This weekend’s visit to Australia by New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins speaks volumes about major changes underway in New Zealand foreign policy.

Hipkins is flying to Brisbane – Australia’s third-biggest city and home to around 100,000 New Zealand citizens – to meet with his counterpart, Anthony Albanese.

The trip’s significance comes in part from its timing. Hipkins is visiting just before Anzac Day on 25 April. On this day each year, Australia and New Zealand both remember the role played and losses suffered by the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (or Anzac for short) in World War I, and by their forces in other conflicts.

In advance of the New Zealand PM’s travel, a new partnership called ‘Plan Anzac’ has been unveiled which promises ‘sustained cooperation’ between the Australian and New Zealand militaries. The arrangement covers a wide range of areas that include ‘strategic engagement, capability, training, readiness and common personnel issues’.

Hipkins’ visit is also expected to serve as an occasion for Australia to unveil a more generous pathway to citizenship for the near million-strong population of New Zealanders living in Australia – an attempt at putting to bed disquiet from New Zealanders who feel Australia has not upheld traditional Anzac ‘mateship’.

There is no better time of year for Canberra and Wellington to send signals of unity.

And the bonhomie comes as New Zealand increasingly follows in Australia’s foreign policy footsteps.

The most recent example of the alignment came in the acceptance by both Albanese and Hipkins of an invitation to the NATO leaders’ summit in Lithuania this July.

The joint RSVP was almost certainly coordinated between Canberra and Wellington.

After NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg publicly invited the pair to attend the meeting a fortnight ago, Hipkins initially remained non-committal, telling reporters he hadn’t decided on whether he would attend and pointedly noting his busy schedule during New Zealand’s election year.

Media reports surfaced soon afterwards that claimed Albanese would be a no-show in Vilnius.

The reporting was not initially denied.

Albanese already has a packed international calendar this year. The Australian PM perhaps thought that his guest attendance at the G7 in Hiroshima and hosting of a Quad (Australia, India, Japan and the United States) leaders’ summit in Sydney next month would be more than enough to satisfy US and European leaders.

If Albanese himself was planning on skipping NATO, this also explained why Hipkins showed a marked lack of enthusiasm.

But criticism by political rivals and commentators – and perhaps some pressure behind the scenes – appeared to change Albanese’s mind and by Monday this week, the Australian leader was saying he ‘would be very pleased to accept’ the NATO invitation.

Yesterday, Hipkins announced that he would also be heading to Vilnius.

In other words, Australia led – and New Zealand followed.

The countries are also becoming closer in other ways.

Most notably, New Zealand defence minister Andrew Little signalled last month that Wellington was interested in joining a second ‘pillar’ of the AUKUS arrangements that focuses on cybertechnology.

A week later, Little held talks in Wellington with his Australian counterpart, Richard Marles.

Little was typically circumspect about the substance of the talks and played down the AUKUS element.

However, Marles noted ‘alignment’ between Australia and New Zealand, adding ‘it’s really important that we are working as closely together as possible’.

The pair’s meeting came not long after a visit to New Zealand by Kurt Campbell, the White House’s Indo-Pacific coordinator – illustrating how pressures and interests from further afield are also at play, a factor reinforced by the NATO invitation.

Then there is the small matter of TikTok.

Both Australia and New Zealand have issued bans over the past month – and surprisingly, this time New Zealand appeared to be the leader, not the follower.

In March, New Zealand’s Parliamentary Service effectively banned use of the smartphone app, owned by Chinese company ByteDance, by MPs and staffers who accessed Parliament’s network.

The move followed a directive (issued in November 2022, although only publicly revealed months later) by New Zealand’s Defence Force ordering its personnel to delete TikTok from their devices.

For its part, Australia waited until earlier this month to make its decision– but it then issued a far more sweeping ban that prohibited the use of TikTok on devices used by employees at all Australian federal government departments and agencies.

It was also reported that more than half of Australia’s federal government agencies had already banned TikTok.

This suggested Australia was the leader after all.

If alignment is a keyword in the 2023 version of the Australia-New Zealand relationship, another is ‘interoperability’.

Little spoke of the need for a ‘seamless sort of interoperability’ with Australia after taking on the defence portfolio earlier this year – and the word is also used repeatedly to justify the new ‘Plan Anzac’ military partnership.

Expect to hear more about the need for New Zealand to harmonise its capabilities with those of Australia – especially when the results of New Zealand’s Defence Policy Review are soon announced.

The outcome of the Defence Policy Review is also likely to serve as a justification for New Zealand to announce greater military spending.

It remains to be seen how China will react to New Zealand’s increasing willingness to fall in line with Australia – and with NATO.

Trade repercussions seem unlikely, although cannot be ruled out if New Zealand becomes deeply intertwined with Aukus.

China and Australia are currently in a healing phase over trade, after Beijing effectively offered to settle a dispute with Canberra over the tariffs China imposed in 2020 on Australia’s barley exports.

In the short term, any displeasure from China at New Zealand’s decision to take a more Australia-friendly path is more likely to come in the form of ‘playing hard to get’.

A notable omission from Hipkins’ travel announcements this week was any confirmation of a trip to China.

In her final months in office, Jacinda Ardern indicated she was seeking to visit China early in 2023 – a plan that Hipkins initially reaffirmed, but later walked back.

In the announcement of Chris Hipkins’ travel plans this week, the Prime Minister’s office did add that the Government was ‘continuing to pursue a trade focused trip to China later in the year’.

But for Hipkins to visit China, he will need an invitation.

And that invitation may have just become that much harder to obtain.

After all, Chris Hipkins is choosing Brisbane over Beijing.

At least for now.

Geoffrey Miller is the Democracy Project’s geopolitical analyst and writes on current New Zealand foreign policy and related geopolitical issues. He has lived in Germany and the Middle East and is a learner of Arabic and Russian. He is currently working on a PhD on New Zealand’s relations with the Gulf states.

A View from Afar – In this podcast, political scientist Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning analyse how New Zealand and other nations are providing intelligence expertise in the defence of Ukraine.

But are the SIGINT and TECHINT operations a part of the NATO partnership, or, a part of the Five Eyes intelligence network’s operations – where the US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand share resources to acquire and coordinate global and targeted intelligence.

Does confirmation from New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern that New Zealand has deployed seven Defence intelligence officers to the United Kingdom and Belgium underscore a direct involvement against Russia and in defence of Ukraine by other independent nations like New Zealand?

• What will the intelligence, including geo-spacial analysis, most likely be used for and how would it be derived and delivered?
• How has western intelligence assisted Ukraine in this war and also in the targeting of Russian generals who were identified and killed during hostilities in Ukraine (ref. Washington Post)?
• How significant has Open Source Intelligence been in the Russia Ukraine war (to date) including the use of citizen acquired video and data and its dissemination to offensive and defensive operations in the conflict?
• And why is SIGINT and TECHINT proving to be more important than ever in this specific conflict?

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• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
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The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top  Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication.

Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category. You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

A View from Afar: Selwyn Manning and Paul Buchanan present this week’s podcast, A View from Afar, where they analyse New Zealand’s national security strategy.

There has been no defence white paper since the John Key National-led governments and no comprehensive review of New Zealand’s strategic priorities, nor assessment of the region’s threat landscape both internal and external.

Now, with hybrid threats like cyberwarfare and terrorism adopting an “intermestic” (international and domestic) characteristic due to on-line recruitment and radicalisation, the perceived need is to develop a holistic national security strategy that addresses defence, security and intelligence needs of the 2020 decade.

But what does this all mean for New Zealand’s defence forces, intelligence community, and cyber-defence agencies?

ALSO: World Watch – The latest/recent round of elections in places like Peru, Mexico and Israel can be viewed as referendums on neoliberalism and national populism.

For example: You can see how Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has adopted Donald Trump-like rhetoric to describe his opponents.

A similar style has been used by the right wing in Peru as well as in Brazil.

The Peru election pits a socialist native Indian against Peru’s former dictator Fujimori’s daughter. She is a neoliberal conservative.

Both national populism and various socialist approaches have something in common: both ideologies reject neoliberal economic theory in principle and in fact.

With the left most likely to win the elections in Peru, and considering the challenges that Peru faces (including a pandemic where Covid-19 has raged through its communities positioning Peru as having suffered the highest recorded death rates in the world) the question begs, has neoliberalism run its course?

WE INVITE YOU TO PARTICIPATE WHILE WE ARE LIVE WITH COMMENTS AND QUESTIONS IN THE RECORDING OF THIS PODCAST:

You can comment on this debate by clicking on one of these social media channels and interacting in the social media’s comment area. Here are the links:

• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Youtube
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

If you miss the LIVE Episode, you can see it as video-on-demand, and earlier episodes too, by checking out EveningReport.nz or, subscribe to the Evening Report podcast here.

The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top  Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication.

Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category. You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

It is clear and proper that New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade is closely monitoring a concerning situation of deteriorating violence in West Papua.

It is also apparent that groups who have long monitored the security situation in West Papua have contacted the New Zealand Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, urging her to speak up against the violence and human rights abuses in the Indonesian-controlled state. I believe the Prime Minister should. Here’s why.

When considering the history of West Papua – the increasing violence; the enduring wish of its peoples for self-determination; the arrests on treason charges of those who seek a pathway toward independence; the intensifying concerns of its immediate neighbours Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, and the states that make up the Melanesian Spearhead Group – it would be a brave but significant step should New Zealand also add its considerable weight behind a call for a multilateral-led resolution to the West Papua conflict.

New Zealand’s reputation as an honest-broker on global human rights issues, and the Prime Minister’s significant reputation for being able to identify common-ground, and, map out a way forward for parties with disparate interests, would provide significant leverage and resolution to a conflict that is at risk of becoming a human catastrophe.

Also, New Zealand is right, smack, in the middle of the Asia Pacific region. Despite Australia’s historical interests in Melanesia, this is New Zealand’s patch as well. Human rights abuses, conflicts, disorder within our region will impact on New Zealand in the future as they have in the past.

Take the Solomon Islands conflict in the early 2000s. The Melanesian state was descending into civil war. In 2003, I was in Townsville, at an Australian airforce base when the leaders of Melanesian and Polynesian states (including New Zealand’s Helen Clark and Australia’s John Howard) signed a non-aggression pact and sent armed forces to the Solomon Islands to help reestablish peace and progress.

The operation became known as RAMSI (Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands).

Under RAMSI, once order was restored in the Solomon Islands, the countries of this region helped the once chaotic state to establish good governance and government operations, and helped to establish a thriving civil society.

The merits of RAMSI can be seen today in how the Solomon Islands now functions as a progressing state and valuable member of the Pacific Islands Forum.

