The Thorndon Bubble

From last night.

Thank you very much to those of you who have signed my anti-whaling petition today!

John Key seems to have joined New Zealand up to the group of pro-commercial whaling nations. In a little over a year the National-Act Government has turned our country from being a world leader in marine mammal conservation into an advocate for the resumption of commercial whaling.

The Labour Party opposes whaling. For more information click here.

If you haven’t signed the petition then please help send a strong message to John Key and Foreign Minister Murray McCully that New Zealanders expect our Government to stand up for endagered species. Sign the petition now:

Number of people who have already signed the petition:

There is a quiet revolution underway in macroeconomics. 

The old orthodoxy – the “Washington consensus” – is being deserted by leading economists in response to the Global Financial Crisis. 

For me the turning point was last month when the IMF published a challenging article by its Chief Economist Olivier Blanchard and others, that calls time out on the old orthodoxy. 

Although much debated because of its suggestion around a higher baseline inflation target, it is much broader in its critique of the failed status quo and directions for change.

If you have’t read it, see it here: http://blog-imfdirect.imf.org/2010/02/12/imf-draws-lessons-from-the-crisis-reviews-macro-policy-framework/

 For further comment see:

http://macroblog.typepad.com/macroblog/2010/02/do-we-need-to-rethink-macroeconomic-policy.html

http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2010/02/do-we-need-to-rethink-macroeconomic-policy.html

http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2010/02/monetary_policy_2 

I will be writing more about the IMF change of direction, the breakdown of the consensus and what it might mean for us. 

We live in exciting times.  The current government is now clearly living in the past.

..meters that is.  Let’s get smart meters in NZ.

In this week’s podcast Dave Clendon lays out the reasons why they are a good idea.

In the couple of days since this podcast was recorded, big bad Gerry Brownlee has stomped all over a very good idea and laid out the reasons to do nothing.

Round two of the debate here on frogblog later this week. In the meantime, you can check out the podcast.

Click to play

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This work is licenced under a Creative Commons Licence.

Yesterday's post about Phil Heatley ended with a poke at the media, accusing them of suffering from the same ethical sickness as our MPs due to their efforts to minimise and excuse Heatley's behaviour. Today, I got an email from Herald political correspondent John Armstrong, who pointed out that I was being unfair. Most of the press gallery, including himself, had unequivocally condemned Heatley's behaviour, and made it clear that those attempts to excuse it were bullshit. And he's right. I'd based my comments on the few who had made excuses for Heatley - notably TVNZ's Francesca Mold, who said it was "just a silly mistake" [video], the Herald's John Roughan, who thought it was a petty issue, and Vernon Small, who thought it was "at [the] minor end of the scale" and that he didn't need to resign for it. These commentators were in the minority - but their sheer outrageousness meant they were the ones that stuck in my mind.

Heatley is a thief, whose abuse of the public trust is inexcusable. Most of our political commentators recognised that. I apologise for misrepresenting them.

Tonight at 9 pm on TVNZ7 or live at the Backbencher.

• Grant Robertson, Labour
• Paul Quinn, National
• Russel Norman, Greens

Topics:

CUTTING THE FAT: McDonalds and Weight Watchers have joined forces to fight obesity. Is this a deal with the devil or a way to help obese people make the proper choices when eating out in the real world? Kiwis are the 2^nd fattest in the world after the United States. What else are we doing to cutting obesity in New Zealand?

SNIPPING CHILD ABUSERS: David Garrett has suggested that parents found guilty of abusing their children should be offered $5,000 to be sterilised. These comments have people up in arms but what do we do about people who abuse their children? How do we stop the cycle of violence?

Oh dear. Anyone who felt a wee bit nervous when Steven Joyce became Tertiary Education Minister has a right to feel justified in their fears after his last couple of annoucements.

First, we hear there are plans to link funding for tertiary institutions to the pass rates of their students from 2012. This is a terrible idea.

It could actually make the problem the Government is trying to fix – supposedly “poor quality” courses and “low standards” – worse, by encouraging funding-starved insititutions to pass everyone in order to secure their funding. Universities are starved of funding enough as it is, without creating a perverse incentive like this.

It could also make institutions wary about accepting students who are “less likely” to pass, like Maori, Pacifica, and adult students without previous qualifications, creating a serious equity issue around access to education for these groups.

Finally, it totally fails to take into account the fact that there are numerous factors influencing pass rates. As I blogged when John Key hinted at this in his speech a few weeks ago, included among “failures” could be people upgrading from a sub-degree course to a degree course because they learn that they are up to the challenge, or people moving out of education and straight into work. I would argue that scenarios like this actually constitute “success”, not failure. But linking funding to pass rates is too blunt an instrument to take this into account.

We also learned that the Government wants to review and reduce the number of tertiary qualifications on offer. This shows that they just don’t understand what higher education is all about.

