[This is as originally drafted. A correction to the first few paragraphs appears at the bottom of the 10 November column.]
Suddenly last week Steven Joyce announced a geotechnical investigation for a harbour upgrade at Opotiki to service an aquaculture venture. For years the government has stayed aloof. Why the shift?
On Thursday Graeme Wheeler will nudge you again, not in words but by his positioning: if you have money to invest, buy a house.
In a major speech on October 14 Wheeler trailed another official cash rate (OCR) cut.
He also said, significantly, that monetary policy “can affect the level of distribution of income”. He did not specify how but conservative commentators have: towards the well-off.
It’s Labour Day next Monday. What’s the point nowadays?
Once there was tradition: organisation and regulation for decency and dignity for those who got their sustenance from work for others.
The Council of Trade Unions (CTU) is in that tradition. It held its biennial conference last week.
It farewelled president Helen Kelly, gravely ill but still sparky on the last day of her eight years at the top: fearless and tenacious, a “complete pain in the arse” for opponents but always with a disarming smile, Labour leader Andrew Little said at the conference.
The loudest words in Steven Joyce’s shiny new National Statement of Science Investment (NSSI) are “as fiscal conditions allow”. Does that actually align with “investment”?
First, note the very word “investment” suggests a shift in cabinet thinking from its “spending” fixation.
TPP has many dimensions. That complicates any attempt at a cost-benefit analysis.
One dimension is time. The costs and benefits will be different in 15 and 25 years from those on year 1 or 5. Some, particularly some opponents, focus on the near-term impact and some, particularly some supporters, focus on the long-term impact.
There has been much talk this past week about New Zealand’s “special relationship” with Australia. Is there one?
Helen Clark found out how “special” it is when John Howard — with whom generally she got on — canned access by New Zealanders living in Australia to social assistance unless they were Australian citizens.
John Key told the Labour party to “man up” and back his Crosby/Textor flip-flop law change for an additional design on the flag referendum. Earlier this year he told Labour to “get some guts” and back his Iraq adventure.
But does Key “man up” under pressure?
Did he “man up” over his indiscreet comments to John Banks in the 2011 election campaign? Did he “man up” over unlawful spying on Kim Dotcom? Did he “man up” over his office employee’s conspiracy with Cameron Slater to slop dirt over his opponents?
A third-term government risks slipping into torpor and/or pothole-filling. Not the Key-English show.
Potholes have proliferated in the first 12 months of its third term: think of Nathan Guy (kauri logs), Sam Lotu-IIga (Serco), Nick Smith (iwi and housing land) — even John Key (ponytails, refugees, Saudi corporate beneficiary).
John Key has now twice been a figure of international fun. First, for ponying around. Now for his flag.
The Economist, a cheerleader for Key’s sort of economic policy, scoffed last Friday that “farce barely describes the process” for choosing a flag. “Many voters … find it distasteful that their country is being rebranded like a sagging brand of detergent.”
Christine Lagarde had a word last week for Graeme Wheeler’s rate cut this coming Thursday. Or, rather, she had a word for big guys but the little guys can listen too.
Lagarde heads the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Some want her as the next United Nations Secretary-General. She told a meeting over the weekend of central bankers of the G20 big economies (Australia is a hanger-on) that they should hold off raising interest rates.