Regarding West Papua, New Zealand, and indeed the other nations of the region, ought not to permit a repeat of the violence that took hold of East Timor in 1999.

For years those advocating self-determination in East Timor were persecuted and killed by forces and militia loyal to Indonesia’s interests. In 1999 the crisis descended into massacre. In the end, it was estimated over 100,000 people were butchered in an unnecessary and preventable street-conflict.

At the time in 1999, New Zealand was hosting APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Co-Operation) leader’s summit. It was the end of the National Party’s run of government and Jenny Shipley was the prime minister. The government was determined to keep East Timor and its troubles off the APEC agenda. It refused to allow the massacre to be discussed at formal APEC meetings, that is, until the United States’ then president Bill Clinton and Japan’s then prime minister Keizō Obuchi demanded that a special meeting to discuss a multilateral response to the East Timor crisis be held.

While thousands of people were being massacred on the streets of East Timor’s capital, Dili, the leaders of APEC’s nations forged a consensus that became a pathway to peace.

Obuchi’s message to his Indonesian counterpart Habibie was as follows: “East Timor remains in a very difficult situation. But Japan has a good relationship with Indonesia. And Japan will continue to encourage Indonesia to take measures to bring East Timor back to a state of peace.”

He went further with diplo-speak akin to: ‘We are your friend Habibie, you know we are your friend. Afterall we provide you with $2 billion US in humanitarian aid [60 percent of the annual total]. We do not want to take that away from you, to do so will cause hardship throughout Asia, and only bring retaliatory consequences to all. So allow the international peacekeepers in to help you bring about peace. To do so is not an embarrassment. It is recognising the gesture of a friend. And to do so will prevent Japan from having to withdraw its aid to the people of Indonesia.” (ref. Scoop, Selwyn Manning, 1999)

The gesture was significant and began a process that led to East Timor becoming the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste – a self-determining independent state.

I argue here, that there is no need for Asia Pacific’s leaders to sit back and dispassionately observe a disturbing escalation of violence in West Papua.

Timor-Leste’s experience, as does RAMSI – the Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands – provide examples of how leaders of a region, who have the willpower, can and do bring warring parties back from the brink of atrocity.

Jacinda Ardern has, for good reasons, obvious diplomatic credentials. She is seen as an honest broker on the world stage. A new generation leader. She is reacquainting New Zealand to a foreign policy that we were once proud of, that is as an independent Pacific Island state. The realignment is something to celebrate. With regard to West Papua, there is an opportunity to use it, and to do good for the people there, who are experiencing persecution and death for their ethnicity and for their political views.

It need not be so.

For the best overall guide to what has happened in the Budget leak/hack scandal, see the just-published article by Henry Cooke: What we know and don’t know about the Budget ‘hack’. Amongst his rundown on the background to the scandal and the theories offered so far, Cooke points out that, rather than being hacked, the Treasury website might simply have been scanned by Google, allowing a cache of pages to become available to someone who has handed them on to the National Party.

Another leading explanation for how the Treasury’s Budget information was released early to National comes down to a simple but obvious idea that parliamentary staffers looked for and found the information on the Treasury website. This would also explain how National leader Simon Bridges could be so categorical in his insistence that his scoops weren’t based on hacking or illegality.

According to this theory, National had one of its Parliamentary staffers monitoring the Treasury website in the days leading up to Budget Day, constantly using the frontpage search bar on the site to look for “Budget 2019”. The hope being that at some stage some Budget documents would be loaded onto the site momentarily, in anticipation of Thursday’s publication, before they were then locked away for safety.

The story goes that by searching every five minutes or so, the National staffer eventually hit the jackpot when documents or pages turned up with the goods. It might have taken hundreds or even thousands of searches over a couple of days.

In fact, National Party pollster and blogger David Farrar has outlined a similar scenario based on his previous experience as a parliamentary staffer: “when I worked for the Opposition in 2000 or 2001, I recall waiting for the Government to release the Police crime stats. They always put a positive spin on it. I went to the Police website and looked at last year’s stats. I also looked at the previous year. They had the same URL format. I changed the year to the current one, and hey presto I had the official crime states four hours before the Government was due to release them” – see: My guess as to what happened.

Farrar argues that something similar may have happened, and it therefore wouldn’t constitute hacking: “So my guess is something similar has happened. That possibly the material was put up on a website of some sort and someone found it. Treasury are calling it hacking because they didn’t think it was open to the public. But there is a difference between hacking a secure computer system, and locating information that is on the Internet (even if hidden). Was there any cracking of passwords for example?”

But do such explanations fit with what Treasury are saying when they claim that their site has been “deliberately and systematically hacked”? It’s arguable either way. Certainly, some tech-specialists seem to think that something much more sophisticated must have happened – especially based on the fact that Treasury has called in the Police. For one of the most in-depth discussions of the potential hacking, see John Anthony’s Budget 2019: ‘They’ll remember it as the budget that got hacked’.

Despite some tech specialists believing that a sophisticated hack has occurred, one expert believes a software application might have simply found the material on the Treasury website: “Kiwi cyber security consultancy Darkscope technical director Joerg Buss said a likely scenario was that someone used a ‘spider or crawler’ program to find hidden content in the Treasury website. Such software may have uncovered Budget 2019 files which had not been protected properly, he said.”

It could also be as simple as using Google to search for the material, which is covered by Juha Saarinen in his article, Conspiracy or cock-up? Strong evidence Treasury published Budget accidentally – rather than a hack. He says that “screenshots of the results from a Google search for ‘estimates of appropriation 2019/2020’ are circulating on Twitter suggest that the data was published accidentally.”

Of course, the fact that Treasury has called in the Police would suggest that the government department believes that something much more sinister or malevolent has occurred. However, care needs to be taken in reading too much into this – especially since the Police haven’t even confirmed that they have agreed to investigate, except to say that they are assessing Treasury’s request.

Furthermore, whenever governments and officials call in the police or make claims that criminal actions have occurred in the political sphere, we should always be very sceptical. It’s the oldest trick in the bureaucratic book – to divert attention or to impugn an opponent with charges that they are mixed up in criminal activity. That’s not necessarily the case over the controversial budget leaks – it’s still far too early to tell what has happened.

This is certainly the argument made today by leftwing blogger No Right Turn, who suggests that government officials have a tendency, when they’ve made mistakes, to try to point the finger elsewhere, often using rather draconian measures to do so – see: Treasury, “hacking”, and incentives.

Here’s his main point about how politicians and officials are inclined to bring the police into politics: “Unfortunately the natural instincts of power in New Zealand are to double down rather than admit a mistake, and to call in the police when embarrassed – just look at the tea tape, or Dirty Politics. With those, we saw police raiding newsrooms and journalist’s homes. I’m wondering if we’re going to see police raiding the opposition this time. Which would be highly damaging to our democracy.”

The blogger says that “the bureaucratic incentive towards arse-covering and blame-avoidance pushes that to be reclassified as nefarious ‘hacking’, and that incentive gets stronger the higher up the chain (and the further away from IT knowledge) you get.”

Here’s his own explanation for the release of the information: “The most likely scenario is that Treasury f**ked up and left them lying around on their web-server for anyone to read, and National or one of its proxies noticed this and exploited it. Accessing unprotected data on a public web-server isn’t ‘hacking’ in any sense of the word – it’s just browsing.”

The onus is therefore on the Treasury to be much more transparent about what has happened writes Danyl Mclauchlan, saying a “brief technical explanation about what the ‘hack’ amounted to would be a lot more useful than all the bluster and nebulous waffle we’ve heard so far” – see: Budget hacking scandal: About time Treasury told us what actually happened.

Mclauchlan says that if it turns out that the leak has simply come from information on the Treasury website, “then we’ll be talking about the resignation of the Treasury Secretary, rather than National Party leader.”

The No Right Turn blogger doesn’t see the Government delivering such transparency any time soon: “neither Treasury nor their Minister has any interest in that (Ministers are rarely interested in incompetence in their own agencies, because it makes them look bad for allowing it). As for us, the public, we’re the loser, stuck with an incompetent, arse-covering public agency which has just failed on one of its most important tasks” – see: Treasury owes us answers.

He argues that the decision to go to the Police means that Treasury can now sidestep such accountability: “conveniently, by referring the matter to the police Treasury has ensured that they can never do that. It might prejudice the police investigation, you see. OIA requests can be refused to avoid prejudice to the maintenance of the law, and anyone who actually tells anyone anything can be prosecuted. Accountability of course goes out the window”.

That doesn’t get National off the hook, however, if the party has done something illegal in the way they have procured or used the Budget information. One lawyer who knows a lot about hacks is Steven Price, and he argues that the release by National of the information was not in “the public interest”, and that it appears to have “broken the law relating to Breach of Confidence” – see: Budget leak: Nats’ behaviour “entirely appropriate”?

Price says that he is “irritated at the sanctimoniousness of Simon Bridges’ denial that the Nats had done ‘anything approaching’ illegality.” He does admit however, that if National have obtained the Budget information “through some area of Treasury’s (or some other government) website that was technically publicly accessible, then that would at least raise arguments that it wasn’t confidential in the first place, because it was in the public domain.”

Herald political editor Audrey Young is also less than impressed with how Bridges has dealt with the matter today, saying: “Simon Bridges needed to do two things today when he fronted the news media about allegations of hacking Treasury and he did neither. He needed to say, at least in general terms, how he received the leak of Budget of documents. And he needed to say he had contacted the police to offer them any assistance they needed in their investigation” – see: Simon Bridges needed to do two things today and he did neither.

But for another view on the politics of it all, and an explanation of why Bridges’ manoeuvres have been smart, see Brigitte Morten’s National plays strong hand over politics jackpot. She argues that it’s in the public interest for National to be able to dispute the Government’s narrative over Budget spending, and to be able to point out the “lower than expected spending” in areas such as health “that the government doesn’t want you to reflect on.”

Finally, for a recent minor – but extremely colourful – Treasury controversy, involving the use of a transformative wellbeing experiment for staff, see Danyl Mclauchlan’s must-read investigation: Peace, Rest and the Monkey Emoji Moon: playing Heartwork cards at Treasury.

The terrorist attack on two Christchurch mosques this month is a watershed moment in New Zealand history.

In the days, months and years ahead much soul-searching will be conducted about the social and political factors that contributed to the massacre of 50 people. Here we shall focus on two: the spread of hate speech via social media; and the intelligence failures that may have contributed.

