Hard News: The Next Labour Leader
295 Responses
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merc,
Mirror man from Hollow men,
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David Hood, in reply to
minor mining?
minor minding mining?
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
Banks is a mingy minger...
minor minding mining?
We look forward to the Minister of Minor Minding Mining's minions' minority report...
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Kumara Republic, in reply to
My first thought days ago was this is union busting stuff.
And what of the 'personality testing' for prospective teachers? Sounds awfully like some kind of House Un-Aotearoan Activities Committee.
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Isaac Freeman, in reply to
Seems to be the standard gold rush model. Doesn't matter how you did at school, you still get issued with an iPad when you board the EQC gravy train.
I dunno. EQC had to hire a lot of people very fast, and it's hardly unusual for people to get entry-level positions in their parents' organisations. Unless there's positive evidence of favouritism, there doesn't seem much here to bother about.
Sadly, it's also not unusual for people in the building trade to go bankrupt. It's a bloody difficult industry, where lots of different companies are sharing one pool of client money, and everyone has to make payroll. One dodgy operator, or even a run of honest mistakes, can knock down other innocent companies like dominoes. Even more so in a market like this, where there's an enormous amount of work to be done urgently, and the insurance companies have yet to release much of the funding.
I wouldn't assume that someone's a risk just because they've been involved in a failed company in the past. -
Greg Dawson, in reply to
I dunno. EQC had to hire a lot of people very fast, and it's hardly unusual for people to get entry-level positions in their parents' organisations.
All well and good as an argument, provided you completely ignore the salaries being paid for these "entry level" positions.
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Isaac Freeman, in reply to
Re schools, I ask again, what (in easy simple to understand words please) is broken?
I've always thought that from the perspective of Wellington it's not so much a question of what's broken as what the government has any control over. There's not a lot a central bureaucracy can do about the day-to-day quality of teaching in classrooms. Ultimately you just have to trust that teachers know what they're doing, but that doesn't sit well when you're expected to come back to voters in three years with successes to report.
You can't do much about recruiting good teachers. There's not enough money to decrease class sizes. There's nothing really wrong with the teachers you have that can be improved. There are, if you're honest, no revolutionary new education techniques waiting to be implemented. There's very little you can feasibly point to and say you've improved it.
Thus, governments tend to get obsessed with assessment and school governance. These are really minor aspects of education, but they're the only areas in which you can make changes without significantly increasing the budget.
Of course it's sensible to construct some kind of narrative about what's broken to justify your actions. But the actual actions you take are determined mainly by the need to do something and the limit range of things you can possibly do.
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Isaac Freeman, in reply to
When did teacher / teacher-union bashing become a national sport…?
To be fair, we also blame parents, students, the gummint, corporate fatcats and the media.
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
I dunno. EQC had to hire a lot of people very fast, and it's hardly unusual for people to get entry-level positions in their parents' organisations. Unless there's positive evidence of favouritism, there doesn't seem much here to bother about.
With a daily food allowance on top of the inflated hourly rate that's a bit over 60% of what a $15-an-hour labourer pulls in an 8 hour day? Nice entry level if you can get it.
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Why the hell does the media have to interview that misfit John Tamihere to pontificate about the current condition of the Labour caucus? He was last a Labour MP almost ten years ago and his political views are closer to National or ACT. That comment about Nanaia Mahuta was seriously uncalled for.
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Islander, in reply to
I loved a response to outrage expressed in the link Joe gave, about the $70 DAILY food allowance, that whinged on about how a lot of the assessors were in hotels and ‘unless you did 2-minute noodles
in the jug’ your only option was to eat in the hotel…jeeezzzusss! Take-aways? Go to a motel and have your own cooking facilities?? I dont spend $70 a WEEK on food (and I drink very good coffee.)
Feeble little gougers-other people commented on the fact that CHCHCH people *with* qualifications in valuing or experience in construction were refused jobs with the EQC assessment dept..
Roll on the heads down dead city-centre streets…*
*Aka a Royal Commission of Enquiry into the EQC -
merc, in reply to
That is chilling.
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merc, in reply to
Yes it does. National hates unions and teachers need one, the same old sorry tale, with students in the middle.
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Isaac Freeman, in reply to
All well and good as an argument, provided you completely ignore the salaries being paid for these "entry level" positions.
Well, true. I was perhaps a bit glib to call them entry level. But I don't see that the salary is a problem in itself.
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Isaac Freeman, in reply to
Perhaps I'd better clarify. The salary seems high to me too, but if it's the same salary that other people are getting for the same job, that's not evidence of nepotism.
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
other people commented on the fact that CHCHCH people *with* qualifications in valuing or experience in construction were refused jobs with the EQC assessment dept..
There's been rather a lot of it about.
Whether it's exploiting a natural disaster, or plundering what's left of public assets under the guise of providing 'more choice', it's more of the standard feeding frenzy that's accompanied past 'privatisations'. Nothing much to get bothered over, it's all the go with our major trading partners who'll be the likeliest source of the second pensions for those who decide these things. -
Craig Ranapia, in reply to
Dude, just tell us what the process actually is. You're being slippery.
What I'm "being" is otherwise occupied with paid work and a hard deadline that was moved up to close of business today at very short notice, and a second I've got to clear before I go out of town for four days on Friday morning.
You know what, Ben - if you actually want try being civil I'll have an ask around because I'm not just going to transcribe great swathes of the National Party constitution because you're visiting from High Dudgeon.
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Chris Waugh, in reply to
Ultimately you just have to trust that teachers know what they're doing, but that doesn't sit well when you're expected to come back to voters in three years with successes to report.
