World leaders’ neglect of refugees condemns millions to a life of misery and thousands to death
iPredict Update: Key To Win Fourth Election But Hand Over To Bennett By End Of 2017
New Zealand Weekly Economic and Political Update
KEY TO WIN FOURTH ELECTION BUT HAND OVER TO BENNETT BY END OF 2017
John Key is expected to win an historic fourth term but then hand over the prime ministership to Paula Bennett by the end of 2017, according to the combined wisdom of the 8000+ registered traders on New Zealand’s predictions market, iPredict. All current ministers expect trade minister Tim Groser are expected to remain ministers until the end of the year, with Murray McCully and Nick Smith currently the most vulnerable. Judith Collins is expected to be re-appointed a minister before the next election. Growth and unemployment forecasts have worsened and two cuts to the Official Cash Rate are expected by the end of the year. Andrew Little appears safe as leader of the Labour Party.
New Zealand Politics:
· John Key is expected to remain National leader until the end of 2016 (89% probability, steady compared with last week) and has just a 69% probability of being National leader on Nomination Day (up from 48% last week). Mr Key has just a 17% probability of remaining National leader until the end of 2017 (down from 19% last week)
· Paula Bennett remains the favourite to become National Party leader if a vacancy arises (35%, down from 38% last week), followed by Judith Collins on 23% (up from 20%)
· Andrew Little is expected to remain Labour leader until at least the end of 2016 (76% probability, up from 75% last week) and has a 77% probability of being Labour leader on Nomination Day (down from 79% last week). Mr Little has a 54% probability of remaining Labour leader until the end of 2017 (down from 56% last week)
· All ministers except Trade & Climate Change Minister Tim Groser are expected to remain ministers until the end of the year. The most vulnerable are Murray McCully, with a 38% probability of departing as Foreign Minister this year, and Nick Smith, with a 31% probability of departing as a minister this year.
· Judith Collins has a 35% probability of being appointed to Cabinet this year (down from 48% last week) and a 73% probability of being appointed before the next election (up from 62%)
· Tim Groser is expected to be New Zealand’s next Ambassador to the United States (94% probability, up from 93% last week) and Maureen Pugh is expected to become eligible to be a list MP before the next election (95% probability, steady)
· Phil Goff is expected to stand for the Auckland mayoralty (96% probability, up from 93% last week) as is Maurice Williamson (80% probability, up from 71%). There is an 87% probability of a by-election in Mt Roskill before the next general election (up from 86% last week) and a 53% probability of a by-election in Pakuranga (steady)
· Next general election expected in 2017 (95% probability, steady compared with last week) with a turnout of 75% (steady)
· Forecast party vote shares at next election:
o National 44.5% (up from 44.4% last week)
o Labour 34.1% (down from 34.5%)
o Greens 11.1% (steady)
o NZ First 7.8% (down from 7.9%)
o Others 2.6% (up from 2.2%)
· NZ First has a 77% probability of holding the balance of power after the next election (up from 76% last week). If NZ First does hold the balance of power, there is a 55% probability it will back National on confidence in supply (up from 50% last week), a 43% probability it will back Labour on confidence and supply (down from 50% last week) and a 2% probability it would sit on the crossbenches (up from 0%)
· National prime minister expected after 2017 General Election (63% probability, up from 62% last week)
· David Carter is expected to be New Zealand’s next High Commissioner to the United Kingdom (83% probability, steady compared last week) and Gerry Brownlee has a 71% probability of being the next New Zealand Speaker (steady compared with last week), ahead of Anne Tolley on 27% (steady)
New Zealand Business & Economics:
· Average Auckland house price expected to rise from $828,502 in May to:
o $839,385 in June (up from $831,273 last week)
o $842,140 in July (up from $834,990)
o $847,900 in August (up from $840,440)
o $850,860 in September (new stocks)
· The average Auckland house price is expected to reach $1,000,000 in the second half of 2018 (55% probability, down from 62% last week)
· Fonterra’s final payout (before retentions) expected to be:
o $4.67 in 2014/15 (up from $4.65 last week)
o $5.50 in 2015/16 (up from $5.41)
o $5.97 in 2016/17 (down from $6.05)
o $6.15 in 2017/18 (steady))
· Quarterly GDP growth expected to be:
o 0.61% in the June quarter (down from 0.66% last week)
o 0.83% in the September quarter (down from 0.90%)
o 0.95% in the December quarter (down from 0.98%)
· Annual growth expected to be 2.61% in the 2015 calendar year (down from 3.41% last week)
· Unemployment expected to be:
o 5.54% in the June quarter (up from 5.51% last week)
o 5.42% in the September quarter (up from 5.40%)
o 5.37% in the December quarter (steady)
o 5.45% in the March quarter (steady)
· New Zealand pay gaps in 2014/15 expected to be:
o Gender 9.95% (steady compared with last week)
o Maori 12.28% (steady)
o Pacific 23.12% (steady)
o Asian 20.43% (steady)
· Current account deficit expected to be:
o 3.70% of GDP in the March quarter (up from 3.51% last week)
o 3.80% in the June quarter (up from 3.57%)
o 3.53% in the September quarter (up from 3.39%)
o 3.49% in the December quarter (steady)
· Annual inflation expected to be:
o 0.44% to end of June 2015 quarter (down from 0.45% last week)
o 0.58% to end of September 2015 quarter (up from 0.50%)
o 0.92% to end of December 2015 quarter (up from 0.82%)
o 1.56% to end of March 2016 quarter (steady)
o 1.49% to end of June 2016 quarter (up from 1.47%)
o 1.50% to end of September 2016 quarter (steady)
o 1.52% to end of December 2016 quarter (steady)
· Official Cash Rate priced to be:
o 3.070% on 23 July (down from 3.270% last week)
o 2.952% on 10 September (down from 3.194%)
o 2.909% on 29 October (down from 3.157%)
o 2.864% on 10 December (down from 3.111%)
o 2.854% on 28 January 2016 (down from 3.102%)
o 2.838% on 10 March 2016 (down from 3.081%)
o 2.828% on 28 April 2016 (down from 3.071%)
o 2.806% on 9 June 2016 (down from 3.058%)
· This implies the OCR is more likely than not to be cut on 23 July 2015 to 3.00% and then to 2.75% on 10 December 2015
· 37% probability of a fiscal surplus in 2014/15 (up from 5% last week)
· Fiscal balance expected to be:
o -0.13% of GDP in 2014/15 (up from -0.32% last week)
o 0.21% of GDP in 2015/16 (up from 0.20%)
o 0.88% of GDP in 2016/17 (down from 1.26%)
o 1.89% of GDP in 2017/18 (down from 1.96%)
· New Zealand dollar not expected to reach parity with Australian dollar by the end of 2015 (only 3.7% probability it will achieve parity, down from 13% last week)
· Stocks on tourism arrivals are now available for trading
Foreign Affairs/Constitution:
· Andy Burnham is favourite to be the next leader of the UK Labour Party (52% probability, steady compared with last week), ahead of Liz Kendall (23%, down from 32%) and Yvette Cooper (17%, up from 15%)
· Boris Johnson has a 31% probability of being prime minister before 2020 (down from 35% last week)
· UK expected to vote to stay in EU by end of 2018 (75% probability, steady compared with last week)
· Socialist Workers’ Party expected to defeat People’s Party in next Spanish election (67% probability, steady compared with last week)
· All Eurozone countries, including Greece, expected to remain in Euro in 2015 (23% probability of an announcement of a departure this year, up from 21% last week). There is only a 40% probability of a departure by the end of 2017 (up from 38% last week)
· Tony Abbott is expected to be leader of the Australian Liberal Party on nomination day (69% probability, up from 63% last week) and Bill Shorten is expected to be Labor leader (81% probability, down from 90%)
· Liberals ahead of Labor for next Australian Federal election in 2016 (69% probability of Liberal win, up from 63% last week)
· Hillary Clinton is favoured to be the Democratic Party’s nominee for US president in 2016 and to be elected to that office (50% probability, up from 49% last week). Jeb Bush has a 40% probability of being the Republican nominee (up from 33% last week) followed by Marco Rubio (23%, steady) and Scott Walker (22%, up from 20%)
· There is only a 16% probability New Zealand will sign the Trans-Pacific Partnership this year (up from 9% last week), and the Trans-Pacific Partnership is not expected to be ratified by the US Congress before 1 July 2017 (only 40% probability it will be, down from 43% last week)
· Helen Clark’s chances of being the next UN Secretary General are 25% (steady compared with last week)
· There is a 10% probability New Zealand will become a republic by 2020 (steady compared with last week)
· There is an 80% probability New Zealanders will vote to keep the current flag
Notes:
· iPredict Ltd is owned by Victoria University of Wellington. Details on the company and its stocks can be found at www.ipredict.co.nz.
· The weekly economic and political update is prepared by Exceltium Ltd on a pro bono basis and is based on a snapshot taken at a random time each week. This week’s was taken at 1:59 pm today.
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]]>Jane Kelsey on Fast Track saga moves back to Senate
Source: Professor Jane Kelsey.
[poll id=”15″]The latest Obama-Republican Party manoeuvre to secure Fast Track negotiating authority for the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) succeeded with a narrow ten-vote majority in the House of Representatives, but the saga is far from over, according to Auckland University law professor Jane Kelsey.
‘The Bill now returns to the Senate where its fate is far from certain’, Kelsey said.
To get Fast Track Bill passed in the House today, the companion measure that provides support for workers who lose their jobs through deals like the TPPA was dropped.
Yet the inclusion of the Trade Adjustment Assistance package, as well as promises to vote to reauthorise the Export-Import Bank, were prerequisites for several of the 14 Democrat Senators who voted for the original Fast Track bill in the Senate.
Key Senate Democrats are now demanding that both those measures are passed in both Houses before they vote on Fast Track, because they don’t trust the Republicans. Republicans in the Senate and House of Representatives are deeply opposed to both measures.
Obama himself has said he won’t approve Fast Track without the Trade Assistance package.
The Senate process requires a 60-vote super-majority for the version of the Fast Track Bill approved by the House before it can bypass a filibuster and move to a formal vote. If just three of the original 14 Democrats withdraw their support from the Fast Track law, the deal will not get to a vote in the Senate.
That next phase of the saga is expected within the next week.
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]]>Lori Wallach: U.S. House Punts Fast Track Problem Back to Senate
Path to Approval Unclear and Thus TPP’s Fate in Congress Uncertain
By Lori Wallach, Director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch.
[poll id=”15″] [caption id="attachment_4640" align="alignleft" width="300"]
Lori Wallach, Director, Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch.[/caption]
Today, the House employed yet another procedural gimmick to punt the Fast Track problem back to the Senate, where its fate remains at best unclear as Americans’ concerns that more of the same trade policy would kill more jobs and push down our wages remain unaddressed.