With the proliferation of social media platforms during the last decade, there has been a steady increase in their use by extremist groups. Be it Wahabbist and Salafists calling for jihad, 9/11 conspiracy theorists or white supremacists, it has given them global reach in a measure never seen before.

READ MORE: How Christchurch’s assault has made a mark on NZ media

#TheyAreUs

This allows extremists in disparate parts of the world to instantly communicate and reinforce their views without having to be in physical contact. They can even plot acts of violence using encrypted platforms and the so-called “dark web”.

That is what is different today when compared to 20 years ago: the threat of decentralised, even autonomous extremist violence has increased commensurate with the emergence of social media outlets that allow them to disseminate their views.

This produces both an echo chamber and megaphone effect: not only do kindred spirits find common space to vent and practice their hate, against the perceived “other,” but more moderate, mainstream outlets begin to pick and emulate some of the language used in them.

Language that was once socially unacceptable in most democratic societies has crept into mainstream social discourse, be it about immigrants, minorities, sexual minorities or indigenous groups.

Hate-mongers turn tables
Hate speech is increasingly normalised under the mantle of free speech, where the hate-mongers turn the tables on civil libertarians by claiming that their freedom of expression is being trampled by political correctness gone mad.

That, in turn, has crept into the rhetoric of politics itself, where mainstream politicians adopt some of the language and policy postures that once were only championed by a rabid yet marginalised political fringe.

One only need to remember the anti-immigrant language of certain politicians and the misogynist, homophobic and/or xenophobic utterances of assorted radio hosts and television personalities, to say nothing of the comments section of what used to be moderate political blogs, to see how the discursive trend has evolved here.

The problem is almost exclusively a democratic one. Authoritarian regimes censor as a matter of course and control the flow of information in their societies, so what can be seen and heard is up to the regime. Unless authorised or condoned by the state, extremists are not given space to air their views in public.

Democratic societies uphold the right to free speech no matter how noxious it may be because it is exactly the unpopular views that need defending. But the principle of free speech never reckoned with the practice of social and mainstream media outlets using business models that are at least in part founded on the idea that there is money to be made in catering to extreme views.

If advertising can be sold on extremist sites and offensive speech is protected, then the bottom line advises that it is not for the media conglomerates to determine what is and what is not acceptable social discourse. That is for others to decide.

This is the public policy conundrum. Where to draw the line between free and hate speech? When does offensive speech become dangerous speech?

Violence simple separation
One would think that the answer would be simple in that any calls for violence against others, be it individual or collective in nature, is what separates offensive from hate speech.

And yet to this day democracies grapple, increasingly unsteadily, with the question of what constitutes censorable material online.

With regard to whether there was an intelligence failure, obviously, there was because the massacre occurred. But the question is whether this was due to policy errors, tactical mistakes, some combination of them or the stealth of the attacker.

At a policy level, the question has to be asked if whether the intelligence services and police placed too much emphasis after 9/11 on detecting and preventing home-grown jihadists from emerging to the detriment of focusing on white supremacist groups, of which there are a number in Aotearoa.

Given a limited amount of resources, the security community has to prioritise between possible, probable and imminent threats. So what happened here? Where a small arsenal of weapons was amassed, improvised explosives made and a lot of planning done without the authorities made aware.

It is known that the security community monitors environmental, animal activist, social justice and Māori sovereignty groups and even works with private investigative firms as partners when doing so, so why were the white supremacists not given the same level of attention?

Undercover agents
Or were they? The best form of intelligence gathering on extremist movements is via infiltration of the group by undercover agents (who can target individuals for monitoring by other means).

Perhaps there simply are not enough covert human intelligence agents to undertake the monitoring of those that would do society harm. And what happens if the person is not an active member of the groups being monitored?

If this is the case, then no amount of intelligence policy reorientation or tactical emphasis would have prevented the attack. As the saying goes in the intelligence business, “the public only hears about failures, not successes”.

New Zealand, however, must “own” this terrorist attack. It happened in our community.

Dr Paul G Buchanan is the director of 36th-Parallel Assessments, a geopolitical and strategic analysis consultancy.

“Everyday racism kills every day” banner in today’s Queen St, Auckland, march against terrorism and extremism. Image: Del Abcede/PMC

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

EDITOR’S NOTE: This article was written for, and first published by, German magazine Cicero.de (ref. Attentat in Christchurch – Willkommen in der Hölle). Thanks also to Prof David Robie, Pacific Media Centre AsiaPacificReport.nz for providing the featured image for this article.

OUT OF THE BLUE:

It was 1:39pm, Friday March 15. As was usual for a Friday hundreds of people had turned up to pray at the Al Noor Mosque in Riccarton, Christchurch. All was peaceful, women, children, men, people of all ages young and old, both Sunni and Shia, were in contemplative repose free of worry. It was a mild, late summer, 20 degrees celsius day. Earlier, the touring Bangladesh Cricket Team had briefly visited the mosque, but left early to attend a press conference. By 1:39pm, they had returned and were outside exiting a bus, intending to continue with their prayers inside the mosque.

At 1:40pm, ahead of the team, a man entered the mosque walking quickly up the front steps. He was carrying an assault rifle and dressed in combat uniform. He immediately began shooting people who were kneeling in prayer. The shots rang out and the Bangladesh team members realising they were witnesses to an attack, retreated, and fled on foot to nearby Hagley Park.

Back inside the Al Noor Mosque scores of worshipers were being gunned down, some killed instantly, others bleeding to death. The victims included little Mucaad Ibrahim who was three years of age.

Mucaad was known by his loved ones as a wise “old soul” and possessed an “intelligence beyond his years”.

Eye witnesses said that once the killer began shooting people, little Mucaad became separated from his family. In the chaos, his family could not find him. The next day Police confirmed he too had been shot dead by the killer.

The murders continued at the Al Noor Mosque until the killer’s firearms ran out of bullets. Then, he simply walked out of the mosque, got in his car, and drove six kilometres to the Linwood Mosque. There too were people who had gathered for their regular Friday afternoon prayers.

Mr Aziz picked up an EFTPOS (electronic funds transaction) machine from a table inside the mosque. He ran outside. He saw a man he describes as looking like a soldier. He said to the man: “Who are you”. Mr Aziz then saw three people lying on the ground dead from shotgun blasts. He realised the man was the killer. He approached the attacker, threw the EFTPOS machine hitting the killer, who in turn took from his vehicle a second firearm (a military style semi-automatic assault rifle) and fired four to five shots at Abdul Aziz, missing him. Then, in an attempt to lure the killer away from other people, Mr Aziz shouted at the killer from behind a car: “Come, I’m here. Come I’m here!”

Mr Aziz said he didn’t want the killer to go inside the mosque and kill more people. But the killer remained focussed. He walked directly to the entrance, once inside the mosque he continued his killing spree. Survivors speak of the killer wearing “army clothes”, dressed in “SWAT combat clothing”, helmeted, wearing a vest and a balaclava.

Inside the Linwood Mosque, another witness, Shoaib Gani, was kneeling in prayer. He heard a noise like fireworks but he and others weren’t too concerned and continued with their prayers. Then, as he and his fellow worshipers were kneeling speaking verses from the Koran, the man next to him fell forward with blood pouring from his head. He had been shot and killed instantly, Mr Gani said. Then others too began falling to the floor dead.

Mr Gani crawled under a table. He saw the killer and his firearm. “Written on the rifle were the words, ‘Welcome to hell’,” he said.

Victims, who were wounded and bleeding, were pleading with Mr Gani to help them. But he was frozen to a spot under a table knowing that the killer was walking around the mosque killing as many people as he could. Mr Gani believed he too would also soon be dead, so he reached for his cellphone, he called his parent’s back home in India. But no one answered. He tried to call his father’s number, but the phone kept ringing. He saw people around him bleeding to death. Others with fatal head-wounds “their brains were hanging out. I just couldn’t do anything. I didn’t know what to do.” Mr Gani phoned 111 (the New Zealand emergency number) and told the authorities people were dead and injured: “The lady on the phone asked me to stay on the line as long as I could.”

Outside, Abdul Aziz picked up one of the killer’s discarded shotguns. Inside the mosque, the killer’s assault rifle ran out of bullets. The killer then “dropped his firearm” and ran back to his vehicle. He got in the driver’s seat. Mr Aziz then ran toward the car. He threw a discarded shotgun at the killer’s vehicle: “I threw it like an arrow. It shattered his window.” Mr Aziz thinks the killer thought someone had shot at him with a loaded gun. The killer turned. He swore at Mr Aziz. When the window burst it covered the inside of the car with glass. Mr Aziz said the killer “then took off” driving in his car. He then turn right away from the mosque driving through a red traffic light and out into Christchurch suburban streets.

Some minutes later, Police and ambulance officers arrived at Linwood Mosque. Anti-Terrorist armed Police entered the mosque. Inside, Mr Gani said the survivors were ordered to put their hands up above their heads. The mass murder scene was covered in blood. The Police then secured the area. Some victims survived because they were under the bodies of the dead. Police told survivors to gather near a grassed area outside. There, people began weeping for their husbands, wives, parents, children, friends.

THE ARREST:

Seventeen minutes later, two Police officers identified the killer, apparently driving his car. They drove the police car into the killer’s vehicle, ramming it against a curb. Immediately, they disarmed the killer, cuffed him, noticed home made bombs in the vehicle – IEDs (improvised explosive devices). They arrested the man and secured the scene.

The rest of Christchurch was in lock-down, children were kept safe inside their classrooms, hospitals began to prepare for casualties, the city’s streets became eerily quiet, people were locked in to libraries, shops, their homes. Police and armed forces helicopters networked the skies. No one knew if the terrorist attacks were committed by a group of people or a lone gunman.

But back inside and entrances to the two mosques, 50 people were dead – one of the dead was discovered the next day by Police, the body was laying beneath others who had been killed. Scores of others were in hospital fighting for their lives, at least another ten were in a critical condition in intensive care. Pathologists from all over New Zealand and Australia were heading to Christchurch to help with documenting the method of murder of the dead.

Within hours of the killings, Australian media named the alleged killer as an Australian born citizen named Brenton Tarrant, 28 years of age. On Saturday morning The Australian newspaper’s front page read “Australia’s evil export”.

Other media in New Zealand followed with details of the man’s background. Brenton Harrison Tarrant appeared in court the next day charged with one single count of murder. Other charges will follow. His duty lawyer did not seek name suppression nor bail, the lawyer told the judge: “I’m simply seeking remand and a high court next-available-hearing date.” Tarrant stood cuffed, smiling at those in the courtroom, at one point signaling with his fingers a ‘white supremacist’ sign. He will next appear in the Christchurch High Court on April 5.

