Political Dumpground

Time to Rebuild For Labour

2011-11-27T12:01:00.001+13:00

The Result
Last night was a poor result for Labour and actually a poor result for the country with only 2 million people voting our lowest turnout since the 1880's. Thanks to our threshold keeping the Conservative Party out National has stolen a majority without a majority of the votes as a John Banks is effectively a National MP as is Peter Dunne given he voted with them on over 90% of bills last Parliament. Less than a quarter of the New Zealand population voted for the Government when you combine those not able to vote, those who voted for the left and those who did not which is a bit alarming. It is a result neither side is happy with because National does not have a stable Government with the centre-right share of the seats decreasing by 4-5 and Labour obviously doesn't get to be Government. The centre-left probably couldn't have had a much better result other than that 2 extra seats to form Government with the Maori Party being possible but it was a bad result for Labour with their vote being eaten up by the Greens and New Zealand First.

Was It The Leader?
Phil Goff got thrown in the deep end facing an unwinnable election where his coverage to begin with was as Helen Clark's replacement. He faced a party that had been crushed under her sheer strength as a leader that had little capability of acting on its own and was heavily in debt from its 2008 campaign. Labour was lucky to get the result it did last night rather than collapsing down to Bill English levels of support like National did in 2002 when faced with a similar situation. Unlike in Helen Clark's 1996 campaign Phil Goff lost the unloseable election rather than the unwinnable one. Phil Goff showed in that last month he could be leader of the country and lifted his 7% support to over 20% a phenomenal improvement but he needed to have done that two years ago if he wanted to win and even then it would have been a stolen election relying on coalition partners being large. The issue in this campaign was not Labour's leader but the fact that National's leader was John Key.

The key issue with Labour's campaign was that it never really focussed on its policy beyond asset sales. Almost all of its policies polled very well but there were never really were pushed hard. Headlines they could have legitimately and effectively used for their flyers that never made it on include:

Ending child poverty
A debt free future
Free healthcare for under 6's

There were many more policies that could have given voters rather than one reason to vote Labour at least two or three which could be enough to really change someone's mind. In general however their campaign was very strong and unexpectedly good.

This was however a very difficult election to win with most the public generally happy with the current Government because they don't follow politics closely. There was no mass discontent for Labour to be the opposition for and in general people didn't want change. This election were Labour to have won it would have been a truly phenomenal result never before achieved in New Zealand.

The Leadership Contest
In my opinion Phil Goff should have stayed leader for at least some of the rebuild even if he did not remain leader for the next election because he has been the type of leader that has allowed the party to become strong and rebuild and this needs to continue. If they get another Helen Clark style leader even if the public loves them the party will not win in 2014 because they will have no candidates to stand and no one to campaign for them. Unfortunately much like Goff was shafted by the selection process after Helen Clark left the new leader will now suffer the same fate with a mere two weeks to build profile before becoming leader in a caucus vote rather than being preferred by the public and party.

All of those now standing are good MPs within Labour's caucus and all have positives and negatives. It is a little odd the right wing commentators all seem to have unified behind David Shearer but he does seem quite like the Labour equivalent of 2005 Don Brash the non-politician politician so perhaps they are reminiscing for that. My own support goes for Grant Robertson who I believe will inevitably be leader anyway but if it is not for another two terms or more many of his advantages will be lost. Whoever is chosen will have a massive task ahead of them and they need to be prepared and I would hope all of the candidates have already begun doing media training for the role.

What Next?
Labour ran the best campaign it has in recent times despite its lack of focus on its broader policies than asset sales. Some MPs and electorates were still sleepwalking in a daze through this campaign however. If Labour wants to win in 2014 it needs major reform. It needs to rebuild its party membership, it needs to find another 10+ new candidates of cabinet level quality who can run for them next time around the country and replace some of the deadwood or areas where it simply didn't have a real candidate like Taupo. Finally it needs to get rid of some of that dead wood that still remains.

Labour should have a look at each electorate and see what it needs to do there to fix things although some results could change on specials.

The Under Performers
In this election the following electorates performed below average for the Labour campaign in their swings on candidate and party vote or turnout from the last election: Clutha-Southland, Coromandel, Dunedin North, Hamilton West, Ilam, Invercargill, Kaikoura, Nelson, Northland, Rangitikei, Rodney, Rotorua, Selwyn, Taupo, Tauranga, Tukituki, Waikato, Waimakariri, Waitaki, Whangarei, Wigram, Te Tai Hauaruru, Wairiki.