That two years of effort by a vast corporate coalition, the White House and Republican leaders – and weeks of procedural gimmicks and deals swapped for yes votes – has resulted in this continuing standoff and no Fast Track enacted spotlights the dim prospects not only for adoption of Fast Track but also for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
Because Republican House members would not support the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) part of the Senate-passed Fast Track package last week, the Republican leadership today had to resort to a Fast Track-only vote. But what exactly that achieves is unclear.
Senate Democrats, including those needed to move the stand-alone Fast Track bill, are demanding that the TAA be reinserted into the Fast Track bill or be passed by both chambers before agreeing to support Fast Track. In addition, key Democratic senators are insisting on the fulfillment by Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of a promised vote to reauthorize the Export-Import bank – which was the condition for the deciding bloc of Senate Democrats to support cloture on Fast Track in the first instance in May.
Meanwhile, House Republican lawmakers remain strongly opposed to TAA and Export-Import Bank reauthorization. As House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi stated today, there is no clear path for enactment of TAA. Yet yesterday, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said that President Obama requires both Fast Track and TAA to come to his desk.
For more, see the New York Times.
]]>Law Society Supports Time-blocking judicial lists – where appropriate
MIL OSI – Source: New Zealand Law Society – Time-blocking judicial lists supported where appropriate
The New Zealand Law Society says it supports extending time-blocking of Judge and Community Magistrates lists across District Courts, where the particular court considers it appropriate for its size and nature.
The Law Society has provided the Ministry of Justice with feedback from criminal practitioners following a ministry request about the possibility of time-blocking Judge and Community Magistrate lists across District Courts.
At present there is time-blocking of lists in a number of District Courts. Lists are booked into time-blocks of no longer than a few hours and courts book two or three blocks in a day, depending on their size and needs.
Commenting on the feedback it received, the Law Society says waiting time can be disruptive to clients, their employers and support parties, and also for lawyers – particularly legal aid providers who do not get paid for waiting time.
“However, time-blocking lists may be counter-productive in courts with insufficient volume,” the Law Society says. “Some courts have alternative methods for delivering efficiencies, such as grouping counsel’s matters together.”
Last updated on the 18th June 2015
–]]>Statistics NZ reports: Weak primary industries slow GDP growth
After a series of strong increases, GDP increased 0.2 percent in the March 2015 quarter, Statistics New Zealand said today. The lower growth reflected a 2.9 percent fall in primary industries (agriculture, forestry, and mining) – the largest fall since September 2010. Despite lower quarterly growth, annual growth was still strong, at 3.2 percent.
“Oil and gas were big factors in the lower GDP growth this quarter,” national accounts manager Gary Dunnet said. “There was less extraction and exploration, as international prices fell.”
Agriculture decreased 2.3 percent in the March 2015 quarter. Lower milk production was behind the decrease, in a quarter that had drought conditions and lower dairy prices. Forestry production and exports of forestry products were also down.
A 2.4 percent increase in retail trade and accommodation helped to offset the decrease in primary industries. Retail trade and accommodation has had continued strong increases and now has its largest annual growth in almost a decade, at 6.1 percent. Possible contributors this quarter include the 2015 Cricket World Cup and more visitors during Chinese New Year than in the past. International tourist spending in New Zealand increased 2.3 percent this quarter, and there was an increase in arts and recreation (including sport, recreation, and gambling services), and international air travel.
It was a mixed picture for the rest of the economy this quarter. On the expenditure measure of GDP, household spending increased 0.7 percent, while investment fell 1.9 percent. An increase in construction investment was offset by large decreases in both machinery and equipment investment.
The size of the economy (in current prices) was $239 billion for the year ended March 2015.
Authorised by Liz MacPherson, Government Statistician, 18 June 2015 – – ]]>Jane Kelsey: US Desperation on Fast Track Plummets to New Depths
Source: Professor Jane Kelsey.
[caption id="attachment_1844" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Professor Jane Kelsey.[/caption]
‘In the latest desperate attempt to haul Fast Track authority and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) back from the brink, the Republicans in the US House of Representatives have launched a new vote for tomorrow by tagging it on to an unrelated bill on retirement programmes for firefighters’, according to Professor Jane Kelsey from the University of Auckland.
The previous Bill failed after being split into two votes, as a procedural manoeuvre intended to defeat overwhelming opposition of the President’s own Democrats in the House to Fast Track and the TPPA backfired.
The first vote, on assistance for US workers who lose their jobs because of free trade agreements, was resoundingly defeated as Democrats argued it did not go far enough to compensate for the TPPA. The second vote, specifically on Fast Track or Trade Promotion Authority, passed with a narrow margin of seven votes, almost all of them Republicans.
An interim measure by the House allowed the legislation to be brought back any time before 30 July.
‘The latest tactic from the Republicans is to promote Fast Track as a stand alone Bill, in the hope that the original numbers stick’, Kelsey said.
‘Yesterday, the line was that there would be no vote on a stand-alone bill this week. Today, we hear the vote is scheduled for tomorrow, but on a Bill that links Fast Track to legislation on pensions for fire-fighters and law enforcement officers.’
Even if the latest Bill gets through the House, it would have to go back to the Senate for endorsement because it would be different from the Bill they originally passed. It is very uncertain what the fate of this would be in the Senate where Democrat support was contingent on the trade assistance package.
Professor Kelsey observed that Obama himself would face a quandary. He has vowed not to support a Fast Track Bill that does not contain the trade assistance component. He also faces a deteriorating relationship to his own Party over a deal that is profoundly unpopular with the core Democratic constituency.
For further detail and analysis see: House GOP Eyes Clean Fast-Track Trade Bill Without TAA Funding http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/16/gop-trade-bill_n_7598488.html
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]]>byWADE…new technology gives ISIS advantage…
cartoons byWADE on eveningreport.nz You can follow WADE (from a safe digital distance) at www.facebook.com/bywade or look at more stuff and buy things in obscene volumes to show how successful and cool you are at www.iammenotyou.com…]]>
Commissioner appointed at Southern DHB
MIL OSI – Source: Association of Salaried Medical Specialists – Commissioner appointed at Southern DHB
Health Minister Jonathan Coleman has today written to Southern DHB dismissing all members of the Board and replacing it with a Commissioner.
“The financial problems at Southern DHB are longstanding. I do not have confidence that the current governance arrangements are suitable for delivering on the changes required in Southern DHB,” says Dr Coleman.
“Southern is forecasting a final deficit of $27 million for the current financial year. That figure has effectively doubled in the last six months.
“The DHB has also forecast that its deficit position will further increase in 2015/16 to between $30 million and $42 million – this accounts for over half the combined deficit of all 20 DHBs. This situation of fluctuating forecasts and progressively worsening deficits cannot continue.
“The Government is committed to the redevelopment of Dunedin Hospital and the provision of high quality health services to all the people of the Southern region.
“All DHBs are funded according to the same population-based funding formula. This formula includes adjustments to recognise rural populations, age and other demographic issues.
“In a tight fiscal environment, all DHBs need to use available funding effectively. No other DHB has failed to control its finances in the way that Southern has.”
Kathy Grant has been appointed Commissioner and takes up the role on 18 June 2015. After discussions with Mrs Grant, she has indicated that she intends to appoint Graham Crombie and Richard Thomson as deputies. A third deputy with a strong clinical background will be appointed by the end of the month.
“Mrs Grant is from Otago and brings significant local knowledge. She has significant business and governance experience and a proven track record in turning around struggling organisations,” says Dr Coleman.
“The team will bring together a mix of strong financial, governance and clinical skills.
“I would like to thank the Board members for their work to date. My decision is not intended to devalue their efforts and achievements. However, a new approach is now necessary.
“My decision is based on the need for a new approach to the DHB’s longstanding financial issues, and to help move the DHB to a more sustainable position over time.”
Kathy Grant bio
Kathy Grant was born in Otago and has spent most of her life in the region.
Mrs Grant currently works as a consultant in the legal practice of Gallaway Cook Allan in Dunedin. She has significant governance experience. Mrs Grant holds several current directorships including Chair of the Otago Polytechnic Council (appointed 2010), a trustee of Sport Otago (appointed 2007), and a director of Dunedin City Holdings Ltd (appointed 2012), Dunedin City Treasury Ltd (appointed 2013), and Dunedin International Airport Ltd (appointed 2008). She was also a member of the Anglican Family Care Board (2009-2013).
Mrs Grant has been on the Board of Trustees for several schools and colleges, and a previous member of the University of Otago Council (2007-2010). She was also previously Chair of the Dunedin College of Education Council (2001-2006).
Graham Crombie bio
Graham Crombie is a Dunedin local. He attended Bayfield High School and Otago University. Mr Crombie has a strong background in accountancy, with a proven record in high level assessments of the sustainability of health organisations. He was President of the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants (2008) and went on to become chair of the organisation (2009-2014).
Mr Crombie also has lengthy governance experience. He is currently chair of Dunedin City Holdings (appointed 2012), Dunedin City Treasury (appointed 2013), Otago Museum Trust Board (appointed 2011), Dunedin Venues (appointed 2015) and director of Surf Life Saving NZ (appointed 2013). He was also the independent chair of South Link Health (1999-2009).
Richard Thomson bio
Richard Thomson was born in Invercargill and attended Otago University. After specialising as a Clinical Psychologist he took up a lecturer role at Otago Medical School. He is now a successful businessman.
Mr Thomson has key insights into Southern DHB. He was chair of Otago DHB (2001-2009) and became a Board member after Otago DHB merged with Southland DHB (2009-2015).
Mr Thomson is currently serving his second term on the Dunedin City Council.
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Twyford says Government should heed Productivity Commission’s recommendation
MIL OSI – Source: New Zealand Labour Party – Government urged to create development body
[caption id="attachment_3025" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Phil Twyford.[/caption]The Government should adopt the Productivity Commission’s recommendation to create an urban development authority to drive large-scale renewal projects in our biggest cities, Labour’s Housing spokesperson Phil Twyford says.
“The Kiwi dream of home ownership is at its lowest in 60 years. A majority of New Zealanders are renters now. Bringing down the cost of urban land will make housing more affordable and make home ownership more achievable.
“The cost of the housing crisis is measured in frustrated first home buyers, and families living in garages.
“It is going to take the kind of active hands-on role by government that National has been so reluctant to adopt as the housing crisis has deepened over the last few years.
“The Productivity Commission’s draft report on Using Land for Housing is a useful and timely contribution to the debate on how to fix the housing crisis.
“A mishmash of rules and policies have made land much more expensive than it needs to be.
“The Commission is right to call for the Government to be more directive about Councils’ local plans. Labour’s policy of a National Policy Statement on housing under the RMA will give local authorities clear direction on increasing the supply of land and housing because building more and better housing is a matter of national interest.
“If we don’t build a better range of affordable housing in parts of the city where people want to live, then we are pricing our kids out of ever owning their own homes,” Phil Twyford says.
