Archive for July, 2012
Friday, July 27th, 2012
Surprisingly to some, Labour women’s affairs spokesperson Sue Moroney is showing a genuine ability to get up the nose of the government, as she goes about wiping the floor with Women’s Affairs Minister Jo Goodhew. This began long before National’s collective meltdown in the House on Tuesday over Moroney’s paid ...
Posted in Articles | 1 Comment »
Wednesday, July 25th, 2012
It isn’t often that we see how the United States feels when it sees itself on the receiving end of a secretive international treaty process – you know, one akin to the Trans Pacific Partnership process that alarms many New Zealanders. Yet only a few days ago, we had front ...
Posted in Articles | 5 Comments »
Tuesday, July 24th, 2012
Well, what an exciting weekend it must have been for the nation’s media. After a 2012 full, thus far, of gaffes, resignations, dodgy dealings at ACC and widely unpopular policies from the government, our press elite went into the National Party conference on the weekend and emerged with a shiny ...
Posted in Articles | 16 Comments »
Monday, July 23rd, 2012
Alexander Cockburn would probably be amused and annoyed that his death in Germany at the weekend will attract a mere fraction of the accolades heaped on his one-time colleague Christopher Hitchens six months ago. But then, amused outrage was Cockburn's signature style – as he said in this recent interview, ...
Posted in Articles | 3 Comments »
Friday, July 20th, 2012
So the brake pads on every single one of the 500 freight wagons delivered to KiwiRail by its favoured Chinese supplier have had to be replaced. When fully loaded, they evidently couldn’t stop in a safe period of time. Wow. What was in the contracts that the Chinese manufacturers couldn’t ...
Posted in Articles | 4 Comments »
Wednesday, July 18th, 2012
It seems a simple enough concept; counselling is meant to help victims to recover from their experience. The conditions for getting access to counselling are not supposed to leave the claimant feeling so re-traumatised that they give up and go without the counselling they need – or pay for it ...
Posted in Articles | 7 Comments »
Monday, July 16th, 2012
In this time of fiscal austerity, some people are being asked to be more austere than others. Thus, the news on RNZ this morning that transport consultants have been paid over $200 million since 2009 for investigation and design work on five of New Zealand’s seven roads “of national significance.” ...
Posted in Articles | 11 Comments »
Thursday, July 12th, 2012
The Maori Party’s relationship with National is looking more and more like that of a battered spouse, a pitiable creature who will swallow any indignity in return for the few crumbs of what the relationships once promised to offer. Of course, the Maori Party will say that it's staying in ...
Posted in Articles | 10 Comments »
Tuesday, July 10th, 2012
So KiwiRail is about to cut up to 220 jobs by October, and SOE Minister Tony Ryall has refused to front up to explain what is going on here. After declining an interview request from RNZ this morning, Ryall’s office issued a limp one line statement, which reads in full: ...
Posted in Articles | 8 Comments »
Friday, July 6th, 2012
Public private partnerships (PPPs) are still being envisaged by the Key government’s as its favoured method for financing new schools, motorways etc, but the experience in Britain with such schemes continues to be really disturbing. Over there, they call them PFIs ( or public finance initiatives) and the Guardian newspaper ...
Posted in Articles | 4 Comments »
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