One of the justifications of great wealth and the inequality necessary for it to be possessed is that it can be used to adorn the world, to the benefit of everyone including future generations. This is something to which people at a more basic economic level cannot easily aspire.
The question, then, is: Why is it that in our age, everywhere in the world, the very rich are incapable of adorning the world, unless it be by preservation of the monuments of the past? The artists and architects who serve them cannot do it either. If beauty is one of the proper goals of life (the others being truth and goodness), humanity has lost its way—at least in this respect. - Theodore Dalrymple
So they promised 15% and delivered 1.5%.
If there was a gold medal for under-achievement, this Govt would win it. They don't miss their targets by 2% or 5% oe even 10% but by 90%. They're currently sitting at 1.6% of their Kiwibuild target! - David Farrar
New Zealand is currently living through another top-down revolution. Though far from complete, it has already captured control of the commanding heights of the public service, the schools and universities, the funding mechanisms of cultural production, and big chunks of the mainstream news media.
The ideology driving this revolution is not neoliberalism, it's ethnonationalism. A potent amalgam of indigenous mysticism and neo-tribal capitalism has captured the imagination of the professional and managerial class and is relying on the latter's administrative power and influence to drive through a revolutionary transformation of New Zealand society under the battle-flags of "indigenisation" and "decolonisation". The glue which holds this alliance of Māori and Non-Māori elites together is Pakeha guilt. - Chris Trotter
Only one more strategic victory is required to complete the Māori nationalist revolution: Pakeha pride in their past and in their culture has to be undermined. The men and women once celebrated as nation-builders have to be recast as colonial oppressors. The country famed for being "the social laboratory of the world" has to be re-presented as just another sordid collection of white supremacist, treaty-breaking, killers and thieves.
Māori, too, are in need of a complete makeover: from slave-owning warrior-cannibals, to peace-loving caretakers of Te Ao Māori – a world to which they are bound by deep and mystical bonds. Inheritors of a culture that sanctioned genocidal conquest and environmental destruction, how can the Pakeha hope to lead Aotearoa towards a just future? As in the 1980s, the Twenty-First Century journey requires revolutionary Māori to lead, and guilty Pakeha to follow. And those guilty Pakeha in a position to make it happen appear only too happy to oblige.
Which is why, in March 2023, New Zealand has an educational curriculum dedicated to condemning colonisation and uplifting the indigenous Māori. Why Māori cultural traditions and ways of knowing are elevated above the achievements of Western culture and science. Why representatives of local iwi and hapu wield decisive influence over private and public development plans, as well as the credo and content of media reporting and university courses.
The Māori nationalist revolution is not yet complete – but it has, most certainly, begun. - Chris Trotter
Surely the large swathes of the media in these past five years are living proof that you can pretend to be neutral until the excitement over a late arrival from Mt Albert sees you swooning just a little bit embarrassingly.
So, instead of a job for life, what about the best person for the job for a public service appointment?
And as the job changes, as it always does with Governments, the same way it does as one chief executive leaves and a new one arrives, you appoint the people most aligned with the thinking, and therefore the greater desire to get it done.
'Yes Minister' and 'Yes Prime Minister' had the reality of the public service worked out - and that was 40 years ago. - Mike Hosking
When Kelvin Davis addressed a conference of indigenous Australians yesterday it is doubtful whether the Minister for Maori Crown Relations intended to damage the credibility of his government's Maori policies, but that's what he did. If the New Zealand Herald is to be believed, first, he used an incorrect translation of the Treaty of Waitangi instead of the Sir Hugh Kawharu translation that the previous Labour government celebrated at the 150th anniversary of its signing in 1990. Davis claimed that Article Three of the Treaty guaranteed Maori "the same rights and privileges of British subjects". In fact, Article Three guarantees Maori "the same rights and duties of citizenship". Small difference in wording, I agree, but the mention of "duties" is significant when it comes to Maori rights. These days all too many Maori spokespeople prefer to interpret the Treaty as promising Maori an armchair ride to prosperity rather than something they have to work for, like other New Zealanders. - Michael Bassett
Davis is telling Maori that they can continue to produce babies outside stable family environments; have disproportionally high numbers of fetal-alcohol syndrome babies; fail to vaccinate them; make less use of free medical services for children; smoke more than Pakeha; have high "Did Not Show" statistics for specialist appointments at public hospitals; continue to tolerate a world where more than 50% of Maori children truant from school each day; and be over-represented amongst the ram-raiders and the Hawke's Bay burglars; and still get ahead. Despite evidence of manifold failures to avail themselves of the opportunities available to them, Davis' government will "focus on equity of outcomes, not just equality". I suspect that Ngata, Buck and Pomare would swiftly tell him he was on a hiding to nowhere, and that Maori leaders like him who fail to stress the need for effort and hard work are guilty of gross dereliction of duty. And they'd be right. Kelvin Davis is deliberately misleading his people. In fact, life wasn't meant to be easy; everyone needs to put in effort.