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Police funding cuts letting criminals get away – Kelvin Davis
MIL OSI – Source: New Zealand Labour Party – Police funding cuts letting criminals get away
National’s cuts to police funding are making it harder to solve cases and letting criminals get off scot-free, says Labour’s Police spokesperson Kelvin Davis.
“The Police Commissioner admitted today the best New Zealanders may hope for when it comes to vehicle crimes is a 10 per cent resolution rate. That’s not good enough.
“In Auckland, just 6.9 percent of vehicle crimes are solved, down from 10.2 per cent in 2009. Just 7.5 per cent of burglaries are solved, down from 9.9 per cent in 2009.
“In other words, more than 92 per cent of criminals in those areas know they can get away with it.
“If the Government is interested in a prevention strategy then making sure criminals know there is a high chance they will be caught would be a good start.
“National’s cuts in this year’s Budget will only make the problem worse.
“The Criminal Case Resolution budget has been cut by $1.78m and the Criminal Investigation Budget slashed by $1.26m.
“At the same time the numbers of general duties constables have dropped by 18 per cent across the country, with cuts in 11 of 12 Police Districts since 2009.
“Police Minister Michael Woodhouse needs to increase funding for crime resolution and criminal investigations as well as reinstate the $15m taken from the overall Police budget since last year.
“New Zealanders need to know that if they are victims of crime, the criminal is likely to be caught,” says Kelvin Davis.
Contact: Kelvin Davis 027 476 9638
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Australia signs landmark trade agreement with China
MIL OSI – Source: Prime Minister of Australia – Australia signs landmark trade agreement with China
[caption id="attachment_2123" align="alignleft" width="252"]
Australia Prime Minister Tony Abbott.[/caption]Today, Australia signed a landmark Free Trade Agreement with China, our largest trading partner, with total trade worth almost $160 billion in 2013-14, and a growing source of investment.
The China-Australia Free Trade Agreement (ChAFTA) will lock in existing trade and provide the catalyst for future growth across a range of areas including goods, services and investment.
The Agreement secures better market access for Australia to the world’s second largest economy, improves our competitive position in a rapidly growing market, promotes increased two-way investment and reduces import costs. It is a win for households and businesses alike.
On day one of the ChAFTA, more than 85 per cent of Australian goods exports will be tariff free, rising to 95 per cent on full implementation.
Australia’s agriculture sector will be able to capitalise on its well-deserved reputation as a clean, green producer of premium food and beverage products. Tariffs will be progressively abolished for Australia’s $13 billion dairy industry. Australia’s beef and sheep farmers will also gain from the phased abolition of tariffs ranging from 12-25 per cent and all tariffs on Australian horticulture will be eliminated.
Tariffs will be removed on almost all Australian resources and energy products, including the 8 per cent tariff on aluminium oxide on the first day of the Agreement, benefitting our exports worth around $1.3 billion a year. The tariffs on coking coal will be removed on day one, with the tariff on thermal coal being phased out over two years.
Tariffs will be also eliminated on a wide range of Australian manufactured goods, including pharmaceutical products and car engines.
ChAFTA completes a historic trifecta of trade agreements with our top three export markets, accounting for more than 55 per cent of our total goods and services exports. Together, these agreements will enhance our vital trade and investment relationships in the region, assist the process of reform, and foster greater prosperity.
Our FTAs with Korea and Japan are only months old and we are already seeing increased exports compared to a year ago – like a 26 per cent increase in frozen beef prime cuts to Korea and a massive 84 per cent increase in the same product to Japan. Macadamia exports to Korea have more than doubled, and Japan is importing 82 per cent more of our rolled or flaked oats. Increases have also been seen in wine, lamb, horticulture and many other products, and we look forward to further positive outcomes once ChAFTA comes into force.
Today’s signing by Minister for Trade and Investment Andrew Robb and his counterpart, Chinese Commerce Minister Gao Hucheng, is yet further proof that Australia is open for business, and is a testament to the strength of the Australia-China relationship.
The Agreement will enter into force after the completion of domestic legal and parliamentary processes in China and Australia, including review by the Australian Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Treaties, and the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee. Both countries are working to complete these steps and bring the Agreement into force as soon as possible.
The full text of the Agreement is now publicly available online at: dfat.gov.au/chafta, along with materials to assist in understanding the Agreement.
17 June 2015
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NZ: Joint newsroom for Herald and ZB an ‘investment in journalism’
MIL OSI Analysis – Pacific Media Centre/Pacific Media Watch – Report by Victoria White.
Current New Zealand Herald newsrooms in the NZME building on Albert Street in Auckland will be moved into an integrated newsroom on Victoria Street West in the near future. Image: NZ Herald.
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Item: 9303
Victoria White AUCKLAND (Te Waha Nui/ Pacific Media Watch): The New Zealand Herald and Newstalk ZB will combine their Auckland newsrooms in November in a move that reflects the news industry’s continual progression toward converged media. The integrated newsroom will be housed in new $190 million premises on Victoria Street West. Under the new arrangement, journalists from the Herald and Newstalk ZB will have their distinct areas in the unified newsroom, but will share a centralised news desk that will direct the flow of news content through the day. Herald editor Shayne Currie said he believed the unified newsroom would revolutionise how its journalists worked. “It’s about bringing together all those different platforms, and making sure we’re all together as one.” Currie said it was “not a cost-cutting exercise at all”. But there would be efficiencies because of a new ability to better plan for stories, whether they were breaking news or a major project like a Rugby World Cup. “So there’ll be a lot more planning around how we present our content and journalism across all those different platforms, and we’ll be working together very closely to ensure that our audiences get the best content possible.” Major investment Currie said the relocation was a “major investment in journalism and our journalists”, and reflected the massive change the media industry was experiencing through the digital revolution. It recognised today’s journalists had to be “agile and versatile”, he said. Part of the project would focus on “upskilling” Herald journalists to ensure they were proficient in at least two media platforms, whether that was print and digital, digital and radio, or radio and video. It was important reporters had “the right tools and the right skills to be able to report the best stories”. “It’ll be the best newsroom in the country by a long distance, and one of the best in the world,” Currie said. The New Zealand and Media Entertainment (NZME) move echoes the increasing number of integrated newsrooms internationally, which reveal the growing role of multi-platform media in journalism. Mediaworks Meanwhile, TV3 owner Mediaworks announced the integration of its newsroom in December, a move which will unify 200 staff from different media platforms into one news team, and will also be operational later this year. The bureau chief of 3 News, Keith Slater, said a strong emphasis of the newsroom will be on digital news. Its journalists would also have to write for its online platforms and operate in the social media world as well. “These are the things that are just going to become common practice. “All of this is tied with convergence. If you get there first, you don’t shoot pictures of a train crash then jump back in your car and drive back [to the newsroom] and put them on air. You can’t do that anymore.” Slater said news relied on consistency, accuracy and credibility, of which the most important, despite the pressures of the digital age, was still credibility. ‘Huge’ cultural shift Massey University communications lecturer Dr Catherine Strong believes the role of convergent media has been growing internationally over the past 15 years. It was “a huge shift in the culture of the newsroom” which would continue, she said. Media commentator and former editor of the Herald Gavin Ellis said integrated media were indeed part of a trend. “All media now deal in the written word, audio, video, so it makes sense to have a structure that reflects this new reality,” he said. “The fact that journalism now involves production of news on multiple platforms means convergence is a natural progression.” NZME currently has separate newsrooms for print and radio, on Albert and Cook streets, respectively.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 New Zealand Licence.
]]>Putting enough land in New Zealand for future housing needs
NewsroomPlus.com
Contributed by Stephen Olsen – part 1 of a series
Productivity Commission chair Murray Sherwin is a past taskmaster of presenting reports, and followed a reasonably tight set of talking points at a media briefing earlier today just ahead of the release of the Commission’s latest two-step production – a draft report simply titled Using land for housing.
With housing issues almost continually in the headlines since last year’s Election campaigning, and court action looming over the legality of the rights that can be exercised over public land in Auckland, the timing couldn’t have been more apt.
A beginner’s guide to the draft report – Using land for housing
As with all of the Productivity Commission’s professionally produced reports to date – it began operating on 1 April 2011 – this is no ‘once over lightly’ treatment.
At 358 pages long you will want to hold off hitting print on this draft report too quickly, and to help you get your head around the overall structure the device of a ‘Cut to the chase’ executive summary is made available – and there is always the media release to refer to as well.
Cutting to the numbers, there are 120 findings to digest, accompanied by 38 recommendations that have the potential to keep the following very, very busy:
- Cabinet
- Parliamentary law-makers
- Territorial local authorities (local government)
- MBIE – Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment
- Statistics New Zealand
- CCOs: Auckland Transport, Watercare
- Treasury
R3.2
The Ministry for the Environment should explore the potential to develop an Urban Feasibility Model that New Zealand local authorities can use.
R3.3
High-growth territorial authorities should review their zoning rules for rural land, to ensure they provide the right balance of promoting efficient use of land for housing and minimising reverse sensitivity risks.
R3.4
Large land price differentials between different types of zones, such as those observed in Auckland, should be a trigger for local authorities to review the adequacy of their land supplies and zoning decisions.
R3.5
A new legislative avenue should be designed to focus spatial plans on activities that:
- are of high importance to the functioning of cities and the provision of development capacity for housing (eg, land supply, infrastructure provision, transport services);
- relate closely to the use of land or space and the management of negative externalities; and
- are most efficiently dealt with at a local level and through local authorities.
R3.6
The new planning avenue should be voluntary to allow local authorities to choose the statutory planning mechanisms that best suit their circumstances.
R3.7
Future plans prepared under the new legislative avenue should be developed in partnership with the full set of central government actors whose services matter for the functioning of cities. Given the fiscal implications of greater central government involvement in spatial planning, both Cabinet and the relevant local authority should approve such plans.
R3.8
The new legislative planning avenue should include processes to encourage robust regulatory analysis and development, as section 32 of the Resource Management Act is designed to do.
Chapter 4: Supplying and releasing land
R4.1
High-growth local authorities should express their land supply targets in terms of zoned and serviced land and report publicly on their performance.
R4.2
Local authorities should monitor and report on dwelling completions and net changes in the dwelling stock, relative to expected and actual population and household growth.
R4.3
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, Statistics New Zealand and territorial local authorities should work together to improve the quality of official statistics available from the building consent form as a priority.
R4.4
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, in conjunction with relevant local authorities, should inventory public land holdings in all high-growth cities to identify sites that could be used for housing.
R4.5
Local authorities should set policies for the publishing of and consulting on draft plan reviews or plan changes of interest to the wider community ahead of notification, unless compelling reasons exist for not doing so.
R4.6
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment and the Ministry for the Environment should, once the work of the Auckland and Christchurch Independent Hearings Panels (IHPs) is complete, evaluate the IHP processes, with a view to deciding whether IHPs should become a permanent feature of the planning system.
