Archive for June, 2012
Friday, June 29th, 2012
A good morning for the rule of law. The High Court here finds the search of Kim Dotcom’s house to have been illegal and ditto for the seizure of his belongings. While in the US, the Supreme Court reined in its self-destructive tendency to rule along politically partisan lines, and ...
Posted in Articles | 5 Comments »
Tuesday, June 26th, 2012
Imagine this wacky, unbelievable scenario. Prime Minister John Key announces that for too long, too many people earning over $100,000 have been paying too little tax, and he’s going to do something about it. From now on, he wants to see IRD boosting the tax take from such people by ...
Posted in Articles | 13 Comments »
Friday, June 22nd, 2012
The chances of achieving culture change at the Accident Compansation Corporation would seem to be almost zero if those in charge of the organisation cannot see that when you create a system of paying staff a bonus to cull ACC claimants, then this payment just might conceivably cloud their clinical ...
Posted in Articles | 13 Comments »
Wednesday, June 20th, 2012
So New Zealand has pledged up to $4 billion in repayable loans to the International Monetary Fund as our contribution to a stabilization fund to help resolve the European debt crisis, and according to Finance Minister Bill English, New Zealand would have to borrow to meet those pledges to the ...
Posted in Articles | 5 Comments »
Tuesday, June 19th, 2012
By all measures, the Greek election result was a relatively good outcome for the global economy, in that pro-austerity parties now seem able to form a government. Regardless, Prime Minister John Key yesterday cited the Greek elections and the European debt crisis as the main reason why his government might ...
Posted in Articles | 6 Comments »
Thursday, June 14th, 2012
The leaked document on the US Public Citizen website confirm the worst fears about the Trans Pacific Partnership talks. The leaked text, and Public Citizen’s analysis of the text can be accessed here.
Thanks to a process conducted entirely behind closed doors, New Zealand seems about to sign up to a ...
Posted in Articles | 11 Comments »
Wednesday, June 13th, 2012
The non re-appointment of Accident Compensation Corporation chairman John Judge falls a long, long way short of what will be required to effect a culture change at ACC. Especially since the government appears to think – if one can judge by the comments from ACC Minister Judith Collins on RNZ ...
Posted in Articles | 5 Comments »
Tuesday, June 12th, 2012
The public debate on raising the entitlement age of National Superannuation is still tending to be couched in terms of affordability and generational fairness. Can and should the baby boomers continue to qualify for pensions (a) at 65 and (b) at the current level of payment, given that such relative ...
Posted in Articles | 5 Comments »
Friday, June 8th, 2012
The government backdown on class sizes is looking like one of those non-apologies where people say they’re sorry because of how you’ve reacted, rather than being repentant for what they’ve done. Far from it. On RNZ this morning Education Minister Hekia Parata made it clear she still thought her plans ...
Posted in Articles | 11 Comments »
Wednesday, June 6th, 2012
The proposals by the Brazilian firm Petrobras for exploratory oil and gas drilling off East Cape are still controversial. Yet as New Zealand heads towards the Rio+20 conference in Brazil, this country has been handed an unexpected free bargaining chip by the Brazilians. Reason being: at home, in an ongoing ...
Posted in Articles | 1 Comment »
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