These electorates need intense levels of work and Labour needs to realise it is an MMP party and centrally allocate resources to these electorates for next time to ensure they are able to perform well in campaigns. The Wellington electorates had a high degree of sharing of resources this election which is why none of them made it into the under performers list despite the strong challenges from the Greens there. With the exception of Wigram and Dunedin North who just had changes of incumbent MPs which usually leads to bad results all of these electorates have been known to have issues with them for a while in the party and it should have been obvious they were going to under perform. Taupo had a -19% swing on candidate vote, -9% on party vote and -12% on turnout and will need the most help. When a candidate after being selected finds they only have 5-10 people to work with on their campaign it is obvious they cannot do well and there needs to be effort put in to make sure that doesn't happen. It also needs to be ensured the party is large enough to find candidates swiftly so it does not have to wait until the very last minute to select a candidate as it did in electorates like Taupo and Tauranga which essentially guaranteed not being able to make traction on candidate vote to win back some electorates for the party and in fact both of those could be with strong long term campaigns.

The High Achievers
Some electorates also did well and have lessons to be learned from them. Specifically: Mt Roskill, Napier, Manurewa, Manukau East, Mangere, Epsom and Botany performed well above average. These electorates strategies should be explored and the information shared with the wider party to develop their campaigns for next time.

The electorates of: East Coast Bays, Helensville, Hunua, New Lynn, North Shore, North Cote, Pakuranga, Papakura, Tamaki, Te Atatu and Waitakere performed above average on party vote also so these electorates should look to how they can help out their neighbouring electorates while running a similar strength campaign in their own electorate for next time.

Future With The Greens
Labour and the Greens are natural coalition partners. However Labour will now be concerned that the Greens could usurp them at the natural party of the left with environmental issues becoming of increasing importance around the world. It is likely conflict between the two parties will grow significantly during the next three years as they compete to be as large as possible when the National Government is toppled which they will hope to be in 2014.

The key thing Labour needs to do here is firstly to be positive and look like the governing party. If Labour allows itself to look like an opposition rather than a Government in waiting the Greens can market themselves as a Government in waiting and take the centre vote from Labour. This already happened to a degree in this election.

Secondly it should take a stronger stance on the environment to ensure people do not defect to the Greens for that reason, this would make them much better coalition partners also. Labour's method of focussing on the environment must always be different from the Greens however because Labour's environmental policy should always be a social issue and in this way the two parties do not openly conflict for the same space and negate each others votes. This means when the Greens sell cleaning up our rivers they sell this because rivers are good and pollution is bad. Labour should sell cleaning up our rivers as a way to promote fishing, tourism and give us a nice place to walk our dogs and let our kids play.

Clearing the Deadwood
Labour should look to those electorates which underperformed and see if those candidates are merely new or if they are someone on their decline. Where they are someone in their decline they need to be cut from the party if Labour wants to be Government. It should also look whether its current list MPs are really worth keeping or whether they should stand down after this term to be replaced by new electorate MPs or new list MPs for specific demographics. List MPs are great but they need to either be doing something special for the party in policy, winning an electorate back in a long term strategy or targeting a particular demographic of voter across the country effectively.

At the same time Labour didn't really have a huge range of people to pick from this time and will need to focus on finding some good candidates. This means there is a need to grow its membership to attract talented people into the fold and a degree of head hunting.

The Future?
If Labour works hard they can turn 2014 into a landslide victory for the left. There is a lot to be done but they can do it and the party is in a much better position to move forwards this time than it was in 2008 so there is hope for the future.

In terms of the future of this blog it is probably about time I took a bit of a break from it. Has been a fantastic election campaign to analyse and I should probably now focus my free time on some non-political things for a while like losing some weight.

How I Am Voting

2011-11-25T10:10:00.001+13:00

Tomorrow is November 26th and election day so it is time to cast my advance vote at the nearest place I can find so I can help out on the day with other things.

Referendum
In the referendum I am voting for MMP. I care most of all about proportionality in election results and MMP is the most proportional system by far so it will be getting my vote. It is not legitimate in my mind for people to vote in this referendum to deny the minority of their right to vote which is what this referendum is about - reducing the numbers of minor parties. My second choice will be STV, it is nowhere near as proportional as MMP but it is a lot better than the other systems and I expect MMP to win which means it will get a review. In the review I would like to see the threshold of 5% abolished and ranking for electorate seats brought in. This means having STV polling high in this referendum is important as it shows people like ranking. Am not too concerned about the referendum as I think it would be nearly impossible for MMP to lose the second one even if it is possible it could lose this time.

