Posts by Kyle Matthews
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Its worth bearing in mind that the Government is responsible for funding the Chief Electoral Office, and its worth remembering that the Chief Electoral Officer recommended a postal ballot in MARCH was because he didn't want to do an electoral referendum because he thought it would be too much hard work.
In other words, he couldn't be arsed even asking for funding to work a little harder. Parekura Horomia all over again.
Parliament could, if it so chooses, vote on a resolution requiring the voting period for a postal ballot to close on Election Day.
I love how PAS is all hi-falluting until it comes to senior public servants, and then feel free to talk up how crap they are, and they just get to sit there and take it.
As I understand it, parliament after 1999 passed a law to avoid having CIR and elections at the same time, because 1999 was a bit of a mess. Not just as an option if they couldn't do it at the same time, but as a preference. This was recommended by the select committee with multi-party representation, and voted on by parliament.
It's not the CEO not being arsed doing the work. Parliament passed to deal with this eventuality. He's recommended to cabinet, and they accepted his recommendation. If you want to bitch at anyone, go talk to 1999.
Annette King owned Bill English on Morning Report this morning. He was in it in the first half, but once she pointed out that he voted for the law that they were now implementing in 1999, he got flustered and had to fall back on "umm. Labour are blaming civil servants!". I think Sean Plunket had a big grin on his face listening to one interviewer flambe the other.
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Which is why I'm wondering why the CEO doesn't believe there's adequate resourcing to handle a CIR being part of the election ballot.
This is covered in that document. More booths, more staff, more counters. I didn't read it closely, but it seemed to be saying that the postal ballot law was passed so that we didn't have them at the same time as an election again - ie, that doing so was a bad idea, no matter what the timing, money etc.
I would have presumed that they could have just counted the CIR the next day, but apparently the law states that preliminary results must be out that night, which I guess means about half again as many vote counters to count the referendum.
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I take the advice of the Chief Electoral Office very seriously -- certainly more seriously than the Prime Minister has on occasion over the last three years or so.
No doubt you'll be reassured by the fact that she's taking it so seriously now.
It defies basic maths to suggest that it will cost the same to run a stand-alone CIR as it would to have the CIR voting slip handed to people at the same time they are handed their voting slips at the General Election.
If you read the document that I/S linked to, you'll see that money isn't a prime factor. Where it's mentioned the primary concern is that they don't have any money for it at all, so would have to bid for additional money between budgets.
It also points out that the Postal CIR laws were introduced as a result of the 1999 election where they were held together. Good to be reminded by those who know.
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As for whether its really impractical, unlike Family Fist, I'm not given to dark conspiratorial mutterings about the perniciousness of government departments. I certainly expect the electoral bodies to give me a straight answer on whether its logistically possible or not.
I'd be curious to see what result you get back from your OIA request I/S, so make sure you post a link to it here.
At first glance I fail to see why four months isn't long enough to organise a simple referendum with one question and a yes/no answer. But there are likely to be complications that I don't know about.
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Dave, that doesn't make sense. What is the referendum for?
Making a couple of hundred thousand NZers feel briefly better about themselves, and then pissed off and disenchanted with the political process.
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I'm not actually disagreeing with you here, but a 'time out' is a pretty useful and low-key exploitation of a pretty basic fear children have of being isolated.
I don't know how other people use time out, but I use it to give a child (or occasionally, myself) space from other people and a chance to let the adrenalin stop pumping and to have a wee break for a couple of minutes. I had a good friend who occasionally had problems with groups of people who put himself in time out fairly often, though it seemed to coincide with his cigarette breaks, and I'm sure is one of the reasons he found it so difficult to give up smoking.
I refereed an ice hockey game in which a kid was too hyped up the other day, and was taking runs at other kids and getting agro. I sent him to the bench for a few minutes, told him to calm down, and he came back out and played much better afterwards.
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Sometimes I'm tempted to make a macro to produce my 'enable sense of humour' instructions at the press of a key...
I stopped reading that one. I got through a whole couple of paragraphs, but if someone is going to forget about the shift key on their keyboard, they need to be making sense at some stage in their post.
If anyone cares, it was about when they linked gangs to managing society.
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He said leaders like Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Pompeii, and Adolf Hitler had also been brought down by the ordinary masses.
Eh? Masses?
Alexander the Great: Alexander died after twelve years of constant military campaigning, possibly as a result of malaria, poisoning, typhoid fever, viral encephalitis or the consequences of alcoholism.
Julius Caesar: Assassinated by Brutus, and other senators.
Pompey: Assassinated by the court of the Egyptian king.
Adolf Hitler: Committed suicide as the Third Reich fell apart around him.
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Personally I don't think our elections are too complex, and people should be able to tick who they vote for, and tick what they feel about one or two other issues, without getting confused.
And if they do get confused about that, then I suspect their vote isn't going to make much sense to me with or without the referendum, so I don't see why we should spend millions more to get a quarter as many people voting in a referendum.
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At the risk of Godwin-ing myself, Germany was awfully "white and first world" between February 27, 1933 (the Reichstag Fire), and July 14 that same year (when it officially, and perfectly legally became a one-party state).
I'm not sure if 1933 Europe and 2008 World is a particularly valid comparison Craig. The failure of the League of Nations, pre-post-Colonialism, and the shock of the first World War are primary features of inter-war Europe, globalisation, world media and crazy indigenous dictators seem to be 'in' right now.
Regardless, I think my point that the rest of the world would take a lot more active interest in NZ being taken over by a military dictatorship still stands.