Just Left

Screwing Super up forever

After a very hard set of consensus building measures, NZ had finally settled on a formula that could work: reasonable rates of super, paid for in part by an accumulation of assets in the NZ Super Fund.

National has been floating a stop to payments for a short period of time. What nobody expected, I don't think, was a cessation of substantive contributions from 2009/10 to 2020/21. Labour has put together a nice graph of what that means:

This stuff makes me incredibly angry. A politically settled argument is now live again and all over, we will need to grind back to a consensus about how to pay a sensible pension.

The economics of the government are not smart. Government debt is at low interest rates at the moment, and never really goes all that high. The NZ Super Fund gets a far better deal - their return on investments is far higher than the cost of govt debt that would go into buying them at the present time.

If this plan goes ahead in this form - that is to say, if people are stupid enough to re-elect National after 2011 - then the choices are these:

• raise the retirement age by a few years
• cut the level of NZ Super payments very substantially 
• tax the rest of us til the pips squeak 

or of course some combination of them.

The tragedy is that we don't need to have any of those nasty choices. The government could simply have held its nerve and continued the payments in the short and medium term. It could have chosen to flatten the out-years debt curve through other means.

Instead, we have a short term fixated National government which is once again throwing uncertainty across all those New Zealanders who hope ever to retire.

Thanks guys.

Budget first impressions

So we have the first Tory Budget in ten years, and the second Budget in the career of Bill English.

There are some friendly headlines and some subtle digs at the future:

• early childhood education will no longer be free when the 6hr/day cap is lifted.
• scholarship funding in tertiary education is being slashed and future funding is being squeezed. 
• ditching of the Fast Forward fund finally done and dusted.
• the home insulation stuff is good, thanks for copying a Labour policy.   

How about the broken promises?

• Tax cuts cancelled. If you actually believed that they were the engine of growth you could keep them in place on the basis they would help you go. Of course that was clap trap, but it was National's key promise.  Broken.
• Super fund effectively axed. No further contributions to 2020/21. That is far longer than was needed and is a statement that National does not think current tax payers should save for their retirement. Fail.

What I am really saddened about is that in the face of massive increases in unemployment that are coming down the road, 2000 a week at the moment, the policy response is...

...

...

...

nothing there. Empty vessel. Nothing. 

 
I said earlier in the month that this Budget would be a fail if it did not address jobs, the environment and fiscal sustainability. Mr English has achieved the last at the expense of the others, and at the expense of future public services.

Therefore the Budget is a fail. Better luck in 2010, National.

A 30 Year Plan

In 30 years I'm going to be pushing 60. Having had a successful career, I will be starting to prepare for retirement. I will almost have paid off my student loan and will own a house.*

The year will be 2039.

That’s when the New Zealand Transport Agency regional director Wayne McDonald has stated is the earliest Aucklanders can expect to be able to [lawfully] cross Auckland Harbour on foot or cycle. This will be when plans for such access are complete. That’s not a ‘plan’; that’s a cop-out.

It is pathetic that the man charged with fulfilling Auckland’s traffic needs cannot foresee foot and cycle access to the Harbour Bridge for at least a generation. Almost every other arterial bridge in the world has non-vehicular access. But Auckland Harbour is unlikely to have such access until almost all the children of baby boomers are nearing retirement age.

Auckland has a traffic problem. A major one. As a commuter (from Kumeu to Otara no less**) I know only too well the perils of Auckland traffic. One accident (such as this morning’s nose-to-tail at Waterview on the North Western Motorway) and traffic is at a standstill. You only have to listen to the traffic report on Morning Report to get an idea of what it’s like in rush hour traffic in Auckland.

The first order of business for the new Super City Auckland Council has to be how to make it more attractive for Aucklanders to get out of their cars and on to alternative forms of transport – buses, trains, and ferries, as well as on foot and bike. There’s already a great cycle track alongside much of the North Western Motorway, and the Northern Bus Passage, which I’m told is a success. The next move has to be giving public transport and foot and cycle traffic dedicated access to the City from the North Shore.