Electorate Vote
I live in Rongotai so I don't have a great deal of options:
FINLAYSON, Christopher   National Party
KING, Annette   Labour Party
LATIMER, Joel   ACT New Zealand
NORMAN, Russel   Green Party
PIERSON, Brent   New Zealand First Party
RICHARDS, Don   Independent
RICKUS, Aroha   Māori Party
WELSH, Bruce   Conservative Party

The National, ACT, New Zealand First, Green and Conservative Party candidates are all with no chance of getting my vote for various reasons. The Maori Party candidate I had never heard of and showed some promise when she gave speeches but not in answer to questions where she read off sheets so also a clear no. Don Richards gave some good insight into the banking issues of today and could have been a good candidate for a protest vote. Last election I cast my electorate vote for Michael Appleby of the Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party as a protest vote. However this time I have an electorate MP I know well due to my increased involvement in politics and she will easily be getting my vote as she does a fantastic job: Annette King.

Party Vote
Last time I was about three months out from the election tossing up between National and Labour. By the time of the election I was tossing up between Greens, New Zealand First and Labour. I ended up choosing Labour a few days before which I don't regret and I will do so again easily. Looking back through Labour's old election policies this is probably the best year for voting Labour there has been for a long time.

Predictions

ACT and Peter Dunne will leave Parliament.
The Maori Party will hold the balance of power.
Mana will get Hone Harawira and Annette Sykes.
The Conservative Party will not get elected.
MMP will win the referendum.
National will get 48% or lower.
Labour will get 30% or lower.
The Green Party will break 10%.
Both John Key and Phil Goff will resign before the next election.
New Zealand First will break 4% again but may not break 5%.

Little Did I Know

2011-11-23T09:24:00.001+13:00

When I commented in a post the other day that it was only a matter of time until someone was killed in the occupy protests it seems it had already happened. In the same incident in which the police pepper sprayed 84 year old school teacher Dorli Lanley they also pepper sprayed pregnant woman Jennifer Fox.

She has now had a miscarriage. To be fair that unborn child was probably also a serious threat to the police.

Fourth Movie Ever

2011-11-21T23:49:00.001+13:00

I am frankly stunned that John Banks has just seen his fourth movie ever. I did not think there was anything possible that could make an MP seem older than Don Brash.

On a side note there is also one of the best description of ACT on Campus in it that I have ever read:

It was a treat for his yellow shirted posse of supporters who have stuck to his side all campaign like a Caucasian only chapter of the Killer Beez.

I am impressed how many of them made it there. I have yet to see a piece of media from there that did not include a Wellington ACT on Campus member in it. They must have basically shipped the entire country's members to that one electorate.

TV3 Debate

2011-11-21T22:04:00.001+13:00

The TV3 debate was a good one for Goff. He didn't end up being subjected to a "show me the money" moment and consistently performed better than John Key throughout the debate. There was one exception to this great performance and that was on the question of Winston.

Labour is stuck in a bind with Winston because they really don't like him. While he is not that much less trustworthy than the regular politician a lot of people hate him particularly those in the middle who used to be his voters and turned away is disgust. However unlike National the Labour Party is not petty and does not rule people out just because they dislike them. Hone is obviously an impossible person to work with in Government and while National managed it to a degree this time it was a disaster. Hone won't even want to be in Government because he wants to build a movement and that takes time in opposition. When it comes time for Mana to be in Government they will probably change leader or have a dominant co-leader other than Hone to make them an acceptable coalition partner.

If political parties can find something in common they should work with them. While Winston is certainly one to deceive the public his stance on coalition is what Government should be like. Political parties should vote for the policies they support not what they can get the best cabinet position from and Labour should not be afraid to work with him nor should National who also have a lot in common with Winston. There is no good way to answer the coalition question but no however and because Key wants win outright he will say no. If Key finds himself in a position after the election where he can't form Government without Winston he will go talk to him. After all what would be worse electoral poison for National? A Government dependent on the Maori Party or one dependent on New Zealand First? I suspect the former.

One of the funniest parts of the debate was the worm. Goff clearly lost on the worm during discussions over coalition partners. However for the rest of it he was on fire actually going off the chart when discussing poverty for it to plummet to negative when Key next spoke. The only thing funnier than it is seeing Kiwiblog and Whaleoil trying to track down the members of the "clearly biased" audience. Their lead so far is John Kingi someone who actually resigned from their Labour Party membership last year not exactly likely to be Goff's biggest fan.

