Showing posts with label Labour Party. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Labour Party. Show all posts

Monday, March 28, 2011

If the polls are even worse, Goff will be off...

AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND - NOVEMBER 10: Maori Par...Image by Getty Images via @daylifeIf the polls are even worse, Goff will be off...

Goff has handled the " Darren Hughes affair" badly and may yet be deposed as leader of the NZ Labour Party.

The question to be asked is this: If Labour can't win the elections with Goff as leader, why keep him on?

I believe a change in leadership would give Labour a huge boost -  it is because Goff is seen as a loser.

With the right leader Labour can still win with coalition partners. National may not have any partners.

Act NZ will be very lucky to continue as a political party in Parliament, and the Maori Party will be well censored by their voters this year. They may end up with only two MP's. And Hone Harawira may throw in his lot as a coalition partner of Labour, along with the Greens, and NZ First. Jim Anderton will be replaced by a Labour MP this year, because he is not standing any more. He will retire. And blame the first Christchurch earthquake for Jim not winning the mayoralty down there.
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Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Key the great helmsman, didn't know about the new government fleet of cars...

John Key, leader of the New Zealand National PartyImage via Wikipedia The great helmsman, John Key...
Public outrage' at government's new fleet of flash cars. Key the great helmsman didn't know about the fleet of new cars? yeah right!


The Prime Minister says he knew nothing about his department buying 34 new BMWs.

John Key says it was the department who signed off on the multi-million dollar deal and he only found out about it last week from a crown car driver.

A spokesman for Internal Affairs has said there was no requirement to inform the government about its decision to choose the option of buying new vehicles.

"It's our contract, we administer it. Our assessment was it was the best value for money to replace the vehicles now and we got a good deal in the first place and we got a good deal now," the spokesperson said.

Key says it's too late to send them back at any rate.

"Those cars are going to turn up in New Zealand," he said, adding that to stop that now would incur high costs.

Internal Affairs, however, has confirmed to ONE News that replacing the fleet was actually "optional", with no penalty for ending the contract.

The cars - the BMW 7 series - sell commercially for about $200,000 each but the government gets a discount for bulk buying, and the actual cost hasn't been revealed for commercial reasons.

The government says the price it will get for selling the 'old' ones is very close to the purchase price of the new cars.

Public condemnation

Despite that, there has been widespread condemnation of the decision to upgrade the fleet.

tvnz.co.nz readers expressed their outrage on a messageboard about the purchase.

'lazza25784' said the move was fiscally irresponsible.

"[It] goes against everything they have been telling us about what we should do with our money! They didn't need replacing, they are only 3 years old for goodness sake!"

The condemnation was echoed on the ONE News Facebook page.

Rebecca Walden said: "Is buying new cars gonna bring NZ out of debt, supply jobs and stop child abuse? I don't think so."

But some people laid the blame on Labour.

'dancingqueen' said on tvnz.co.nz's messageboard: "Look at who took out the contract for this fleet of cars in the first place. Yes, your beloved Labour Party, who seem hell bent on spending to the cows come home. The National Party are simply honouring the contract that Labour bestowed on us."

Greens say no

The spending has also been slammed by the Green Party.

"Everyone else is having to tighten their belts and John Key is cutting staff, and creating unemployment in order to apparently tighten the belt of government," Greens co-leader Metiria Turei said.

But English told Radio New Zealand that argument is a "bit rich".
"One of the reasons the Labour government bought the BMWs was because they were meant to reduce carbon emissions. They were meant to be the most fuel-efficient cars even though their capital cost might have been higher than other options," he told Radio New Zealand.

English said when the contract next came up for renewal the government would see if there was a better deal and probably a "more mainstream model of car".

Before 2008, ministers, the leader of the opposition and guests of government were driven around in Ford Fairlanes.

Turei said the contract should be cancelled or evidence provided that it was value for money.

English said the electorate "always thinks that politicians are pampered, overpaid, and far too well looked after and I don't think that's going to change".

The fleet change is expected to happen within the next few months.

Acknowledgements:  NZPA

http://tvnz.co.nz


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Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Key's speech more about politics than governing...

David Cunliffe, Charles Chauve (politician), A...Image via Wikipedia


Key's speech more politics than governing...



A politics lecturer thinks John Key's statement to Parliament yesterday was short on detail and more about politics than governing.


John Key's speech outlining the government's plans for the year is being described as more politics than governing.

Otago University's lecturer in politics Dr Bryce Edwards says the speech was short on detail.

"This is really directional stuff, it's the Prime Minister standing up trying to look visionary, trying to show the public that this Government is going somewhere, but for anyone looking for more substance they would've been left wondering quite a bit," he told Newstalk ZB.

He says it's more about positioning the government to protect it from attacks in the coming election campaigns.

"You can see this in terms of quite a strong approach towards children in need, vulnerable children," he says. "Most of this is mainly rhetoric but it's trying to take off some of the heat that they might be expecting from Labour in the campaign."

But former National Party president Michelle Boag told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking this morning that they're not ideas designed to win an election.