Chapter 5: Regulations and approval processes
R5.1
Urban territorial authorities should remove District Plan balcony / private open space requirements for apartments.
R5.2
Once the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment has completed planned work on updating Building Code rules and guidance related to air quality, lighting, acoustics and access in multi-unit dwellings, local authorities should review minimum apartment size rules in their District Plans, with a view to removing them.
R5.3
Urban territorial authorities should remove District Plan minimum parking requirements, and make more use of traffic demand management techniques.
R5.4
Local authorities should undertake robust cost-benefit analyses before considering the introduction of building height limits, and should lift current limits where it cannot be demonstrated that the benefits outweigh the costs.
R5.5
Local authorities should review District Plan controls on the design and construction of buildings or dwellings that exceed standards set under the Building Act, with a view to removing them.
R5.6
The Government should introduce amendments to the RMA to clarify the role and importance of housing and urban environments.
R5.7
In reviewing their District Plans, local authorities should move more residential land-use activities into “permitted” or “restricted discretionary” status.
Chapter 6: Planning and delivering infrastructure
R6.1
When councils refer to the supply of land for housing, they should be clear about the readiness of land for building (eg, un-zoned but planned-for future zoning; zoned; zoned and serviced; zoned, serviced and consented).
R6.2
Councils should identify areas where there is existing infrastructure capacity and ensure that planning rules do not prevent intensification from occurring in these areas.
R6.3
Councils should prioritise the development of up-to-date asset management information systems. This should be supported by recruiting and developing staff with the skills and expertise needed to make effective use of these systems, and ensuring that the information from asset management systems is integrated into decision-making processes.
R6.4
Councils should pursue opportunities to make more efficient use of existing infrastructure assets including through greater use of user charges where this can reduce demands on infrastructure.
R6.5
Government should adopt the Local Government Infrastructure Advisory Group’s recommendation to amend the Land Transport Management Act to allow pricing on existing roads where there is a business case that enables effective network optimisation.
R6.6
Councils’ asset management systems should feed into decision making about optimal infrastructure standards. The data used to inform standard-setting should be shared openly with the development community.
R6.7
If councils determine that a good case to change infrastructure standards exists, then developments that already have consent should be exempt from the change. Alternatively, developers should be compensated for any additional costs incurred as a result of the change.
Chapter 7: Paying for infrastructure
R7.1
Evaluation of the financial prudence and reporting regulations should monitor how the regulations affect councils’ ability to provide infrastructure to support growth and review whether 15% is the most appropriate debt-servicing ratio for high-growth councils.
R7.2
Councils should include information in their development contributions policy about the relationship between dwelling floor area and the cost of providing infrastructure services. If smaller dwellings impose lower costs on the infrastructure network, this should be reflected in lower charges.
R7.3
The Local Government Act should be amended to make clear that developers may formally request that councils construct growth-enabling infrastructure, to be repaid through targeted rates on the properties that benefit from the infrastructure connections, and obliging Councils to consider such requests.
Chapter 8: Governance of transport and water infrastructure
R10.2
There is a place for a UDA to lead and coordinate residential development at scale in both greenfield and brownfield settings, working in partnership with private sector developers. Legislation would be required to establish and give powers (such as compulsory acquisition) to one or more UDCs in New Zealand.
* Stephen Olsen is an associate member of the Parliamentary Press Gallery. This NewsRoom_Plus contribution was prepared with assistance from Olexander Barnes and Sylvester Racule.
NewsRoom Digest: Top NZ News Items for June 16, 2015
This edition of NewsRoom_Digest contains 3 media release snippets and 5 links of the day from Tuesday 16th June.
Top stories in the current news cycle include confusion remains over whether the Government is legally obliged to offer central Auckland iwi right of first refusal over land intended for housing, Minister for Primary Industries Nathan Guy defends the export of kauri logs says it’s a good way to promote the country and Social Development Minister Anne Tolley says people who apply for successive food grants are being offered budgeting support to help them manage their money.
NEWSROOM_PLUS ‘EXTRAs’ Two articles published by our Wellington team today were:
http://newsroomplus.com/2015/06/16/a-taste-of-great-britain-in-wellington/ http://newsroomplus.com/2015/06/16/campaigns-1/
SNIPPETS OF THE DAY
Share Market For Small Businesses Open: Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Paul Goldsmith today welcomed the first listing on NZX’s new securities market, called NXT.
Drugs Seized On Ship: The New Zealand Defence Force frigate HMNZS TE KAHA has dealt drug smugglers in the Western Indian Ocean a blow, seizing almost 260 kilograms of heroin worth NZ$235 million. The ship has been working with the Combined Maritime Forces (CMF), a US-led naval partnership which aims to prevent drug and people trafficking, piracy and terrorism, since May.
Only Two Weeks Left To Get A 50% Return On Your Kiwisaver Top Up: KiwiSaver members have just two weeks left to top up their accounts to qualify for the Government’s Member Tax Credits, says the Financial Services Council CEO Peter Neilson. Last year KiwiSaver members failed to pick up $400 million in member tax credits.
LINKS OF THE DAY
NZ NEEDS CLIMATE PLAN : An International Energy Agency report out today shows the need for New Zealand to develop a clear and practical plan to reduce domestic greenhouse gas emissions, the Green Party said. Click here for more : http://www.iea.org/newsroomandevents/pressreleases/2015/june/iea-sets-out-pillars-for-success-at-cop21.html
SIGN LANGUAGE INTERPRETER BACKS NZ SHAKEOUT : More information on New Zealand ShakeOut, including a link to the video, can be found at www.shakeout.govt.nz,https://www.facebook.com/NzGetThru andhttps://twitter.com/nzgetthru
UN GUIDEBOOK TO PREVENT CHILD LABOUR IN AGRICULTURE : A new handbook issued by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) will seek to establish guidelines intended to prevent the use of child labour across the world’s agricultural communities in an effort to tackle a problem that affects some one hundred million children globally, the United Nations agency announced today. Click here for more : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/293658/icode/
GRANTS TO BENEFIT NZ WRITERS : Research is a crucial part of the writing process. Copyright Licensing New Zealand (CLNZ) and the New Zealand Society of Authors (NZSA) Research Grants support New Zealand writers by providing assistance to writers who wish to undertake research for a fiction or non-fiction writing project. The 2015 application process opens on 19 June. For more infromation, see here: http://www.copyright.co.nz/Awards/CLNZ-NZSA-Research-Grants/
COMMISSION BEGINS INDUSTRY AND CONSUMER ENGAGEMENT ON IMS REVIEW : The Commerce Commission has released its first paper for industry and consumers as part of the review of input methodologies announced last week. A copy of the problem definition paper can be found here:http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/input-methodologies-2/input-methodologies-review/
And that’s our sampling of the day that was on Tuesday 16th June 2015.
Brought to EveningReport by Newsroom Digest. –]]>Government Extends Term for Acting GCSB Director Una Jagose
[caption id="attachment_4702" align="alignleft" width="220"] Acting GCSB director, Una Jagose.[/caption]The term of the current Acting Director of the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB), Una Jagose, has been extended to 31 March 2016, Minister Responsible for the GCSB, Christopher Finlayson, announced today.
“The Government has decided not to continue with the State Services Commission’s current recruitment process and instead extend Ms Jagose’s appointment as Acting Director,” Mr Finlayson said.
A wide-ranging review of New Zealand’s security and intelligence agencies, to be carried out by Dame Patsy Reddy and Sir Michael Cullen, was announced on 13 May 2015. The independent reviewers will report directly to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee by the end of February 2016.
“It is important that the GCSB has stable leadership during the review and Ms Jagose is performing very effectively as Acting Director,” Mr Finlayson said.
“The review of the security agencies may make findings and recommendations that affect the type of person we need to lead the GCSB.
“Once the findings of the review are known, and the Government has considered its response, the State Services Commission will carry out a new recruitment process.”
The GCSB is a Public Service department with its head office in Wellington. The Acting Director of the GCSB is appointed by the Minister Responsible for the GCSB.
Una Jagose has been Acting Director of the GCSB since 28 February 2015.
– –
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Greenpeace Activists say ShellNo! as oil rig departs for Arctic
Today, Shell Oil’s drilling rig — the Polar Pioneer — left port to drill in the Arctic.
Shell received government permission to drill in the Arctic this summer despite its history of failures and safety violations, the Obama Administration’s own study showing that there’s a 75 percent chance of a major Arctic spill within this century if we drill in the Chukchi Sea, and the devastating consequences Arctic drilling would have on our climate. It’s outrageous.
But this bleak news is fueling something powerful. While governments refuse to rein in big oil companies, ordinary people are stepping up. And a movement is growing between communities and across borders.
Here’s a snapshot of just the last 72 hours:
#ShellNO!
Shell’s first oil rig left the Port of Seattle for the Arctic this morning, but its departure didn’t go as planned. As the rig began to move, thirteen Greenpeace US activists formed a human blockade between it and the Arctic — holding it there for hours.
And that was just the beginning. More kayaktivists joined the protests on the water nearby: families, the Raging Grannies, former corporate executives, even people who came all the way from Alaska. All united in the same goal: to stop Shell from drilling in the Arctic.
Even now — as Shell’s rig moves towards the Pacific Ocean — it is met by protest after protest. And it certainly shouldn’t expect to be welcomed with open arms once it crosses out of U.S. waters.
Toast the Coast
Across the border from the kayaktivists, 5,000 people came together at Toast the Coast in Vancouver, CA last Saturday to celebrate their coastline and to reject Arctic oil drilling. Indigenous peoples, environmental activists, artists, and even celebrities Jane Fonda and Rachel McAdams joined firmly in opposition to Shell’s plans.
Jane Fonda spoke to the crowd about her motivation for doing something to stop Arctic drilling: “I want my grandchildren to look back and say ‘Grandma was on the right side of history.’”
Then she added, “If I get arrested [protesting Shell] it will bring even more attention to the issue — I hope I get arrested.”
It sounds like Shell can’t count on an uneventful trip through Canada’s waters, either.
What happens in the Arctic doesn’t stay in the Arctic
These last three days show that Shell’s vision of the future — where Arctic drilling is an inevitability — is not something people are willing to accept.
In Canada, the United States, and around the world over 7 million people believe in a better future and are ready to fight Arctic drilling. Whether it is by scaling an Arctic rig as Greenpeace volunteers did earlier this year, hopping in a kayak, or sending a letter to President Obama, people are joining together and stepping up for what they believe.
If Shell wants to drill in the Arctic this summer, it is in for one hell of a fight.
Take action now to join the growing movement to save the Arctic!
Dawn Bickett is a Content Editor for the Americas at Greenpeace.
– – ]]>Ten of 10 students get it: fair for teachers, good for us
NewsroomPlus.com
Contributed by Daniel Haines, Political & Auckland Correspondent
“Our conditions of employment are the conditions of your children’s education”.