1 Percenter of the Day

2011-11-20T02:12:00.001+13:00

"MAMA ECONOMY" (THE ECONOMY EXPLAINED) ORIGINAL SONG by TAY ZONDAY

2011-11-19T23:50:00.000+13:00

99 Percenter of the Day

2011-11-19T23:42:00.001+13:00

Source.

"Rough Edges"

2011-11-19T12:25:00.001+13:00

On TVNZ:

MMP's rough edges have been shown over the last week, says Maxim Institute researcher Steve Thomas, because one party leads all others by 20 per cent of the vote and there is still no certainty they will be in government.

One of the things that annoys me most about those who argue for changing MMP is the idea that the largest party should be guaranteed Government because it is simply incorrect.

For a very simply model:
Right Wing Party - 49%
Left Wing Party 1 - 25%
Left Wing Party 2 - 26%

In this situation while the right wing party may have a 23% lead on the other two parties it is clear left wing parties are preferred and they should be Government.

Under MMP the exact same situation occurs but is obviously more complex as parties do not remain strictly in any kind of ideological boundaries.

The reason National being Government is uncertain is because it may eventuate that less than half of voters support them on election day. This is completely fair and is not a sign of rough edges. As much as people shout in the media of how popular this Government is the fact is they are not. A popular Government gets 60-70% not looks like it is scraping around 50%. If you were a business and 1 in 2 of your customers did not approve of your service you would not be considered successful.

Whatever happens in this election there will be a Government supported by the majority of voters and this is how it should be. Under all of the other options available in the referendum we leave our selves open to having a Government that has less than 50% support because they are not proportional. All of them could in fact lead to the situation we had twice under first past the post where the National Party won more seats despite the Labour Party having more votes.

Land of the Unfree

2011-11-19T11:37:00.001+13:00

The USA Government's reaction to the occupy wall street movement has been startling. It seems like it it only one step short of Libya's protests now and it is only a matter of time until a protester ends up being killed with the situation currently being one of daily excessive violence by the Police. Iconic photo of this week is 84 year old school teacher Dorli Rainey who was one of the thousands the Police have pepper sprayed over the last few weeks:

These are not the actions of a country which supports freedom of speech.

Open Labour's Results

2011-11-18T20:24:00.001+13:00

I made several submissions last year to a project called OpenLabourNZ designed by Clare Curran. It aimed to have consultation with the public in a way parties have never done previously and received thousands of pieces of feedback.

The result is the development of an Open Government Charter. This will contain many of the suggestions to come out of the feedback process that took place earlier in the year. The charter will also go up for further consultation to refine what goes into it.

The main points of the charter currently looking to be included are:

Require Ministers and Government agencies releasing all Cabinet papers and other relevant papers (with some exemptions) onto a dedicated website, in line with the Official Information Act (the Act), once a decision is announced by government.
Publish the Hansard in a format that can easily be re-used and republished by anybody for any purpose.
Release appropriate public sector data and information free of charge, in line with the current Declaration on Open and Transparent Government and NZ Data and Information Management Principles.
Work towards publishing or broadcasting all public Parliamentary proceedings (such as Select Committees) over the Internet and digital television.
Consider the regular use of formal citizen assemblies to help develop policy in areas where public input and consideration can assist in tackling complex problems.
Develop a trial of online voting in local government and general elections.
Consider the degree to which other public services can be made available online through an easy-to-use one stop website.

David Farrar has criticised the charter for not being "fixed" already and going through more negotiation. He argues Labour should simply announce it as their policy and implement it. This is the very problem the charter aims to fix. It is not acceptable for political parties to say okay we have done a bit of consultation this can never be changed again. The very point of the charter is to open the Government up to being more actively consulting and working with the communities it is supposed to represent.

The amount of work put into the policy is incredible and while I am sure there are things that could be added, like opening Parliament up to OIA's, it is very comprehensive.

Return of Muldoon Era?

2011-11-18T20:13:00.001+13:00

When people started circulating images a few months back of Muldoon looking like John Key it was a bit of a laugh. Slight physical appearance similarities and being a National Party Prime Minister seemed to be about all they had in common. However John Key trying to muscle the media brought on a twinge.

Today the news is more serious:

TVNZ and Radio New Zealand were among media contacted yesterday by police investigating a complaint from Key over the recording.
Neither organisation has handed over any material at this stage and TVNZ is considering its legal position after it was sent the search warrant this afternoon.
TVNZ has not heard the tape, but has been told by police that they are interested in obtaining raw field vision of the cup of tea meeting.

