Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: The Letter, in reply to Tom Semmens,
The Herald editorial uses 539 words before it finally gets to this:
We regret having reported inflated and conflated dollar figures.
Then:
The core issue remains, however: At a minimum, removing Mr Barker's China trip and a donation to a rowing club the MP's daughter belonged to, Labour faces Liu's claim that he made $38,000 in donations to the party and anonymously through MPs.
At least they're saying "claimed" rather than "confirmed", but by their own account they've don't have the information to cite a figure like $38,000. Liu's second statement says it is his "belief" that he donated "close to" $100,000 and we now know that what he believes to be a donation is is not necessarily a donation.
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Hard News: The Letter, in reply to Joe Wylie,
Yeah right.
It seems fair to note that the MP responsible for that brainfart, Clare Curran, seems to have been demoted so far down the 2014 Labour list that she withdrew from the list altogether. There’s not much more the party can do to register disapproval.
The Greens don't have the complication of recalcitrant MPs who have safe electorate seats.
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Hard News: He Panui: Media Take, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
can it take a macron? (as it were)
Heh. That would open a right old can o’ worms, given the source of the show’s funding.
Tāke (or Taake) also means “tax” – as in the Department of Island Revenue’s Māori title, Te Tari Taake.
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Hard News: The Letter, in reply to Matthew Poole,
Not overly, no. The way they’re treating the Greens is abominable. Not because they’re being nasty but because they’re behaving like there’s a potential future government that includes Labour and doesn’t include the Greens. Their “We’ll talk about that after the election” reaction to the Greens’ ETS/carbon tax policy, for example, is begging for voters to say “It’s too risky to vote for you, because your government is going to include the Greens and you won’t tell us about how you’ll handle this major policy of a key partner.”
What have the Greens said about how they'll deal with Labour's ETS policy, out of interest? And why is it incumbent on Labour to immediately re-assess its own policy because a coalition partner has a different one? Seriously, people were yelling at Labour to respond literally within minutes of the Greens announcing their carbon tax. The same with Labour declining, for perfectly good reasons, to submerge its identity into a campaign coalition with the Greens, before the voters have even made their choices. It does become wearying.
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Hard News: He Panui: Media Take, in reply to TracyMac,
Not to say a good berating isn’t satisfying sometimes, but I don’t think it’s necessarily any better journalism.
Sometimes it's appropriate to thump the desk, but not all the time.
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Hard News: Labour's Fiscal Plan:…, in reply to Gareth Ward,
Agreed.
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Hard News: He Panui: Media Take, in reply to Steve Curtis,
Interesting that your ‘Take’ involves face to face discussions with the journalists and is not like the ABCs Media Watch, which doesnt require their participation, and in my opinion is able to offer a much more critical review.
Well, that's certainly a much more comfortable platform from which to lecture, but that's not what our show is, or has ever been. We've always made a point of talking to media creators and decision-makers.
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Hard News: He Panui: Media Take, in reply to Ewan Morris,
Toi Titi
Toi Iti :-)
Worst typo ever. I'm operating somewhat over capacity at the moment.
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Hard News: The Letter, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
Is the Paul Liu in that story
any relation to Donghua Liu?Probably not. It's a pretty common name.
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The final evolution of the “second statement” Liu story is in this morning’s paper. It contains one new element – the role of Steven Ching.
The man who hoped to be the first Chinese MP for the Labour Party has emerged as a central figure in the donation claims of Donghua Liu.
Steven Ching was a successful fundraiser for Labour and was No42 on the party list ahead of the 2005 election, but withdrew.
The Herald can now reveal that the Auckland businessman, who organised dinners where guests donated $1000 to sit beside former Prime Minister Helen Clark, approached the office of David Cunliffe about Liu’s residency bid.
Mr Ching was not home and did not return messages, but Labour sources confirmed he was the “conduit” between Liu and the party.
When the Herald broke the news that Mr Cunliffe wrote a 2003 letter on behalf of Liu’s residency bid, the Labour leader said he did not recall having ever met the businessman.
“To the best of my knowledge that letter came through my office and an immigration agent on his behalf.”
Mr Cunliffe this week said “to the best of my knowledge” Mr Ching was not that agent. “However he appears to have had some contact at staff level with the New Lynn Electorate Office over the matter.”
Labour sources said Mr Ching had links to Liu and became the “conduit” between the party and the millionaire businessman. “Ching was the ‘money man’ responsible for organising the fundraising dinners and established a good relationship with Liu,” said one.
Keith Ng wrote about Steven Ching in 2005 and it was not complimentary.
Then a year later, for The Listener:
Ching, for example, has been a very successful fund-raiser for Labour, as well as being a donor. This endeared him to the party hierarchy, but his list placement caused resentment among party members, who were less than impressed by his credentials as a campaigner.
His selection turned sour when the Herald on Sunday reported in April that he failed to disclose a guilty plea for obstructing a fisheries officer in 2001, and alleged that he asked an acquaintance to lend him $50,000 after offering the acquaintance help to become a justice of the peace. Ching stood down from the party list pending an investigation into the claim. Last week, Labour’s ruling council refused his plea for reinstatement. President Mike Williams said that nothing would change until police gave Ching the all-clear.
Ching’s rise and rapid fall has been the cause of much chagrin within the Chinese community, but even before the scandals there was an obvious barrier to his becoming a parliamentary representative – he barely speaks English.
Language is a sensitive issue. People who don’t speak fluent English need representation, too, maybe even more so, since they are less able to speak for themselves. But what good is a representative if they are unable to represent the views of their constituents?