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May 9, 2024 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 09 May 2024

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General Debate

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Chuck Bird

Is there a conflict of interest?

Covid inquiry: Tony Blakely’s advice to Government and what it means for the inquiry he chairs

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/covid-inquiry-tony-blakelys-advice-to-government-and-what-it-means-for-the-inquiry-he-chairs/NADWIRNJYRBNTFXVAUPJWP2RRI/
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May 9, 2024 8:01am
- Benedict Yu
  
  It is behind a pay wall so I don’t know 🙂
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:05am
  - greybeard
    
    I Googled “Tony Blakely” and found he is an epidemiologist, from Otago University.
    So yes, there is a very real risk of conflict of interest.
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:24am
    - grumpy
      
      …..and an extreme wokester who seems anle to get the word “Aotearoa” into every sentence when being interviewed.
      
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      May 9, 2024 8:41am
      - Stellaboxer
        
        Speaking of extreme woksters I’ve just driven past a Police car on state highway 2 between Featherston and Greytown decked out in the ridiculous rainbow flag! What the fu@k is going on? 7 months into this government we have police cars decked out at the taxpayers expense in the livery of a social justice movement, a movement that I would hazard a guess is not supported by all of those taxpayers picking up the tab. Apart from illustrating the painful fact that this country seems unable to act with any independence of thought even when similar nonsense has resulted in negative consequences for police forces abroad. We seem to just be obsessed with copying the prevailing lunacy of those countries we illogically hold in some sort of unquestionable reverence regardless of the ethics or results of any policy. Question to Mark Mitchell , why are you allowing a government agency such as the police force to be used as a platform for a progressive social justice movement? Are the Police politically neutral or are they now promoting social agendas ? Who authorised this and why? What are you going to do about it?
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:45am
      - oldpark
        
        @grumpy 8.41am
        Could the mentioned be better described as” The Enemy Within” .Sounds that way . Many people have been wrong before, maybe not this time .
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:20am
      - Ghost
        
        The pride car has been around since 2018. The colours are removed after pride parade. The diverse community car was rolled out last year with different languages all over it
        
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        May 9, 2024 1:12pm
      - Stellaboxer
        
        “ The pride car has been around since 2018. The colours are removed after pride parade”Obviously not.
        
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        May 9, 2024 6:02pm
      - Ghost
        
        It was meant to be, but using ai, I found this article that the previous government have since rolled out a few of the cars around N.Z.
        
        https://www.newthinking.com/society/policing-with-pride-whats-in-a-rainbow-car
        
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        May 9, 2024 6:08pm
    - pdm
      
      It sounds like Brooke van Velden who is the Minister reviewing the enquiry terms etc thinks so too.
      
      According to David Seymour with Mike Hosking she is reviewing all aspects, including membership of the enquiry panel, and will be announcing new terms and other relevant changes in a few weeks,
      
      It will be interesting to see if Blakely stays – it seems to me he is more suited as a witness rather than Chairman.
      
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      May 9, 2024 8:42am
      - igm
        
        Toss the woke bastards out and start again. We want a positive outcome . . . soon!
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:53am
      - MCōs
        
        Meet the new boss
        Same as the old boss
        
        What are you expecting?
        Someone from outside the necessary field of expertise who is out of their depth because I should imagine all these people working in this area at the level necessary to understand the topic know each other
        Some panel beater who got all their knowledge off the internet in their spare time ain’t going to cut the mustard.
        
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        May 9, 2024 12:43pm
    - Miritu
      
      “Police car …. decked out in the ridiculous rainbow flag!”
      “Who authorised this and why? What are you going to do about it?”
      Stellaboxer, very good questions which are rarely asked and never answered.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:14am
      - John Loveridge
        
        What police officer would want to be seen dead in such a monstrosity? Have they no sense of dignity?
        
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        May 9, 2024 1:02pm
      - leoj
        
        Mark Mitchell is still glowing over his Christmas card from Cuddles Coster.
        
        He has been hanging around Luxon too much. There is not a spine between them.
        
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        May 9, 2024 1:20pm
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    You can read what each man has defined as their own conflicts of interest in Appendices C and D attached to the reply to this OIA.
    
    https://fyi.org.nz/request/25750-conflicts-of-interest-tony-blakely-and-john-whitehead
    
    Blakely has close connections to H1
    Tony says he has met Helen Clark quite a few times since then and worked for many years in public health research with her husband Peter Davis –
    https://www.stpauls.school.nz/news/collegians/kiwi-professor-leading-voice-australias-covid-19-response
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:06am
  - alwyn.a
    
    [Mod – please don’t post link bypassing pay walled articles, thanks]
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:05pm
  - Ra Henare
    
    Extract
    
    Blakely’s connection to New Zealand’s Covid response is more concerning. He reported that, during the course of the pandemic, he: “provided direct advice to key policymakers and advisors in the NZ response, including: Doctor Ashley Bloomfield, DG [director general] of Health [until] mid 2022; Sir Prof David Skegg, Chair Strategic Covid-19 Public Health Advisory Group; and many other policymakers and commentators”.
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:37pm
    - miltonF
      
      So Blakely is going to be reviewing his own advice?
      
      Somehow that doesn’t surprise me. Par for the course on everything Covid. Absolute corruption flowing from every aspect of it.
      
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      May 9, 2024 4:41pm
- rouppe
  
  Topic raised on Hosking’s show.
  
  Basically he’s an epidemiologist, was and remains good friends with Bloomfield, Baker etc, is of the cohort that strongly supported the measures taken.
  
  So not independent or open minded.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:19am
  - RoboRob
    
    Sounds like a typical Labour ‘fair and unbiased’ investigation.
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:05am
    - igm
      
      A wonder Ardern, Hipkins, Bloomfield, and Wiles are not running this rort.
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:50am
      - pdm
        
        They were trying to – then an election came along and stuffed up their plans.
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:17am
  - bennerg
    
    I would prefer to see an overseas expert with NO connections to any New Zealander involved, so it is completely impartial in that way – just like the Privy Council was – NZ is too small a fishbowl.
    
    And also someone with a scientific background, but not linked in any way to the Pharmaceutical Industry.
    
    Good luck on that one!
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:08am
    - Frank Thomas
      
      Agree regarding NZ being too small a place to find someone who wasn’t directly affected to run it, however if I recall correctly they tried that when they used a retired Canadian judge for an inquiry into David Bains conviction. He turned out to be completely biased towards Bain and his whole report got tossed out. I don’t know what the answer is, but surely you would have at least a lawyer or preferably a judge rather than an entomologist running it.
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:28am
      - MCōs
        
        Nobody’s going to make everybody happy
        You mentioned one case and another that comes to mind is Judge Mahon who was hauled over the coals following his Erebus report largely because of the way he ripped into Air NZ
        People have preconceived views of what the outcome should be and don’t take too kindly to reports that go the other way
        
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        May 9, 2024 12:57pm
- Grunter
  
  Blakely is the head rooster of the COVID mess. He is judging his own decisions! And we are now meant to trust him as chief of the inquiry? Yeah right! What as waste of time and money.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:28am
- Simon
  
  NZ herald its own conflict of interest in “reporting” on so called inquiry.
  