THE AFTERMATH:

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern later told media: “It was absolutely his [the offender’s) intention to continue with his attack.” PM Ardern said: “Police are working to build a picture of this tragic event. A complex and comprehensive investigation is (now) underway.” To balance the requirement of investigation with the customs of Muslim burials, PM Ardern said liaison officers are with the victims’ loved ones to help “in a way that is consistent with Muslim faith while taking into account these unprecedented circumstances and the obligations to the coroner.”

PM Ardern said, survivors of the massacre had indicated that this attack was not “of the New Zealand that they know”.

One day later, Survivor Shoaib Gani (mentioned above) told media he still could not sleep or eat. The sounds and sights were still vivid in his head: “I still can feel myself lying on the floor waiting for the bullets to hit me.” He said, he will travel back to India to visit family, but he will return to Christchurch: “It’s just a few people, you know. You can’t blame the whole of New Zealand for this… It’s a good country, people are peaceful. Everybody has helped me here. One right wing (person) doesn’t mean everyone is bad. So I can come back here and live and hope nothing like this happens in the future.”

In the hours after the attacks, all around New Zealand, in the cities and in small country areas, Police were stationed and were ready in case others were involved and were preparing further crimes.

Beside the Police officers, people, of all races and religions, began laying flowers at the steps to their local mosques. Messages included read: “Salam Alaikum, Peace be unto you”, and, Aroha nui”, “Peace and love”, “You are one of us”. The outpouring of grief swept the South Pacific nation, and as this piece was written, a mood of support, comfort, reassurance and solidarity with those of Muslim faith was in evidence.

In Australia, Sydney’s landmark Opera House was like a beacon in the night; coloured blue, red, and white – the colours of the New Zealand flag embossed with the silver fern (Ponga) an emblem of Aotearoa New Zealand. Australia’s peoples, like in New Zealand, began laying flowers at the steps of its mosques in a gesture of inclusiveness.

In the aftermath, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has committed to ongoing financial assistance to dependents of those who have died or are injured, and assistance, she said, will be ongoing.

Questions are being leveled as to how a person with hate can enter, live, and purchase weapons in New Zealand while expressing hate toward other cultures and harbouring an intent to kill others.

PM Ardern said: “The guns used in this case appear to have been modified. That is a challenge Police have been facing, and that is a challenge that we will look to address in changing our laws… We need to include the fact that modification of guns which can lead them to become essentially the kinds of weapons we have seen used in this terrorist act.”

When asked how she was coping personally with the tragedy, she said: “I am feeling the exact same emotions that every New Zealander is facing. Yes, I have the additional responsibility and weight of expressing the grief of all New Zealanders and I certainly feel that.”

That responsibility includes ensuring New Zealand’s Police, the nation’s intelligence and security services and “the process around watch-lists, including whether or not our border protections are currently in a status that they should be, and, including our gun laws.”

THE BACKSTORY:

Indeed, New Zealand is part of the so-called ‘Five Eyes’ intelligence network that includes the USA, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Global surveillance is coordinated and prioritised among the Five Eyes member states. While significant resource, technology and sophistication is committed to the Five Eyes intelligence agencies, New Zealanders fear that those who find themselves as targets, or within the scope of intelligence officers, are predominantly of the Muslim faith.

In contrast, the accused killer who allegedly committed the horrific Christchurch mosque attacks, has been active both on social media and the dark web expressing, with an intensifying degree, his ideology of hate and intolerance. It does appear of the highest public interest, certainly from an open source intelligence point of view, to ask questions of why New Zealand’s (and indeed the Five Eyes intelligence network’s) surveillance experts did not detect the expressed evil that had radicalised the heart and mind of the perpetrator of this massacre.

It is also fact, that New Zealand is a comparatively safe and peaceful nation. But within its midst are people and groups fermenting on racially-based hate ideas. Whether it be in isolation or among organised groupings, the threat of racially driven terror crimes exists.

The alleged killer, Brenton Tarrant, has lived among those of New Zealand’s southern city Dunedin for at least two years. It appears he was radicalised around 2010 after his father died and he toured Europe. He wrote about becoming “increasingly disgusted” at immigrant communities. In early 2018, Tarrant joined a Dunedin gun club and began practicing his shooting skills and allegedly planned his attacks.

Regarding Christchurch, while it has a history of overt white racist gangs, at this juncture, it does not appear they were directly involved in this series of crimes.

But this leads to many unanswered questions, including:

• Was the killer a lone mass murderer, a sleeper in a cell of one?
• Were those with whom he communicated and engaged with on the web in extreme white racist ideologies aware of his plans?
• Was Christchurch chosen by the killer for logistical reasons?
• Was it because the city is easier to drive around than Dunedin, Wellington or Auckland?
• Was it because Christchurch has at least two mosques within easy driving distance?
• Were the Bangladesh Cricket team in his scope of attacks?
• Was the killer attempting to incite a violent response from Christchurch’s burgeoning Muslim community, or, expecting a response from the Alt-Right, from white racist groups such as the Right Wing Resistance (RWR), the Fourth Reich, and Christchurch’s skinhead community?

THE FUTURE:

Survivors of Friday 15th’s terrorist attack say they have complained of an increase in racism and expressed hate in recent times. They say, their concerns have not been taken seriously. These are the concerns that Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has committed to listen to, has committed to represent, and, as the prime advocate for her country’s peoples, to act on to ensure cracks in New Zealand’s border, security and intelligence apparatus are corrected.

And, what of New Zealand’s social culture? How will it be affected? That will be determined by the actions of each individual person, each community, town and city and how as a nation New Zealand redefines “The Kiwi Way”.

Members of New Zealand’s media will also need to act responsibly. It is fair to say some have a reputation for argument that verges on alt-right intolerance, for example, on Twitter only two days after the mass murders, a prominent radio journalist, who is employed by one of New Zealand’s largest networks, tweeted: “28 years on an [sic] we still haven’t stopped madmen getting guns. #ChChMosque… [Replying to @Politikwebsite] And the neo nationalist right are the result of the virtue signaling exclusionary left.”

Perhaps such examples are out of step with New Zealand’s population. But such attitudes do create a dialogue of justification for those who harbour intolerance. However, if the outpouring of love and compassion continues to bind rather than divide, then perhaps New Zealand has received, as they say, ‘a wake-up call’, where racial intolerance and extreme ideologies have no place among peoples of all kinds, Maori and Pakeha, of all religions, political persuasions and creeds.

One thing is certain; to stamp out the evil of hate extremism, New Zealanders will pay a price that will be charged against the Kiwi lifestyle. Personal liberties of freedom, of expression and privacy will certainly be eroded further as this nation of the South Pacific grapples with how to keep its peoples safe. The means of how to achieve relative safety will be hotly debated, but it is a necessary juncture in this nation’s history, a moment when we all must confront and challenge ourselves so that people of innocence, people like little three year old Mucaad Ibrahim, can go about their days in trust, in peace, in joyful purpose and achieve their deserved potential. Anything less is a second killing for the victims of Friday 15, New Zealand’s darkest hour.

by Dr Bryce Edwards

Are New Zealanders dying unnecessarily because the government won’t fund cancer drugs that are considered standard in other countries? That’s the message from CANGO, a coalition of not-for-profit cancer organisations who launched a campaign yesterday, on World Cancer Day, for better access to cancer drugs for New Zealanders.

There is now a full-scale debate going on about whether the Government is doing enough in terms of cancer care. The allegation from cancer patient advocates is that successive governments have become complacent about cancer treatment, to the point where cancer treatment in this country is in crisis, and patients are paying the price.

Some are suggesting that Labour is already breaking promises over cancer treatment and little has changed with the change of government.

Drug funding is always one of the most contentious and prominent issues in cancer debates. A number of cancer patient advocate groups are campaigning for improved access to life-saving drugs, as well as calling for a review of the Pharmac drug-buying agency. This is best seen in Duncan Garner’s call yesterday, saying “We as New Zealanders should be demanding better drugs and more funding” – see: Time for inquiry into Pharmac’s funding of cancer drugs.

Garner argues New Zealanders are “getting third class medicines”. For example, because of more limited access to drugs in this country, “A woman with stage four breast cancer will live five years in Holland, but just 13 months here.” He says that “in the time Australia has approved 24 new cancer drugs, we have approved – wait for this – none.”

The broadcaster points the finger at the new Government: “Labour promised voters world class cancer care but, of all the rocks I’ve looked under, I can’t find any evidence anyone has done anything – and the clock is not only ticking but people are dying waiting.” Furthermore, Garner alleges that Parliament’s health select committee “wants a proper inquiry into Pharmac” but “the Beehive isn’t keen”.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern appeared on Garner’s AM Show this morning and answered his questions about drug funding and Pharmac, putting the case in favour of the status quo – see Zane Small’s Jacinda Ardern: Not fair to compare Pharmac with Australia’s system.

Ardern reiterated that Pharmac has “been pointed to as being the envy of others”, and she defended the system that keeps drug buying decisions “separate from politics”, saying “I will always maintain the principle that I should not be the one making decisions about drug treatment in New Zealand.” She also explained that Pharmac refuses to buy new medicines if they don’t “add anything that a past product” already has.

The Minister of Health, David Clark, has also reportedly “been quick to dismiss any plans to review the agency” – see Ruby Macandrew’s Health organisations join calls for a review into government drug-buying agency. This article details growing support, especially amongst health organisations, for a review of how Pharmac operates and why it is so slow in adopting new cancer treatments.

Apparently, in “its 25-year history Pharmac has never been reviewed”. This doesn’t mean that there have never been questions raised about its operations, and Breast Cancer Aotearoa Coalition chairperson Libby Burgess says: “History shows us that navel gazing by Pharmac and the Ministry unsurprisingly leads them to the conclusion that everything is just fine. Meanwhile New Zealand patients are suffering and dying needlessly through lack of access to effective modern medicines”. She argues that the “grindingly slow pace of Pharmac’s opaque decision processes is a national disgrace”.

The New Zealand Cancer Society appears to have sympathy with this point of view. It’s medical director, Dr Chris Jackson, is reported as believing “Pharmac need to consider an early access scheme to new cancer treatments which had not been considered for funding” – see Melanie Earley’s Northland father-of-three forced to sell ‘dream home’ to fund cancer treatment.

According to this news report, “There are no timelines around when Pharmac needed to make decisions on whether to fund a drug or not”, and Jackson says: “In the UK there are outlined timelines, I’d like to see something like that here so patients aren’t left in limbo – the window of opportunity for those affected by cancer is now.” Jackson also calls on Pharmac “to rethink the funding of Keytruda”.