These powerful words were the backdrop for the New Zealand Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) campaign launch in Auckland last night, aligned to bargaining on behalf of 17,500 teachers for improvements to teachers’ pay and conditions.
The PPTA’s position is that over the last five years teachers’ pay has fallen behind inflation, which means that teachers have taken a pay cut. The government says that they want to make teaching a top choice career, and the PPTA, the union and professional association for secondary teachers, is negotiating with the government to fix this, and to make sure great teachers are attracted to and kept in our schools.
There is no doubt that Secondary teachers do a massively important job. They work hard and their students know what they do for them – a key platform for the campaign (see below).
Held at Trades Hall on Great North Road in Grey Lynn this campaign launch opened with a whakataukī, a karakia and a waiata – connecting everyone for the remainder of the evening.
Angela Roberts the PPTA President channeled the vibe of the audience well when she opened with: “It’s good to be in a room that celebrates solidarity and unionism.”
Her passionate speech identified future challenges and provided longitudinal context, particularly highlighting the difficulties the PPTA could face if negotiating with a hostile Government. Roberts called for the union members in the room to go back to their communities and seek support for a campaign founded in reason and logic.
David Cunliffe was the Labour Party’s representative at the meeting; he was the first of the sitting MPs to speak, delivering a pre-prepared speech that was written on the back of the Labour Party policy manifesto, a fact he had to remind the room of. Cunliffe spoke about life-long learning, social mobility, and publicly funded education.
Denise Roche was the Green Party representative; she applauded the PPTA on their strong, though unsuccessful, resistance against the Education Amendment Bill (No 2); whilst also applauding the PPTA for their ability to minimize the negative effects of the Employment Relations Act. Roche spoke about how the PPTA are seeking reasonable pay increases and made it known that the Green Party would be “with you as much as we can, and when you want us.”
Tracey Martin was the New Zealand First representative, and was introduced by the MC as “a long friend of education and teachers”. Martin spoke strongly about her passion for education, claiming that as a Board of Trustees Chair they had a shared history. Martin expressed her belief that parents trust teachers to raise their kids, and so to win this campaign she advised: “don’t explain the profession, explain your humanity”. Martin said teachers are experts at educating children, and political representatives need to be alongside teachers at the coalface to understand the issues.
Anatomy of a campaign
As part of PPTA’s campaign to raise public awareness of the value of teachers, a film crew was engaged to talk to students about what they think of their teachers.
Creative Campaign Strategist Anna Dean was brought on board to brainstorm ideas on how the campaign could achieve cut-through in today’s media environment with a slightly different approach.
“Video really is a key medium to be operating in these days,” she says, “and as I had worked with director Dean Hewison and producer Bevin Linkhorn recently on a campaign for NZ On Air at Alltracks.co.nz, I felt confident they would be able to create something bold and beautiful.
Anna Dean: “Budgets need to be spent carefully these days with the increasingly prohibitive cost of print, and video is what gets traction in the newsfeed right now. I think this is also such direct and simple messaging.
“It really does show how unfair the lack of a real pay rise for NZ secondary school teachers is. Teenagers see first hand the challenges teachers face so they are the perfect spokespeople.”
In the words of the PPTA’s Tom Haig “The results were off-the-cuff, unscripted and wonderfully articulate”.
.
What makes a great teacher?
What do teachers do all day?
… and the punchline – Can you solve the problem?
Related Issues in the news:
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A Taste of GREAT Britain in Wellington
NewsroomPlus.com
Contributed by Olexander Barnes
Yesterday was the 800th anniversary of the signing of the Magna Carta. The British High Commission in Wellington marked the occasion by holding an event to celebrate all things British and to honour her Majesty the Queen with the unveiling of a new portrait, and to reference the Queen’s Birthday the hashtag for the event was #QBP2015
The event was held in Wellington’s Shed 6 and attended by many prominent politicians and dignitaries, including Labour leader Andrew Little, National List MP Kawaljit Singh Bakshi and the Catholic Archbishop of Wellington John Dew among others.
The hall was filled with an abundance of GREAT Britain messages and banners, accompanied by the obligatory Union Jacks. Guests were greeted for instance, by images of actors like Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman from their hit TV show Sherlock.
The formal part of the evening was started with an introduction and greeting by acting MC, the deputy head of the British High Commission Patrick Reilly. This was then followed by a speech by the British High Commissioner Jonathan Sinclair, who talked of the historical significance of the Magna Carta, not just in British Law but also in American and New Zealand law.
There was then a small interlude where a short informative film about the history behind the Magna Carta was played, as narrated by Monty Python star Terry Jones.
At the conclusion of the film, a first round of toasts were had in honour of Britain, the Magna Carta and the Queen. The whiskey that was used for these toasts had been recreated to match that of a couple of bottles of 19th century whiskey that had been found under the floorboards in Ernest Shackleton’s hut in the Antarctic in 2010.
When Minister of Internal Affairs Peter Dunne took to the podium his speech highlighted the strong historical and current connection that the United Kingdom and New Zealand share, as well as humourously emphasising our strong sporting rivalry with the upcoming Rugby World Cup to be played in England later this year.
A second round of toasts was had to honour this partnership, and then it was time for the unveiling of a special photographic portrait of the Queen. The portrait is a limited edition print by British photographer David Bailey, which is only being made available to a select number of British High Commissions and Embassies around the world.
Thus with the curtains pulled back and the portrait officially unveiled, a quartet sang the national anthems of both countries and the official portion of the night was brought to a close.
- See also our report on the Magna Carta and events being held throughout the year to mark its 800th anniversary.
–]]>
NewsRoom Digest: Top NZ News Items for June 15, 2015
This edition of NewsRoom_Digest contains 4 media release snippets and 8 links of the day from Monday 15th June.
Top stories in the current news cycle include the situation swirling around iwi interests in Crown land in Auckland, the way that questions about people smuggling issues are unfolding in Australia and a concerns being raised in Christchurch about the selection of houses for a wider survey of the standard of post-quake repairs.
These was definitely the batting order of Monday post-Cabinet Press Conference this afternoon where Prime Minister John Key expressed confidence the Government’s legal position on land in Auckland is solid and drawing a parallel to “what we did in Christchurch”, and his comments on asylum seekers who may have wanted to make a course for New Zealand were non-committal.
The one substantive line of questioning – introduced by TVNZ’s Corin Dann – was whether the Government would be open to a review of current HASNO laws given officials expressing the likely need for a review at some point in the future.
NEWSROOM_PLUS ‘EXTRAs’
Two articles published by our roving Wellington team today were:
1. RIP Jerry Collins – http://newsroomplus.com/2015/06/15/community-1/
2. Happy Birthday Magna Carta! – http://newsroomplus.com/2015/06/15/history-today/
SNIPPETS OF THE DAY
NZ to join Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank: New Zealand has agreed to become a founding member of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, which is being established to invest in new infrastructure across Asia, Finance Minister Bill English and Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully say. The Bank is a China-led initiative aimed at addressing a significant gap in infrastructure investment in the Asian region.
Green Party: Entrenched Pay Inequality: Ten percent pay rises for CEOs are evidence of an economy based on entrenched inequality, the Green Party said today, following the release of The New Zealand Herald’s executive pay survey.
Falling Kiwi Dollar: The New Zealand dollar, which hit a five-year low at the weekend, may fall further this week amid concern prices could remain weak in the latest dairy auction and on expectations improving US data will boost the prospects for the Federal Reserve to hike interest rates.
Stop Elderly Abuse: New Zealanders need to confront the reality of elder abuse to prevent the exploitation and mistreatment of older people, Senior Citizens Minister Maggie Barry says. New research released on World Elder Abuse Awareness Day shows around one in 10 older New Zealanders have suffered some form of abuse or neglect.
LINKS OF THE DAY
PERFORMANCE OF SERVICES INDEX: New Zealand’s services sector showed further expansion in May as key indices continued to scale the heights, according to the BNZ – BusinessNZ Performance of Services Index (PSI). More details available here:
http://www.businessnz.org.nz/resources/surveys-and-statistics/psi/2015/scaling-the-heights-psi
NEW CIVIL DEFENCE RECOVERY LAW : Civil Defence Minister Nikki Kaye today announced that Cabinet has approved changes to the Civil Defence Emergency Management (CDEM) Act that will improve the way communities recover from emergencies. The new legislation is expected to be introduced into Parliament within the next few months, and is outlined in the Cabinet paper available at: www.civildefence.govt.nz/assets/Uploads/20150615ROLFCabinetPaper.pdf
HELP STOP CHILDREN FROM BEING TRAFFICKED INTO BROTHELS : TEAR Fund is encouraging Kiwi cyclists to use their bikes to stop children from being trafficked into brothels. Every 30 seconds, a child is trafficked around the world. The average age of a victim is only 12 years old. By cycling in the TEAR Fund Poverty Cycle challenge, New Zealanders can help combat this trade in lives. For more information or to register for the challenge, go to www.povertycycle.org.nz
LOCAL AUTHORITY SPENDING INCREASES : Local authorities’ seasonally adjusted operating expenditure increased 4.3 percent in the March 2015 quarter, Statistics New Zealand said today. Purchases of goods and services was the main driver of the $95.0 million increase in total operating expenditure.For more information about these statistics, click here :http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/government_finance/local_government/LocalAuthorityStatistics_HOTPMar15qtr.aspx
NZIER CONSENSUS FORECASTS FOR JUNE 2015 : The latest NZIER Consensus Forecasts shows forecasters have pared back growth expectations slightly since the March quarter survey. Activity indicators over the past quarter have been mixed, with global dairy prices continuing to fall but household spending remaining strong.Click here for more : http://nzier.org.nz/publication/growth-expectations-softening-consensus-forecasts-june-2015
UNION QUESTIONS CEO SALARIES : Far too many workers aren’t able to provide for themselves and their families and are missing out on getting ahead because wealth is being concentrated at the top, the CTU said today. For more information, click here: http://union.org.nz/news/2015/inequality-not-%E2%80%98flat-falling%E2%80%99-minister-0
NEW BIOSECURITY PUPPIES NEED NAMES : Six new home-grown biosecurity beagle puppies could soon be patrolling New Zealand’s borders, and the Ministry for Primary Industries is looking for names for two of them. The puppies can be seen on youtube –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DejiCaJi5TQ&feature=youtu.beFRUITS FOR WINTER: Seasonal produce rich in antioxidants and immune-boosting vitamin C can keep you fighting fit, and able to ward off winter infections, says 5+ A Day. Eating well and exercising regularly are two of the best ways to fortify your immune system and keep sickness at bay. For tips and recipes go to : http://www.5aday.co.nz/
And that’s our sampling of the day that was on Monday 15th June 2015
Brought to EveningReport by Newsroom Digest. –]]>NZIER reports economic growth expectations softening – Consensus Forecasts, June 2015
The latest NZIER Consensus Forecasts shows forecasters have pared back growth expectations slightly since the March quarter survey. Activity indicators over the past quarter have been mixed, with global dairy prices continuing to fall but household spending remaining strong.