This is a infringement of the ability of the media to freely report on current events. The Police issuing a search warrant on the media is an incredibly serious event and is something that should never be done lightly. What is worse the Police are not just trying to seize the tape. They are looking to seize footage the TVNZ and Radio New Zealand clearly legally shot. Even if they were to seize the tape for what benefit would this be? The larger damage to Key's reputation has already happened and people are more concerned by his reaction to the recording than what was actually on the tape as evidenced by Goff urging people to stop talking about it and focus on policy. There is no reason the Police cannot wait for Court hearings to finish and Key can seek damages. The International Federation of Journalists has condemned the actions of the Police, something normally reserved for corrupt third world countries.

It is bizarre Key would push the Police into doing this. That I know of legally filmed material by journalists has never been taken before and this case really does not seem one where they should.

At a press conference the other day a journalist asked Key if he was at war with the media. It certainly seems to be the case.

Leaked Video: Young Nats Teleconference

2011-11-18T11:28:00.000+13:00

Conspiracy of the Day

2011-11-18T11:16:00.001+13:00

John Key wants to get rid of MMP, he has expressed his desire for SM already publicly. All the electoral systems currently offered other than MMP are quite deliberately for less proportional systems. There were in fact more proportional systems they could have offered such as open list PR which means no electorate MPs but the public has control of the lists parties put forward meaning no unpopular MPs sneaking in on the list (as seems to be people's main concern with a proportional system).

Now this teacup situation seems to have been incredibly poorly handled and puts National at risk of losing Government by losing polling to other parties. The largest winner out of all of this has been Winston Peters who has leapt on the situation and has thus managed to gain the attention of the media again in a positive light. This puts him in the running to be in Parliament and possibly hold the balance of power.

Winston is the big fear the change group has been trying to push for months despite him not looking even remotely close to entering Parliament. Could it be the teacup scenario is deliberate? In the video of the meeting we even see John Key touch the recording device, did he really not see it? Clearly the only logical explanation is that Winston Peters, John Key and Vote for Change have joined up to get Winston back in Parliament again in exchange for helping MMP to lose this referendum.

Facts about National's record

2011-11-16T11:29:00.000+13:00

Labour tell their version of the economic situation we have been in for the last 3 years. I eagerly await an outraged post by David Farrar. I hope he won't disappoint.

Welfare Fraud Bullshit

2011-11-16T10:34:00.001+13:00

One of the benefits of studying law is that you get to learn exactly what the law is in a number of areas so you can tell when politicians spout absolute bullshit. I would highly recommend taking law for anyone who seeks to understand politics. In this case the welfare law paper I took comes in incredibly useful because it makes it very easy to see through National's commitment to crack down on welfare fraud as really being quite minor policy change. The full press release is here.

Mass Fraud

This year alone, Work and Income’s data matching found around six to 12 per cent of people were receiving benefit payments they weren’t entitled to. This shows we have to do better by the taxpayer to safeguard their money and protect the integrity of the welfare system

This is designed to create the impression of massive fraud. They don't use the actual numbers of fraud which WINZ has because less than 1% of owed money is due to fraud. The large problem we have is with people not understanding forms or filling in the wrong one or WINZ just granting people completely the wrong benefit. The actual stats are in the full policy document: $22 million of fraud each year, $183 million filling in forms wrong and it does not give the even larger number of where WINZ just fails at paying people the right benefit and they have to pay it back.

Drug Use

Jobseekers whose recreational drug use affects their ability to apply for or secure a job will also be sanctioned, and through the investment approach those with drug addictions will be supported to overcome their illness.

So where this is likely to be an issue with sickness beneficiaries who often have mental illness issues and thus resort to drugs. Under National's new category these people will be 'Jobseekers' rather than sick. Essentially this policy is meaningless because how would the Government know? The Police are supposed to prosecute for illegal drug use so how it would be possible for WINZ to decide there was drug use and the Police to not is difficult to see. The second problem with it is that only a third of drug users who seek help have adequate services to assist them in their area. Unless National is planning to put hundreds of millions into this area they cannot possibly provide enough support to get all beneficiaries off drugs and I suspect they are not promising this as good as it would be. This policy would likely be to expensive to implement and not happen or rather not happen significantly.

Drug Test

Jobseekers who don’t apply for a job because they are asked to take a drug test, or who fail a pre-employment drug test, face having their benefit cancelled.

Adding that the "because they are asked to take a drug test" is actually a less strict requirement that previously. You can get your benefit scrapped for refusing to accept any job. A girl I knew had her benefit cancelled because she didn't go and work in a fish gutting factory when she was a vegetarian. This is not a change in policy.