  People around here shouldnt need a inquiry to know covid was handled by fucking mongs.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:00am
- NothingLeft
  
  Sir Humphrey Appleby approves of this appointment
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:38am
- Master Mariner
  
  In addition to being a whitewash, The interviews are not to be made Public.
  From an email after making my submission,
  
  “An important feature of our COVID-19 Royal Commission is that we’ve been directed to undertake it in a non-adversarial way. Unlike the UK Inquiry, for example, we are not using an adversarial process with cross-examination of witnesses in a public forum. On balance, we think a non-adversarial approach is the right one as it is likely to be quicker, less costly, and more insightful.”
  
  And Website,
  https://www.covid19lessons.royalcommission.nz/the-inquiry/record-of-inquiry-engagements/
  
  Conflict of interest is without doubt. No cross examination ? No Public Forum. Gee I cant wait to be told what too think about our response //
  
  Interestingly enough though , The longer it takes the more incriminating it will be as the Public’s eyes slowly start too open as evidence comes too light.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:47am
  - Master Mariner
    
    A Glaring ommission in the Interviewees are Hendy and Wiles and that Fake ” Think Tank” of knowledge I cant spell that was used to scare the public regarding 80k Dead.
    
    Why not ? Should they be one of the First too interview ?
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:28pm
  - Ipanema69
    
    Yes the entire point of an adverserial system with cross examination is to throughly test the decisions that were made at the time.
    
    For some this may not be a pleasant experience.
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:36pm
- Philview
  
  Now that AstraZeneca have pulled their covid vaccine I wonder who will be next. Wikipedia profiles quietly being amended.
  
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  May 9, 2024 11:25am
- KH
  
  My very hetero conservative policeman mate is just fine with gays in the police.
  But he says he is getting worried that they will soon make it compulsory.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:27pm
Benedict Yu

This is an extract from the introduction page on the website of Mount Hutt College, a medium sized high school in rural Canterbury.

Take a deep breath….. 🤡

“Our school values of PRIDE: Passion, Respect, Integrity, Diversity and Excellence underpin our day-to-day work.”

“Our school vision is based upon developing Our People | Ō mātou tāngata and Our Place | Ō mātou whenua. Learning is linked to growth in three dimensions: Mind | Hinengaro, Body | Tinana and Spirit | Wairua. We aim to connect with ākonga and whānau so that our young people can see their progress in their Growth Profile.”

https://mounthuttcollege.co.nz

What does that mean? I have no idea. The children grow their spirit and follow progress in their Growth Profile? 🤔😕

I did not set out to pick on this school. I just stumbled across the website, because I stumbled across the school.😐 However, I found it startling that there is no information on the website about the school’s academic performance. I browsed the entire site. It has extensive reports on sport and extracurricular achievements, including participation in the Miss Canterbury beauty pageant. 😳Nothing about the curriculum, the qualifications of the teachers, performance on achieving university entrance. Nothing. ☹️

Now maybe this is actually a good school? You just can’t tell from the website. So you look up the latest Education Review Office (ERO) report on the school. What do you find?

Word salad, ☹️😳😳 and ERO paraphrasing the school website. 😭

https://ero.govt.nz/institution/348/mount-hutt-college

I recognise that some folk may think that I am being pedantic. It is just a school website. However, it does have 600 students. Is it too much to ask that it tells parents meaningful information?

I suspect that this school website is not atypical. It is more likely indicative of the plague of wokeness and mediocrity that has invaded New Zealand education.

What is more concerning is the ERO report that I link to. If this report is typical of its work, just shut ERO down and save a few hundred million.

The Minister should issue guidance about what she expects to see on a school’s website. For a start, quantitative information on achievement to help parents judge the quality of the school.

She should then send a “please explain” letter to the ERO about their useless reports. 😠
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May 9, 2024 8:02am
- G152
  
  And where are the Chinese and Japanese terms that would explain to those citizens living here just what all that was about??????????????????
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:15am
- JimBobJoe
  
  Ben – Minister school or Minister to ERO. Pointless.
  
  You know and have articulated the answer – disestablish the Min Of Education and start from scratch
  
  Would be difficult. But could it make things worse?
  
  Start with an independent curriculum setting agency. Ban all previous MoE employees from joining. Then build out from that core.
  
  There will be some elements of the MoE that can be pulled out, like payroll and some pure administration functions, into a new structure.
  
  Would be messy but the current situation is completely screwed…
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:15am
  - MCōs
    
    Reminds me of the old Who song
    Wont Get Fooled Again
    
    Meet the new boss
    Same as the old boss
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:12am
  - Grunter
    
    I agree – start from scratch. The State-run monopoly has clearly failed. Imagine if we had a clean sheet of paper starting tomorrow…..
    1. No Govt indoctrination
    2. Parents/Families choose how to educate children (we do this now with books, online reading and learning etc – so why are schools any different?)
    3. No teacher unions – they have overstepped their brief long ago. They are a big part of the problem.
    4. Major tax breaks for families so they instead use their own money to educate their owns kids (and make their own school lunches)
    5. Groups of teachers/principals allowed to set up their own schools as a commercial entity. Good schools survive, great schools thrive, bad schools get what they deserve.
    
    Educating your children is one of the most important things you do as a parent. Handing over that responsibility to the Government is a cop-out and very dangerous – as we are now seeing.
    
    I think we would be surprised at how quickly NZ would set up a new high-performing schooling system if the Govt pulled out immediately.
    
    This is never going to happen of course – but it is the only logical answer to the mess we now have.
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:18am
    - Sacha
      
      It is the parents’ responsibility to prepare their child in good health, with age- appropriate social skills, for school. Whatever that takes.
      It is the schools’ responsibility to educate the children. Children who for whatever reason are not ready to learn, need to be sent back to their parent’s care.
      Education has allowed itself to be hi-jacked by Social Welfare, and everyone has suffered.
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:56am
    - Ian Boag
      
      I bet you can point us at a country someplace where they do all this …. and it works fine.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:34am
      - miltonF
        
        Nearly every country on the planet. I think they call it “private schools”.
        
        Are you seriously claiming that public schools have a better track record than private schools?
        
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        May 9, 2024 4:47pm
  - PurplePen
    
    If schools that use Baccalaureate or the other international system do well and the parents that send their kids to the same like those systems so well, why can’t the the MoE use those systems and just pay an annual license fee. Then the only bureaucrats needed in the MoE is a negotiator temporarily to negotiate the licence contract.
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:47am
    - Sacha
      
      There are people here in New Zealand who think that only educational systems developed here in New Zealand should be used to educate young New Zealanders. Like the MoE.
      That’s how we come to have half-baked school curricula starting right from New Entry days.
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:45am
    - Ian Boag
      
      IB schools tend to be private ones where the parents pay buckets to send the kids. Such parents generally have an interest in the kids’ education.
      