Despite the slightly weaker expectations for the New Zealand economy, growth is still expected to be fairly solid out to 2018. Forecasters expect growth of 3.3% in the March 2015 year, moderating to 2.8% and 2.7% in the following two years. Strong residential construction was a key contributor to GDP growth over 2014, driven by house-building demand in Canterbury and Auckland.
While forecasters have wound back the extent of residential construction growth expected over 2016 and 2017, the level of activity is still expected to be very elevated. A further ramp-up in house-building in Auckland will offset the reduced growth impetus as the Canterbury rebuild nears completion. The labour market is one particularly positive story. Forecasters expect a further strengthening in employment demand to reduce the unemployment rate to close to 5% in 2017.
– – ]]>Auckland Harbour Bridge road surface gets a skid-resistant skin
MIL OSI – Source: New Zealand Transport Agency – Auckland Harbour Bridge road surface gets a rejuvenating skin peel The NZ Transport Agency’s motorway maintenance team has been giving the road surface a new lease on life and improving its skid resistance by removing a very thin layer off the surface. The colour of those lanes is now slightly lighter and the new texture means road users may also notice it sounds different too. The Auckland Motorway Alliance’s Director Steve Mutton says a special machine has been micro milling to create minor grooves in the road and expose high friction surfaces of the existing stones in the pavement to improve its texture. “This improves the skid resistance and therefore the safety of the road surface.” “The NZ Transport Agency has strict policies on the skid conditions of its highways. Each year every piece of highway surface is tested to check whether it meets thresholds for skid resistance. Sections that fall below the thresholds are then prioritised for maintenance repairs.” The centre lanes of the Auckland Harbour Bridge are surfaced in an older material that is in good general condition but lacks the required surface texture. Micro milling has been a cost effective way of refreshing the surface and ensuring it meets the necessary texture and grip levels. “It’s the first time this particular micro milling machine has been used on the NZ Transport Agency’s network. Until now the full depth of the road surface had to be replaced, which is a comparatively expensive exercise. Micro milling removes as little as 2mm from the surface to modify its properties.” One of the other benefits of the micro milling is that the lane markings will now be more clearly visible in wet weather and poor light conditions. “We have opted to leave the existing line marking and micro mill on either side of the lines, which creates a raised surface that will now be more visible when the road’s wet.” The previous surface had lasted approximately eight years before it fell below the safety threshold and it’s expected it’ll be another five years before it needs more work. –]]>
Happy Birthday Magna Carta !
NewsroomPlus.com
If it had passed you by, Google’s history doodle has come to the rescue to herald the fact that 15 June is the official day to celebrate that most historical of documents – the Magna Carta.
As the British Library itself says, before inviting you to explore its 800-year legacy with unique collection items, newly-commissioned articles by leading experts, videos and animations, and a range of teaching resources, the Magna Carta is one of the most famous documents in the world.
As a special activity the British Library invited young people across the world to debate their digital rights and responsibilities and submit a clause to a Magna Carta for the digital age page. The Top 10 clauses are being announced this week. See:
Events in New Zealand
Suitably the 800th celebrations have been embraced by the New Zealand Law Society, with attention drawn to the fact that one section of the Magna Carta is still New Zealand law. The Society also gives a useful pointer to an address from 2008 by former Court of Appeal judge Sir David Baragwanath, who showed how it has been a very important influence on New Zealand’s law.
Events in New Zealand have been coordinated by the Auckland University-based Magna Carta 800 Committee for New Zealand who have posted a helpful array of further pointers (to events, experts et al) on a comprehensive website – with a full list of events.
Already this year there has been an address by Attorney-General Christopher Finlayson on Commonwealth Day on 9 March, and two events this month: a Canterbury Historical Association panel (Magna Carta – Rights and Legacies) and a Service of Commemoration held yesterday at Auckland’s Holy Trinity Cathedral.
Still in Auckland, events for today are a lighting of the exterior of Auckland War Memorial War Museum and pealing of bells at St Matthews in the City and in Wellington there is a Parliamentary Reception and announcement of winners of the Attorney-General’s Essay Competition early this evening.
British High Commission Event
The team at NewsRoom_Plus are especially looking forward to reporting on this evening’s double-whammy event being put on by the British High Commission in Wellington which combines:
- a Queen’s Birthday Party 2015 at which a limited edition print of David Bailey’s new photographic portrait of The Queen will be unveiled – one of only twelve available to High Commissions and Embassies around the world.
. - plus, From Magna Carta to Modernity – a celebration of the signing of the Magna Carta in 1215, and the influence that document had, and still has, on human rights all over the world. In that connection this website is highly recommended:
But wait there’s more…
By the end of the week the NZ Law Society‘s magazine LawTalk will be available with a special feature on the Magna Carta, and next Tuesday evening 23 June Victoria University senior law lecturer Dr Carwyn Jones will deliver a talk titled “Magna Carta, Human Rights, and the Treaty of Waitangi” at the National Library in Wellington.
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byWADE…make time to just think about things…
TPPA, $4 quadrillion of derivatives hanging over the banking system, the US going from $1 trillion to $5 trillion cash in circulation since 2009, greece having the books in order…fukushima being totally sorted …aaahhh…breath…that’s better isn’t it? More cartoons byWADE on eveningreport.nz You can follow WADE (from a safe digital distance) at www.facebook.com/bywade or even buy the greeting card of this cartoon (if the editor doesn’t delete this link….)]]>
Keith Rankin on Unpacking Austerity in Europe
Analysis by Keith Rankin. This article was also published on TheDailyBlog.co.nz.
A respondent to my last week’s posting said:
How’s the Greek challenge to austerity working out again? I do believe they are being told to pull their heads in and get on with austerity.
Very true. But so far the Greek new new-left Syriza government is holding its nerve. Even if it ends up failing in its mission to end catastrophe politics in Europe, it does represent a beacon of hope for new left‑wing politics. That’s why the European political establishment is fighting so hard to keep Europe on its present slow suicide track by not making concessions to Greece’s government led by Alexis Tsipras.
The Economic Unreality
One of the big ironies is that Europe is behaving so much like it did in the late 1920s, except that then it was Germany playing the role now played by Greece. Germany’s debts then were those imposed by the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. These debts could only be paid if Germany’s vengeful post-treaty creditors (the victorious powers after World War 1) allowed Germany to run a trade surplus. Trade was the only way that Germany could earn the ‘gold standard hard currency’ required to pay those debts. Yet Germany’s creditors were themselves trying to run trade surpluses. They were indulging in ‘vendor finance’ which is just a fancy way of saying they were trying their very best to lend to Germany, not to be repaid.
I simplify. The creditor powers were trying to get their private sectors to lend to Germany’s private sector, with the expectation that the German government would tax its private sector heavily, and pay its reparations to the governments of France, United Kingdom and United States. The unintended aim was to make Germany’s private sector the biggest debtor in the global economy, with the private sectors of France, UK and USA becoming the biggest creditors in the global capitalist economy.
It’s the same in Europe today. The southern governments are being required to repay northern-based institutional creditors in ‘hard currency’ (Euros in this case). The only way this can possibly happen, given the determination of northern European and other creditor economies to run trade surpluses, is through huge lending to the southern private sector, enabling a boom in debt-fuelled spending in the south which would in turn enable the southern governments to collect more taxes.
It’s a fantasy of course, like the subprime housing loans of the mid-2000s. The Greek private sector today is in no better shape to acquire gazillions of Euros worth of imports on credit than the German private sector was able to owe gold marks in 1928.
The Economic Theory (it’s quite simple really)
Because the Eurozone is a fixed currency zone (as was greater Europe under the gold standard). It means that trade imbalances need to be reconciled through a process of internal devaluation and revaluation. This is another way of saying that northern European countries must, through higher inflation, run substantial trade deficits so that southern European countries can run the trade surpluses that enable them as countries (public and private sectors) to service their debts to the north.
The Euro problem results from a one-way flow of goods from the north to the south in the 2000s’ decade. The solution is a decade-long rebalancing one-way flow of goods from the south to the north. If interest is to be paid, the latter south to north flow must exceed the former north to south flow.
The basic theory of internal devaluations and revaluations says that the creditor bloc should have higher than normal inflation and the debtor bloc should have lower than normal inflation. That is understood (and has been understood ever since David Hume enunciated the ‘price-specie-flow-mechanism’ in the 1750s) as the normal means to achieve a one-way trade flow. Hume (and Ricardian economists subsequently) believed that this process was self-regulating. The drain of money from debtor countries like Greece would automatically create deflation. And the flow of money into creditor countries like Germany would automatically induce the required inflation. For this to work in Europe today we would probably need the inflation rate in Germany to be 10 percentage points higher than in Greece; eg 7% inflation in Germany and 3% deflation in Greece. Pigs will fly before the Germans will accept 7% annual inflation as part of the cure.
An Alternative Mechanism
Policymakers in dominant economies cannot create inflation when inflation is needed and is known to be needed. So an alternative to Hume’s mechanism is needed. Japan has tried valiantly to create inflation, but cannot.
In Germany’s case the authorities wouldn’t create inflation, even if they could. Germany is at core a mercantilist nation – a mercantilism aggravated by a semi-mythological national trauma over inflation – that understands economic success as the indefinite accumulation of trade surpluses. To be good world economic citizen, Germany needs to become like modern Japan, only more so. Japan today does run trade deficits, and does have the highest public debt to GDP ratio in the world, and has had zero interest rates for two decades.
There are other ways the objective of trade rebalancing could be achieved. One would involve protectionism, which, by the way, was not the cause of the Great Depression and was part of its cure.
A better approach would be to adopt Social Credit style national dividends in the northern European creditor nations, funded by quantitative easing rather than by taxes, combined with the introduction in those northern countries of a 25 hour work week. That would turn the northerners into net consumers rather than net producers. (The word ‘net’ is important here; this is a green solution.) The already highly indebted northern governments would be taking on the deficits that the northern private sectors would not consider taking on. Northern Europe needs public debt at Japanese levels in order to balance the huge private surpluses endemic in the rich world.
The Politics
The real austerity agenda is one of privatisation. In a superficial sense, Greece’s government can pay a chunk of its debt if it sells all its assets to northern private interests. But, in making Greek resources plunder for foreign capitalists, the underlying trade imbalances would be accentuated by even greater imbalances in financial income – interest and profit outflows – that would add to the unspent private cash reserves in the north and have to be recycled as even more debt.
The other part of the political agenda is that the northern financial interests want compliant governments in the other southern countries. Compliant left-wing governments – the one’s that prioritise the reduction of government debt while confining their leftishness to identity politics – are just fine to these interests. They are desperate that Syriza-style anti-austerity live-with-debt politics does not spread to the likes of Spain and Italy and France. That kind of effective political economy would reveal the nakedness of the austerity Empress.
