Bill English has been sounding as if he is sorry for Labour: he angers iwi by lobbing section 9 of the State-owned Enterprises Act on to the asset selldown embers; he says the size of the selldowns loot is a “guess”.
The section 9 hoo-ha was so unnecessary that it seems almost like a manoeuvre to give the Maori party’s patchy profile a lift with a pretend win and/or a pretext to go round iwi rohe pitching the investment opportunity.
Author: Colin James
On a wing and a smile Political transition in National’s business-as-usual re-election
On a wing and a smile Political transition in National’s business-as-usual re-election
Conference on the 2011 election, Victoria University of Wellington, 16 February 2012
Innovating innovation — but still on a shoestring
Here’s an idea: invite the super-rich who are buying hideaways and other bits of this country to put a bit of their pocket money (meaning, the odd $10 million or so) into high-tech startups here.
They get a deeper connection with their part-adoptive country. We get more of our science turned into business ventures — and just possibly more of the intellectual property and its earning power (and taxes) stays here.
A better public service? That's the hype
Two “superministers” are the core of the John Key government’s second term and with one of them comes an ambitious remake of public services.
Key’s most important appointment in December was of Steven Joyce as economic development superminister.
Joyce directly runs the economic development, science and innovation and tertiary education portfolios. Tertiary education links to science, skills and labour. Phil Heatley’s energy and resources and Amy Adams’ ICT officials are inside the Ministry of Economic Development. David Carter’s primary industries are the cash cows of development and Gerry Brownlee’s transport duties are mainly infrastructure, critical to economic development.
Defining the Key government
There is a rule: a government is defined by its first year of its second term. That’s what National bosses believe. The pressure is on John Key and his cabinet.
Key made that point by implication when appointing his cabinet in December: he was looking for results and would judge his ministers accordingly.
It's the constitution, stupid. Not so ho hum
n the news recently: a National party apparatchik from John Key’s electorate got excited about a TV programme on poverty during the election campaign and used his sinecure on New Zealand on Air to push a ban on such naughtiness; and reaffirmation of a ministerial trading-floor deal to legislate more pokies for Sky City in return for it building a convention centre.
Ministers off to Oz: time for strategic thinking
The big topic for Julia Gillard and John Key and their cohorts of senior ministers meeting in Melbourne this weekend is not the bilateral projects and tactics. It is where two small countries on Asia’s edge fit in a rapidly and deeply changing world.
The easy topic will be the single economic market (SEM) process and related policies. But within even that comfortable project is a lesson and behind it a strategic question.
Why inequalities have come back into politics
Inequalities are the big political issue for 2012 and beyond. That’s not because the left is about to surge — the left has yet to connect principle to modern conditions. It is because the economic efficiency justifications are crumbling.
For three decades or so the ruling theory has been “all boats rise”. Looser regulation and lower taxes freed entrepreneurs to innovate more, take more risks, make more money and thereby make us all richer.
When the good don't speak out against the bad
The rest of the world would respect Islam more if it more often heard decent Muslims condemning Allah-invoked murders of innocents. There is a lesson in that for those who value capitalism.
The human purpose of religion is to bind humans in harmony, to make value in an otherwise valueless existence. Terror and murder is the antithesis of that. Those acts invite retaliation and regulation, which diminish all our lives, as we find at airports where we are treated like criminals, made to prove our goodwill in X-rays.
The foundations for national resilience
It’s rough out there and it might get a lot rougher. Hunker down for 2012. Or stand up, count blessings and make the best of things. There is a lot to make the best of.
Christchurch knows what it is like to be roughed up. There was a nasty revisitation just before Christmas. For the rest of us, the rough may be round the corner.