Hard News by Russell Brown

Read Post

Hard News: Didn't see that coming

121 Responses

First ←Older Page 1 2 3 4 5 Newer→ Last

  • Andre Alessi, in reply to Sofie Bribiesca,

    When did IMP suggest hiring for below minimum wage?

    They didn't. However, it's implicit in the policy:

    $1.1 billion will be used to create shorter term jobs (3-18 months’ duration) and to administer the programmes. The remaining $200 million per year will be available for longer term grants to create sustainable work emerging from the initiatives supported.

    The aim is to fill gaps where the market is not able to create and fund jobs and to create sustainable community-based employment.

    The work will reflect the wide range of skill levels among those who are unemployed or under-employed.

    The intention may be to fund work that would otherwise not get done because the immediate economic benefits don't justify hiring people to do the work, but that isn't how employers will actually use the grants. They'll see "free money for work people otherwise wouldn't do even at minimum wage".

    I get that intent does count for something in policy, but explicitly calling the policy "right to work" should be raising the hackles of anyone who isn't actively anti-union.

    Devonport, New Zealand • Since Nov 2006 • 864 posts Report Reply

  • Stephen Judd, in reply to Raymond A Francis,

    I think the Left should think about whose private stuff ends up in public before playing the dirty politics card

    The issue is the public interest in the contents of the emails. No one is saying open season on private comms. It is the subject matter of the communications that justifies their release.

    Here, the public interest is in collusion with a very nasty person, and possible abuse of the powers of office.

    For what it's worth, I was quite anxious that it would turn out that someone from Labour was feeding stuff to Slater. And if they had I would take that on the chin.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 3122 posts Report Reply

  • Alfie, in reply to Tom Semmens,

    Hosking makes my skin crawl, I can't bring myself to listen to him.

    +1 to that!

    Dunedin • Since May 2014 • 1440 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown, in reply to Moz,

    Where are the leaks of Miss Clark’s emails calling West Coast voters ” Inbred ferals”

    I suspect they exist only in the fevered imaginations of right wing trolls.

    More to the point, as I recall, she said it out loud. Not one of her finest moments.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • James George, in reply to Andre Alessi,

    Imagine a situation where employers could routinely hire call center workers for below minimum wage on short term contracts to "fulfill a need", for example. It would be sold to the public as " giving new workers experience" even though call center experience is not particularly useful to workers, and the effect would be depressing wages further in what is already a low-paying industry.

    See that is a thing conservative governments like the National Party used to try & pull and are probably doing in some states of Australia right now. They don't do it here because the natz regard youth unemployment as a lesser issue than ensuring their petit bourgeois voters can keep clocking a good earner from sitting on their asses in a paid off home. Banks love the current situation too, it gets older types who used to always remain liquid, borrowing against the increased value of their house. Bigger home loans for those who can afford to buy also increases bank profits.
    I cannot believe the upsurge in net migration at a time when unemployment particularly youth unemployment is so high, is the oops sorry! accident the KeyCorp mob claim it is.

    Job creation schemes which aren't about lowering wages, have a chequered history because politicians imagine if a program that put 1000 people into work successfully, is multiplied by 100, then 100 thousand kids will find employment and when that doesn't happen the pols shit themselves blaming everyone/thing but their own stupidity.

    I could tell some crazy tales of how really good useful programs got shafted by idiot pols.
    Here's one. A really keen & committed woman I used to work with, created an 'Office Practises' course for women who had lived under the hammer coming out of incest, domestic abuse, sex industry exploitative type situations.
    It went the bomb for years helping women help themselves to a better life. Until some bloke whose former punching bag did the course, complained to a pol about 'sexual discrimination'.
    The pols and the senior bureaucrats behaved in their usual spineless manner and the program was instructed to include males. Yeah right - this was an intense program where women had spent a lot of time dealing with really sensitive issues going back their whole lives, and getting em dealt with.
    Throw some blokes into the mix and it doesn't matter how sensitive those guys are alleged to be, many women who are already full of problems about blokes, just shut up or even worse.
    The program ended the next year because it wasn't working any more.