Where has Davis got the notion from that it is possible to guarantee any people "equity of outcomes" no matter what choices they personally make in life? No other country has such a policy for the very basic reason that it just can't work. - Michael Bassett
Sadly, Davis is one of the blunter knives in this government's drawer. By continuing to recite that unattainable mantra he also calls into question his ministry's preoccupation with promoting co-governance. How can our country recover the ground lost in the pandemic and in the storms if significant numbers of the decision-makers' only qualification to be in charge is their ethnic make-up? We know of course that many Maori have made an effort and have succeeded in life. Good. That means they can qualify for roles in governance on the grounds of their ability, not their ethnicity. Then in governing roles they are just as accountable to the wider public as non-Maori. Just what Article Three of the Treaty envisaged. - Michael Bassett
A stronger relationship between local and central government, as well as officials more willing to listen to outsiders, is needed if New Zealand is to live up to its claims of a "world-class" public sector, former public servants and politicians say. - Sam Sachdeva
The public sector has … a huge focus on planning, which is appropriate - it's something we do need to do - but it all seems to fall to pieces when it comes to the delivery. - Anne Tolley
Those two are not even aligned so that when local government comes to do its 10-year plan, it knows what the three-year funding commitment from Waka Kotahi is - how on earth can you plan infrastructure? - Anne Tolley
There seems to be a lack of creative tension: people are so busy being polite to each other, they don't argue much anymore, it seems, whereas the public service I remember was actually a pretty hard school. - Graham Scott
The conclusion we can draw from this is don't look to the Courts to redress unfair laws – it's just false hope and a waste of money.
This highlights a gaping problem with our democracy. The public has no legal protections against a Parliamentary majority that abuses the rights of others.
Thank you, Justice Mellon, for reminding us of that alarming reality and exposing the need for laws to protect the sovereignty of the individual against 61 members of Parliament. - Frank Newman
What Christopher Luxon got right in his state of the nation speech was severalfold.
You have to accept that Governments lose elections and the current Government will lose this election in October because of some of the stuff Luxon outlined yesterday.
It is hopeless at delivering stuff and the stuff it did deliver very few wanted, or even asked for.
It's easy pickings for an opposition to outline a litany of failure and it will serve them well if they keep reminding voters just how bad it has gotten —from the MIQ debacle to the vaccine roll out, to the Kiwibuild shambles, to the light rail waste to the cycle bridge— and Luxon spent a decent amount of time on wastage, of which there is mountains. - Mike Hosking
But the bits that will really resonate is the message of hope and aspiration.
This country, not so long ago, was winning. It had a rock star economy and a spring in its step and was a can-do country.
In five and a half years it's been trashed. Those who want better have been side-lined for those who don't care or can't be bothered.
It's a very good example of how hard it is to do well but how easy it is to give up and let it all slip.
This is a country riddled with malaise, there has been an avalanche of working groups and committees that have twiddled and tinkered and thought-bubbled - and come up with next to nothing. -
In some respects the pressure is on National. Not only is the victory there for the taking, it's just how large the thrashing is going to be.
But the trick is to keep reminding us what a mess it is and keep telling us how much better it used to be - and will be again. - Mike Hosking
The economic stimulus during Covid from extra government spending and monetary policy was even greater as a proportion of the economy than elsewhere. The restrictions on the border were more disruptive to the labour market than in other countries, and the desire to crank nominal wages for political reasons more intense.
Since this Government came into office, the minimum wage has risen by a vast 44 per cent.
Ministers also hiked the effective minimum wage for migrants much higher, and both flowed through to increased labour costs. We were in a pro-inflationary environment long before the rest of the world.- Steven Joyce
Government spending these days is more than 40per cent of economic activity. Restraining it would help reduce inflationary pressure on the economy. Restrain it enough and it would be possible to provide some tax relief to struggling families as well.
But restraint is the key. If the Government just borrows more to increase public spending or to give handouts to families, that will push inflation up further.
The good new is that there is huge capacity to cut public spending. Government expenditure has increased by an unbelievable 65 per cent since 2017. Some of it was for the pandemic, but that should be winding out by now. Blind Freddie can see we have a bloated public sector which has gorged itself on free money.
People have made much this week of consultancy spending, but however big that is, it's small beer. The real problem is a general looseness with the public purse, and the hare-brained schemes ministers have been spending all the money on. There has been virtually no fiscal discipline for five years. Every brain fart of an idea has been funded. - Steven Joyce
You can be sure what we see is the tip of the iceberg. As one who's been there, I can confidently predict billions and billions will be able to be wrung out of the current Government's spending and nobody outside the Wellington vortex would notice.
There could easily be enough money to both restrain government spending overall to help control inflation, and give the long-suffering taxpayer a much-needed downpayment on tax reduction. As a result of tax increases and bracket creep, New Zealanders are collectively paying more than $40b more tax this year than they did six years ago. No wonder they are feeling the pain.
The Government's problem is that their mismanagement of core public services like health and education means that, if anything, the public and people working in those sectors will be wanting to spend even more money there. - Steven Joyce
To meet the reasonable aspirations of New Zealanders, this year's Budget will need to be crafted with the sort of surgical discipline that we haven't yet seen from this Finance Minister. He will need to spend money in the right places, slaughter great herds of sacred cows, and provide something to alleviate cost-of-living pressures, all without increasing borrowing. He will also need to demand accountability from the public sector for performance.
If he took a zero-based look at the gargantuan increases in spending on his watch, then with a lot of hard work all that should mostly be possible. If he doesn't, then I think we are in for a bumpy ride.
High inflation, high tax, squeezed family budgets, teacher strikes, people turned away from emergency departments and highly visible wasteful spending, could all add up to a looming winter of discontent. - Steven Joyce
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