In fact, according to a statement from David Clark, the Government is considering adopting the UK model. Isobel Ewing reported yesterday, “He has officials assessing the performance of the English NHS Cancer Drugs Fund and expects to have a better idea of whether it can be adopted here by the end of this year” – see: ‘Difficult situation’: Cancer patient leads pleas for better Govt funding of treatments.

This news item also reports on the alliance of eight major cancer non-profit organisations, CANGO, which “wants the Government to introduce a rapid access scheme for new cancer treatments in New Zealand”. According to CANGO, “thousands of New Zealanders are dying unnecessarily because treatments that are considered standard care overseas aren’t available here.”

Furthermore, the CEO of the Lung Foundation, Philip Hope, is also reported as explaining “Pharmac’s current funding model favours low value, high volume treatments and more expensive and effective treatments get delayed or denied.”

In the weekend, 1News reported on the latest plea for advanced breast cancer sufferers to get access to the two new and expensive medicines, Ibrance and Kadcyla – see: World-leading breast cancer expert calls on Pharmac to make two new breast cancer drugs more affordable. The report tells the story of how “Auckland woman Wiki Mullholland has been pushing for better treatment of advanced breast cancer since she was diagnosed in May.”

There is expert weight behind this campaign: “A world authority on terminal breast cancer, oncologist Dr Fatima Cardoso is supporting the cause.” Dr Cardoso also reflects on wider access to cancer drugs in New Zealand, saying “The medium survival of patients with this disease in New Zealand is about half of what it is in other developed countries. From those results, it is not good, and it needs clearly to be improved”.

Cardoso’s analysis of the availability of breast cancer drugs is also provided in Ruby Macandrew’s news report, ‘We’re giving up too soon’: Advanced breast cancer expert calls for attitude change in NZ.

According to this, Pharmac has already made a decision to make the two type of medicines available, albeit with some key exceptions in regard to patients already receiving other treatments. Cardoso is reportedly disappointed with this, stating: “In countries where drugs like these are available, metastatic patients [those with ABC] can sometimes live eight, nine, ten years. So this is unacceptable that a country like New Zealand has a one-year median survival for these patients.”

Finally, Duncan Garner is currently leading the charge for better access to cancer medicines, and so it’s also worth looking back at his open letter to the Minister of Health in August in which he challenges him to return to his promises: “why do warrior opposition MPs promise record spending on world-class cancer treatments when they want your vote, then upon getting the chance start talking like a stiff cold robot who is too scared of repeating the promise in case he or she has to make it come true” – see: Dr Clark, this is life or death, please help.

by Dr Bryce Edwards

Is the Labour-led Government “disconnected from reality” over its fledgling house-building programme? KiwiBuild minister, Phil Twyford, says he is “pretty gutted” by his realisation that the house building agenda will fail to get anywhere near its targets this year. 

It’s merely the latest in a long-line of bad publicity, stuff-ups, and questions for the Kiwibuild scheme. And this will have many voters and aspiring home-owners losing confidence in the Government’s housing plans. And inevitably KiwiBuild is once again picking up new nicknames – such as “KiwiBusted”, “KiwiFraud”, or Simon Bridges’ chosen term, “KiwiFlop”.

Disconnected from reality?

It was only a few months ago that Phil Twyford was laying into critics and even government officials who suggested KiwiBuild might not deliver the promised number of houses on time. For example, when Treasury forecast that Kiwibuild was only going to have half its forecast impact on construction, Twyford rebuked the officials, saying “Some of these kids in Treasury are fresh out of university, and they are completely disconnected from reality”.

Now Twyford has had his own reality check, and yesterday told media that he wasn’t going to be able to deliver on promised Kiwibuild numbers for this year. While the Government is promising 100,000 affordable KiwiBuild houses, the target for July of this year is only 1000, of which only 33 appear to have eventuated.

This is all best covered by Henry Cooke in his news report, Phil Twyford says only 300 KiwiBuild homes are due to be finished by July, which quotes the minister saying “It’s clear now that we won’t meet our first year target, and that’s a real disappointment to me… It’s been tougher than we expected for the first year.”

In this story, Opposition spokesperson Judith Collins is trenchant in holding Twyford to account: “He clearly cannot do the job. He’s been a minister since November of 2017 and delivered 33 homes – in that same time the private sector has built 35200… He’s got no excuse because he had this portfolio in opposition for over six years. He should have worked out how hard it is to have interventions in the property market.”

Although the Government has promised 1000 houses by July of this year, Twyford isn’t confident enough that they will even deliver 500, according to Jenna Lynch, who also reveals that some KiwiBuild houses aren’t selling to first home buyers and are being released onto the market, “defeating the whole point of the programme” – see: KiwiBuild houses might not end up with first home buyers.

Twyford has been joined by both Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Finance Minister Grant Robertson in conceding defeat on the KiwiBuild numbers, but Acting Prime Minister Winston Peters isn’t giving up – see Jason Walls’ Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters still thinks 1000 KiwiBuild houses can be built by July.

Having been asked about the targets, Peters told reporters today: “We’re not giving up at all – we’ve got six months to wind this up as fast as we can, and practically we will.” He added: “We’re going to recommit ourselves in our first Cabinet meeting to getting this thing back on track.”

Ongoing problems with KiwiBuild

In explaining KiwiBuild’s failure to reach its targets, Phil Twyford appears to be pointing the finger at the construction industry and developers. He said yesterday that “It’s been more difficult than we expected to really shift developers off their existing business model which is about getting a return on capital from small numbers of mid to high end homes.”

The Minister also talked about this last year in an interview with Newsroom’s Thomas Coughlan, in which he characterised setbacks as merely “teething problems” – see: Twyford on his hopes for 2019. Apparently, Twyford “believes the teething issues have come from the state of the residential construction sector, which is dominated by small firms, with low productivity, who are incentivised to build expensive rather than affordable homes.”

There are some other problems with the KiwiBuild scheme. Anne Gibson, for example, looks at some of the figures listed on KiwiBuild’s official website and finds that although 46,807 people registered as being interested in KiwiBuild, only 267 have actually become “pre-qualified” to purchase a house – see: KiwiBuild monitor: 33 complete, 967 to go by July, Twyford says target ‘tough’.

In response to the low numbers of eligible buyers, Mike Hosking wrote last year about these figures: “You would have heard of the thousands that applied, of course. The Government wanted you to hear that. The thousands that signed up for the updates, the thousands that showed an interest. But an interest isn’t a deposit, it isn’t a deal, and it certainly isn’t a sale” – see: So where’s all the KiwiBuild buyers then?

Hosking has also written earlier this week on the housing programme, summing up the alleged failings of the scheme, so far: “the homes that aren’t built, the homes that don’t sell, the tenders that don’t attract bidders, the prices that are too high, the locations that don’t parent right, the sizes that don’t suit” – see: New Year, same old KiwiBuild stuff-ups.

In this column Hosking looks at the mystery surrounding ex-KiwiBuild CEO Stephen Barclay, who has resigned. He comments: “yet another cock-up in a long line of cock-ups that’s plagued this grandiose farce since day one.” And he complains that “no one is fronting in terms of just what has gone wrong”.

There is plenty of speculation about why Barclay has stepped down. For the most plausible, see economist Gareth Kiernan’s article, Resignation another step to KiwiBuild failure. He suggests that perhaps Barclay had his “wings clipped” with the organisational re-configuration that happened last year in the KiwiBuild programme. And if so, “the prospects of getting a new head of KiwiBuild with the initiative to turn Phil Twyford’s dreams into reality seem slimmer than ever”.

What happens next?

Given the apparent mess that the KiwiBuild programme is in, should it be scrapped? Should the Government go back to the drawing board? Or should the Minister responsible be sacked?

Unsurprisingly, Judith Collins is calling for Twyford to go. She was on TVNZ’s Breakfast today giving advice to the Prime Minister: “I would say to Jacinda Ardern, a bit of advice for someone who has been in politics a little bit longer, to shift Phil at her next reshuffle because if she doesn’t I’m going to have so much fun over the next year” – see: Judith Collins: Ardern should dump Twyford over KiwiBuild – ‘If she doesn’t, I’m going to have fun’. Collins also forecasts KiwiBuild’s “demise inside 12 months”.

On The AM Show, Duncan Garner suggested Twyford needed to go, saying “you’ve flopped Phil… In any other world, Phil Twyford would be dog-tucker, out” – see: Duncan Garner lets rip on ‘toxic’ KiwiBuild not hitting targets. But, despite the “poisonous” failure of KiwiBuild, he says that Twyford will be “protected for now”.

Garner also suggests that the Labour-led Government needs to look again at the whole KiwiBuild programme: “Freeze this policy, rethink it, even ditch it, it’s been changed so much anyway who knows what it even stands for now.”

Over on Newstalk ZB, Mike Hosking declared that the minister is “deluded” and “so far out of their depth it’s dangerous” – see: KiwiBuild fiasco is far from over.

But there’s also a fair bit of praise for Twyford: “I tell you what I do admire about Phil Twyford, the embattled, bewildered Housing Minister: At least he fronts. He fronted with me yesterday, and took a pasting because you can’t hide or argue your way around the cluster or calamity of facts and the avalanche of bad news that’s fallen down on top of him. But at least he is there to actually fight his corner. Many people these days run and hide. I also admire him for bulldozing over the Unitary Plans in places, like Auckland, where for years councils have refused to make enough land available for building.”

So, should Twyford be sacked? The Spinoff’s Alex Braee writes about the issue today, and he agrees that the Minister deserves to be fired, pointing out that Twyford’s mistakes are worse than those of sacked minister Clare Curran: “This failure is vastly more serious, both in political perception terms, and in terms of how much of a real world impact it has” – see: Kiwibuild set to fail at first hurdle.

Yet Braae declares that it is better that Twyford stays: “Perhaps a more fitting punishment for Mr Twyford, after presiding over a horrendous botch of one of the government’s most important policies, would be that he has no choice but to continue. Then again, there’s a cabinet reshuffle expected early this year, so someone else might find themselves with the nightmare job of fixing this.”

Finally, despite all the criticism and pessimism about Kiwibuild, there are still some enthusiasts pointing out the arguments in its favour. For the best effort, see Barnaby Bennett’s What almost everyone is missing about KiwiBuild.

by Dr Bryce Edwards

The week before Christmas was dominated by what may actually have been the most important political issue of the year in New Zealand – revelations that government agencies have spied on New Zealanders through the use of private investigators. The matter ended up being somewhat buried in the end-of-year chaos, and perhaps conveniently forgotten about by politicians with an interest in the issue remaining unresolved.