Higher education is not only about churning out the type of “work-ready” graduates that industries say they want. It’s also about teaching life skills, critical thought, research, and other skills which enhance employability in any industry.

We can’t predict now what skills industries will demand in two, three, or five years time when people graduate, so we’re better off focusing on quality higher education that can be adapted to different jobs. I mentioned this in my last blog on tertiary issues too.

While its good to avoid replication of qualifications that are substantially the same, it’s important to remember that a diversity of courses reflects our diverse society, skills, and needs.

With these latest announcements, Stephen Joyce has shown his failure to grasp these key concepts.

Words can’t describe how cringeworthy this plan is. It will make Wellington look cheap and tacky, and trying to be something we are not.

Yes Wellywood is fine as an occassional nickname, when referring to the wonderful growth of the film industry here. When we use it, we do so with pride for what has been accomplished.

But please please Wellington Airport, do not stick that sign up on our hills. It is tacky and awful. Mosgiel can do that as a joke, but not Wellington.

I’m not a big fan of civil disobedience which damages property, but if that monstrosity goes up, I’ll be half tempted to call for volunteers to pay it a visit at midnight. A few axes and problem solved.

If it said Wellington only, it would be a bit less tacky. But even then, it doesn’t work. Hollywood is Hollywood. Wellington doesn’t need to copy their sign. We have a great city, with so much going for it. A sign like that just makes us look like we have some sort of city penis envy.

A reader has emailed wishing me a happy birthday and sending me this link.

‘Fair and balanced‘ Fox News asked in an online poll what people thought the US Tea Party Movement is about.  Here are the results:

Thanks for that.  It has really helped to make my birthday a happy one.

The NZ Herald talks charity:

At the heart of John Key’s approach are the concepts that the Government should not be providing everything in social welfare, that, indeed, it may not be the best judge of what is needed, and that charity is a good thing. He has sought to further these ideas by building on work done by the previous Government, most notably in abolishing the $1890 cap on rebates for charitable donations.

Most recently, legislation has provided for that rebate to be received automatically by wage and salary earners who donate directly to an approved charity from their pay cheque.

Yet such measures amount only to tinkering when compared with the extremely enticing tax breaks that underpin the strong tradition of private charity in the US.

The Dominion Post weighs in to the sterilisation debate:

ACT list MP David Garrett should know by now that, when he thinks aloud, he will almost certainly find himself in trouble.

Like Maori Party bad boy Hone Harawira, he shoots from the lip, and his homespun philosophy is rarely politically correct.

But despite both MPs’ comments ritually provoking outrage, a kernel of truth is often found therein.

Last week, Mr Garrett was in hot water again, this time for daring to suggest that parents who have abused their children be offered $5000 to get themselves sterilised. …

Predictably, Mr Garrett’s comments were compared with the excesses of Nazi Germany. Mr Kahui’s lawyer, Lorraine Smith, called them “outrageous and a disgrace”.

Karl du Fresne blogs on how hysterical some of the reaction was, with the Nazi comparisons.

Back to the Dom Post:

But those who lambast Mr Garrett for initiating an idea that at least attempts to confront the issue need to face an unpalatable fact: programmes in place now to protect vulnerable children are failing. Sixteen children died last year as a result of family violence.

Delcelia Witika, Lillybing, James Whakaruru, Nia Glassie, Chris and Cru Kahui comprise just a handful of the names on New Zealand’s roll of shame, each one killed by people whose responsibility it was to care for them.

And people who knew these little ones were being abused did not intervene. It is not good enough.

There is no doubt that the Garrett proposal is a step too far. However, even his most vehement critics should find an initiative instigated by Social Development Minister Paula Bennett more acceptable.

Last week, an Experts Forum on Child Abuse recommended that state agencies be able to keep track of parents whose children had died, or been taken off them.

The problem is that, at present, files are closed when a child dies, and social workers don’t know another child has been born to the same mother until that child, too, comes to their notice through abuse or, worse, because he or she has died.

I’m amazed we do not already do this.

It is no wonder Mr Garrett is casting around for new ideas. The old ones aren’t working.

And that is why his comments, on this blog, sparked a national conversation.

And the ODT looks at government spending restraint:

It makes sense for governments to regularly review the costs of administration and services and, especially, to look for efficiencies in operating and technology costs.

Some $2 billion is required to be found in the next two years for the latter, which in turn it is hoped should lead to less duplication of office support functions and services.

It is telling that Mr Key has cited last year’s health sector reforms, which pooled district health board payroll and procurement, with estimated savings over five years of $700 million – and the loss of 500 jobs.

The Government does not consider what is planned to be on the scale of the radical reforms of the Rogernomics era, yet it has declined to make public estimates of potential job losses, which rather implies that the reforms will be sufficiently substantial to be job-costly, and the public service unions have not been slow to express their anguish.

The recession knocked $50 billion out of the economy – the public sector can’t be immune from that.