Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 20/12/24

A bit like the news about those KiwiRail ferries, we must wait for the details about decentralising our polytechnics

It has been coming for a while and it has arrived just before Christmas – or some of it has arrived.

The government has confirmed its plan for breaking up the national institute of technology and re-establishing independent polytechnics.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 13/11/24

A sorry state of affairs: offence was given – or was it taken? – thanks to PM’s failure to foresee the effect of his choice of words

“Never apologise, never explain” (according to one source consulted by Point of Order scribes) was the infamous dictum of former Bank of England governor Montagu Norman and epitomised the British take on central bank communication.

But maybe not. An article in the New Yorker said “Never apologize, never explain” is often attributed to the nineteenth-century Oxford scholar Benjamin Jowett, who supposedly added, “Get it over with and let them howl.”

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 24/10/24

Nicola Willis talks about targets to a public service audience – then explains what the Social Investment Agency will do

Andrew Bayly (it is far to suppose) awoke this morning and braced to face further questions about how much liquor he consumed, when he consumed it, and other matters on the day he blundered into calling a worker a loser. How many interactions he had with the complainant in this political drama is among the further questions being pursued by Opposition politicians and the media.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 8/6/24

Good news: the govt is ending contracts for emergency housing in motels – but not as quickly as Rotorua would like

The Beehive spin doctors have done a nice job with news that the government is ending contracted emergency housing motels in Rotorua

Lindsay Mitchell: Welfare - Just two timid targets from the National government

The National Government has announced just two targets for the Ministry of Social Development. They are:

- to reduce the number of people receiving Jobseeker Support by 50,000 to 140,000 by June 2029, and

- (alongside HUD) to reduce the number of households in emergency housing by 75 percent, by June 2029 – this is fewer than 800 households in emergency housing.

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.

Point of Order: Govt gives census officials more time to collect data in cyclone-hit areas...

....and goes global with appeal for recovery funds

The cleanup after Cyclone Gabrielle continues to dominate the outflow of announcements from the Beehive.

Today’s news notably includes something that had been anticipated – the Census collection period will be extended in areas impacted by the Cyclone.

Ministers have announced –

Point of Order: We know what the PM thinks of David Seymour.....

.....but how does he stack up alongside Vladimir Putin?

Ukraine loomed large in the latest announcements and the one speech posted on the Beehive website in the past 224 hours.

The speech came from the PM, telling us what she said in her address to Ukraine’s President Zelensky on the occasion of his addressing the New Zealand’s Parliament.