    Any way my point is that IMP haven't indicated that they are about 'cadetships' or any other tory scams to exploit young kiwis. We should give them a chance to explain what they are about & not curse them for having hopeless programs that cannot work.
    Properly designed & implemented industry based employment or training programs do work. When they are done properly they make big returns to a society and not just economic either.

    Since Sep 2007 • 96 posts Report Reply

  • Keir Leslie,

    I suspect Internet /Mana don't care if they scare moderate voters away from Labour, as long as they increase their own vote. (Or, rather, I suspect that all the incentives run that way, and I suspect the party acts as if that's true, even if the lead actors may consciously know that it's self-defeating.)

    Since Jul 2008 • 1452 posts Report Reply

  • Alex Coleman, in reply to Russell Brown,

    Well, she said some coasters can be a bit feral, which still wasn't her finest moment, but the 'inbred' part seems to be a right wing blog based fabrication.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 247 posts Report Reply

  • Moz, in reply to Russell Brown,

    More to the point, as I recall, she said it out loud. Not one of her finest moments.

    It was a very WTF Helen moment.

    To me, part of the point was that a lot of people were shocked that she'd say something like that. Whereas with certain other politicians we'd mostly be surprised that they were silly enough to say it where people could hear it.

    Sydney, West Island • Since Nov 2006 • 1233 posts Report Reply

  • ChrisW, in reply to Russell Brown,

    Greymouth Star to the rescue. In its report of the initial reaction to WhaleOil’s ‘Feral dies in Greymouth, did world a favour’, it explained carefully -

    The ‘feral West Coasters’ label has been around since 2000, when former Prime Minister Helen Clark was speaking on National Radio at the height of the native timber logging debate, but her comments were taken out of context.
    A transcript of the sentence in question shows that Ms Clark actually said: ‘Attitudes of some on the West Coast could be fairly feral’.

    Nothing about breeding.
    I’m not sure ‘feral’ was in currency as a term of abuse in 2000. She may well have unwittingly relaunched it as such, whereas I think she thought she was using it in a semi-technical sense as fair comment in regard to some West Coasters.

    Yet Geoffrey Palmer’s ‘pluvial’ in describing NZ as “an irredeemably pluvial country” in the wake of Cyclone Bola never caught on.

    Gisborne • Since Apr 2009 • 851 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha, in reply to James George,

    that programme sounds great.

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Keir Leslie, in reply to ,

    It's kinda counterproductive if you're KDC and want to change the government at the upcoming election though.

    Since Jul 2008 • 1452 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha, in reply to Raymond A Francis,

    the facts do not back them up so far

    Don't be ridiculous. There's a whole book of them.

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha, in reply to Keir Leslie,

    For sure. Wouldn’t think we’d need to explain MMP to a German (especially after Russel Norman already tried).

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • nzlemming, in reply to Russell Brown,

    Hosking's interview with Laila Harre is amazing.

    I'm starting to think Wells does a better Hosking than Hosking.

    Waikanae • Since Nov 2006 • 2937 posts Report Reply

  • Matthew Hooton, in reply to Russell Brown,

    It was news to me. I had never heard the story about him hacking into Helmut Kohl's IT to reduce his personal credit rating. The fact Dotcom may have said it all around the country at Internet-Mana meetings doesn't mean it is not news when he says it at his party's campaign launch in front of TV cameras. By that standard, if Key or Cunliffe said something outlandish at their campaign launches, they'd be able to say "it's not news - I've said that lots of times in small meetings around the provinces with National/Labour audiences".

    Auckland • Since Aug 2007 • 195 posts Report Reply

  • Tom Semmens,

    Wow, just wow.

    David Fisher recounts his journey into and out of addiction. The level of influence Cameron Slater has clearly come to have on a huge section of our MSM is scandal in itself, regardless of the Hager emails.