New Zealand’s Labour Party is still, in the main, of the compliant deficit-phobic left rather than of the brave and intellectually edgy new new-Left. New Zealand has one of the most indebted private sectors and one of the less indebted government sectors. Yet so much of what Labour is about is that we cannot afford this and we cannot afford that. Even the Governor of the Reserve Bank knows that we need more debt, not less. That’s why interest rates were cut on Thursday and will be cut again; to reduce the price of debt so that we get money moving again.
The Economic Reality
Your debt represents my employment. My spending represents your income. Your austerity represents my unemployment. My forced austerity represents your insolvency.
Greek government deficits (the additions to the debt) averaged over 10% of GDP since austerity was imposed. In the 10 years before the financial crisis they averaged 5% of GDP. Spain had public debt of only 36% in 2008, much less than Germany’s 64%. Since austerity Spain has reached 98%. Austerity, supposedly about compromising living standards in order to repay debt, has both shattered living standards and substantially increased the rate of accumulation of public debt. Counter-austerity, on the other hand, can raise Greek living standards making it possible for Greeks to pay more taxes, and can raise the GDP denominator, making the debt more serviceable.
The economic argument about European debt is simple, when looked at in a systemic way. Syriza addresses the systemic issues, and wins the argument. In a significant act of defiance, Greece reopened its public television network this week, two years after it was shut down as a failed public economy measure. Let public enterprise blossom.
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]]>NewsRoom Digest: Top NZ News Items for June 12, 2015
This edition of NewsRoom_Digest contains 4 media release snippets and 5 links of the day from Friday 12th June.
Top stories in the current news cycle include coverage of the falling New Zealand dollar which is expected to ease the pressure on manufacturers and farmers but could mean a rise in the cost of living including higher fuel prices, further reverberations from and commentary about the drop in the Official Cash Rate, comments from Minister of Social Housing Paula Bennett acknowledging that some state houses are not up to standard, and items about a string of ‘health scares’: Scarlet fever, Legionnaires Disease and (in Korea) Middle East Respiratory Syndrome.
SNIPPETS OF THE DAY
Dairy Industry Reviewed Through Consultation: The Commerce Commission today released a consultation paper outlining its proposed approach, timeframes and scope for its review of the state of competition in the New Zealand dairy industry. The consultation paper and terms of reference are available on the Commission’s website. See:http://www.comcom.govt.nz/regulated-industries/dairy-industry/report-on-the-state-of-competition-in-the-new-zealand-dairy-industry/
NZ Dollar Drops Below 70 US cents: The New Zealand dollar fell below 70 US cents for the first time in almost five years after the Reserve Bank began cutting interest rates earlier than some had expected yesterday.
Legal Highs Policy Adopted: After an intense and at times emotional two hour debate the Kāpiti District Council has adopted a policy to restrict the sale of psychoactive substances (legal highs) in Kāpiti. The policy will ensure that 99.9% of the district will be protected from any future retail sales of legal highs.
Wool Price Ease Up: New Zealand wool prices eased from recent highs at auction this week as shorter wool failed to attract the same premium as longer wool on offer the previous week.
LINKS OF THE DAY
PRIVACY COMMISSIONER LAUNCHES $75,000 RESEARCH FUND : The Privacy Commissioner is calling for applicants for a new privacy-related research funding programme worth up to $75,000 in total. For more information visit: https://privacy.org.nz/further-resources/privacy-research/
FOOD PRICES INCREASE FOR THE MONTH OF MAY : In May 2015, food prices rose 0.4 percent, Statistics New Zealand said today. This follows a 0.3 percent fall in April and a 0.1 percent rise in March. Click here for statistics:http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/economic_indicators/prices_indexes/FoodPriceIndex_HOTPMay15.aspx
AXING OF TEACHERS GRANTS : The scrapping of grants aimed at solving teacher shortages will only add to the looming teacher crisis the Government refuses to address, Labour’s Education spokesperson Chris Hipkins says. Read more here: http://www.edgazette.govt.nz/Notices/Notice.aspx?NoticeId=616690
LOGISTICS GUIDELINE PUBLISHED : The Ministry of Civil Defence & Emergency Management today published Logistics in CDEM: Director’s Guidelines for Civil Defence Emergency Management Groups. This will complete another recommendation from the Review of the CDEM Response to the 22 February 2011 Christchurch Earthquake. The guidelines ave available to download from the Ministry’s website at www.civildefence.govt.nz/cdem-sector/cdem-framework/guidelines
VERBAL ABUSE CONSIDERED BIGGEST BULLY IN SCHOOLS : School students think verbal mistreatment is the biggest bullying issue in schools – higher than cyberbullying, social or relational bullying such as social exclusion and spreading gossip, or physical bullying. For more information visit http://www.censusatschool.org.nz.
And that’s our sampling of the day that was on Friday 12th June 2015.
Brought to EveningReport by Newsroom Digest. –]]>Lori Wallach: Defeat of Fast Track Package Highlights Americans’ Concerns About the Trans-Pacific Partnership – Senate-Passed Bill NOT Adopted
Source: Lori Wallach, Director, Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch.
[poll id=”15″]THE FAST TRACK PACKAGE sent over from the Senate was rejected today by the House because two years of effort by a vast corporate coalition, the White House and Republican leaders – and weeks of procedural gimmicks and deals swapped for yes votes –could not assuage Americans’ concerns that more of the same trade policy would kill more jobs and push down wages. Even as President Barack Obama, in a highly unusual move, came to the Capitol at the last moment to appeal directly to Democrats, the House rejected the Senate-passed bill enacting Fast Track, creating an even more uncertain future for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
To try to save face, the Republican congressional leadership called a vote on just the Fast Track portion of the trade bill after the initial staggering defeat of the broader measure. However, legally that vote has no meaning because the rule of House consideration of the Fast Track package required that all aspects of the bill be approved or the Senate-passed bill was deemed rejected by the House. And, the Fast Track portion of the package cannot pass the Senate free-standing without the portion that was voted down in the House. Although these procedural matters may seem arcane, the bottom line is that the legislation enacting Fast Track was not passed by the House despite a massive effort by the White House, Republican congressional leaders and a might corporate coalition.
What became clear in the contentious debate about Fast Track in recent weeks is the growing discontent in Congress about the contents of the TPP. The lack of enforceable currency manipulation standards; the potential exposure of U.S. health and environmental protections to investor-state challenges; concerns about food safety, medicine prices and internet freedom; and insufficient assurances that labor, human rights, and environmental protections will be meaningful or enforceable have all become major flashpoints in the U.S. congressional debate.
After years of deadline-missing negotiations and mounting TPP opposition among prominent economists and thousands of civil society organizations across the political spectrum, the TPP was already hanging by a thread. While the White House and Republican leaders may try to regroup and slice and dice the controversial provisions some other way, the House’s refusal today to adopt the Fast Track legislation sent over from the Senate leaves an uncertain path for both the TPP and Fast Track.
Passing trade bills opposed by a majority of Americans does not get easier with delay because the more time people have to understand what’s at stake, the angrier they get and the more they demand that their congressional representatives represent their will.
The crazy gimmicks employed to try to overcome what polls show is broad opposition to Fast Track actually backfired. Yesterday, the House Republican leadership put most Republican representatives on record in favor of cutting Medicare by $700 million with a vote on a procedural gimmick. Today, it was Democrats’ ire about a gutted version of a program to assist workers who will be hurt by the trade agreements Fast Track would enable that was the proximate cause of the meltdown. That program was included only to try to provide cover for the two dozen Democrats who would even consider supporting Fast Track at all.
Today’s outcome is a testament to the strength and diversity of the remarkable coalition of thousands of organizations that overcame a money-soaked lobbying campaign by multinational corporations and intense arm-twisting by the Republican House leadership and the Obama administration. The movement now demanding a new American trade policy is larger and more diverse than in any preceding trade policy fight. It includes everyone from small business leaders and labor unions to Internet freedom advocates and faith groups to family farmers and environmentalists to consumer advocates and LGBT groups to retirees and civil rights groups to law professors and economists.
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]]>Prof Jane Kelsey: The US Congress fails to pass both the Fast Track Bill and Trade Promotion Bill
Source: Professor Jane Kelsey.
[poll id=”15″]
[caption id="attachment_1844" align="alignleft" width="200"] Professor Jane Kelsey.[/caption]
CONTRARY TO SOME LOCAL NEWS REPORTS, the US Congress did not pass the Fast track or Trade Promotion Bill last night.
‘The procedures are complicated, hence the confusion’, says Professor Jane Kelsey from the University of Auckland.
The single Bill previously passed by the Senate was split procedurally into two votes, both of which had to pass.
The first vote on the package was on Trade Adjustment Assistance, which provides assistance for workers who lose their jobs as a result of US free trade agreements, and was massively defeated by 302 to 126, with Democrats saying it did not go far enough.
In order to save face when the overall measure was defeated, the Republican leadership held a symbolic vote on the Fast Track authority portion, which narrowly passed by 219 to 211 votes.
That means the Fast Track bill did not pass in the House.
This is a serious defeat for President Obama who personally went to Congress to lobby Democrats just hours before the vote. House Democrat Leader Nancy Pelosi was among those who voted no.
There may be moves to seek a revote on the workers’ assistance bill next week to try to revive the package, but given the level of opposition in today’s vote, that seems unlikely to be successful.
‘So the Fast Track saga continues, and a proposed ministerial meeting remains on hold’, Kelsey said.
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]]>Bunny McDiarmid resigns as executive director of Greenpeace New Zealand Aotearoa
MIL OSI – Source: Greenpeace New Zealand – Bunny McDiarmid resigns as executive director of Greenpeace New Zealand Aotearoa
[caption id="attachment_4634" align="alignright" width="300"] Bunny McDiarmid – Image courtesy of PMC.[/caption]
Bunny McDiarmid, executive director of Greenpeace New Zealand Aotearoa writes:
I think I have the best job in New Zealand. Being the head of Greenpeace is challenging, fun, humbling, often exhausting and always interesting.
But, now it’s time for someone else to do it.
As a supporter of Greenpeace New Zealand I wanted to tell you personally that I have decided to resign from my position as executive director of Greenpeace New Zealand Aotearoa.
It was not an easy decision for me to make, but maybe fitting as this year is the 30th anniversary of the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, the ship on which I first sailed into Greenpeace. My plan is to go back to some sailing with my family in the Pacific and beyond, and combine that with some Greenpeace work.
I have been the executive director for 10 years. That decade has been a truly exciting time to be leading this amazing little organisation that you’re such a key part of. I have loved it.
I’d like to thank you for all your support, strength and commitment. Whenever we stand up and take action, knowing that you are by our side makes all the difference and gives us great strength.
Greenpeace NZ is in really good shape, which has made this tough decision a little less tough. The team here is strong, innovative, hard-working and passionate. They have made my job exciting and rewarding. Their courage and tenacity means they will continue to find solutions to the challenges we face both here in New Zealand and also, increasingly, around the world.