      Not really mainstream stuff.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:36am
- Paulus
  
  Problem which appears be increasing us is that we are seeing from many quarters, such as Education particularly at the moment, that the so called professional in this occupation are the only ones who know best in all aspects, such as lunches, and they will do everything they can supported by what is left of the so called media to try and destroy the duly elected Government.
  What we are seeing is that the Government are doing what they were elected on, but that is not what these people actually want.
  In any current election the present Government would be destroyed to the joy of the left country who took everything given by Ardern and now have to straighten the books first,,
  That is not what they want, whatever that is – and who would get in in another election, what do they want everything, and now !
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:19am
- David Garrett
  
  Bene: Excellent comment. Perhaps what is more worrying than the woeful school website is that apparently ERO is no better. Thank God both my children are out of the school system.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:19am
- Matt Long
  
  Now that the participation trophy children are in the workplace, whole organisations as well as adults get participation trophies instead of being measured on KPIs.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:21am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    A couple of years ago, a public service manager recounted to me the difficulties he had doing performance reviews for new graduates joining the department. He would rate them as “meeting expectations” and they would melt down because they were not rated as “outstanding”, often taking time off work on stress leave. These are 22 year olds 6 months into their careers. 😅😅
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:31am
    - kiwikidsnz
      
      I’ve had similar experiences. From around the millennium a larger % of graduates seemed to base their job success & self esteem on how well they ticked boxes. While I worked solely in the private sector the trend was even more visible in the public.
      
      I blame the Universities.
      
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      May 9, 2024 8:47am
      - kowtow
        
        Starts in the home.
        
        The Greens emasculated discipline .( who else voted for that Sue Bradford measure in the House)
        
        The schools long ago backed off old time common sense and adopted all manner of mealy mouthed excuses for failing to do their job of encouraging , teaching, promoting citizenship values etc
        
        Then you have the unis .
        
        Essentially we’re witnessing the success of the Long March through the institutions.
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:27am
      - cmm
        
        Blame the universities? No.
        
        The universities are just the end of the long line of failed upbringing these kids have had.
        
        Their parents have told them they are special since birth
        They have not experienced any competition in their young lives.
        20+ years of everyone gets a trophy.
        Everyone tells them how much they deserve everything.
        They set their expectations based on what they see on Tiktok etc.
        They didn’t get proper performance feedback through school.
        Then they went to university…
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:41am
    - Steve Otto(North Shore)
      
      Stress leave – ffs. Stress is when you have nearly saved enough money for a new house, and you lose one of your three jobs.
      What woke snowflakes they are.
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:08am
      - alwyn.a
        
        I always liked Australian Cricketer Keith Miller’s comment on the situation. He was talking about pressure but it is really the same as stress. Miller had been a pilot in WW2.
        
        Miller’s wartime exploits were to give him a greater sense of perspective when he returned to the sports field. When asked many years later by Michael Parkinson, about pressure in cricket, Miller responded: “Pressure is a Messerschmitt up your arse, playing cricket is not”.
        
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        May 9, 2024 12:15pm
    - Tom Hunter
      
      they would melt down because they were not rated as “outstanding”, often taking time off work on stress leave. These are 22 year olds 6 months into their careers.
      
      It’s across the entire Western world. Gen Z, Work and other things
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:36am
      - Steve Otto(North Shore)
        
        It is really tough for them Gen Zs.//
        Lazy —— fill in expletive.
        
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        May 9, 2024 4:43pm
    - Sacha
      
      I have a family member who deals with Human Resources in a large multinational company. I am told that increasingly, troubled (mostly dis-satisfied female) employees are advised to seek alternative employment, because their current situation is clearly not meeting their needs. They get severance cheques to help them decide.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:03am
    - Burtland
      
      Try working with these idiots where their outputs are reviewed as part of a quality process – they can be very disingenuous to the point of ensuring the review is canned.
      
      Very problematic if safety is involved.
      
      They seem to take all criticism personally – its all about them 😵‍ They get disillusioned and leave to become the next Steve Jobs – the exit interview reveals it all.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:23am
- Blog-aholic
  
  Have you not noticed that almost to a fault EVERY school in NZ now either has a Maori name equivalent on all signage, website, letterhead or has changed its name to a Maori name……….not sure of course what that achieves but the taxpayer pays for Labours socio-eugenics experiment.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:23am
  - Kiwiguy
    
    My kids private school has none of this rubbish, and refuses to engage in it apart from what is mandated by the Education Dept.
    The public primary school they went to prior was the same, though I notice a wee bit creeping in when I view their website.
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:00am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    All part of the Coup started in 1975. (Waitangi Tribunal)
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:10am
  - PurplePen
    
    A friend’s daughter works in a preschool and they had ERO or equivalent? inspect them and they got a black mark because not enough of their attendees were maori, or maybe it was not enough were brown. What the hell.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:06am
    - Grunter
      
      Did they count the red-haireds as well? Makes as much sense as counting skin colour.
      
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      May 9, 2024 2:10pm
- I remember when
  
  BY:
  And that’s in rural Canterbury one of the least Maori aware regions in New Zealand.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:44am
  - I remember when
    
    ERO is largely a ‘box’ ticking exercise.
    Once the boxes are ticked you can relax for the next five years.
    They only have minimal contact with the classroom teachers and don’t do the job the old inspectorate did.
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:56am
- softail 1450
  
  Benedict Yu, I don’t see the problem myself ,for example we have a cousin who has a child starting at that very school who identifies as a non binary gay transsexual with a bad lisp and one leg so Mount Hutt college will be like an old friend to her/him.
  Did I mention the class She/He intends to specialise in ? ‘ identifying Taniwha in South Island lakes and rivers’, apparently Harvard have already offered her a full scholarship regardless of her exam results ,what’s wrong with that it’s DEI at its finest 🥸
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:45am
  - Sacha
    
    That’s so good to know. I wonder if I should enrol my impending great grand-child now?
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:06am
- Nigel Kearney
  
  There has to be a system of objective measurement that is sufficient to show how much value each school is adding. The calculation and publication of that should not be decided by the school at all.
  
  Without this, there is not a lot the ERO can do. A couple of days of observation by an ERO reviewer is not enough, especially when people know they are being observed. Organisation mission statements are often waffly crap as well, even for well-functioning organisations.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:49am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    My opinion of ERO and its staff is very low.
    
    I first encountered ERO staff as a trainee 2ndry Teacher on a placement in a Boys’ College. The ERO staff kept quizzing us trainees (3 of us) about the extent of bullying at the school. We told them that in the 2 weeks we had been at the school we hadn’t encountered any bullying amongst the boys or with the staff to the boys.
    The ERO staff (all female ) didn’t believe us and just said.. It’s a boys’ school… they’ll be bullying.
    
    I ended up teaching at that college……and for all its faults.. it DID NOT have a bullying culture amongst the boys.
    
    When ERO visited or inspected your classes, there was no feedback as to whether you were performing well as a teacher…. In reality most of the ERO staff seemed to have come from a primary teaching background and I doubt they were competent to judge if I was delivering a decent Physics or Horticulture class anyway.
    
    The one thing I will never forgive them for is that they told the college that the 20 min silent reading which all members of the school (teachers and pupils) undertook immediately after lunchtime break was a waste of time and should be done away with.
    
    That brief period of silent reading settled the boys after lunch and led them to see that reading was something that should be done regularly and it was ok for boys to read..
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:33am
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      Oh, I’ve just remembered another incident of ERO uselessness…
      
      When my eldest daughter started at the local high school, they had vertical form classes…which meant that her Form-time was spent with pupils from Year 9 to Year 13. It was a good way to get to know a range of kids at the school quickly and build friendships beyond their year 9 class mates.
      