Yet the story isn’t going away. Today, the Herald published revelations about how the private investigations firm Thompson & Clark was previously employed by government-owned Southern Response insurance to review Official Information Act answers about the use of the private investigations firm itself – see Lucy Bennett’s Megan Woods seeks answers on Southern Response’s use of private investigators.

Here’s the key part of the story: “In January 2017, when Woods was the opposition spokeswoman on the Christchurch quake recovery, Thompson & Clark Investigations Ltd (TCIL) invoiced Southern Response $2070 for reviewing a response to an Official Information Act request from the Labour Party research unit on its use of TCIL.”

The article reports on how “TCIL also appears to advise Southern Response on how to circumvent public scrutiny.” For example, Thompson & Clark gave the following advice to Southern Response’s chief executive: “to get around disclosure, privacy and OIA issues, we normally set up a discreet email address for you – in Gmail or similar … do you want us to set up a discreet email account for you – or do you want to?”

The original “explosive” SSC report

Despite the State Services Commission report being released during the busy period just prior to Christmas – leading to what some see as a lack of media coverage and scrutiny of the issues – there have been some excellent articles and columns published about it.

Andrea Vance produced some of the best coverage of the report and the aftermath. Her first report, Security firm spied on politicians, activists and earthquake victims, detailed the full extent of what had been uncovered by the report into government agencies using private investigators. Overall, she said that the “explosive report details a slew of damning revelations”.

Vance followed this up with an in-depth article, Public service bosses ignored warnings about Thompson & Clark for years, which revealed that “for a decade public service bosses ignored the warnings about Thompson & Clark. Their tentacles were everywhere. Dozens of ministries and agencies used their services – and yet no-one in the upper echelons of the public service questioned their reach or influence.”

According to Vance, “officials became drunk on the power of the information offered up by security firms like Thompson & Clark. It allowed them to keep tabs on their critics and stave off any reputational damage.” She also argues that “A cavalier attitude to personal and sensitive information, and a troubling disregard for the democratic right to protest, was allowed to flourish within the public service over 15 years and successive governments.”

Hamish Rutherford produced some excellent analysis, explaining: “In an age where the use of contractors is already under scrutiny, a string of government agencies have effectively outsourced snooping, in some cases for highly questionable reasons. In some cases this was done with a lack of clear contracts, creating a fertile atmosphere for mission creep” – see: Use of private investigators exposes carelessness about role of the government.

Rutherford writes about how remarkable it is that public servants weren’t aware (according to the report) that what was going on was unacceptable. He therefore concludes: “we are reading about public servants who appeared to be seduced by private investigators, who decided to make their job easier without considering the implications for democratic rights, or the need to remain neutral. Weeding out improper behaviour may take work, but it seems the report exposes examples where public servants need to be told what their job involves, which would be a far more fundamental problem.”

RNZ’s Tim Watkin also has some strong analysis of what occurred, saying that the report on the state snooping “is a bit of a page-turner and a terrifying read for anyone who cares about the integrity of the public sector” – see: Heart of Darkness in the public sector.

According to Watkin, the situation is perplexing, given the risk-averse nature of the public service: “My concern is what this says about the culture at the heart of our public service. How did leaders who are by the very definition of their roles meant to be servants of the public decide that this level of covert surveillance was a good idea? Government agencies are typically so risk averse these days that they have multiple managers signing off press statements and an inability to make a decision on which pencils or toilet paper to buy without first clearing it with the minister’s office. Yet they are willing to subject those ‘ordinary New Zealanders” to secret surveillance.”

Possibly, Watkin says it’s the very risk-averse nature of the current public service that has caused them to be more open to snooping on citizens: “there seems to be a deep-seated sense of butt-covering and paranoia”. This is the very point made by Gordon Campbell in his blogpost, On why Thompson + Clark are just the tip of the iceberg.

In recent years, according to Campbell, the public service has become politicised, meaning that public servants have become more sensitive to the political needs of their ministers rather than the public good. This means that snooping on citizens and protestors starts becoming sensible, and to dissent against breaches of ethics in the public service has become much more dangerous for your career.

Not surprisingly, some of the strongest condemnation of state snooping on citizens has come from those organisations known to be affected – especially environmental groups. Former Green co-leader, and now Greenpeace head, Russel Norman emphasises the anti-democratic nature of what has been going on: “The chilling effect of being under constant and intrusive surveillance for simply campaigning on important social issues, fundamentally corrodes what it means to live in a free and democratic society. We’ve learnt that under the previous government, no-one was safe from being spied on if they disagreed with government policy” – see: Rotten to the core: The chilling truth revealed by the SSC report.

Norman concludes: “The State Services Commission (SSC) investigation may well be one of the most important examinations into the inner workings of the state that we’ve seen in New Zealand. I’d go as far as to call it our Watergate moment.”

If that sounds like the expected complaints of an activist, then it’s also worth reading what former United Future leader Peter Dunne had to say in his column, Only a first step in the data battle.

Dunne explains what has occurred as being “a gross breach of that implicit covenant between the Government and its citizens”, and he raises serious questions about how much more privacy is being curtailed by government agencies. In particular: “Was any information provided, formally or informally, to the intelligence services by Thompson and Clark, and was any information gathered at the behest of the intelligence services?”

Newspaper editorials have also condemned what has been uncovered in the public service. The Otago Daily Times has a strongly-worded editorial about the dangers to democracy uncovered in the report: “It blasts a warning about the insidious nature of state power and the need for vigilance and protection. Those who would disregard civil liberties for what they might think is the greater good should think again. Big brother and big sister are an ever-present threat. This is even more so in the electronic age. It was first thought the internet might lead to more freedom and more opportunity for dissent. But the massive losses of privacy, the ease with which data is collected and modern data analysis all hand more potential power and surveillance ability to big business and big government” – see: An ‘affront to democracy’.

In Christchurch, The Press has been asking important questions about what the report has revealed – see the editorial: More questions about spies and the public service. Here are the concluding questions: “The public needs to know more about this scandal that is so contrary to the way we expect our public servants to behave on our behalf. The public wants to know who approved of this surveillance, why it was considered necessary in a democracy and, perhaps most important of all, how much was really known about it by the ministers in charge.”

Will anything actually be done about the spying scandal?

The biggest risk to arise out of the controversial investigation into government agencies’ misuse of spying on citizens is that nothing further will now occur. So despite new stories being published about the state surveillance, there’s a danger that we are coming towards the end of the scandal, with no significant reform being offered to correct the problems.

Although the Thompson & Clark firm has been discredited by the scandal, many are arguing that they are not actually the real problem. For example, Andrea Vance says: “although they took advantage, Thompson & Clark aren’t responsible for public service culture and the undermining of democratic rights. That lies with Peter Hughes. For public confidence to be fully restored, the public service must demonstrate accountability and accept culpability, starting from the top down.”

Perhaps it’s time for a proper official and independent commission of inquiry into the spying problems in the public service. Security analyst Paul Buchanan has been arguing for this. And Gordon Campbell agrees: “given that the Thompson+ Clark problem is a by-product of the politicisation of the public service, security analyst Paul Buchanan is dead right in calling for a public inquiry. Only a wide-ranging investigation can address the attitudinal issues and power relationships between ministerial staff and public servants, of which Thompson + Clark are merely one of the end results.”

Tim Watkin has also argued that more needs to happen: “The proper response to this report is not a few hours of tut-tuting, the Prime Minister expressing formulaic concern that the spying was “disturbing” and the symbolic resignation of a single chair. No, the proper response is a change to the public sector culture. So who will lead that?”

Long-time political activist Murray Horton also proposes an inquiry – see: Thompson & Clark just tip of spyberg. Let’s have an inquiry into whole covert world of state spying. Horton explains the significance of the latest changes in state surveillance of citizens, saying that there’s been two major changes: contracting the spying out (perhaps deliberately in order to escape rules), and expanding the targets beyond just activists.

Other activists – especially those affected by the state spying – put forward proposals for reform in Jessie Chiang’s article, Environmental groups call for change after security firm revelations. For example, Russel Norman calls for prosecutions of those involved, and for the Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment to be broken up. And Kevin Hague from Forest and Bird says: “I’m encouraging state services to go back to [learning] how to operate as a state service… and your obligations to the public and not just to the government of the day”.

For more thorough reform suggestions, also see blogger No Right Turn’s A private Stasi. He says “Businesses like Thompson and Clark, whose service is explicitly anti-democratic, need to be made illegal and put out of business.”

Finally, there’s the issue of the breaches of rules by Crown Law when working for the Ministry of Social Development – which Andrea Vance has described as “one of the most shocking findings”. The chief executive of MSD at the time was Peter Hughes, who of course is now chief executive of the State Services Commission, and therefore in charge of the whole of the public service. There will therefore be suspicions of conflicts of interest in terms of resolving that issue, and Hughes has handed the ongoing task to his own deputy at the SSC. For the best discussion of all this, see Aaron Smale’s Hypocrisy at the highest levels.

by Dr Bryce Edwards

Will New Zealand politics in 2019 be characterised by policy substance or issues of leadership, personalities and political manoeuvrings? The various political journalists and pundits have made their forecasts (and indulged in some wishful thinking) for the year ahead.

Every year the political journalists at Stuff put together a long list of predictions for the year. This year’s list has the usual mix of policy and people-focused forecasts – see: 2019 Political predictions: Big calls for the year ahead. And it’s also worth looking back at how well they did with their 2018 forecasts (they scored only 90/200) – see: 2018 Political predictions: MPs made big, bold moves.

In terms of policy issues for the Government, the Stuff team are predicting the following for 2019: the capital gains tax will be extended but generally the Government will water down tax reform, a referendum on euthanasia will be established, promised abortion law reform will be parked, and little progress will be made on KiwiBuild.

The Government will also continue to be beset by the Sroubek immigration saga, worker strikes will continue (although the teacher unions are predicted to resolve their claims early in the year), the bullying inquiry in Parliament will lead to substantial reform, and Green co-leader Marama Davidson will embarrass her party with another soap-box campaign.

There are also some major political manoeuvrings predicted – in particular, Judith Collins is forecast to carry out a successful coup against her leader, Simon Bridges. Two new National Party-friendly parties will arise. And a Cabinet reshuffle will bring promotions for Kris Faafoi, Ruth Dyson, Deborah Russell, and Fletcher Tabuteau. And they predict a backbench Government MP will get in trouble for personal issues, and another minister will depart.

Emulating Stuff’s exercise, rightwing blogger David Farrar has his forecasts here: Predictions for 2019. They include a rebrand for the Act Party (to become the “Freedom Party”); deputy Labour Party leader Kelvin Davis to be replaced, another government minister will go, and any proposed new capital gains tax will fail to get enough parliamentary support.