Would be very surprised if removing benefits from those who lose a job due to failing a drug test doesn't already regularly happen. This presumably just formalises existing practice and makes it mandatory. It is also possible this is the only change National was planning to make in its crackdown on drug use.

Data Sharing

National will make it easier to match information in benefit applications with information held by other agencies to catch fraudsters sooner

There is not really any problem other than perhaps some minor privacy concerns around doing this and it would be done by whoever got in. This sort of change is public service driven usually because Government's can't actually know what the additional information departments need is because they don't work with them in that level of detail. The full policy document reveals this isn't actually a change and the departments already share millions of documents they just intend to spend $700,000 on doing it next year.

Advanced SWAT Team

We will beef up authorities’ investigative power, funding a new team of fraud specialists to hone in on reducing abuse across the welfare system.

Again no issue with this but it is important this doesn't cost more than the welfare fraud does. We don't have a great deal of welfare fraud in New Zealand and "fraud specialists" presumably have quite a large salary. This could have a negative effect on the number of beneficiaries caught. Case workers have a better knowledge of the beneficiaries they deal with. If case workers stop dealing with fraud and instead a special fraud unit takes over they may not have the requisite knowledge of the cases to effectively spot fraud.

Relationship Status

In particular, we will review the rules around relationship fraud, and make clearer the rules around when benefit recipients need to let Work and Income know about any relationships they are in

This is an attempt to change a recent Court decision (Ruka) around relationship status. This is not to do with marriages but de facto relationships. The current rule is reasonably strict that you must show financial independence and lack of emotional commitment. So if you for example have an informal system of paying child support after a relationship ends and good visiting relationship this is likely to make both partners ineligible to receive any benefits. However the test used to be easier to find people to be in a relationship because there was just a series of factors to apply to determine how close they were which could catch people who for example shared a property or kept in regular contact after ending a sexual relationship. National is presumably proposing to change it back via legislation. This is bad because it was a very difficult test to apply and had very inconsistent application (not that Ruka has not also had difficulties). This is the most significant change but it is nothing to do with fraud it is about how the Government views relationships.

Evading Warrant

Those beneficiaries evading a Police warrant will also have their benefit cancelled.

It seems fairly obvious that those who are on the run from Police should not receive a benefit but not sure this policy could actually be applied in more than 1-2 cases a year. It is likely that lots of people who have warrants issued on them are not actually running from the Police they just have been out when the Police called around or they have poor contact details so they probably wouldn't request benefit cancellation.

Unexpected Result

2011-11-16T09:37:00.001+13:00

Had quite an unexpected result from the poll on whether it should be legal to marry more than one person:

34 % in favour
37 % opposed
27% undecided

It seemed appropriate to ask the question given gay marriage is fairly widely accepted by the public now and it is actually just a matter of time before the members of Parliament catch up on the general mood of the public in the area.

This area could be one of the future areas of change post gay marriage because ultimately we need to have a discussion around the boundaries of it. It is fairly clear the legal marriage people now get is not a Christian marriage. The laws no longer support that same kind of relationship between couples and for less than half of married couples are both Christian. Therefore it only makes sense we cease to look at the legal institution of marriage as though it should conform to only one religion. The fact is there are many other religions that allow for multiple partners and the New Zealand Government forbids them from continuing this practice.

The ban exists for two reasons. The first is that ethno-religious reason that marriage should be between one man and one woman. The second is the risks of domestic abuse that can often result in polygamous marriages. Polygyny is the most common form of polygamous marriage where a man marries two women at the same time who do not marry each other. This form of marriage is often used as a method of subjugation of women and can have highly detrimental effects.

The first reason can be dismissed because we simply should not conform to ethno-religious norms in our law, they should be without bias to citizens who are different for whatever reason. The second is more challenging however and ultimately comes down to the same sort of arguments that made prostitution legal. Polygamous marriages are happening whether we like it or not. People simply fail to get marriage certificates and have religious communities far away from towns. When people do not register their marriages or avoid talking to Police about the nature of their relationship this is an environment that fosters increased domestic violence. People would not be in a situation where they could report issues of domestic abuse and their less frequent contact with the outside world fosters subjugation.

Accordingly with legalisation we could expect more of the relationships of that nature but with less harmful effect. Whether this balances out to make it all worth it is unclear and it is likely Parliament won't touch the issue for the long time. However it is very interesting how close this poll was even with its very small sample size and obvious bias issues.