      ERO squashed this and told the school to revert to Peer-age appropriate form classes… presumably to stop the possibility that youngsters would be bullied by the year 11-13…etc.
      Again , it was an example of ERO being clueless about the culture of the school… Bullying wasn’t a thing there…
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:46am
    - PurplePen
      
      I get the impression that a !ot of govt agencies have graduates that either don’t have many braincells or don’t know how to use the ones they have. Recently had a discussion with a direct report to the CEO of the Water Services Agency. They said their staff had had a useful meeting with the local authority about potable water etc. I asked can you send the minutes of the meeting under an OIA. No minutes were taken nor filed. What I got in the end was an email with the phrase “Our staff’s best recollections of the content of the meeting”. Where have these people been working? What if the local authority decides to challenge what was agreed to at the meeting. Amateurs.
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:13am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        I have been told that up until about 15 years ago, the Reserve Bank had the pick of the best economics graduates. You spend 5 years there and then move into the private financial institutions. Apparently that is finished. Simply because someone ruined the Reserve Bank.
        
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        May 9, 2024 11:03am
- Simon
  
  Lol – ERO. ERO have had to be forced to close down schools where the “teachers” were beating the kids. No police complaints lodged by ERO who carried out formal investigations.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:04am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Iona Holstead the CE of the Ministry of Education was previously the CE of ERO. 😭
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:44am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    Yep, until last year, ERO had never found anything wrong with Gloriavale’s slavery and general lack of education for children
    
    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/493872/education-review-office-reviewing-gloriavale-school-after-employment-court-case
    
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    May 9, 2024 2:21pm
- NothingLeft
  
  Rural canterbury has very low percentage Maori population. But Methven is a home to a lot of left leaning country lifestylers, so hard-out virtue signalling.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:40am
- Lara
  
  How about forwarding this to Erica Stanford. Boy, she has a job on her hands!
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:05am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    She has 6,000 staff who can get her information.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:59am
    - NeverMindTheBollocks
      
      And yet
      
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      May 9, 2024 8:20pm
- Ra Henare
  
  With all due respect BY. Schools have been spouting this word soup(albeit without Maori) for decades.
  
  Even back to the 60s when I was at School.!!!
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:40pm
- rouppe
  
  Yes, well, Wellington College has its own problems.
  
  At my son’s graduation, this principal spent some time talking about how being “as one” increased strength and that pride and honour were important attributes to take away from the school. After that they announced “top student”, followed by “top Maori student” and “top pasifika student”. How tone deaf is that?
  
  At that same graduation, the person preparing the information completely butchered my son’s (my) surname. Not just a mispronounciation, or a minor misspelling, complete butchering. I asked the principal for a meeting with that person, with him in attendance. Flat out refused. When I told him that my culture required the person to front, not just a brush off from a third party, no matter how senior they were, he refused to consider it.
  
  While my son got good results from that school academically, their lack of respect for other cultures and the principal’s response to my complaint means i will never recommend them.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:04pm
- John Loveridge
  
  It’s the very same bullshit as my youngest daughter’s high school in Christchurch city.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:04pm
Ghost

Hmmmm

‘Terrible choice’ for school with lunches programme change, principal says

The bell has just rung to end lunchtime at Porirua College, and all is calm as students return to class.
They’ve just eaten stir-fry vegetables and dumplings, served up by a team of 10 who make 1200 meals a day including for three local schools. Principal Ragne Maxwell said the lunches – eaten at the school’s four houses where students say karakia before beginning their meal – has helped the school become the best version of itself.

Article

So, your students are getting stir fry vegetables and dumplings for lunch. Your students sound like they are eating better lunches than some working people

Principal of Aorere College in Papatoetoe Lianne Webb said that was not enough for students who relied on lunch as their main or sometimes only meal of the day.

Article

Why is it their only meal. How about looking into that. For those families on a benefit where is the money to look after their children going? Is it not time some parents put their children first?

“If you had a choice between a hot hamburger yeah and two muesli bars probably the hamburgers would have a higher uptake than two muesli bars.”

Wtf, you are giving your students hot hamburgers for lunch. Shit. Again, better lunches than some workers eat. There is nothing wrong with a nice sandwich for lunch, most people survived and thrived on it growing up in school. The occasional tuck shop purchase. But the opti9n isn’t two muesli bars, but if misinformation there

Parents RNZ spoke to said that while a hot lunch was best, especially in winter, free kai and a full puku were still life changing.

“That’s alright, as long as the kids are fed, I guess the sandwiches and the fruits are just as healthy as the hot meals,” one person said.

“I think the hot meal was good, very good, but even sandwiches for kids that will be okay too, they will eat healthy,” another parent said.

Commonsense from some parents, but I wonder if it is too late to go back to school and get some free hamburgers, oh I mean stir fry and dumplings, oh wait, there is something else you do at school. What is it. Can’t be education because principals are whinging about phone bans, having to teach kids to read, write and do math.
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May 9, 2024 8:03am
- igm
  
  The outcome of paying ferals to breed with no responsibilities, they becoming a further drain on taxpayers.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:08am
- kowtow
  
  I take it the school is state funded so why the ‘Māori incantations and prayer used to invoke spiritual guidance and protection’ prior to scoff time.( there ‘d be outrage from the usual suspects if it was Christian grace before meals)
  
  And given they’re getting stir fry and dumplings surely a few verses from Mao’s Little Red Book would be more appropriate.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:12am
- Grunter
  
  It just reflects what a shambles society has become.
  
  Feed your own kids! That’s what parents do. It is time to grow up and take responsibility.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:21am
- Benedict Yu
  
  Yeah I don’t think we should get too triggered by the lunches. I really doubt they are gourmet. I could feed 20 children stir fried vegetables and plain dumplings in sauce at a lower cost than a ham and salad sandwich 🥪 and an apple 🍏.
  
  I get the impression that David Seymour set out to better target the school lunch program, only to find it too difficult. Instead, he resorted to centralised food preparation which will apparantly reduce costs. It might. He claims that he can provide cheaper and better lunches. I’m sceptical.
  
  It is interesting that if you rewind 15 years, it was John Key who championed the food in schools program. It was opposed by Labour. David Shearer said that food was the job of parents. Steve Maharey opposed food in schools calling it “Tory charity”.
  
  https://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2012/09/who_started_food_in_schools.html
  
  It started with weetbix for breakfast and has grown relentlessly ever since.
  
  Somehow I don’t think that we have heard the last of this issue. 😃
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:22am
  - kowtow
    
    Good interview with Seymour on the Platform this am.
    Should be available on pod later.
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:28am
  - artemisia
    
    Cost of labour included?
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:39am
  - cmm
    
    I am not opposed to school lunches so long as they are done properly.
    
    In many countries (eg. I believe Norway and Sweden), the kids are involved in the lunch preparation and clean up etc. Older kids help out with ordering etc.
    
    As a result, the lunch gets integrated into education and all the kids get at least basic understanding of nutrition, home economics, etc.
    
    The NZ way is just educating people for hand outs.
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:20am
  - Paulus
    
    What is becoming relevent today is that the suppliers of the School Lunches have companies set up to provide food to schools where they are heavily related.
    And they employ the staff (whanau) to prepare the food.
    And do not send in anything relating to costs and volume- just a bill which is paid,
    Serious analysis and review needed which we are told will come in a year or so.
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:28am
- artemisia
  
  TVOne news last night showed students getting a dollop of pale hot mac and cheese. Mostly pasta obviously. Large bowl s of fruit on the tables. Cheese sammies or crackers can have similar nutritional value at a fraction of the cost.
  