Again, caution is required – Farrar also looks back on his predictions from last year, giving himself a score of 12/20 – see: Scoring my 2018 predictions.

On the left, David Cormack presents more of a wishlist than forecast, particularly on issues like climate change: “let’s just do something. Anything” – see: It’s the end of the year as we know it. Let’s make things happen in 2019. Cormack also hopes something is done about immigration, inequality, and the lack of housing.

Continuing the leftwing predictions/wishlist, Greg Presland writes at The Standard with his own outlook on 2019 – see: Political punditry in 2019. Some of the more interesting forecasts are: Phil Goff to win the Auckland mayoralty again, Simon Bridges to remain as National leader, National will continue to have no political party allies, and the New Conservative Party wins a bigger profile but doesn’t actually take off.

The New Conservatives are predicted to do much better by Martyn Bradbury, who sees them going above five per cent in the polls, aided by an escalating culture war in New Zealand – in particular a conservative backlash against the “woke” left which he sees as being more interested in a “counter productive fight” against the likes of Jordan Peterson – see: Pessimistic Predictions for 2019.

In addition, Bradbury forecasts Phil Goff to lose the Auckland mayoralty, the Greens to slip further in the polls, Labour Party deputy leader Kelvin Davis to step down, Shane Jones to continue building his powerbase in the Northland electorate (eyeing up a 2020 election there), and “Kiwibuild will continue to underperform and remain a political weeping wound throughout 2019.”

Another version of a 2019 wishlist was published in the Herald, and was amongst a longer list of complaints about life in New Zealand – see: No more! Things we can do without in 2019. The “no more” list includes: “Abortion in the Crimes Act; Child poverty; Public health service waits; National Party leaks; New Australian Prime Ministers; One more person referring to “Burning Bridges”. It sounds like you have Winston whispering in your ear; Bullies; KiwiBuild scandals; Brexit updates; The Prime Minister missing question time.”

The Spinoff surveyed fifteen political pundits on what the three biggest issues of the political year would be – see: 2019 in politics: What will the big issues be? The main issues picked were climate change (cited by six), geopolitical issues relating to China (six), the economy (four) and housing (four).

In terms of climate change, Linda Clark says: “Finding the politically saleable way forward is going to be a real test of the coalition’s skill and persuasion. This issue needs a bipartisan approach – but there won’t be one.”

Many other writers cite the reports generated by the myriad of Government working groups as defining the upcoming year. Stacey Kirk says: “Tax, education, criminal justice reform, welfare reform and mental health working groups are all expected to land in the coming year, and when that happens, the Government will have some tough financial decisions to make” – see: Political slates wiped clean won’t stay that way for long in 2019.

Kirk also suggests that National will be very policy-focused this year, too: “Intent on being the policy factory Labour never was in Opposition, National is set to be releasing a number of discussion papers as well as some fully formed policies. In the hope it will keep the party’s rep as a slick operating unit – looking leaderly and switched on”.

A Herald editorial also draws attention to the various working groups being a focus for politics in 2019, and forecasts that, in terms of the mental health report, “the Government probably will do something significant on that front this year”, while the radical reforms proposed by the Tomorrow’s Schools working group are likely to be watered down – see: Smorgasbord of issues to keep us all busy in 2019.

It’s tax reform that many are pointing to as the big issue of 2019, and Peter Williams has an excellent discussion on this in his column, Tax set to become major political issue. Williams argues, however, that large scale reform seems unlikely.

This also seems to be the conclusion of Bill Ralston, who views the Tax Working Group’s report as significant, but believes politics is likely to curtail radical reform: “All of the group’s proposals would require the consent of NZ First. Even if Peters does agree to all the proposed changes, which is very unlikely, Labour will have to take its new tax platform to the electorate in 2020. Voters, especially the rapidly rising elderly cohort, are likely to be averse to tax increases, especially a capital gains tax on their houses and share funds, their keys to a comfortable retirement” – see: Grab your popcorn, there’s plenty more political drama to come.

Ralston’s more interesting prediction and analysis is about Judith Collins taking over National’s leadership: “National will have to drop several percentage points in the polls before a coup can happen, but I’m picking that Collins has in mind a timeline that could give her the leadership shortly before next Christmas. The plotters, I understand, also have links to Winston Peters and New Zealand First. A Collins leadership would work to the benefit of both National and Peters who, it is believed, could work with her. It would give the Nats a potential partner in a future government, and be a valuable bargaining chip for Peters in any post-election negotiations with Labour.”

Finally, if political pundits are not deemed reliable enough – after all, who predicted the major issue of 2018 would be anything like the Jami-Lee Ross saga? – then perhaps it’s time for supernatural talents to be consulted. Newshub have recruited two, who disagree about how stable or wild the upcoming year is going to be, but what they do agree on is that Judith Collins is on her way in – see Sophie Bateman and Sam Harvey’s Interview with the psychic: Top predictions for 2019, and Vita Molyneux’s ‘Psychic’ Barry Newman predicts what 2019 holds for New Zealand.

By Dr Bryce Edwards

Debate has now kicked off over the Government’s most radical reforms to date – the overhaul of the way our schools are run. With the release of the “Tomorrow’s Schools Independent Taskforce” proposals for change, there is now a polarised and highly-ideological battle involving important values that will inform the future of education in this country. Today I’ll round up opposition so far to the proposed reforms and tomorrow’s column will look at the case in favour of the reforms.

I wrote about this ideological battle in a column on Wednesday, in which I outlined the clear left-right divide on how education should be organised – see: The sound of ideologies clashing. This points out that the status quo results from the fact that “David Lange’s 1988 Tomorrow’s Schools reforms saw traditional rightwing values of competition, choice, and performance win the day.”

In contrast, the Government’s new taskforce report is putting forward “a very leftwing proposal for reforming how New Zealand runs its school system, based on values of collectivism, cooperation, and equality.” In the end, therefore, even though there is “much less black and white than many on the left and right might suggest”, the likely success of failure of the new proposals to get public support will depend simply on “on whether the leftwing or rightwing values resonate more. It’s a simple left or right choice.”

The details of the proposed reforms are well covered by Simon Collins who draws attention to the polarised nature of the debate: “Battle lines are drawn over a proposed radical shake-up of the education system which has brought excited praise from liberals but condemnation as ‘Stalinist’ from more traditional schools” – see his news report, ‘Stalinist’ or ‘exciting’: Battle begins over radical school reforms.

Summing up the proposals, Collins says: “The taskforce would reverse key changes made in the last big reforms known as ‘Tomorrow’s Schools’ in 1989, when regional education boards were abolished and every school was given control of its operations budget and staff appointments.” Collins reports that conservative forces have tended to condemn the proposals, with more liberal institutions being supportive.

Another useful account of the details can be found in Derek Cheng’s Tomorrow’s Schools Review: All you need to know about the proposed education shake-up.

The most fervent critique of the proposals so far, comes from Matthew Hooton, who says: “No one should doubt the proposed radicalism” of the reforms, which are so extreme they go to show the new “regime has a further, much more sinister character” than was previously apparent – see: Education plan seeks far-left reform.

Hooton views the debate over the future of schooling as very much a left-right battle: “The main ideological divide in education is about comfort with difference. Perhaps surprisingly, the political right tends to be more encouraging than the left of innovation in schools.”

Hooton says that on the other hand, “the left’s main educational value is equality. That includes trying to help disadvantaged communities but it also requires tackling perceived privilege and achieving greater standardisation.”

According to Hooton, ironically it’s the current system that has produced a less entrenched private schooling system: “The only winners from last week’s education proposals will be private schools and children with parents able to afford them. Before David Lange’s Tomorrow’s Schools in 1989, private schools were in such demand that children were put on waiting lists the day they were born. Thirty years later, private school enrolments have fallen from 4.1 per cent of all students to just 3.4 per cent and they now resort to advertising. The reasons are complex, but one is Lange’s vision of freeing state schools to better reflect the values and priorities of their communities.”

Therefore, Hooton emphasises the benefits of devolution in the current model, which would be put at risk by the changes: “Sometimes this involves fairly trivial matters, like new school uniforms. More importantly, it has been about schools adopting different pedagogies and programmes that meet the needs of their particular communities and students, without first needing to apply to some centralised district board.”

Hooton also challenges the independence of the so-called “Independent” review, pointing out that its chair is also “the chairman of the New Plymouth Labour Party”. An Otago Daily Times editorial questions this too: “Parenthetically, it can be noted the ‘independent’ claim for the taskforce is – as is often the case with inquiries – hardly convincing. Taskforce chairman Bali Haque wrote a book criticising the secondary school system, and he has also been on the PPTA executive and president of the Secondary Principals’ Association.”

Although not against the proposals per se, the Otago Daily Times raises strong questions about them – see: ‘Stalinist’ or ‘exciting’ education change. The editorial makes it clear that the proposals are a big deal, and relate to a large ideological gulf: “Should the review’s recommendations be carried out, they would represent an upheaval of major magnitude, larger some say than even the radical changes from 1989’s Tomorrow’s Schools. Little wonder, then, that those supporting ‘parental choice’ and those wanting a ‘fairer’ system could be a long way apart.”

The editorial has a long list of questions which is worth listing at length: “Will schools and teachers be less inclined to strive for the very best in a less competitive environment? Will connections with communities be weakened and voluntary support lessened? Will parents and pupils have fewer choices and will the diversity of schools’ flavours be reduced? Will school boards become just advisory bodies without real power? Supposedly, they and principals would have more time and energy to concentrate on pupil achievement. But are not the likes of the appointment of the principal and even board nitty-gritty fundamental to pupil success? What about the bureaucracies created by the hubs? Why could not their roles and their advice be provided by a strengthened ministry? Could collaboration rather than competition be fostered in other ways?”

Some education sector groups and individuals have come out in opposition to the reforms. For example, RNZ reports that “Auckland Grammar headmaster Tim O’Connor says proposed reforms to the education system are a direct and serious attack on state education” – see: Headmaster slams radical proposals for schools.

O’Connor is reported as believing “the proposed changes would set education back 30 years. He said parents would be disempowered if functions of school boards were moved to education hubs”. He is quoted as saying too much power will be taken away from parents: “So they lose all governance responsibilities; they have nothing to do with school finances; they have nothing to do with school property…. Effectively what they [the taskforce] need to be honest about is they’re not a board of trustees; they’re an advisory group at best”.

Similarly, this news report says, “Briar Lipson from the think tank, the New Zealand Initiative, is concerned that reducing competition between schools will reduce incentives for them to lift their performance.”

