OnPoint by Keith Ng

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OnPoint: Did you know we're in a recession?

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  • Yamis,

    This morning on TV1 or National Radio(I forget which) Anne Tolley said (paraphrasing) that teachers wishing to address class size issues need to take it up wither their school board, as the ministry already assess secondary teacher funding on a class size of 17 pupils and if teachers were teaching classes of 30 or more it was because of local decisions....

    A hallelujah moment. She speaks on something other than pay!!! Albeit a load of you know what.

    In my school of around 2,400 students and around 80 odd classes the smallest would be around 17, 18 or so, however the average is typically around 27, 28, with many up over 30. Due to a few seniors leaving school this year mine are 23, 26, 27 and 32. They started at 26, 28, 28 and 32.

    Schools employ DP's, AP's, deans, guidance counsellors, naughty student counsellors, careers staff, sports staff and on and on, along with deans, level coordinators, HOD's etc who are all on reduced teaching loads so that they can actually do their job.

    To say it's the Board of Trustees issue to deal with is pathetic. We're trying to give the kids an education, train up future ABs, silver ferns, Valerie Vili's, and save the world in a semi functional environment.

    Since Nov 2006 • 903 posts Report

  • Eric Dutton,

    But surely we are in a recession and it is the gummint's job to do something about it. Task list for the minister:
    1: Restore full employment
    2. Create a favourable balance of trade
    3. Restrain the growth of public debt
    4. Catch up with Australia

    These are all things that the government promised at the last election. Why not deliver? The Key government resembles nothing so much as a large dog chasing Volkswagens. They have now caught the Volkswagen and they don't know WTF to do with it.

    So they transmute into a wuncharchy. After nine years in opposition to develop policy.

    We want to catch up with Australia? Get a wunch of bankers to tell us how.

    We want to create jobs? Get a wunch of bankers to tell us how.

    Want to create export led growth? Get a wunch of bankers to study the problem.

    These are not difficult problems. It is just that there are a lot of preconceptions preventing the wunch from seeing the solutions. English's distasterously inflationary attempt to increase GST by 2.5% is a case in point.
    GST can be increased to 50% without any direct effect on internal prices, but with immediate effect on the profitability of exports and import replacement industries. It simply has to be done correctly and in a fiscally neutral way.

    Because GST is refunded at the border under GATT rules, a 50% GST would provide a large export stimulus. Chocolate manufacture for Australasia would return to Dunedin. Biscuit factories could put on an extra shift to supply Australia. Slowly, manufacturing would recover from the damage done by years of currency manipulation.

    There are solutions. Its just that the wunch is so blinded by conventional wisdom that they will never be able to see.

    Whangarei • Since Nov 2006 • 13 posts Report

  • Sacha,

    Here's what you're dealing with. This government is relaxed about funding 10 figure bailouts for SCF investors or tax cuts for the already wealthy, but kittehs will die if teachers ask for more pay (or better conditions):

    There is no new money to offer teachers a bigger pay increase unless they wanted to burden their students with a future of paying off national debt, says Prime Minister John Key.

    ...

    Mr Key said the Government was already borrowing $256 million a week.

    "Do the teachers really want us to borrow more than that and place a noose around the neck of young New Zealanders?"

    He said there would always be more industrial action under a National government.

    "That's just the way unions react, the unions back and fund the Labour Party and so they are always going to be our opponents while we are in Government," he said.

    Education Minister Anne Tolley has repeatedly said there was no extra money and "it's not like we can magic money overnight".

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report

  • Sacha,

    Can someone post about what conditions the Ministry is seeking to 'claw back' in its recent offers as has been mentioned but not spelled out in some reports?

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report

  • Jeremy Eade,

    Do the National Party really want us to ignore the communications of our educators and place a noose around the neck of young New Zealanders?

    "Noose around the neck," what an ugly fearful phrase.

    auckland • Since Mar 2008 • 1112 posts Report

  • Ian Dalziel,

    enter The Determiner...

    ...and often expertise committment are one thing that's DEFINATELY needed.

    and CAPPING trumps spelling?
    Definitely a suitable case for commitment...
    :- )

    but otherwise
    good luck with it all

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report

  • Ian Dalziel,

    Albatross...

    "Noose around the neck,"
    what an ugly fearful phrase.

    yeah! What happened to millstones anyway?

    or just putting monkeys on their backs
    or even selling their futures for mere silver...

    I don't think this government knows where adults come from...

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report

  • Matthew Poole,

    Surely there are a couple of journalists who could study up on what teachers actually want and comment on a SINGLE THING other than pay

    Yamis, my nugget about pay being somewhat secondary to conditions was gleaned from those news reports. They're putting the information in there, but pay will keep getting hammered until the PPTA says "This is not a pay dispute. It's a conditions dispute" and keeps on repeating that message every time a journalist asks for a quote. Allowing Tolley, Key and the media to frame the question, and then answering only that question, means it'll continue to be portrayed as a pay dispute. Most of the electorate won't join the dots unless they're told there are dots to join.

    Auckland • Since Mar 2007 • 4097 posts Report

  • martinb,

    Yep Craig. You're the expert on patronising crap: try this one:

    Teachers are now a "noose around the neck of young New Zealanders".

    Waiting.

    Less genteel, less bullshit.