Green Damage

2011-11-16T09:17:00.001+13:00

The Green Party has been found to have links to those who changed the slogans on hundreds of hoardings around the country. It was done by Russell Norman's EA's partner who was formerly a Green Party member and the EA was aware of the campaign. The hoarding vandalism is quite funny. It is however a real hassle for the National Party volunteers who now have to fix those signs. Unlike in some of the minor parties who hire people due to lack of membership the larger parties have unpaid volunteers usually doing the job of repairing hoardings. It's probably okay this coordinated stickering happened this time but if it becomes regular practice to deface hundreds of hoardings that is a massive waste of activists time who already dedicate so much to their campaign. Its better if it just sticks to the small time vandalism like Paula Gillion's batman hoarding.

The interesting thing to see now will be how this affects the Greens in the polls. From what I can see there is two possible outcomes. As some context if you follow Horizon Polling on voter loyalty you will see for this whole term there has been this little cycle going on where Labour loses voters to National, National loses voters to the Greens and the Greens lose voters to Labour.

Russell Norman utterly condemned the vandalism of the hoardings which was mostly done by his own supporters. Most of the public are unaware how much time it takes and will simply find the action funny including some of the less involved Green Party members. What this means is that those of the left who hear Russell Norman condemning the actions of supporters may now be put off by him and switch to Labour.

The alternative scenario is that which Russell is trying to avoid; losing National voters back to National. The Green Party has picked up quite a lot of blue-green people particularly in this last term and those people are not dedicated voters to them. By it being seen that the Greens are attacking National a lot of these people could switch to National thus reducing the Greens votes and their prospects of forming a coalition with their preferred partner Labour.

Thus the Greens are trying to make the best of a difficult situation and pick the lesser evil, probably the smarter move because at least lost party votes to Labour don't reduce their chance of Government as much. This could still put them below 10% again however.

Simply Offensive

2011-11-16T09:01:00.001+13:00

For John Key to compare his situation to the News of the World saga or people discussing someone committing suicide is just offensive. His conversation was nothing like that and there is no way he should be allowed to get away with such claims.

He is going to have a very difficult time to get any kind of charge laid and all this press is looking bad for them.

To lay the charge they actually have to prove he did it deliberately not merely left his sound device there by accident. This is because the law could not sensibly allow people to be charged for accidental recordings otherwise you would not for example be allowed to have anything which had people in the background.

On top of that he needs to prove the recording was of a private conversation. He has a big issue here because:

It was in a public place
It was between public figures
It was on topics which are not private and would be unlikely to constitute private facts
There is a public interest in disclosure

It is clear he is relatively without a leg to stand on in making the complaint to the police so why do it? It was not going to make the release of the information any less likely because we have double jeopardy rules. My guess is he was worried that some of the policy issues coming up in the media would be damaging and they could get them out of the news using this scandal. This may have backfired however as I don't think they would have believed it would reflect this badly upon them.

Recordings Blunder

2011-11-14T21:44:00.001+13:00

One would have thought the last thing John Key would want is more publicity about the tea party moment with Don Brash. Instead he is through every media outlet it seems trying to put the muscle on The Herald to not publish the tapes which appear to be quite damaging. All this is doing is giving them more publicity and now if they are released they are guaranteed to make front page headlines where before they may have been a little editorial note a few days later that most people would never read.

This shows the Muldoon side of Key that he should be repressing. He has had a pretty good run so far of positive reporting but it will come to an end and some of the journalists will start to become nastier as his career goes on as with all Prime Ministers. This doesn't bode well for his reaction to later bad news stories that he is trying to lay this dodgy police complaint.

It is quite clear there is no legal backing to stop this publication. Privacy laws only cover things which are private not things done in incredible levels of publicity. If he wanted to have a private conversation with Don Brash he should have held a meeting in private and not invited the media. That the media report on what was said is an obvious consequence of inviting them to a meeting and he shouldn't have said anything he didn't want published.

Karapiro Dam For Sale

2011-11-14T11:58:00.001+13:00

It seems the Government is acting early and Karapiro Dam (or a share of it) has gone up for sale on Trademe. Brilliant campaign idea from whoever came up with it.

Definition of Stupidity

2011-11-12T11:57:00.001+13:00

A post by Lou Taylor on No Minister goes through 10 definitions a few of which I agree with:

1. Labour believing that new leadership next year will somehow restore them to their rightful position as a dominant political force.

3. Voters flocking to back Key as preferred PM but not giving their party vote to National.

Key is popular because he comes across as normal. In a world that is on the brink of imploding financially then normal may seem a good and safe idea. But last century's definition of normal may not cut it now.

