How some really big decisions get made

Tony Ryall last week redistributed some money from the generally sick to cancer patients. Hekia Parata redistributed some from teacher numbers (class size ratios) to training and testing the teachers (but not pay them more). Welcome to zero-new-spending budgeting, a 2010s redistribution mechanism.
There are much bigger redistributions to be decided — and bigger ways to make big decisions. read more

The rocky political economy of the budget

Budgets do four main things: fund what the government does (focus: the present), set the conditions for investment, particularly this decade to fix imbalances (focus: the future), redistribute income (focus: social cohesion) and massage public opinion (focus: politics). Next week’s budget has big challenges on all fronts. read more

The big and the small, past and future

In politics there is the big and the small, the past and the future. Most Prime Ministers prefer the big and the future but usually spend much of their time on the small and the past.

John Banks is in the small category, an engaging but diminishing figure who pulled one too many swiftie. The issue in the Sky City and Kim Dotcom donations to his 2010 mayoral campaign is not as Key puts it, whether he complied with the law. It is how much he obfuscated. read more

There is a tide in the criminal affairs of men

Anne Tolley cracked the law-and-order whip last week: a lifetime register for child sex offenders. But is the public still enthusiastically for the “Crusher Collins” line on crime?

This question arises as former Police Minister John Banks, drop-in leader of the “three-strikes-and-you’re-in (prison)” ACT party, has gone on media trial on allegations that “anonymous” donations to his 2010 mayoral campaign were known to him, which, if proved, would oust him from Parliament. read more

The real threats from Key's one-armed bandits

Here’s a way to think small: park a box halfway up Auckland’s Queen street and invite the world there for confabs, with views of office buildings and shops.
That is what a law change to license a few hundred extra fleecing machines will buy to benefit tourist operators and retailers, who will create low-paid jobs to service the throngs. read more

An Easter moral for companies

Easter’s just passed, a time to think of higher things — like whether capitalism can have a moral purpose. This has become a more common question since the global financial crisis (GFC).

Some neoliberals say there is a moral purpose: enrichment. Only after capitalism and its associates, innovation and productivity growth, got going did whole populations climb out of subsistence. Before then the quality and quantity of life for the great majority of populations in the great majority of areas waxed and waned with the weather, war and other wayward factors. read more

Some say it's time for a customs union with Australia

Here’s a picture of Australia that may not be familiar: average net household wealth fell 6.5 per cent in 2011 to be 11.5 per cent below the 2008 peak; house prices are falling and sales last year were at a 17-year low; mortgage arrears are rising; retailers’ profits have plunged; the construction industry is contracting sharply; GDP rose only 0.4 per cent in the December quarter. read more

Finessing leaders can beat beating them

One thing voters look for in a government is sure-footedness. Vacillation and uncertainty are the kid brothers of vote-killing disunity. They give oxygen to opponents.
One part of being sure-footed is skilled political management to anticipate trouble, intervene to avert it and, if something does go off the rails, quickly sort it and minimise damage, all while hewing to a defined course. read more

Need "results": let's have a 1980s restructure

A quote: “Restructuring is expensive and disruptive and can be counterproductive, at least in the short term.” So much for the sprawling realm John Key is aggregating for Steven Joyce.

And who said it? A niggling academic or unionist? Actually, the very “better public services” advisory group of big guns whose December report ministers say they are following. Ministers would not have had to read far: it is on the third page of the executive summary. read more