Gary Judd KC: Karakia and judicial neutrality.....

Karakia and judicial neutrality: A principled examination of the demands of judicial office

I am pleased that, with limited exceptions, the practice of court‑initiated karakia appears to have been discontinued. I previously raised this issue in correspondence with the Chief Justice Dame Helen Winkelmann, describing the proposal as a serious departure from judicial neutrality, inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and the rule of law.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 1/11/24

Overseas psychologists are ruled out from treating us on cultural safety grounds – so the govt is lowering the bar for Kiwis

When you don’t have enough trained health workers to cope with the demand for help – what should be done?

Pave the way, perhaps, to approve practitioners with lesser credentials than those who now provide services.

David Farrar: Did Labour break trust in Government?

This chart [below] uses data from the General Social Survey. As you can see trust in four vital government institutions increased slightly from 2016 to 2018. Since then it has plummeted for all four institutions. A movement of an entire point on a ten point scale is huge.

Clive Bibby: Banking and the Courts

I happened to catch Hon Judith Collins (one of the more reliable ministers in the current cabinet) answering questions in the House about the government’s decision to allow some forms of genetic engineering to proceed beyond the laboratory stage.

While interested in her reply to the normal concerns about the genie escaping from the bottle, l was able to reflect on perhaps more important areas of Crown responsibility where it already had.

Professor Robert MacCulluch: Has the New Zealand Parliament and our MPs become Irrelevant to our Future?

Here are six reasons why our present National-ACT-NZ First government, although voted in by a majority of the Kiwis, has become irrelevant to the plans of the left:

NZCPR Newsletter: Spotlight on the Courts

“Houston, we have a problem!”

New Zealand’s Supreme Court – the highest court in our land - has been captured by activist judges.

What is heartening, is the emergence of a wide range of eminent legal voices all openly criticising the Court and calling for this problem to be addressed.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive 6/3/24

Let’s see if “blood on their hands” MP might be mollified by outcome of Shane Reti’s meeting with iwi health leaders

Shannan Halbert, a fellow who was dumped as a Labour MP by a majority of Northcote voters at the 2023 general election, returned to Parliament as a list MP last month in the wake of Kelvin Davis’ retirement. He took his seat just in time to fulminate against the passage of the Pae Ora (Disestablishment of Māori Health Authority) Amendment Bill under urgency.

Allan Beever: The rule of law is fundamental to a free society

So why don’t NZ courts always uphold it?

Ever since the 17th century, the rule of law has been regarded as one of the fundamental values of a free society. It means you cannot be forced to do something unless there is a law requiring you to do it.

It also means people in power can coerce you only if there is a rule justifying it. This is the opposite of the “rule of persons”, in which the rulers have arbitrary power: they have the authority to force you to do things simply because they think those things should be done.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 25/9/23

More migrant workers should help generate the tax income needed to provide benefits for job seekers

Under something described as a “rebalance” of its immigration rules, the Government has adopted four of five recommendations made in an independent review released in July,

The fifth, which called on the government to specify criteria for out-of-hours compliance visits similar to those used during the dawn raids, requires an amendment to the Immigration Act. That’s a job for the next Parliament.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 18/8/23

As global dairy prices plunge, O’Connor steps up with final plan to bring down farm emissions, too

Two burning questions to be asked of ministers – how are they spending (or misspending) our money and how are they further regulating us? – are answered in a batch of press statement from the Beehive over the past 24 hours or so.

The sum mentioned by Agriculture Minister Damien O’Connor made him the biggest of the spenders in the latest announcements.

Ross Meurant: It's Not the Cops it's the Courts

Most mornings now, we wake to read of another ram raid.  We are also confronted with increased shootings and violent crime.   More relevant is, what are the police doing about it? 

Headline this week:  Operation Cobalt: Police issue 15,000 traffic tickets to gang members in disruption tactic. (1)

Issuing traffic infringements in Fendalton, Karori and Remuera won’t reduce crime but definitely it will boost the coffers, for denizens of these sectors do pay their fines, even if it’s only for doing 56 kph in a 50 kph zone.

However, issuing fines to gang members, which will never be paid and has little impact on bandits who ride their chariots irrespective of WOF, registration or legal ownership? Is this the solution to the crime wave?

Mike Butler: Blaming racism for incarceration

Maori Party co-leader Te Ururoa Flavell is still alleging police, courts, and Corrections racism for the high rate of incarceration of Maori and has got a visiting United Nations delegation to go along with his story. Flavell raised the issue about a year ago when told parliament that “for the 3495 theft apprehensions recorded as Caucasian there were 588 prosecutions; and for Maori, for the 5660 apprehensions recorded, 1173 resulted in prosecution—in other words, prosecution rates of 16.8 percent versus 20.7 percent”.

Flavell went on to claim that “if a Maori teen and a pakeha teen are apprehended for the same crime, the young Maori is more likely to be prosecuted while the Pakeha youth is more likely to get off. Does this not raise questions of fairness and of discrimination in those people who would be sceptical of institutional racism?”