"Our long term strategies which have to be addressed for the sake of New Zealand's sustainability as an economically well off nation."

She says John Key has identified what needs to be done in the welfare sector.

"It has been shown over many decades throwing money at it does not fix the problem because we're no better off for all the money that's been thrown at it."

Labour Party president Mike Williams thinks Mr Key is putting a gun to the heads of state housing tenants.

"The vast majority of statehouse tenants, believe it or not, don't bother to vote and when they get off their backsides and do vote, they don't vote National as happened in 2005." he told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking. "I think that's a mistake Labour can work on."

He says if he was John Key, he'd fire his speech writers.

"There's no poetry, there's no passion, there's no sense of humour, there's no sens of history."

Mr Williams says John Key's been saying the same things for two year, but nothing's really happened.

Meanwhile Labour MP Grant Robertson says shuffling the chairs around the deck of the public service will do nothing to boost our economy or create jobs.

He says there are lots of rumours going around about restructuring in various departments.

"Everybody wants a more efficient public sector that's responsive to the community needs," he says. "That involves actually sitting down with public servants and working out how we can help them to do their jobs better."

"Just reorganising causes more disruption and more difficulty for people in their jobs."

Grant Robertson says that does nothing to make the public service better for everyone.



Acknowledgements: © 2011 NZCity, NewsTalkZB


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Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Phil Goff is on the mark with his anti-tax avoidance policies - a clear choice for voters this year..

Labour leader Phil Goff addresses a crowd in H...Image via WikipediaPhil Goff is finally on the mark with his tax proposals - a tax free threshold that the more successful Australian economy has  had for some years. Labour plans a crackdown on lucrative tax loopholes left wide open by the National Government. Property speculators have used these for years to avoid tax. It plans to set up an Anti-Avoidance Tax Taskforce  to close the loopholes which National has never attempted to close for obvious reasons.

Billions of dollars have been estimated to have been lost by tax avoidance - or in plain language tax dodgers! A small percentage of this would compensate for any threshold increases. So forget any claims from John key that it would be unaffordable. Key has been borrowing about a billion dollars a month just to run New Zealand Inc.

Labour plans to exempt the first $5,000 of income, and would introduce a top tax rate over $120,000 per annum. A figure that has been peddled around for some time. A weekly sweetener of $10.00 per week which will have some appeal for superannuants, beneficiaries and the lower paid in the workforce.

The plan is neither irresponsible or badly costed. A similar plan in Labour's successful re-election as government in 1999 was to raise taxes over $60,000 to pay for more spending in the health and education sectors.

It has been National's borrowing policy during the last two years that is putting NZ into hock. Labour will have to find some alternative to these  Muldoon-like economic policies. Key lacks any credibility by criticising  Labour's early policies which may change to some degree  in the lead-up to the elections this year.

John Key will find out it will take more than a silly grin to impress voters this year. Change for the sake of change will not be a credible election winner! Some will say that we have had enough of Shonkism in government. So much for change and the Labour-lite label.

Its also a return to the future with National's privatisation policies. Voters will be given a clear choice - left to the future with Labour, or right down the gurgler with National.
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Sunday, December 5, 2010

Three time loser Hekia Parata replaces Wong minister

John Key at his victory speech at SKYCITY, Auc...Image via Wikipedia Three time loser Hekia Parata relaces Wong minister. She is a National Party list member...

List MP Hekia Parata will replace Pansy Wong as Minister for Women's Affairs and Ethnic Affairs.

She will take over Wong's women's and ethnic affairs portfolios as well as the associate role for ACC, energy and resources. She will also be appointed an associate minister in the community and voluntary portfolio headed by Maori Party co-leader Tariana Turia.

Parata was elected as a National list MP in 2008 and stood for the party in the Mana by-election last month where she reduced Labour's majority in the traditional red seat.

Key said her outstanding campaign in Mana was evidence of her competence and ability.


"Mrs Parata has a strong background in the public service and has also been a successful businesswoman.''
She will be a minister inside Cabinet.


Wong resigned from Cabinet after it was revealed she witnessed the signing of a contract for her husband's business while on a taxpayer-subsidised trip to China.


MPs and spouses accessing the subsidy are not allowed to undertake private business
.
An independent report into her use of the subsidy found she, and her husband Sammy, did not regularly misuse the travel allowance but should repay $474.12 for part of the trip to China, which  Wong was found guilty of misusing.

Prime Minister John Key today announced Parata would be sworn in as a Cabinet minister on Wednesday.

Whatever way you look at it,  Hekia Parata was a loser In the Mana by-election even if she reduced Labour's majority there; something that was expected anyway.

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Sunday, December 20, 2009

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year...

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, Shane Jones and the Labour Party.Next year may be your year. Have a great 2010.

Monday, September 15, 2008

National's ham-fisted attacks against the neutrality of public service.....


The Government is accusing National of trying to bully the Auckland District Health Board.

National's health spokesman Tony Ryall wrote a letter to the DHB warning of significant political issues should it promote activities associated with the Government.