You are part of a great team at Greenpeace.
Together we tackle the tough jobs. We constantly try new ways to be as effective as possible. We don’t let the obstacles or mistakes we make along the way prevent us from learning, picking ourselves up and carrying on. That’s not something you can buy at the dairy.
Telling you that I’m leaving Greenpeace now, as the anniversary of the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior approaches, makes me realise we need her more than ever. The need for her today is at least as strong as it was 30 years ago and the sense of hope that she inspires is just as powerful. I hope you were able to experience this for yourself when the current Rainbow Warrior visited New Zealand a couple of years ago.
On the anniversary, Friday the 10th July, the Rainbow Warrior will be in the Pacific continuing to campaign against the biggest threats to our planet, the air we breathe, and our climate. To commemorate the anniversary, and celebrate the courage shown by those people who stand up and take action for what really matters, we will be holding an exhibition and other special events during the weekend.
I have loved being part of Greenpeace New Zealand over the last 10 years as executive director. I will keep working for Greenpeace in whatever way makes sense and where I am needed. But now is the time for someone else to take on this wonderful role. I’m not dashing out the door just yet. I’ll be here until around the end of October or early November to hand over to my successor and introduce them to you.
With love, respect and many thanks,
Bunny McDiarmid Executive Director, Greenpeace New Zealand
– -]]>Radio: NZ Report to Australia – PM is Spy-Phobic + NZ Superstar Racehorse Bonecrusher Passes Away
New Zealand Report: Selwyn Manning joins Dave Penberthy and Mark Aiston to deliver his weekly New Zealand Report. This week, New Zealand’s Prime Minister is Spy-Phobic + NZ’s Superstar Racehorse Bonecrusher Passes Away – Recorded LIVE on 12/06/15. ITEM ONE Prime Minister John Key Spy-Phobic: Only one month after revelations that New Zealand’s signals intelligence agency had hacked and spied on the governments of friendly Asian countries, our Prime Minister John Key has admitted he expects he is also being spied on. On Thursday, Key said he suspects his cellphone could be used by overseas spies to listen in to meetings he attends. “I kind of work on the principle that I will be [listened to] at some point. So I have, without being stupid about it, more security on my phone than most people have, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t break into it.” Key said he replaces his cellphone every few months for security reasons. ITEM TWO Bonecrusher Passes Away: (Ref. NZHerald.co.nz) The wonderful New Zealand champion racehorse Bonecrusher died this week at the age of 33 years. Bonecrusher will be remembered by Australian racing fans for winning the 1986 Cox Plate, dubbed the race of the century. Bonecrusher came from humble bloodlines, and was purchased for just $3000. He became a superstar here in New Zealand, a household name, and amassed more than $3 million in winnings. As a 3-year-old Bonecrusher won the New Zealand Derby, Air New Zealand Stakes, Tancred Stakes and the AJC Derby. And as a 4-year-old he won five races including four Australian group ones, the Underwood Stakes, Caulfield Stakes, Cox Plate and Australian Cup. One of his best races was when he beat the Melbourne Cup winner At Talaq in the Australian Cup at Flemington. I met Bonecrusher when he was retired. He was driven around New Zealand by an old school mate of mine, Gregory Pope. He would attend shows and gala events. Children would hug him and he always wore his champion cover. He was a wonderful horse, tall and strong, with a lovely nature, who is regarded by top jockeys here in New Zealand as being the equal of the other Big Red horse, Phar Lap. Bonecrusher has been buried at Elllerslie Racecourse here in Auckland. A monument will be erected there in his honour. New Zealand Report is broadcast live on FiveAA.com.au and webcasts on EveningReport.nz, LiveNews.co.nz, and ForeignAffairs.co.nz. –]]>
NewsRoom Digest: Top NZ News Items for June 11, 2015
This edition of NewsRoom_Digest contains 5 media release snippets and 6 links of the day from Thursday 11th June.
Top stories in the current news cycle include the Reserve Bank cutting interest rates in response to weakening demand and low inflation and signalled further cuts may be needed, the Labour party saying the Reserve Bank has been forced to cut the OCR to stimulate the economy and the Real Estate Institute saying the national median price of residential properties rose 7% in May, driven by a 20% increase in Auckland prices.
SNIPPETS OF THE DAY
OCR Reduced To 3.25 percent: The Reserve Bank cut the benchmark rate a quarter-point and signalled more may be on the way as the dairy sector’s weak outlook weighed on the nation’s terms of trade and threatened to delay an increase in inflation from its near-zero level. The New Zealand dollar tumbled.
Green Party: Govt Must Fix Auckland Housing Crisis: The decision to cut the Official Cash Rate (OCR) today is the right one but will add fuel to Auckland’s rapidly rising house prices unless central government acts swiftly and smartly, the Green Party said today.
New Lending Codes Applies To Banks Too : The Banking Ombudsman Scheme has published a Quick Guide explaining how new responsible lending requirements and changes to hardship applications affect banking. See the Quick Guide on Concerns about lending decisions: https://bankomb.org.nz/news-and-publications/quick-guides/item/concerns-about-lending-decisions
Labour: Overpriced Power Rates: Contact Energy is charging the poorest New Zealanders the highest electricity rates, ripping off those who can least afford it, Labour’s Consumer Affairs spokesperson David Shearer says.
Nelson Housing Accord: A Nelson Housing Accord aimed at improving the supply and affordability of housing in the district has been signed today by Building and Housing Minister Dr Nick Smith and Mayor Rachel Reese. Download a copy of the accord: http://www.beehive.govt.nz/sites/all/files/Nelson-Housing-Accord.pdf
LINKS OF THE DAY
RBNZ CUTS INTEREST RATES TO 3.25% : The Reserve Bank today reduced the Official Cash Rate (OCR) by 25 basis points to 3.25 percent. Click here to see the Official Cash Rate (OCR) decisions and current rate:http://www.rbnz.govt.nz/monetary_policy/ocr/
7,989 DWELLINGS SOLD IN NZ FOR MAY ALONE : REINZ, the most up to date source of real estate data in New Zealand, announced today that there were 7,989 dwelling sales in May 2015, up 21.6% on May 2014 and up 10.4% compared to April. View housing prices in the region here:https://www.reinz.co.nz/shadomx/apps/fms/fmsdownload.cfm?file_uuid=7FAC0A60-E9E3-45DC-B700-E3F3F92B72B2&siteName=reinz
NZ DEFENCE JOIN IN “TALISMAN SABER” : More than 600 NZ Defence Force personnel will take part for the first time in a biennial joint Australia-United States military exercise known as Talisman Saber. See also :http://www.defence.gov.au/Exercises/TS15/
UNION QUESTIONS GOVERNMENT’S DECISION: The Taxpayers’ Union is questioning the Government’s decision to give $485,000 of taxpayer money to local Councils to run youth councils and workshops. Read more:http://beehive.govt.nz/release/485k-funding-councils-support-youth
GUEST NIGHTS HIGHER IN APRIL : National guest nights for April 2015 were 3.6 percent higher than in April 2014, Statistics New Zealand said today. See statistics here:http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/industry_sectors/accommodation/AccommodationSurvey_HOTPApr15.aspx
MORE THAN 250,000 REGISTERED FOR NZ SHAKEOUT : More than 250,000 people have already registered to take part in New Zealand ShakeOut, our national earthquake drill. For further information go here:www.shakeout.govt.nz.
And that’s our sampling of the day that was on Thursday 11th June 2015.
Brought to EveningReport by Newsroom Digest. –]]>Keith Rankin on Housing Supply: Investment versus Rental Properties
Analysis by Keith Rankin. This article was also published on Scoop.co.nz.
THE HOUSING DEBATE in New Zealand is befuddled by the language used, and by people with propertied interests who are happy to maintain such confusion.
Every now and again, however, we see unwitting exposure of the multiple meanings given to popular words. In one NZ Herald article (Rising numbers of Aucklanders heading for regions, 4 June 2015), ‘Auckland timber sales representative Mike Towns invested in nine properties in Hawkes Bay. Returns “are not so strong from an investment point of view, but they’re good from a rental return point of view”.’
The media uses the word ‘invest’ very loosely. Mr Towns was buying properties with the intent of gaining returns in the form of yield; namely rent from tenants. The Herald reporter says he “invested”. Yet Mr Towns himself said that his transaction was not undertaken from “an investment” point of view. He clearly understands property investment as the pursuit of capital gain. This concept of investment reflects the reality that an investment house need not be occupied; it’s a financial security rather than a dwelling. A tenanted house, on the other hand, clearly is a dwelling; it’s somebody’s home.
Shamubeel Eaqub, on Sunday Mornings on Radio NZ (Renters: society’s second-class citizens) reaffirmed this point by noting that letting properties is an ‘incidental’ component of housing investment. (From the point of view of an economist such as Eaqub, housing investment is building new houses. There are three distinct meanings out there for the word ‘investment’.)
Government spokespeople have also inadvertently noted that investment houses may or may not be tenanted. When discussing the proposed ‘warrant of fitness’ for rented houses, they note that if landlords’ costs are raised it will mean that some houses may be withdrawn from the rental market, to the detriment of the tenant community. They don’t say what will happen to these houses if they are withdrawn, but we are left to presume that they will be untenanted – essentially empty. (See my comments in Running on Empty, North and South, 16 April 2015.)
The neglected issue of housing supply is what I will call the ‘housing stock participation rate’. I use this expression as a deliberate analogue of the well-known ‘labour force participation rate’. Housing is employed fulltime when it is occupied by a family (or other) group appropriate to the size of the house. Housing is employed part-time when it is underoccupied; eg one person living in a large house. Housing is unemployed when it is between occupiers, maybe undergoing refurbishment (analogous to retraining). And houses are ‘not in the housing force’ if they are not available to be lived in.
We need to know whether the housing stock participation rate is falling, and housing supply is therefore shrinking. From a policy or analysis point of view, it is incidental whether the dwellers of a house are owner-occupiers, paying tenants or house-sitters. What matters is the size of the housing force, a subset of the total housing stock. Further, we know that building more houses will increase the housing stock. But this alone will not necessarily increase the number of houses that are available to be lived in.
We need a proper ‘Housing Force Survey’ that is analogous to Statistics NZ’s Household Labour Force Survey (HLFS). We may be surprised at the extent of multiple house ownership by non-landlords.
Housing policy should have four components: (1) seeking to maximise the ‘housing stock participation rate’; (2) ensuring that all dwellings meet minimum standards (with a possible exemption for owner-occupied properties without children); (3) ensuring that the housing stock increases with population growth; and (4) ensuring that housing density is greatest closest to places of employment and to transport hubs. We have a toolkit of taxes and subsidies that can provide the appropriate incentives.
Many ‘investment’ properties appear not to be in the housing force, just as ‘discouraged workers’ are not in the labour force. Our policy priority is to ensure that every investment house is also a healthy home.
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