    For the last six years, Slater managed to turn himself into a dealer for willing newsroom junkies. Fisher confesses, but how many other journalists are unwilling to give up the comfy embrace of Slater's particular heroin?

    Sevilla, Espana • Since Nov 2006 • 2217 posts Report Reply

  • Bart Janssen, in reply to Tom Semmens,

    For the last six years, Slater managed to turn himself into a dealer for willing newsroom junkies.

    Glove puppets perhaps?

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 4461 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha,

    To repeat what I said upthread, TV3 at least went into the meeting pursuing hacking as their angle. BEFORE Dotcom’s speech. And what do you know, that’s the only one they pursued all the way to the screen.

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Sacha, in reply to Matthew Hooton,

    outlandish

    and what would count as that, pray tell?

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    Front page of Herald today...
    Dotcom: I had no idea Liu had any problems
    They seem to be pushing this story, guy invests in Mega, guy gets busted for alleged money laundering. This is one of the charges .com is facing himself , allegedly, and is basically a meaningless charge unless it can be proven that the money was come by illegally. For a start this is a police raid, not a resulting conviction following a court case so nothing proven but still the Herald sees fit to try and tar .com with this virtual broad brush, dirty politics or just bad journalism?.
    Seems the powers that be, through the long blue arm of Johnny Law, have it in for Internet Mana. Hone, it appears, may be charged for careless driving following an accident in the Maungamukas. I know this stretch of road, it is treachourous. The police seem to think that all the blame lies firmly at the feet of Mr Harewira and not with the abysmal state of the roads, especially in the North.
    If you have a look at the pictures of that collapsed piece of State Highway 1, just south of Kawkawa, you will see that the actual road construction is less than 200mm thick. This is quality of the roads we have to put up with, these roads cost lives. We already have roads of national importance but they are failing fast. What seems to be of importance to National in respect to roads is how much their mates can make from building new ones to their holiday homes.

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • Alex Coleman, in reply to Matthew Hooton,

    hacking into Helmut Kohl’s IT

    What does that mean?

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 247 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel, in reply to Steve Barnes,

    infrastructure infra dig...

    This is quality of the roads we have to put up with,
    these roads cost lives.

    Roads of National Impotence
    -----------------Vs -----------------
    Roads of Notional Importance

    Keep on trucking...
    :- )

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes, in reply to Ian Dalziel,

    Keep on trucking…:-)

    Mother Truckers...

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • tussock, in reply to Danyl Mclauchlan,

    National couldn't have asked for anything better than a reminder to wavering centre voters that the alternative to Key - dirty politics or not - is a government propped up by a bunch of nutty, angry activists.

    As against the ACT party? Who've discovered all science is wrong.
    The Conservatives? Who by comparison don't think anything is wrong.
    Winston? Who's discovered it's all China's fault, again.

    National? Who've declared everything they've ever done wrong is a massive left-wing conspiracy of epic proportions and also up is down. #Johnkey.

    How do they say it? "If you're not angry, you're not paying attention." IMP does seem to be chasing the angry and disenfranchised left vote, young folk and unemployed that get precisely fuck all from any other party for about twenty years now.

    And good on them, as the Greens continue their drive to serve the safe centre of reasonable people who don't have any actual problems. To some extent, you might almost consider it a huge conspiracy of former greenies to make the Greens look more reasonable by comparison. Eh? If you're a National voter or some other brand of crazy person.

    Since Nov 2006 • 611 posts Report Reply

  • Tinakori, in reply to Sacha,

    TV news of whatever ilk almost always go to events with the story mostly written. It is the job of the event or interviewee to fill in the blanks. It's usually too expensive to send crews out on spec.

    Wellington • Since Jul 2013 • 118 posts Report Reply

First ←Older Page 1 2 3 4 5 Newer→ Last

Post your response…

Please sign in using your Public Address credentials…

Login

You may also create an account or retrieve your password.