  Reported that there are some 3,000 people paid to deal with school lunches. Most possibly part time, but still …
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:25am
  - kevn
    
    art… You can bet there will be an carefully planned oversupply going straight to ‘elsewhere’ = free food.
    Call me cynical.
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:27am
  - pdm
    
    arty I would almost prefer the soggy tomato sandwiches I used to get in summer to macaroni cheese.
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:47am
  - Burtland
    
    the 3000 people are paid the LIVING wage – part of Labours rort
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:44am
  - rouppe
    
    Anyone here over the age of 50 ever have hot lunches when they were at school? Not including the pie at the tuck shop.
    
    Nope, me neither.
    
    The entitlement expressed by complaining about possibly not having fresh burgers or dumplings is just astonishing
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:10pm
- wsk12345
  
  Wow. I’ve never eaten like that for lunch 5 days a week. When I was working I’d buy lunch maybe once a fortnight as a treat. And now I earn less than the min wage I’m funding other people’s kids to have flash stir fry and dumplings. And they have the nerve to whinge.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:27am
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  How long before the kids are fed their evening meal before leaving school for the day?
  Do we have schools or 5 star hotels?
  Lunch: cheese and marmite sandwich and an apple. Does not cost $8.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:33am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    “cheese and marmite sandwich”
    
    🤢🤢🤢🤢🤢🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
    
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    May 9, 2024 8:37am
    - kevn
      
      BY… Or cheese and Vegemite for those who find the beef extract Marmite a bit potent/tasty.
      
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      May 9, 2024 8:40am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        I have tasted vegimite. Once. 🤢🤢
        
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        May 9, 2024 8:44am
      - Maggie Pie
        
        At boarding school we used to call in vaginamite 😀
        
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        May 9, 2024 8:52am
      - MCōs
        
        Marmite/vegemite is certainty not suited to the Asian palate, but that’s what I had every day of my primary school career.
        It’s probably called woke tucker somewhere in the world
        
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        May 9, 2024 8:59am
      - Steve Otto(North Shore)
        
        MCos, that would explain why our Thai friend in Alaska does not like it. I took a jar up there.
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:13am
      - Ian Boag
        
        Some Canadian friends were visiting – watched us eating toast – asked why did we put road tar on it?
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:16am
      - cmm
        
        The funniest is when foreigners thing Vegemite/Marmite is chocolate spread.
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:45am
      - artemisia
        
        Marmite isn’t beef extract, it is yeast extract. Agree bit more potent than Vegemite.
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:04am
      - artemisia
        
        Had some kids from the US staying and introduced them to Vegemite. One said ‘yuck no way’. The other said ‘can I have more of that chocolate stuff’.
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:07am
      - cmm
        
        There is a scale to strength:
        
        South African Marmite is very, very sharp. You only want the tiniest dab of that stuff.
        
        In comparison. Vegemite and NZ Marmite are pretty much brown margarine. You need a healthy dollop of the stuff to even know it is there.
        
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        May 9, 2024 12:28pm
    - JimBobJoe
      
      You may react that way Ben, but generations of NZ working class kids, me included, went through school on this type of food. And our results were at or near the top of international rankings.
      
      Jam sandwiches, cheese sandwiches, a piece of fruit
      
      The envy felt by a number of us when a more well off kid opened there school lunch box and it had raisins in a little packet inside!!
      
      And of course we played on jungle gyns with hard ground underneath and played full tackle bullrush.
      
      Our schools are now breeding grounds for children with little to no resilience …
      
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      May 9, 2024 8:45am
      - Ian Boag
        
        Ah the good old days ….. rose tinted glasses and all that.
        
        Back in the day you refer to the good results you refer to owed much to the fact that most of the students quit early. I was at a high school with 400-odd pupils. Just 20 in year 13. About 1/4 had vanished by the end of year 10 and a similar proportion tossed out without School Cert at the end of year 11.
        
        That was OK because the freezing works, wharves and a whole lot of protected “industry” (building overpriced junk) – soaked up mindless muscle. You could get an apprenticeship with only two years of secondary school. Unemployment was such that it was claimed at times that the minister knew them all by name … 🙂
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:05am
      - Steve Otto(North Shore)
        
        Bullrush! Yep, take out the biggest guy you can find, and he is now on your side!
        
        7 1
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        May 9, 2024 9:16am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        Yes I am aware. I wish all good fortune to folk who like vegimite. But we now have schools with a very large cohort of Asian kids. They are not going to eat it.
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:22am
      - mogg
        
        Try cooking pasta to al dente, drain water then stir in 2 or 3 teaspoons of Marmite/Vegemite to your taste. Always add some of the pasta cooking water back in to lubricate. A very tasty meal in 10 min.
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:46am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        Pasta and vegimite? 😭
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:57am
      - Flossie
        
        BY – you say Asian kids wouldn’t eat it.
        Japanese kids might actually like it as it is quite similar to Miso which is made using fermented soya beans.
        Having said that I do like Vegemite but do not like miso!!
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:58am
      - JimBobJoe
        
        Ian Boag. … No rose tinted glasses. It was a solid primary school I attended which had proper reading recovery programmes and even speld for dyslexia…
        
        Very few left that school without reading and writing skills. We cant say that today. Kids are turning up at secondary school almost illiterate….
        
        And while yes there was self selecting when 15 year olds left at secondary level puffing secindary results, that doesnt explain the drop at primary level.
        
        Ffs we have school teachers getting stressed teaching basic arithmetic…. Too much ‘your special’, not enough solid rote learning to set a platform..
        
        You may laugh it off…. But our workforce is increasing unable to comprehend written instruction, spell, work simple sums or even speak coherently. Thats a real concern in an ever more competitive world…
        
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        May 9, 2024 11:14am
      - MCōs
        
        I don’t remember too much from intermediate school.
        A couple of things stand out
        One of the kids who I realize now was epileptic used to get bullied because of his seizures which caused him to lose concentration and appear bewildered for a few seconds. Poor bugger took some shit for that.
        The other thing was the first kid to grow some pubic hair proudly showing his dick to his mates.
        I had a mate there who had about fifteen siblings
        His dad worked night shifts somewhere
        
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        May 9, 2024 5:38pm
    - Cassandra
      
      This is NZ, Ben – classic kiwi food. Enjoy! Question: do prisons serve stir fry and dumplings for lunch? When I was in hospital recently I was offered a salad sandwich for lunch.
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:20am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        No but school children are not prisoners.
        
        My point is that stir fry vegetables and dumplings is a cheap, basic dish. Even a working class Chinese, Vietnamese, or Cambodian person could have that for lunch. I’m simply reacting to the idea that it is too flash for New Zealand school children.
        
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        May 9, 2024 9:49am
    - Tom Hunter
      
      Rural Kiwi born and bred kid and … I fucking hated vegemite and marmite sandwiches, and there was no other serving of them, like toast, that worked for me either.
      
      🤢🤢🤢🤢🤢🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:47am
    - PurplePen
      
      Well when we turned 9 or 10 we had to make our own sandwiches, I had more than the average number of siblings. Mum was clever enough to outsource this task to us as soon as we were able. But I distinctly remember making cheese and vegemite and soggy tomato sandwiches myself and enjoying them.
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:21am
      - wsk12345
        
        Whereas I chose not to make them – too early in the morning and just had first meal of the day at 430 when I got home – or 6 ion the days I had sport.
        
        Didn’t do any harm.
        
