But then I also think that every other panellist should put Deborah Hill Cone on their Not With Me Thanks list.

On the subject of this being a good time to call for the right to hit kids, we have the Chief Executive of For the Sake of Our Children Trust, Christine Rankin...

A few people on the roster for The Panel on National Radio have specified other panelists they really…

One:

“I again urge the government to do something – anything – to address the terrible treatment of…

Just sitting here crying.

cheers
Bart

There's still big shortages in various areas around the country, particularly the building trade, as a result of the national government doing away with apprenticeships.

Kyle, the National government didn't do away with apprenticeships – they remained an option but not a well publicised one (which was a mistake). The…

I thought it was the foreigners?

throwing a rock-a-hula-tiki party isn't going to help...

who's idea is it to encourage all those foreign ideas anyhow...

anyone care to source the real reason for inflated house prices?

I thought it was the foreigners?

if this article is reliable, we have 152,000 claims for disability from iraq and afghanistan, with 12% of soldiers having served suffering post-traumatic stress.

1500 soldiers are recognised as 'permanently disabled'.

here's another report on PTSD.

Another reminder that the death toll from this war (or any war) is only the begining of the horror

very true. people have long been pointing out that current body armour doesn't protect hands, feet, digits, or limbs.

anyone have stats on US soldiers permanently disabled in iraq?

There's still…

Another reminder that the death toll from this war (or any war) is only the begining of the horror. What so few people understand about the war in Iraq is that the tremendous advances in medicine and trauma care in particular disguise the fact…

that wedding photo breaks my heart

It shocked then saddened me, but then I noticed that the bride's bouquet matched the crimson trim on her dress. So while things are going to be a little tougher for them than for other newlyweds, they still have little pleasures to enjoy.

That wedding pic really made me feel bad. And generally frustrated that this crap…

On another rather horrifying note – the rate of young Maori (men?) leaving school without qualifications was appalling…

I wonder if G.Dubya was invited to the wedding?

Sorry Marcus, I actually agree that declining apprenticeship rates are a problem – however other forms of vocational training have gone through the roof. Fixing apprenticeships relies on…

put all those troublesome kids in the army. that'll sort them out.

Or Nasa perhaps?

You are however quite salient in talking about "getting beyond the politics of obtaining money" – this is a real problem in the grouping of Liberal political economies. While tax rises…

I've not read this report in any detail but I'd be wary of isolating any one factor, tax or otherwise, to explain the relative performances of different countries.

Yes, I was being a bit tongue in cheek there actually ...

Yes, I am coming round to this view myself, for the alternative as posited by the Kiwiblog crew (Sonic excepted of course, you are my hero) is simply...inhuman.

Well, more to the point, the results point in the opposite direction from John Key's more-private-charity pitch.

It's about taking the money, and then respectfully talking about spending it – with the people it is intended to go to.

Oh that's just crazy talk. Seriously, I have an in at the Council, and this seems to be the The Big Problem.
When you talked about..."NZ's selected role…

The common feature of the high achieving countries, as identified by a body of comparative political economic research, is that they…

Suspect getting the copyright legislation into a good state will be big ask...I'd been pondering copyright changes when considering impacts of regulation on telecommunications last year and found the (UK) Office of Communications site which has some good background information about regulation.

Yes. High taxes and deep welfare seem to be good for children.

Yes, I am coming round to this view myself, for the alternative as posited by the Kiwiblog crew (Sonic excepted of course, you are my hero) is simply...inhuman.
In order to learn to care we must access within…

except for Japan on 30%

no wonder they invented pocamon.

but seriously. perhaps the finding on high child injury can finally put pay to criticism of current emphasis on safety culture.

Heh,…

The most interesting thing about it as a piece of social research is that NZ – and the other Anglophonic Liberal political…

New Zealand's rate of child death by intentional injury is shameful. But it's lower than it was in the 1980s, and sharply lower than it was in the 1990s, a boom time…

We don't have anyway of knowing if that is good, bad or average. Reporting an average here would help. If the average was 8%, then it doesn't look too bad. If the average was 2% then we should be concerned.

It's all in the Unicef report itself, mostly with attractive…

You may note a reasonable correlation between countries with "smacking" bans and countries at the other end of the scale from us. It's probably not the day to be firing out a press release demanding the right to smack.

In essesence, what Arend Lijphart calls "Consociational" democracies almost catagorically seem to do better than Majoritarian democracies (i.e. the…

The reporting of statistics is appalling because they don't give you anything…

I presume you are not a renter, don't stock supermarket shelves, work in retail, don't have a student loan, pick grapes, serve tables...

Gross wealth and income may be growing in NZ, but has increasingly not been going to the wage earners, and entry level…

The UNICEF study is disturbing, even assuming things have improved, and there's always problems with data comparability, it's still worrying that we've performed so poorly after several years of relative economic prosperity – perhaps the link is no so…

although a bit of me would like to grizzle at it being held just a couple of days before the deadline for the Select Committee submissions...

Mostly a function of the deadline being so tight. I think Internet NZ did quite well to get out of holiday mode in time.