate with virtual impunity.

The latest example being Colombian presidential candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay, a 39-year-old senator who remains in intensive care after he was shot three times - twice in the head - at a campaign event in the capital, Bogotá.

Professor Robert MacCulloch: Advice to Young Kiwis how to manage your career in NZ.....

Advice to Young Kiwis how to manage your career in NZ, where corruption and nepotism are rampant, though where no-one ever gets prosecuted.

On The Platform Radio show last week, I unleashed on the topic of the lack of integrity and nepotism and corruption in New Zealand. It works differently here from other countries. For example, one of my mates from Argentina who founded the field of the "economics of corruption" described how wage setting by unions frequently works there: the union boss negotiates with the company boss behind closed doors. In exchange for taking a reduced wage demand, the company boss gives a suitcase of cash to the union boss. Simple as that. In NZ, it turns out we are way more sophisticated.

Brian Tamaki: Te Pāti Māori’s Gravy Train Exposed – And They’re Spitting Tacks

We are one people, one vote, one law and one flag.

Debbie Ngarewa-Packer says I’m playing “revolting politics”, but let’s be real – what’s truly revolting is how Te Pāti Māori has exploited Manurewa Marae to further their corrupt political agenda. If anyone should be apologising, it’s Te Pāti Māori, but they’re too arrogant to admit their wrongdoing.

Te Pāti Māori are spitting hate at me because I was one of the first to expose their corruption at Manurewa Marae. They know I’m not afraid to call them out, and the truth stings.

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.

Point of Order: Loan rules rile Sri Lankan law student, who regards them as racist.......

........but why should Greg O’Connor apologise?

National MP Erica Stanford makes a good point, when she says new classrooms will sit empty if Labour keeps on failing to get kids to school and learning the basics.

Only half of the country’s kids are attending school regularly, she says (with disturbing truancy data high in her considerations, presumably).

She has tweeted her comments in a follow-up to the government’s announcement of plans to spend $400 million on new schools and classrooms. And she boldly pledges:

Karl du Fresne: What sort of country have we become?

The New Zealand Herald broke the news this week that former cabinet minister Kris Faafoi, who resigned only 12 weeks ago, has set himself up as a lobbyist. It’s already an overcrowded field, but he should have a distinct advantage over all the other political hustlers who infest Wellington because of his inside knowledge and contacts. “We know how the government works at the highest level,” his company’s website boasts. Translation: Faafoi’s mates in the cabinet and his former underlings in the bureaucracy are only a phone call away.

John Porter: Can You Smell That?

Is that whiff the odour of corruption?

Before new MPs can sit, speak or vote in the House as a Member, participate in debates or serve on a select committee they must be sworn in.

An MP can be sworn in by either taking an Oath of Allegiance or an affirmation.

I, Joe Blow, swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, her heirs and successors, according to law. So help me God.

Allegiance to the Queen according to law.

Do you think government ministers believe in the Rule of Law?

John Porter: Nepotism or Corruption in the NZ Government?

Nepotism is the practice by those with power or influence of favouring relatives or friends, especially by giving them jobs. Corruption is dishonest or fraudulent conduct by those in power.

Not a lot of difference between nepotism and corruption, is there?

But an article recently published online, if accurate, clearly shows there is a substantial amount of one or the other going on in this Labour Government, and most of it is centred around Nanaia Mahuta.

Bruce Cotterill: When trust is lost, corruption gets a look-in

One of the more interesting events of the past week was the announcement of our decline in the rankings of the world’s most liveable cities.

For those of you who missed it, Auckland has typically registered in the top 10 of this annual index, compiled by the Economist Intelligence Unit, while Wellington has usually listed in the top 20. Last year Auckland made the number one spot while Wellington was number four.

Sadly, as the rest of the world gets back to business and we continue to struggle to do just that, our 2022 rankings have plummeted. The new rankings have Auckland as just the 34th most liveable city in the world. Wellington now sits at number 50.

Karl du Fresne: We don't know how lucky we are

Perhaps our politicians aren’t such a bad lot after all. Consider the following.

British Conservative MP Patrick Mercer recently resigned as party whip after the embarrassing disclosure that undercover reporters had paid him £4000 – part of a promised contract worth £24,000 a year – to ask questions in Parliament, supposedly on behalf of Fijian business interests. Only days later, two Labour peers, Lords Cunningham and Mackenzie, were suspended by their party after being filmed boasting how they could get around House of Lords rules to promote clients’ interests.