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        May 9, 2024 1:36pm
    - Paul
      
      Tofu and Hoisin tastes similar !
      
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      May 10, 2024 12:23am
  - Sacha
    
    I think that in some communities providing a hot after-school meal would be a great idea. Of course some families would take advantage but aren’t there always ?. . .
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:56am
- Spam
  
  Socialism is so…hard…to…unwind…
  
  Our school doesn’t get any “free” (taxpayer provided) lunches. Why not? We have children turning up to school without lunch (only a few, the principal knows who they are, and ensures they get something donated by the teachers).
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:50am
  - MCōs
    
    Socialism certainly is so…hard…to…unwind…
    All that “free” (taxpayer provided) education
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:05am
    - Ian Boag
      
      Pension
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:07am
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        Still beating that drum, Ian?
        
        1 0
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        May 9, 2024 8:29pm
    - Grunter
      
      Which is exactly why it does not work!
      
      Name one thing that the Govt runs that actually works….. there is nothing!
      
      I will give you a logical alternative to anything you seriously come up with.
      
      8 3
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      May 9, 2024 9:25am
      - softail 1450
        
        Grunter, Total compliance and unquestioned control over around 90% of the citizenry ?
        
        4 1
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        May 9, 2024 10:23am
      - MCōs
        
        An organised education system, which is what taxpayer via the government provides in NZ including the private schools, is an awful lot better than whatever shambles a disorganized one would come up with
        There are religious schools I’ve heard of that operate outside the mainstream. I read about a Jewish school in London where the kids, born in the uk, emerged unable to speak English.
        When I worked in Jakarta, which I thought was like a slightly downmarket Bangkok, I asked in the office where all the radical Islamists were? I was told in the rural areas where the kids were radicalized in madrassahs.
        
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        May 9, 2024 1:42pm
    - JimBobJoe
      
      Intergenarational funding of large scale items like basic education, healthcare, water and road systems is not socialism….
      
      They are investments in shared assets.
      
      Providing food and shelter to everyone on the taxpayer us in no one the same.
      
      But you know that
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:59am
  - kowtow
    
    (only a few, the principal knows who they are, and ensures they get something donated by the teachers).
    
    And therein the problem.
    
    If tyhose children turned up bruised the school would very likely ask questions and involve the police.
    
    If parents aren’t feeding their children that’s a case for at the very least a social worker intervention ( along the lines of what the very maligned Bill English wanted) and yet once again here we have it , because of a tiny minority of shit parents the tax payer is being foisted with a massive bill to pay for hundreds of thousands of wasted ,pointless meals.
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:34am
greybeard

https://www.waikatotimes.co.nz/nz-news/350271723/school-lunch-provider-says-new-sandwich-scheme-wont-cut-it/?utm_source=stuff_article&utm_medium=referral

https://www.waikatotimes.co.nz/nz-news/350206469/benefits-outweigh-costs-school-lunches-morrinsville-primary

This looks like a case of sour grapes from Te Puna Kai Catering director Nicole Rakena: she set up a catering company for the express purpose of feeding kids at school, and no doubt has a healthy contract with the Government to do so.

What these articles never mention is the cost per meal, and just how much the taxpayers are putting into her pocket.
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May 9, 2024 8:04am
- Swifty
  
  “No-one should profit from education….”
  
  That used to be the NZ teacher’s unions catch cry. Probably still is when it suits them.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:23am
greenfinger

Swarbrick and Davidson are clearly running beside themselves about Genter quitting the Greens and taking a slug of voters with her. Why else would Swarbrick say Genter’s outburst is unacceptable (clearly more than one occasion) from one side of her mouth and then accuse there are similar behaviour on the other of the aisle based on hearsay? Another classic Swarbrick foot-in-mouth. She continue to say she is not excusing Genter’s behaviour but proceeded to provide an excuse. When it looks like an excuse, sounds like an excuse and stinks like an excuse, it is an excuse! Apologise and leave it at that, Swarbrick. As soon as you use the words “while” or “but” or “and” or explain, you have lost!
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May 9, 2024 8:05am
- KH
  
  JAG’s explanation to the privileges committee.
  “Minister Doocey had not read the report on how to operate his chair. It jumped towards me making me lean over him and I was saying “read the report”. None of this would have happened if he sat on a bicycle instead of that MPs chair.”
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:36pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

She is insinuating that if Trump loses the election, his supporters will turn to violence as a means to keep him in power.
This is the crazy Maxine Waters.
“I want to know about all of those right-wing organizations that he’s connected with, who are training up in the hills somewhere”
Video incl.

https://feedsnorth.com/watch-maxine-waters-deranged-conspiracy-theory-about-trump-supporters/
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May 9, 2024 8:07am
- softail 1450
  
  Steve Otto, the democrats have tried hard to keep the moron Waters away from microphones and cameras for some time ,unfortunately for them she’s like the stink of dog shit very hard to eradicate completely.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:54am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    Been very quiet lately
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:18am
- Inandout
  
  SO, that same unbalanced woman of colour urged people to abuse and disrupt diners who supported Trump while he was President.
  
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  May 9, 2024 11:29am
Flossie

How did my generation, and my parent’s and my children’s generations, all survive school with a peanut butter sandwich and an apple for lunch? And we went to school with a breakfast of weetbix and milk in us. Hot milk in winter. Let’s put responsibility for feeding kids right where it belongs and that’s with the parents. If you can’t afford that then don’t have the kids in the first place. Comparatively easy to manage that these days.
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May 9, 2024 8:14am
- Ian Boag
  
  What do you eat for lunch?
  
  Luncheon sausage in white bread?
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:40am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    Hubby would consider that a treat.
    
    The poor darling is going to get fed celery sticks and carrot sticks with Peanut butter/yoghurt for lunch….and Tofu stir fry for tea.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:03am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      Have you put him on a diet? 😕
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:55am
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        I’m trying to keep him alive…
        
        He sneaked a cream horn yesterday….
        
        8 0
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        May 9, 2024 10:57am
    - Sacha
      
      Does he eat up? Or are you teasing us?
      Looks very unappetising to me.
      
      3 0
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      May 9, 2024 12:03pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        He eats every vege/salad green/piece of fruit I place in front of him these days (with the exception of raw red onion).
        
        He was a reluctant eater of vege/fruit for much of our married life…. but came home from the opticians one day after a diagnosis of macular degeneration and told me I’d have to feed him tlots of leafy greens and colourful veges.
        
        I asked him to guess what that stuff was I had placed on his dinner plate and in the salad bowl every night of his married life!!!
        
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        May 9, 2024 1:59pm
      - Ghost
        
        Does he take any supplements for macular degeneration?
        
        2 0
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        May 9, 2024 2:05pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        Does he take any supplements for macular degeneration?
        
        No.
        
        He has wet & dry MD in both eyes and gets anti-VEGF injections in his eyes as needed (6-8 weekly intervals/alternate eye).
        
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        May 9, 2024 6:53pm
      - Ghost
        
        Oh bugger that’s no good
        
        Mum has wet. Her specialist recommended she take Clinicians Visioncare With Lutein a decade ago
        
        2 0
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        May 9, 2024 7:08pm
  - Jethrod
    
    Nothing that flash
    
    3 0
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    May 9, 2024 10:23am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    White bread buttered, luncheon, dumata sauce.
    Beats sushi every time!
    
