Archive for April, 2016
Friday, April 29th, 2016
So a couple of guys found to be criminally liable of environmental pollution in Argentina lodge an application with the Overseas Investment Office… in order to buy some prime New Zealand rural land. Seems that their factory back home had carelessly and/or intentionally discharged toxic waste into the Lujan river. ...
Posted in Articles | 1 Comment »
Thursday, April 28th, 2016
Years ago, Richard Nixon explained to his chief adviser Bob Haldeman what has since become known as the “Madman Theory” of foreign policy.
Basically, if America’s rivals could be reminded that Nixon was an unstable, rabid anti-Communist with his finger on the nuclear trigger, Nixon reasoned, then maybe they’d be less ...
Posted in Articles | 6 Comments »
Wednesday, April 27th, 2016
The denigration of Kiwirail continues. The latest review (based on a 2014 assessment) of the options facing the company have enabled Kiwirail to be hung out to dry once again as a liability and burden on the taxpayer.
The company is an ‘economic cot case’, in the words of one media ...
Posted in Articles | 11 Comments »
Thursday, April 21st, 2016
Reportedly, an extradition treaty with China is now on the table, although – thankfully - Prime Minister John Key has also indicated that a lot of detailed work would be required before any such arrangement took final shape, much less came into force. For now, our sympathetic murmurings about China’s ...
Posted in Articles | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, April 19th, 2016
Don't mention the South China Sea dispute. Oh, but he will! Earlier this week, the image of dauntless Prime Minister John Key not backing down in the face of alleged Chinese intimidation would have done him no harm at all with the voters back home. Here was the plucky Kiwi ...
Posted in Articles | 4 Comments »
Monday, April 18th, 2016
For the past fortnight, New Zealand has been obsessing on the reputational risk to this country of being seen as a tax haven – despite the fact that (with the notable exception of the Australian Financial Review) few sources offshore have linked New Zealand to the Panama Papers. Well, here’s ...
Posted in Articles | 5 Comments »
Friday, April 15th, 2016
Unfortunately, the systematic use of tax avoidance strategies – by corporates and by wealthy individuals – is not occurring in a vacuum. At an accelerating rate, new technology is wiping out the sort of jobs in the retail sector, white collar professions and transport industry that up until now, ...
Posted in Articles | 9 Comments »
Tuesday, April 12th, 2016
Image by Grant Buist
Prime Minister John Key could have dealt with the clamour for an independent inquiry into the Panama Papers scandal in a variety of ways. He could have - for instance - set up a public inquiry, as was done in the mid 1990s, in the wake of ...
Posted in Articles | 5 Comments »
Friday, April 8th, 2016
Belatedly, US complicity in the global tax avoidance systems is now trickling out into daylight. To some, one of the suspicious aspects of the scandal to date has been how few firms and individuals from the US have featured in the document dump from the Mossack Fonseca law firm. The ...
Posted in Articles | 10 Comments »
Thursday, April 7th, 2016
For the past ten days, the world has been daring to hope that the wheels may finally be coming off the Trump bandwagon – sufficiently at least, to deny Trump the nomination outright. According to this narrative…. perhaps come August, when the Republicans will finally get to anoint their candidate ...
Posted in Articles | 8 Comments »
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