I wouldn’t mind betting that it would be quicker to ride a bike from Takapuna to the City during rush hour than it would be to drive – but the option isn’t available unless you want to take a ferry from Devonport. Not only is it cheaper for all concerned (no petrol or on-road costs, plus the road wear of cyclists is likely to be much lower than a car) but the flow-on effects of having one less car on the road as well as less carbon emissions and a fitter, healthier society benefit everyone.

I would have thought that calls for a cycle lane across the Harbour Bridge would have been the perfect opportunity for John Key to plug his much heralded Cycle Way Economic Recovery – especially as significant tracts of his own electorate would stand to directly benefit from less congestion on the Harbour Bridge. Messrs Key and Joyce have been noticeably quiet on this matter – yet another example of empty rhetoric regarding the Cycleway.

* I'm currently 27.
** I would catch public transport if it were realistically available for me. But leaving home at 6:51am to spend almost two hours on buses, and not getting home until almost 9:00pm is not realistic. My current (temporary) living arrangement is probably never going to lend itself to public transport.

EDIT: Sorry about the hellishly long URL on the first post. Ballsed something up there.

Ciao tutti!

I'm off to Italy for (I think) a well deserved vacation. I'm back on the day after the Mount Albert by-election. Could not have planned it better if I'd known the date. So there probably won't be any posts from me until then, although I thought I might comment on Italian politics while I am there - we'll see about that. Depends if the mood takes me while in the vicinity of an internet cafe. But if not, until I return, peace out and go David Shearer! Sorry I won't be around to doorknock on the 13th.

A thought to mull on

Clinton, Blair, Clark, Rudd, Obama. Five progressive leaders starting office and ending it in 92, 97, 99, 07 and 09, and 00, 05, 08 so far respectively.

As time has gone on, have these centre left leaders seen their scope for left wing policies increase?

My initial view is yes.. and not only due to the financial crisis. The underpinning neo liberalism that the Clinton administration so assiduously promoted does not really look so good in retrospect. In each of the five countries it deliverd too high social costs to be sustainable.

If it is a yes, then nz's next Labour govt should also have more room to move. Thinking through where to move to and why is imperative...

Conservative irony and contradiction

"Family First" and the Christian "Kiwi Party" have both come out defending the appointment of Christine Rankin to the Families Commission.  I don't even know where to begin in terms of the ironies and contradictions.

Kiwi Party leader and former United Future MP Larry Baldock said the situation regarding her husband's former wife was "too personal to delve into".

and

The national director of Families First, Bob McCoskrie, said he still saw Ms Rankin as a very positive appointment.

"We are just sorry that the public trial has happened on her personal life."

These groups are more than happy to not only delve into the personal lives of others but also cast judgment.  These are the groups that want to re-criminalize homosexuality, that opposed (almost exclusively based on "family values" arguments) the Civil Union legislation, that have a policy of abolishing no-fault divorce (i.e making divorce more difficult), that repeatedly attacked Helen Clark's "childlessness" as if it was some disease.  These are the groups that made submissions (and helped generate thousands more) saying that a married mum and dad with kids was the way the truth and the light. 

So when it comes to some people's rights it is ok to combine the public and the personal, but it's not ok with their darling of the hour simply because she supports the 'biblical right" of parents to smack their kids.  At least they are being clear about what the real priorities of the "family first" and "Kiwi Party" are.

Defending the Indefensible

Christchurch father, James Mason, has been convicted of assaulting his four-year-old-son. Mr Mason pulled the child’s ear and punched him in the face.

Let’s put aside for a second the fact that the media have been reporting this as Mason being tried under the ‘new anti-smacking laws’ for flicking his child’s ear. Principessa has already covered the media fudging on this. What has astounded me is that a father that punched his four-year-old-son in the face may have actually had a form of legal defense under the former Section 59 of the Crimes Act.