7. We really need another 3 years of Dunne's commonsense.

10. ACT- In a changing world to go from policy politics to personality politics.

His reflection on this however is key:

We should all be thinking about how we see NZ's political and economic landscape in 10-20 years time.

Regardless of who "wins" this election, if we don't start to really look at where we are heading as a country, then elections will end up merely being a sideshow.

The ultimate definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

The changes implemented by political parties as a result of their election promises are minor in their impact on our overall society. Policy is important because it shows you the direction of a party and voters need to know there is a competent hand to deal with the issues of society of the day (so they pick the one that addresses the most of there needs). The direction is the more important part of those policies. You can't simply trust the values that politicians yell out to be strong supporters of e.g. supporting family values because ultimately those are usually meaningless statements.

People in reality have three choices:

Do we want to move to a society where we provide for everyone when they need help
Do we want to move to a society where people have personal responsibility for life's misfortunes
Do we want to be somewhere in the middle

If you are strongly political you will normally pick either one or two which makes your voting decision easy. Those who pick the third will always struggle because almost no one who becomes an MP actually wants to be in that place eventually. They represent the swinging voters who shift to which ever party wants to change this small aspect of welfare for a little more personal responsibility or add a bit more support to this area of schooling and it is essentially in their interests that the Government changes every few years so that it never moves too far from equilibrium. If we hold elections purely on that basis we will never go anywhere as a country and politics will be stuck in small time bickering. Then again maybe that middle ground small time bickering perpetually is what is best for society in the long run.

Over For ACT

2011-11-12T09:58:00.001+13:00

John Key had the cliche cupper with Banks in Epsom looking nowhere near as classy as the previous ones. The problem is going to be however that it is just not enough.

John Key has damaged his reputation by showing he is willing to work with someone like that. Voters will be put off by him wanting to work with such an extremist little party.

On the other hand he has also failed to tell voters directly to vote for Banks, said he won't give him a cabinet position and said he won't vote for him personally. The lifeline was not strong enough and it is likely Banks will now lose Epsom.

The cabinet position statement was also interest for Key's promise to the Maori Party to work with them after the election. I am not sure how they will feel about not being able to be ministers again particularly as Pita Sharples said last year he will be unable to afford his mortgage repayments if he ceases to be a minister after this election.

How to Lose Votes and Alienate People

2011-11-10T10:19:00.001+13:00

Behold a Tea Party candidate randomly yelling at constituents for daring to suggest banks have had some role in the financial crisis:

Top 10

2011-11-10T10:10:00.000+13:00

Didn't get a chance to look through them the other day with exams on but here are Labour's top 10 statistics from the last 3 years. Some of them are quite surprising:

Unemployment has increased by 50 per cent, leaving 157,000 New Zealanders out of work.
(Source: Statistics New Zealand, Household Labour Force Survey)

100,000 New Zealanders have left for Australia after he promised he would stop the brain drain.
(Source: Statistics New Zealand, International Travel and Migration)

Prices have gone up nearly four times faster than incomes over the past 3 years. John Key increased prices by hiking GST after promising not to.
(Source: Statistics New Zealand, New Zealand Income Survey and Consumer Price Index)

The first credit rating downgrade in 13 years and a double downgrade at that.
(Source: Westpac, Weekly Commentary: Sign of the times, 3 October 2011)

There are 60,000 more people on benefits costing an extra $1 billion a year.
(Sources: MSD, National Benefit Factsheet and Monthly Benefit Data; and Treasury, Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Update 2011)

The wage gap with Australia has increased by $32 a week.
(Sources: Statistics New Zealand, Quarterly Employment Survey and Australian Bureau of Statistics, Average Weekly Earnings, PPP adjusted)

There are 55,200 15 to 24 year olds not in education, employment or training and the number of young people on the unemployment benefit long term has increased by over 700 per cent.
(Sources: Statistics New Zealand, Household Labour Force Survey, NEETs and Hon Paula Bennett, Question for Written Answer 6058 )

The economy has grown by just 0.4 per cent since John Key took office.
(Source: Statistics New Zealand, Gross Domestic Product)

National’s tax cuts for the most well off were supposed to be paid for with the GST. They actually cost an extra $1.1 billion in their first nine months.
(Source: Treasury, Financial Statements of the Government of New Zealand for the year ended 30 June 2011)

The underclass has grown with the number of children living in benefit dependent households increasing by over 32,000 in the past 3 years.
(Source: New Zealand Council of Christian Social Services, Vulnerability Report, Sept 2009 and Sept 2011)