Another elite school principal, Brent Lewis of Avondale College, is quoted by Simon Collins as labelling the proposals as “Stalinist” due to their apparent attempts to regain bureaucratic and centralised control – see: Big schools vow to resist ‘Stalinist’ school bureaucracy. He’s reported as believing that “schools needed to be nimble to respond to social and economic changes”, and that “bureaucracies are almost the antithesis of that”.

Lewis also believes the proposals will be deeply unpopular with parents: “If we apply this model, we will force large numbers of people to go to schools they don’t want to go to…. The political cost of that will be extremely high. You can do many things in New Zealand, but if you mess with people’s children and their life opportunities, then good luck to you”.

The same article reports that the Principals Federation is uncomfortable with the “proposal to rotate principals around schools with only five-year terms in each school”. And Act Party leader David Seymour is quoted opposing the reforms: “This is an intrusion on the autonomy of schools and will undermine communities’ ability to develop their own property by removing it and placing it in the hands of a remote bureaucracy”.

Similarly, National Party blogger David Farrar opposes the proposals on the basis that they would take away power and choice of families: “this is basically to force kids to attend their local school no matter how shitty or crappy it is. No more choice. You will go to the school the Government tells you to attend and like it. This will send house prices even higher in areas with desirable schools” – see: Govt taskforce proposes stripping school boards of all meaningful roles.

Coming from a different perspective, principal of Te Wharekura o Manurewa, Maahia Nathan, says the proposals “will not benefit Māori students in mainstream schools” – see Mānia Clarke’s Wharekura principal critical of education review.

Nathan says, “The core of the mainstream education system is still there. Nothing has really changed… the pieces on the board game have been moved around, but it’s still the same.”

Finally, the Government’s taskforce is now seeking feedback on the proposals – you can get more information on this and the report here: Tomorrow’s Schools Review.

by Dr Bryce Edwards

John Key was once very candid in explaining the realpolitik reason New Zealand had to send troops to assist the US war on terror: it was simply “the price of the club”. He was speaking of the intelligence alliance known as Five Eyes involving the United States, Australia, Britain, Canada and New Zealand.

The Labour-led Government is unlikely to be equally upfront that this week’s decision to ban the Chinese company Huawei from supplying the infrastructure for the new telecommunications 5G network is also due to New Zealand’s membership of the Western allies’ club.

That reality is clear to political journalist Richard Harman, who says the Huawei ban “was the only one it could have come to. To have let Huawei in would have placed New Zealand at odds with its traditional friends – Australia, the United States and Britain – and offside with the Five Eyes alliance” – see: How the Huawei decision saw the old friends prevail.

This article points out that the Huawei decision “came coincidentally with the presence in the capital of a top-level delegation from the British Foreign office and also a senior FBI official from the US. The FBI official was here to open a new FBI liaison office in Police Headquarters.” And although it’s not clear that there was any recent pressure on the GCSB to ban Huawei, Harman points out that the signals from Five Eyes partners were very clear on the matter – especially with a British Government report in July, and then in “August Australia barred Huawei from participating in its 5G network.”

There is certainly going to be a cost for the ban. First, it seems that there will be consequences in terms of inferior and more expensive communications for consumers. Second, this country’s economic and diplomatic ties with the superpower of China will now be strained as a result.

Such costs could end up being significant, and will affect every New Zealander. In terms of Spark’s planned new telecommunications network, Barry Soper explains today: “they’ll probably have to settle for a more expensive and less efficient option. Huawei points out that in a trial for 5G in March they achieved a world record of more than 18 gigabytes a second while their competitors could only manage one gig. With data transfer rates at that speed perhaps that’s what spooked the GCSB” – see: Spy agency’s Huawei ban conveniences Government.

Soper says that essentially New Zealand has “finally picked sides” in the geopolitical rivalry between China and the US. He also stresses the economic and diplomatic prices that New Zealand will have to pay, saying “This decision has wide-reaching implications for this country with our biggest trading partner” and the “renegotiation of our Free Trade Agreement will now be on the back burner”.

In terms of diplomatic reaction, Soper says: “Now this is all out in the open it can come as no surprise the Chinese couldn’t find the time to see Jacinda Ardern in Beijing before Christmas, she was ready to go at the drop of a hat.”

Leftwing commentator Gordon Campbell seems to agree, saying “the Huawei ban is a hostile act”, and the “indefinite postponing of PM Jacinda Ardern’s trip to China is probably the first symptom of the cooling in our relationship” – see: On how banning Huawei fits into our new hostility towards China.

Campbell also suggests that the Huawei ban on involvement in the 5G project will be costly. He points to the fact that “In Australia, the Huawei bid was reportedly 30% lower than competing tenders”, and concludes that it “is reasonable to assume there will be extra costs for consumers as a consequence”.

As to why the Government is suddenly so sensitive about this new telecommunications network, when they haven’t been so worried in the past, Gordon provides a good explanation: “5G will be the key piece of architecture in the so-called ‘Internet of things’ that’s envisaged to connect our electricity and water systems, medical and driverless technologies, systems in homes and hospitals, factories and farms. The security concerns about China being central to the provision, installation and maintenance of such a massively interlinked system is not hard to imagine”.

Campbell argues that the Huawei ban is part of “a trifecta of measures via which the 5 Eyes allies have been beefing up their stance towards China” – the other two components being “(a) the increased defence spending in Australia and New Zealand for which countering China expansionism is the only conceivable rationale and (b) the massive increase in Australasia’s aid and diplomatic profile in the Pacific, in order to counter China’s ‘cheque book’ diplomacy”.

New Zealand really had no choice but to ban Huawei according to intelligence expert Paul Buchanan: “Diplomatically, it would be very difficult for the GCSB to green light Huawei’s involvement in the 5G upgrade in the face of the US request to withhold approval” – see: Huawei vs Five Eyes: NZ diplomatic ties at centre of dilemma.

Furthermore, “The fallout from such a decision could open a rift within the Five Eyes partnership because New Zealand is already seen as the Achilles Heel of the network given its past record of poor cyber security awareness (say, in the overlap between professional and personal communications). It is therefore prudent for the GCSB to side with the US on the matter.”

Siding with Western allies over China is evidence of New Zealand’s shifting orientation towards its biggest trading partner, according to Victoria University of Wellington’s strategic studies professor, Robert Ayson – see his Newstalk ZB interview: NZ’s relationship with China could suffer after GCSB decision – academic.

On the Huawei decision, Ayson says: “I think it’s an important sign that New Zealand’s approach to China is becoming more cautious. I think the special friendship between New Zealand and China is now a little less special in some ways”.

Ayson believes the reasons behind the ban would have been both genuine concerns for national security and about New Zealand’s alignment with the Five Eyes countries. He concludes: “I guess one of the question is, does New Zealand want to be seen as a weaker link?”

The cost of the Huawei ban is also well canvassed by Jamie Ensor in his article, NZ could see major fallout from Huawei 5G decision – expert. In this, Richard Harman is quoted on its impact on diplomatic relations with China: “The frequency of contact between New Zealand and China, and the intimacy of that contact, might slow down for a while”.

In terms of economic ties, Harman points to tourism and education as being the most likely hit. In terms of “worst case scenarios”, he says the Chinese Government “might try and restrain Chinese students who come here for education” and they might “take New Zealand off the preferred list of tourist destinations”.

Condemnation of the Huawei ban has been coming from both left and right. The former general secretary of the Labour Party, Mike Smith, has been highly critical of his own government: “The GCSB ban on Spark’s use of Huawei technology means this government has gone from ‘honest broker’ to poodle in a very short time” – see: Spooked!

He also suggests that it might be time for New Zealand to withdraw from Five Eyes, and says we shouldn’t believe much of what is being said about Huawei: “Maybe it’s time we got out of that too – it was designed for war. GCSB Minister Andrew Little argues that the GCSB decision is about the technology not the country. Nobody else believes that, certainly not the lobbyists and commentators including security analyst Adam Boileau, who said that argument didn’t make a lot of sense. He says Huawei’s engineering is pretty good.”

Rightwing blogger David Farrar appears to be in agreement on much of that, saying “the reality is that no one anywhere has ever been able to point to an actual security problem with Huawei. It is basically scaremongering” – see: We join the nonsense ban on Huawei.

Farrar elaborates: “Basically New Zealand has succumbed to peer pressure from our five eyes partners, primarily the US. Their motivations are protecting US companies from competition. They have never ever been able to say what exactly is it that Huawei has done wrong or could do wrong. They’ve been banned purely because of the country they are based in. This will increase the costs of telecommunications in New Zealand, by removing a preferred supplier. It will also be seen as a deeply offensive move by the Chinese Government and our exporters will probably end up paying the cost.”

Finally, for a fictional conversation about how the politics of the Huawei decision might be explained, see Chris Trotter’s From a table by the window.

Selwyn Manning interviews New Zealand First leader Winston Peters on the New Zealand spy agency GCSB and New Zealand Police illegal surveillance of a permanent resident of New Zealand, Kim Dotcom.

TIMELINE OF EVENTS:
On August 10, 2012, under questioning by Paul Davison QC, Detective Inspector Grant Wormald informed the High Court that a government agency took park in operational planning at a meeting on Dec 14, 2011.
Paul Davison QC then asked Detective Inspector Wormald to identify that agency, he refused citing the secret status of the agency.
Paul Davison QC then asked whether any other surveillance apart from that of the Police took place – In direct quotes: Paul Davison QC asks: “So apart from the surveillance which might have been going to undertake on your behalf was there any other surveillance being undertaken here in New Zealand to your knowledge?” Detective Inspector Wormald replies: “No there wasn’t.”
Aug 17, 2012: Bill English signs ministerial certificate suppressing details of GCSB involvement.
The Questions:

THE POLICE – AN ATTEMPTED COVER-UP?
Question1: What is your view of the GCSB’s unlawful surveillance of Megaupload boss Kim Dotcom? Question 2: Do you believe the Police officer committed perjury when he replied “No there wasn’t.” when asked was there any other surveillance being undertaken? Question 3: What possible defences may be asserted by the Police? Question 4: What do you think was the GCSB’s motivation to seek and acquire a suppression order by way of a ministerial certificate from the acting Prime Minister Bill English? Question 5: Should the New Zealand Police be the entity that investigates the GCSB’s unlawful surveillance?

THE PUBLIC INTEREST:
Question 6: What is the public to make of this series of events? Question 7: How can the public interest be satisfied over this whole affair? Question 8: What kind of inquiry do you feel needs to be initiated into this affair?