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    May 9, 2024 5:52pm
- NothingLeft
  
  peanut butter and other nuts are effectively banned from schools – taking away yet another cheap easy lunch option for 99% of population.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:45am
  - lifesgood
    
    Serious nonsense this banning of peanut biutter etc. How many kids have peanut ellergies and why? That needs to be investigated. In all my years through school I never heard of one kid with said ellergy and we all ate peanut butter sandwiches.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:05am
    - NothingLeft
      
      Severe peanut allergy is about 1 in 400. Most who have allergy can be made safely tolerant to being around it and accidental ingestion by oral immunotherapy (taking a very small dose of peanut every day)
      
      Could it be that the banning of peanut butter etc by safety elves has been the cause in the rise of nut allergies?
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:27am
  - rouppe
    
    Banned because that one person might touch it and react badly.
    
    Well keep your bloody fingers out of someone else’s lunch
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:16pm
    - NothingLeft
      
      in cases of severe allergy even being in a room with smell of peanuts can induce anaphylaxis. There was a case a few years ago where a boy kissed his girlfriend some hours after having a PB sandwich and killed her. Sympathy and banning is warranted in cases of severe untreatable allergy – there really isn’t any alternative if we want those kids to get educated, but it should be case-by case and immunotherapy should be tried first, lets do what we can to maximise freedoms.
      
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      May 9, 2024 2:16pm
- Flossie
  
  And I suppose weetbix is a no-go for the gluten free? And of course regular milk will be out for the lactose intolerant…
  Never knew or heard of peanut allergies back then.
  How come we survived??
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:05am
- Ra Henare
  
  For me, Porridge for breakfast that Mum Made before she went to work on the 7:50am train. Dad had already left at 7:30am.
  
  But then I was 12 years old and able to bike/walk to school on my own. Good old days them late 50s when parents accepted responsibility for bringing up their kids.
  
  Social welfare is a good idea in theory, but crap results in practice.
  
  Ie Solo Mums Benefit
  Job Seeker Benefit
  School Lunches
  
  PS. Its social welfare not SOCIALISM.
  NZ does not practice socialism, it practices FASCISM.
  Look up the definitions.
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:50pm
  - rouppe
    
    My mum used to mix it up cold in a pot the night before and leave it on the coal range that was dampened down overnight.
    
    Hot thick and yummy the next morning with lashings of brown sugar
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:18pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    That would be porridge with brown sugar and cream from the top of the milking vat?
    Oh, knob of butter as well?
    
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    May 9, 2024 5:54pm
Maggie Pie

‘You can’t beat Wellington on a good Winston day’ 😀

https://twitter.com/winstonpeters/status/1788091456126857714
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May 9, 2024 8:17am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Brilliant…
  
  Perhaps Chippie should start studying thigh gaps instead of wage gaps.
  
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  May 9, 2024 11:05am
- NothingLeft
  
  I think Wellington would be much improved if beatings were liberally handed out to the majority looney lefties that live there. That’s the reality of living under the authoritarian socialist regimes they all seem keen to usher in anyway, and maybe they would revise their beliefs if they were to experience a period of living in Venezuela, Cuba, China, North Korea, Zimbabwe etc.
  
  The most strident opponents of the left are those that have had to suffer living in such places.
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:30pm
  - Ra Henare
    
    NothingLeft.
    Just a small correction.
    Cuba, China Nth Korea are communist countries. Along with Laos, Vietnam.
    
    I have lived(albeit briefly) in China, Vietnam and Laos.
    
    They are not the shit holes you infer.
    In fact the roads are fantastic and health care is great.
    
    People seem to confuse the Communist Countries as being old style communism down to village level.
    
    China and Vietnam are rabidly Capitalistic at a day to day/normal life level. Laos also has a large chunk of capitalism at work.
    
    I cant speak for Nth Vietnam and Venezuela. But I believe Cuba has loosened the chains and now allows property ownership.
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:01pm
    - NothingLeft
      
      I lived in China for years too. There is limited rule of law and people are regularly disappeared for the crime of being inconvenient to politicians. Social support is non-existent with huge cost for health and schooling and enormous numbers of destitute elderly, while all the party officials and princlings are mega wealthy. Govt corruption is immense. It’s an authoritarian kleptocracy with good press and chrome plating – and is failing in the way they generally all do.
      
      Veitnam seems better for the time being, but will no doubt go the same way as china as they get richer. It’s inevitably in authoritarian non-democratic countries.
      
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      May 9, 2024 4:00pm
G152

Looks like the left have beaten all others to ‘training up in the hills somewhere’ or on university grounds…
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May 9, 2024 8:19am
wsk12345

Talked to a mate who is a financial advisor with a KiwiSaver provider. Said they are getting a massive increase in requests to access KiwiSaver for financial hardship.

Also heard an interview the other day where a bank economist said that only 20% of their mortgage customers have not rolled onto >5% interest rates.

So peeps taking from KiwiSaver to pay interest to the banks?

I don’t see interest rates going down in the next 18 months or more. This could get ugly. People with big mortgages will run through their $70k kiwisaver pretty quick. Then what?
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May 9, 2024 8:20am
- cmm
  
  I recently spoke with a hairdresser who said that their business has fallen off a cliff in the last 6 months as people tighten their belts and spend less on frivolity.
  
  These are the real indicators of economic downturn.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:47am
  - Inandout
    
    cmm, that hairdresser would have had a long holiday when Jacinda stopped NZ for a month, and Auckland for 100 days.
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:33am
    - cmm
      
      Correct. They all took the small business hand out thing but were very happy to be able to open their business again – even with the restrictions.
      
      She told me that a lot of people changed their hairstyles during Covid to easier to manage that could be done at home. Many of those people went back to more elaborate hairstyles after Covid, but are cutting back again.
      
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      May 9, 2024 12:38pm
- mogg
  
  Thankfully long term bond markets see it very differently to you and your mate.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:49am
  - wsk12345
    
    They don’t help people in mortgage stress though do they?
    
    And I think even our bank economists and RB governor are regularly pushing out expectation as to when rates will drop. And the Fed.
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:51pm
    - mogg
      
      The inflationary pressures we are seeing now were created 2 yrs ago. If RBNZ reduces rates too early it will mean the return to higher rates in future.
      What you seem to be complaining about is free market economics and Capitalism.
      
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      May 9, 2024 2:36pm
- imalwaysright
  
  We hear about bank profits, but we don’t hear much about their income.
  
  Banks are draining tens of billions from the economy and people with mortgages and other bank debts can’t afford to spend money in the general economy.
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:15am
- PurplePen
  
  For decades before the GFC mortgages averaged 9 percent. Why shouldn’t they return to average 9 after enough years after the GFC? Based on that alone I reckon rates won’t be going back down at all. Not until they get back up to around 9.
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:31am
  - Ian Boag
    
    House prices were 3-4x (now 7-10x) annual income. Deposits were something like 30-35% (now 20%).
    
    The world was a different place. Over time, as house prices continued to climb faster than incomes, deposits were lowered. Coincidentally – for other reasons – interest rates went through the floor with stoked the fire some more.
    
    So that’s why 9% rates are a bit problematic here.
    
    Some simple sums. The typical gross yield on a rental is about 3.5% give or take a bit. About 80c/week per $1000 of value. So a $500k house rents for about $400/week give or take a bit. It’s dictated by what tenants can afford to pay not by the landlord’s interest bill.
    