    Auckland • Since Jul 2010 • 206 posts Report

  • Islander,

    Yamis - why the fuck just sports?
    Why not musicians/entomologists/carvers/deep artists/divers/poets et al?

    Limitation imposed by limited people is what limits us all-

    (I fully support teachers/unions of most kinds and am leftwing._

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report

  • Kumara Republic,

    What next? It's getting to the point where the proverbial monkeywrench in the engine is poised to be thrown. What might the wrench take the form of?

    If there isn't enough money for teachers, then why is there enough money for holiday highways and mismanaged financial institutions?

    The southernmost capital … • Since Nov 2006 • 5446 posts Report

  • Caleb D'Anvers,

    Shorter National: "We're not responsible for anything we do in Government. We're borrowing 256 million a week, but that's someone else's fault. Workers are unhappy, but that's just a nasty Left Wing plot! Classrooms are overloaded, but that's all a local issue. Nothing to do with us, apparently. But please, vote for us again!"

    Because, presumably their inability to handle the levers of the state in a competent way when they're given them is ... someone else's fault. And they're probably relaxed about it.

    London SE16 • Since Mar 2008 • 482 posts Report

  • Jackie Clark,

    The problem is, Caleb, that Key will get in again because he's Key. So until people wise up to his emptiness, and until Goff has either a personality transplant/grows some balls, I am afraid that National are going to get away with some truly heinous shit.

    Mt Eden, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 3136 posts Report

  • Sofie Bribiesca,

    Sorry, I should have been more specific. I was just blowing off steam with that comment.

    Still, jolly marvelous job so far imo.
    Coming in late as usual, but having just read this this morning, it was so refreshing to see that someone (and proving more and more to be from PA) was able to unfold the rubbish from the other diabolical behaviour in the House that I witnessed t'other day. It was appalling to watch.
    Go Keith!

    Good to see Public Address keeps its Nat apologist around ready to defend anything these clowns claim.

    And this sounds like more of the same. What's the point of that snide comment? No matter what someones affiliation(or otherwise) may be, there is no reason that others cannot enjoy a forum of robust interaction around here unless a moderator thinks so.
    Geez martinb pull ya head in.

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report

  • Sofie Bribiesca,

    Is their any evidence that many people took what English was saying all that seriously?

    The swinging voter decides elections and they swing off soundbites and smiles.

    Just a bunch of swingers then? :)

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report

  • nzlemming,

    Sofie, I thing the big swinging thread is over there =====>

    Waikanae • Since Nov 2006 • 2937 posts Report

  • Jacqui Dunn,

    I thing the big swinging thread is over there =====>

    I thing you mean the big swinking thread, don't you? And please, where? I followed the arrow and fell off the computer.

    Deepest, darkest Avondale… • Since Jul 2010 • 585 posts Report

  • Sofie Bribiesca,

    Sofie, I thing the big swinging thread is over there =====>

    Ohh, what did I miss again?, shall I guess...;)

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report

  • nzlemming,

    Sorry, Jacqui, I meant the Incomparable Ms Hart's "Oh, Cock" column and the commentary attached thereto. http://www.publicaddress.net/default,6913.sm

    Waikanae • Since Nov 2006 • 2937 posts Report

  • BenWilson,

    Goodness Sofie, you must be able to see my screen. It does indeed swing just to the right, on the next tab.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report

  • Jacqui Dunn,

    Sorry, Jacqui, I meant the Incomparable Ms Hart's "Oh, Cock" column and the commentary attached thereto.

    S'Okay, my friend. I've just spent several hours reading another dozen pages of yet another thread (guess which one that is!) and thought perhaps that was the one you meant. Have to say, if I never see mention of a certain lot of films and a certain group of people for the next several years, I will be very happy. Talk about tedium! (Ooops, I've just realized I'm sure to hear about some of the aforementioned - next year is election year!) I don't think that thread would have reached that total if some of the posters had actually read stuff before they wrote. Nor if they desisted from commenting on things they "thought", "reckoned" or "heard".

    Oh dear. Bad mood. Best get my coat.

    Deepest, darkest Avondale… • Since Jul 2010 • 585 posts Report

  • Sofie Bribiesca,

    Goodness Sofie, you must be able to see my screen. It does indeed swing just to the right, on the next tab.

    Oh Ben, Ben,Ben,Ben,Ben.
    Rodney Hide has just risen joyously in the House. Hope your swinging makes you happy. And yes, I can see your screen. ;-)

    here and there. • Since Nov 2007 • 6796 posts Report

  • Ian Dalziel,

    The fearless vampire killers...

    Rodney Hide has just risen joyously in the House.

    they always forget to use the stake,
    or cut the head off...

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report

  • Joe Wylie,

    Rodney Hide has just risen joyously in the House.
    they always forget to use the stake,
    or cut the head off...

    The latter's not an option, a point Trace Hodgson once made with The Return of Mouldy, where a zombie Muldoon was portrayed returning from the political dead in a late-night TV horror. An off-screen viewer asks why no-one had got around to decapitating him, only to be told that for a guy with no neck it's just too hard.

    flat earth • Since Jan 2007 • 4593 posts Report

  • Jacqui Dunn,

    Wonderful, gentlemen!

    Deepest, darkest Avondale… • Since Jul 2010 • 585 posts Report

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