Health Minister David Cunliffe describes that as a ham-fisted assault on the neutrality of the public service and a craven act of political interference. He says John Key should get Mr Ryall to apologise for his blatant attempt to bully the DHB.

However, National's health spokesman Tony Ryall says he has received information which suggests the DHB may go beyond the rules in acting independently. He says there is a big difference between informing the public and proactively spinning news to make Labour look good. Mr Ryall says DHBs should be spending the public's money on frontline services for patients and not PR departments.



Compliments:
© 2008 NZCity, NewsTalkZB

Sunday, April 29, 2007

No reason to vote for National, Labour is managing NZ well...

There is no reason to vote for National, Labour is managing NZ well, despite all the anti-government rhetoric! National doesn't have any leadership - apart from boys wanting to do a man's job: Batman and Robin! Boy wonders, Johnny and Billy? Yeah right!

National doesn't have any new policies other than regurgitated New Right failed policies rejected by New Zealanders in 1999 and ever since. But lets get serious and comment on the Key rhetoric, the Clayton's policies when you have none!

I don't know what Key meant in his published address in today's Dominion Post newspaper in relation to relitigating history. We have had some great things in the past that we have to remember and, obviously, some we would wish to forget. We somtimes have to look back to go forward and not make those same mistakes: electing Muldoon 1975-84; Bolger and Shipley 1990-99. These were watershed years in relation to future economic policies.Borrow and hope with Muldoon, and the 'Mother of all Budgets' with Bolger and Richardson.

In some respects John Key is right, the future is centred around the economy, education and the environment - but he left out health which is just as important and of course, employment. Global warming will be an important subject for the Labour led Government during the next ten or so years, and the Leader of the Opposition, John Key, will be able to make important contributions in that area, considering the amount of hot wind that emanates from the National caucus.

Helen Clark has not lost her mojo, John Key.You haven't been around long enough to have one. Her popularity continues to rise. She is halfway through her third term; that in itself is quite an achievement.She has had many difficut problems to overcome which she has dealt with in a professional manner, despite all the rhetoric of the rightwing opposition and its fellow travellers who are widespread and varied.

Labour hasn't lost the pulse of the New Zealand people. Labour is continuing to deal with the various problems that exist to help lift New Zealanders up the ladder; the labels are as irrelevant as the National Party is to New Zealand and New Zealanders.The Government's Working for Families policy will help New Zealand families, as will the tax policy in the budget to assist NZ businesses.

I see absolutely no reason why there should be a change of government; there is no real alternative in any case. National? Yeah right! As they alway said, Labour governs and National rules!

Many of the problems of yesteryear have not been dealt with - there is still no real industrial democracy, especially in the private sector; Labour should have totally scrapped the fascist Employment Contracts Act and gone back to the original industrial legislation, not amend it with the present insipid Employment Relations Act. New Zealand workers still have battles to fight and win; such as regaining double time overtime rates as of right!

There are still challenges ahead; there are the forces of the unholy rightwing alliance to overcome - the New Right economic policies of the National and Act parties and the social policies espoused by the various fundamentalist Christian sects which are as dangerous as those of its Islamic counterparts.

Until next time!

Friday, February 16, 2007

New Zealand's welfare state not the cause of NZ's social decline!

New Zealand's welfare state is not the cause at all of our social decline and the creation of an underclass, as claimed by Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten which published a full page report headlined The Kiwi miracle that faded, this is the liberal conservative newspaper attacked for publishing those controversial Islamic cartoons that insulted and infuriated Islam last year.

The above newspaper regularly attacks the Danish Government's welfare policies that are based on New Zealand's. A welfare crisis; an underclass heralding social disaster in New Zealand? I don't think so. New Zealand has problems and has had these social problems that were caused by the economic reforms of the late 1980's and the excesses that followed with the policies of the Bolger/ Shipley National Government, 1990-1999.

The Employment Contracts Act, the most fascist piece of legislation since Sid Holland's emergency regulations created during the infamous Watersiders lockout in the early 1950's, was designed to emasculate the NZ trade union movement, and it did; to reduce real wages, and it did; and to create flexiibility for NZ employers on a scale not seen since the great depression, and it did. There were a variety of insidious changes created to our society because of that legislation alone. Some of the biggest victims of that legislation were mature workers, many of whom have never had long term employment since that time. Awards were scrapped and employers soon did away with overtime and holiday double time rates. The side effects to these employment changes caused corresponding social changes which have deterioated to such a degree that there is a real and existing underclass of New Zealanders, a severe and worsening drug problem and violence on such a scale in parts of our country never seen before, not even during the great depression era. That is where John Key's underclass originated!

We all know what the problems are, where they originated and what should be done. The problem is they are now so deep-seated and difficult it will take time to eradicate. The Labour Government and its allies have started well by reducing unemployment rates to the lowest in 20 years. Its Working for Families policy will have a positive effect on poverty, but wage rates have to be increased dramatically as will welfare benefits in the short term!

John Key and his National Party are irrelevant and do not have positive policies to improve the lot of the lower socio-economic sector of this country, or even the middle and lower middle classes of New Zealand!