So with national standards and charter schools, N-ACT is breaking the system to make sure there's plenty for the next government to fix?
I'm not overly familiar with the current state of the NZ education system, but based on memory and what I read in the news and here, it would seem to me that it's not broken, but there are some things that could use a bit of maintenance. And some problems can be fixed by throwing money at them. Properly funding the education system right from pre-school to PhD so that teachers and academics get good wages (cos their jobs are actually, like, really important, as in up their with doctors, nurses and farmers in terms of providing the basic necessities of life) and schools don't need various kinds of fundraising drives or full fee paying foreign students to make up the shortfall in cash needed for maintenance and equipment and books would be a good start.
Genuine programmes to actually end poverty would also help. Sick, hungry kids can't learn well. Ending violence, too. It's disturbing to read of how many NZ teachers fear for their safety at school. That's certainly not something I have to worry about in China.
I hated high school. One reason was that sporting success was celebrated far more quickly and to a far greater degree than academic success. Sorry, but that is just fucked. Sport is good, sure, but can we please change social attitudes so that bright kids are encouraged?
And could we please persuade our political leadership to finally abandon the absolutely ridiculous, perverse idea that education is a private good, and that stupid, narrow minded ideas of "user pays" should not be inflicted on education? Education, from pre-school up to and beyond PhD, is, and always has been, a public good. An educated populace is a happier, healthier, more productive populace that makes better long term decisions for the good of its society.
So, I dunno, that's just what I can see that could use some fixing. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe all of those problems have been fixed over the dozen years I've been in China. I hope so. I doubt it. In any case, nothing's ever perfect and there's always stuff that can be improved.
But let's face it: N-ACT has no interest in fixing these things. An underclass represents a pool of potential cheap labour and makes work less secure, which helps drive wages down, which helps N-ACT's constituency make more money. Anyways, poor people are only poor because they're lazy sinners. Good, virtuous, hard working people all get rich. Obviously. Geez, how much of modern politics is actually the Prosperity Doctrine heresy writ secular?
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Islander, in reply to
ame salary that other people are getting for the same job, that's not evidence of nepotism.
Given the age of at least 2 recipients, it is most emphatically nepotism. I'm sorry, a *19yearold* HAS SUFFICIENT COMMUNICATION SKILLS SO GETS A CUSHY JOB?? Paying *5 times the average wage?* With (as far we know) absolutely no other relevant skills whatsoever?
What the hell else do you call it?
Corruption? Because that's the other word that comes readily to mind about the entire ChChCh EQC set-up. -
martinb, in reply to
Sadly have been trying to watch the video of this for days and not been able to.
Initially it said it was unavailable, now it says there is an error with the video. PA computer folk any ideas? It isn't flash or any of the other troubleshooting suggestions.
But from the people who did manage to view it certainly didn't say that Shearer had won it-
In fact here is the summation of the journalist in this tv3 round up:
"David Cunliffe owned it. He was direct, confident. He spoke like a leader. Shearer simply wasn't as sharp or strong".
http://www.3news.co.nz/Labours-leaders-to-be-debate/tabid/370/articleID/235119/Default.aspx
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Rich of Observationz, in reply to
Dude, just tell us what the process actually is.
Yeah, are you saying that the process is secret, but it's ok because you've shared it with the Electoral Commission and they're happy that you're happy? And that it meets s.71 and the poor old electorate have no reason to know any more...
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Isaac Freeman, in reply to
Given the age of at least 2 recipients, it is most emphatically nepotism. I'm sorry, a *19yearold* HAS SUFFICIENT COMMUNICATION SKILLS SO GETS A CUSHY JOB?? Paying *5 times the average wage?* With (as far we know) absolutely no other relevant skills whatsoever?
I'm not saying I like it. It sounds like there's plenty to investigate. But nepotism is a specific claim: it's not enough that there's a family relationship and the job is paid well. You'd need some evidence that they're paid better than other people with similar qualifications doing the same job. Perhaps that evidence exists, but I don't see it in the article.
What the hell else do you call it?
Culture of waste? Inflated salaries? Rushed hiring process? An organisation that suddenly had to do a job it was never designed for? Stressed people throwing money at problems because there's no time to organise a better process?
Perhaps any sufficiently advanced cock-up is indistinguishable from corruption.
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DexterX, in reply to
I didn't realise that our schools were bleeding money
...and so on until I realised that politics has now become trouble makers looking for problems to spend other peoples money on to make themselves feel better.That is so on the money - so much for the illusion of equal opportunity.
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Nikki Kettle, who works as an assessor, for which she earns $180,000 a year ($75 an hour), plus allowances of up to $24,000, has also landed one of the sought-after assessing jobs next year.
These jobs will return an hourly rate of $55. Her mother, Gail Kettle, is the EQC claims manager.
The family is from the North Island..
The fuck?
Many people of senior management status, with considerable expectations of accountability, get a lot less than that.
$75 an hour for professional services is acceptable -- even on the low side -- in a contract situation, where there are costs in doing business (and certainly no $24,000 in reimbursements) but as a rate for an employed position it seems extraordinary to me.
Wow.
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Islander, in reply to
But nepotism is a specific claim: it’s not enough that there’s a family relationship and the job is paid well.
What the actual fuck do you actually need to alter the definition of nepotism than
relation paid heaps without real qualifications- because they are a relation of the employing person? Hmmm?“nepotism: undue favour shown to relatives e.g. by giving them jobs etc.”
[Islander, Emma. I've edited your comment to remove personal abuse, and also I can assure you that you couldn't be more wrong.]
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