Cam Slater: Winston Calls Carr an ‘Irrelevant Ill-Informed Shill’

The Media Party is all aquiver that Winston Peters seems to have more courage than them when it comes to calling things as they seem. He’s doubled down on Bob Carr, calling him an ‘irrelevant ill-informed shill’ which, given the ample information that abounds on the internet, seems entirely accurate:

David Farrar: How Hipkins hid the $400 million school move blowout

The Post reports:

As parents, teachers and community leaders shivered together on that wintry morning, the project was already in trouble: costs had blown out from an estimated $63m to a staggering $405m.

Gary Judd KC: Senior King’s Counsel files complaint about compulsory tikanga Māori studies for law students

The tikanga regulations will compel law students to be taught that a system which does not conform with the rule of law is nevertheless law which should be observed and applied

I have made a complaint to Parliament’s Regulation Review Committee concerning the Professional Law Examinations Tikanga Māori Requirements Amendment Regulations 2022 (“tikanga regulations”). Today the Law Association’s newsletter LawNews published an edited version of my complaint with the headlines reproduced above. My complaint in its edited form follows. The original, complete with LawNews graphics can be found here.

At present, the compulsory law degree subjects are The Legal System, The Law of Contracts, The Law of Torts, Criminal Law, Public Law and Property Law.

Owen Jennings: Radio Spectra and Methane

I am old enough to remember getting out of bed at 3.00am on cold mornings to listen to the radio broadcast by Winston McCarthy of the All Blacks playing in South Africa. No TV’s back then. McCarthy’s inimitable voice captured not just the passage of play but managed to lift excitement levels several notches even in dull games.

Dr Bryce Wilkinson: What activist kids should know about productivity growth

It is fashionable to see climate as the main threat to the future quality of life of young people today. The word “climate” is commonly followed by “crisis” or “emergency”.

School kids are being organised and encouraged to march the streets. While it is commendable that young people are taking an interest in important issues, agitating for uncosted policies assumes New Zealand households have no competing spending priorities.

Breaking Views Update: Week of 28.4.24

Saturday May 4, 2024 

News:
Māori win customary title over Tokomaru Bay on East Coast
The entire stretch of Tokomaru Bay on the East Coast will be subject to a joint customary marine title for two hapū, and extending up to four miles out to sea.

A High Court judge has found the two groups, who during the case settled a dispute over boundaries for their rights, had proven they had held the area under tikanga, or custom, without substantial interruption since 1840.

Professor Robert MacCulloch: Do Newsroom's staff think they are culturally superior to the rest of us?

Do Newsroom's staff think they are culturally superior to the rest of us? Are they arguing that Amazonians & other Indigenous Societies are "philistines"?

Can't remember the last book by a Kiwi author you read? Think the NZ government should spend less on the arts in favor of helping the homeless? If so, as far as Newsroom is concerned, you probably deserve to be called a cultural ignoramus & philistine. This past week it targeted MP Todd Stephenson, ACT's Spokesperson for Arts & Culture, in a "Gotcha" interview. Here is an extract:

David Farrar: Some three strikes data

1st strikers

• 55% of 1st strikers were sentenced to less than 2 years imprisonment (or no imprisonment)
• 20% of 1st strikers were sentenced to 2 – 3 years imprisonment
• 25% of 1st strikers were sentenced to more than 3 years imprisonment

Capitalist: Hold the Guilty to Account

As I write this, facebook.com is alive to the sounds of National Party MPs crowing that the ban on cellular telephones has come into force in schools; something fully supported by your favourite capitalist. In recent days they’ve been crowing about a 2030 target to get 80% of year 8 students doing the 3Rs at their age level. Once again, noble objectives that are fully supported by the man in the street.

But why is it required and why do so many National Party politicians go full retard off the reservation so often? Let me explain…

Beware the university seeking to limit the freedom of speech

The Education and Training Act enshrines academic freedom in law. It distinguishes aspects of academic freedom over which the university itself has jurisdiction, from aspects that protect its students and academic staff from institutional interference.

An example of the former is “the freedom of the institution and its staff to regulate the subject matter of courses taught at the institution.” This makes clear that academic staff cannot unilaterally decide to teach whatever courses they like. They must negotiate the content and format of courses with the university as an institution.

Duncan Garner: $20b a year invested in education and our kids can’t read, write or count

I have a challenge for you. It won't take long and depending on your subsequent reaction, it may be life-changing, for you and your family.

So here goes: Do you know how well your kids are doing in primary school?

Can they read, write and do maths at or even above their curriculum level?

 Friday May 3, 2024 

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Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 3/5/24

Winston Peters delivers a speech about NZ’s relationship with China but media focus on Bob Carr’s talk of legal action

Much more media attention is being paid to something Winston Peters said about former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr than to a speech he delivered to the New Zealand China Council.

One word is missing from the speech: AUKUS.

Penn Raine: ‘A little learning…’

And how dangerous ‘a little is’ was displayed this week when Sean Plunkett and Michael Laws interviewed Victoria University’s Student Union President, Markail Parkinson and Salient editor, Henry Broadbent respectively on why the Free Speech Union’s debate on free speech had been postponed. The debate had sought to explore the role that our universities have in supporting, or not, free speech and was to have featured Jonathan Ayling , CEO of the Free Speech Union. It may yet not go ahead as the interview revealed that Ayling might be considering bringing up subjects from no-go areas of co-governance and trans-gender politics.

Ross Meurant: Solutions to Crime

More Police.

A typical hackneyed political promise which has never produced the results proponents promised, be they Police Association advocates or Paragons of Parliament.

Strategic redeployment of existing police resources to deal with ever changing manifestations of crime (currently ram raids and always, dope trafficking), is the appropriate tactic that the current Police Commissioner should be applying.

Cam Slater: Wily Winston Far Too Clever for Bob Carr and David Parker

Former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr was recently in New Zealand at the behest of the Labour Party and spoke at a meeting organised by them. In his speech he lambasted the Government and Winston Peters for entertaining becoming part of AUKUS.

Which was rather strange, since it was Labour who initiated conversations regarding AUKUS in the first place.

Dr Eric Crampton: GST back to councils?

If a localist agenda involves punting more responsibility down to councils, then central government assistance in funding some of those responsibilities could make sense.

If councils were only responsible for core infrastructure, that can and should be covered by rates revenue and user charges on use of the infrastructure. If the resulting rates charges are unaffordable because of low income in the district, that's generally a problem for central government redistribution policy. Central government takes a lot of money from higher earning households and redistributes it to lower earning households, particularly lower income households with children.

Ele Ludemann: Better way to learn

Education is one of the most challenging ministerial portfolios and one in which ministers often struggle to gain support.

Education Minister, Eric Stanford has only been in the role for a few months and is already making positive, and largely popular, changes.

Peter Dunne: MPs salaries

It is one of the oldest truisms that there is never a good time for MPs to get a pay rise. This week’s announcement of pay raises of around 2.8% backdated to last October could hardly have come at a worse time, with the economy on the brink of recession, massive cutbacks in public expenditure, public sector redundancies and rising unemployment.

Yet the response from MPs to the decision of the independent Remuneration Authority has been unusually muted. Even those who might have been expected to be more outspoken and prone to grandstanding on the issue of MPs’ pay have so far been restrained in their responses.

David Farrar: Hipkins demands Peters is sacked for telling the truth

Winston Peters in Radio NZ referred to former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr (who is an opponent of AUKUS) as being very close to China (but more bluntly and significantly).

Bob Carr has threatened defamation and this has led to Hysterical Hipkins to demand Winston Peters be sacked.