This was a father that picked up the kids bikes, threw them against the ground, and then assaulted one of them. This was not a father acting out of love for his children. This was a father that lost his temper when they didn’t do what he wanted them to do and lashed out at a defenseless child.

I’m proud of the previous Labour-led Government (and National for that matter) for supporting the Repeal of Section 59 through Parliament. I sincerely hope the Government will take cases like this into consideration when reviewing the law in the future.

Oh, and I’m waiting for the likes of Bob McCoskrie from Family First to jump to the defense of Mr Mason. Come on – at least be consistent Bob!

UPDATE: Duh, I didn't read the second page of the Herald article. True to form, McCoskie has stated that the virdict was right but wrong. In the same sentance.

Jury considers assault charges against ear flicker

The lovely Handmirror ladies have done a few posts before unpicking what the media have to say when reporting on assault and rape.

I would like to draw some attention to this article:

Jury considers assault charges against ear flicker

And then we read:

“It is alleged he flicked his older son's ear and punched him while slamming both their bikes onto the ground with the children still on them”.

So not just an Ear Flicker then aye?

I should point out that the by-line for this article is Newstalk ZB- Home to Leighton Smith.

And You're Invited!

I've just been emailed notice of a public consultation meeting regarding the proposed Auckland Supercity, hosted by Waitakere MP Paula Bennett and Associate Local Government Minister John Carter:

When: Weds 20 May, 7pm
Where: Kelston Community Centre, Cnr Great North Rd and Awaroa Rd.

As Julie at the Hand Mirror points out, this is the only consultation meeting in Waitakere City (or anywhere near the Western Ward of Rodney for that matter), so if you're out west, be sure to make an appearance!

Everything there is to know about the filibuster that Wikipedia can tell you but you probably can’t be stuffed looking up.

You have got to hand it to the Tories. Don’t get me wrong, I maintain that last week was easily their weakest since taking power. But you have to admire the way they swept away Auckland’s democratically elected local authorities. They replaced them with an interim body that can best be described as a politburo, then somehow managed to slap a ‘waste of taxpayer money’ tag on the Labour led resistance.

Of course the tendency to deride democracy as a waste of money is one of their favourite tricks. People having their say in the resource management process is one example of waste that cannot be tolerated. As is the status quo in Auckland governance. Consulting people and letting them have meaningful input takes time and money. It would be cheaper to just abolish democracy completely and appoint John Key supreme overlord of the nation of Keyev – pesky parliaments are such costly, time consuming things.

Regardless of the inconvenience however, the filibuster is a very old and very important part of our democracy.

 

In ancient Rome, Cato was known as one of the masters. His marathon speeches often delayed the taking of votes more than long enough for his objectives to be cleverly met. Others with less finesse simply filibustered to give their allies time to bribe or bully enough senators to swing the majority in behind their position.

But the most intriguing use of the filibuster was an epic 10 day effort by the Opposition in the Ontario Legislature during the 1993 establishment of the – guess what – Toronto super city. Over 12,000 amendments were moved. Thousands of which each allowed a separate street in the city to have a consultation meeting. There was one for every street on the map. This resulted in one street, Cafon Court, winning the right to special consultation and the ability to call for its own public hearings due to an exhausted government accidently voting the wrong way! I understand amendments along similar lines were tried by Labour this weekend but sadly the speaker ruled them out.

I don’t expect this extreme stalling to become a common tactic in the New Zealand parliament. But it is something the public should expect to be employed on their behalf when a highly controversial law is rammed through without a select committee process.

 

The filibuster is effectively the only real weapon a badly outnumbered opposition has at its disposal. The government has the numbers to pass any law it pleases. All Labour can do right now is stall. This is an especially important part of democracy in a unicameral system such as ours. We don't have the checks and balances of an upper house or executive branch. So if you think that the House sitting for a few extra days is a waste of money. Just be grateful your taxes don't have to stretch to a senate.

I also welcome the circumstantial evidence that our party is looking overseas for ideas to fight this government tooth and nail with. Game on.