    Now let’s buy that $500k house with 20% (100k) deposit. $400k at 9% would be $36k/year in interest. $700/week plus a bit of capital repayment probably makes it about $850. Throw in $5k of rates and $5k of insurance = $200/week. We won’t talk about maintenance. Say $1050/week plus maintenance all up give or take a bit. $55k/year vs $20k odd renting.
    
    Can be made to work if prices keep running away over time. Always have so far …. Today’s FHBs are taking a highly leveraged bet on prices. Helped along by the ability to rat Kiwisaver.
    
    Works well if prices keep rising. They work very not well if prices plateau – or worse – if they fall.
    
    The low interest – low deposit – thing has run out of steam and we are backed into a corner. Don’t look at me for an answer ….
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:29am
    - miltonF
      
      The answer is that house prices need to drop. People cannot afford a mortgage at traditionally average interest rates because prices are ridiculously high.
      
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      May 9, 2024 5:01pm
  - NothingLeft
    
    Interest rates are unlikely to drop much below 6.5-7.5% any time soon, and with Global sharemarkets running at ridiculously high P/Es more likely than not there will be a crash/correction and spike up again in interest rates. (Unless wave of new AI driven growth in things like robots starts to impact).
    
    In meantime there’s been a whole lot of wage inflation in last 4 years (>20%) and a 10% drop in house prices over last 2 years so house prices have effectively come down a decent amount, and are unlikely to rise given continuing higher interest rates.
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:53pm
- Master Mariner
  
  Yep, And “Behind on Mortgages” at a high.
  I am one who recently took 70% off my Kiwi Saver account by via a Deal provided to Seafarers such as myself.
  The Investment profile did not meet my expectations, Ie Green Investment etc.
  On another note I fixed my Mortgage for 5 years ( Max) 2 years ago. Against all advice from Bank Manager.
  Why, Inflation !. It is not going to go away soon and it looks like there are a Hell of a lot of “Black Swans” flying around waiting to Roost.
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:58pm
  - mogg
    
    Does the Seafarers super have inflation protection, or is that non of my business.
    
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    May 9, 2024 3:29pm
    - Master Mariner
      
      Nope that I know off, But Fisher have an agreement too take funds out of Lifesaver account on completion of contract.
      This what I did
      
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      May 9, 2024 8:13pm
  - NothingLeft
    
    My lawyer commented recently about how lucky I was to have fixed for 4 years in 2022. Luck my arse, it was obvious interest rates were going to skyrocket.
    
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    May 9, 2024 7:01pm
kowtow

NZME Emmerson cartoon attacking Luxon for $57000 for office refurb as screwing over the hard pressed taxpayer .

OK , did he do one on Hipkins blowing $400 mil on one school and not informing cabinet , while screwing over the hard pressed taxpayer.
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May 9, 2024 8:26am
- NothingLeft
  
  Or Robertson pissing away $10billion on money market gambling losses via LSAP – $2000 debt dumped on every Kiwi, or $8k ish for every net taxpayer.
  
  20 1
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  May 9, 2024 10:12am
  - Master Mariner
    
    Too be fair it was both Orr and indirectly Robertson.
    Someone has to pay for the “Great Cash Splash”.
    
    And they want more to “Gamble” on the currency Market!!!
    As Kerry Packer once said, An Alan Bond only comes around once in your life ( Something like that).
    
    5 1
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    May 9, 2024 1:03pm
- Arthur Fleck
  
  The left love Big Government.
  
  Well, Big Government comes at a cost to the hard pressed taxpayer.
  
  9 1
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  May 9, 2024 10:23am
- Jethrod
  
  Emerson is a lowlife scribbler, who I never, ever view.
  And seriously, what is the situation with the Marlborough high schools, is it proceeding or is it on the back burner?
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:29am
  - kowtow
    
    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/510334/education-ministry-does-u-turn-on-school-co-location-project-after-spending-24m
    
    2 1
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    May 9, 2024 2:12pm
Bridgenag

AstraZeneca vaccine withdrawal

CARL HENEGHAN AND TOM JEFFERSON

https://open.substack.com/pub/trusttheevidence/p/the-aztec-two-step?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
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May 9, 2024 8:34am
Bridgenag

Update on COVID mRNA Vaccine Harms
“All of which leaves those of us who have been so heavily censored, defamed, debanked, deplatformed, and otherwise punished in a wide variety of ways (including loss of medical license in some cases) for speaking medical and scientific truth, and for trying to educate, provide information necessary for informed consent, and otherwise acting as responsible health care professionals wondering what happens next, and what will be the allowed “truths” of today and tomorrow.”

https://open.substack.com/pub/rwmalonemd/p/update-on-covid-mrna-vaccine-
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May 9, 2024 8:35am
Bobba Fret

Kiri Allen has been very quiet lately. I wonder what she is up to?
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May 9, 2024 8:37am
- Suze Wainwright
  
  Watching what happens to Golriz…?
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:18am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  She’s the campaign manager for Ria Hall who will be running for the Tauranga Mayoralty
  
  She was also standing for a councillor seat for Pāpāmoa ward and has former Justice Minister and East Coast MP Kiri Allan as her campaign manager.
  
  https://www.nzherald.co.nz/bay-of-plenty-times/news/tauranga-election-2024-singer-ria-hall-announces-bid-for-tauranga-mayoralty/MUP45M3OF5E2RH3MH2CVESHHVM/
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:08am
  - softail 1450
    
    MW ,,I wonder who’s funding the daily cocktail hour ?
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:36am
  - Matt Long
    
    According to one source she has been experiencing the joys of off roading in a rental car at Doubtless Bay.
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:09am
    - Bobba Fret
      
      Yes that is actually why I mentioned her. I wonder if that will eventually be confirmed by the general media?
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:52am
Chuck Bird

I think many earn their money but the timing is bad.

Empathy missing in action as MPs take pay rise

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/kahu/wheres-the-empathy-luxon-is-axing-thousands-of-jobs-from-the-public-service-then-accepts-hefty-pay-rises-for-his-parliamentary-mates/SVWVBAROXVGS3BM2AN2NKQKTEM/
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May 9, 2024 8:37am
- Nigel Kearney
  
  No, the timing is perfect. It’s a very long time until the next election and the amount is small when viewed as an annual rate of increase since the last one, and compared to inflation.
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:53am
Maggie Pie

A Specialist Surgeon was forced against his will by Ardern, Hipkins and Bloomfield to have 3 mRNA jabs to keep his job.

He asks…..

Do you believe the dams will burst and the truth will finally become mainstream?
Will the media finally use their platforms to talk about the reality of Pfizer and Moderna mRNA harm?

https://twitter.com/toobaffled/status/1787992362230403540

(My fave comment…. “A qualified mechanic would never say to a car owner put sand in your engine, your car will think it’s on holiday at the beach. His principles would not allow him to do that.
Why oh why did the Medical Industry sell out the Public with Jaxxine advice.)
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May 9, 2024 8:42am
- kevn
  
  Maggie…. But ‘he’ and ‘her’ got a gong for all this nasty business.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:08am
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Not to mention an exemption….
    
    https://twitter.com/marinavanzyl/status/1788118145707712892
    
    7 1
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    May 9, 2024 9:15am
    - Inandout
      
      Maggie, what irks me is that there is a possibility some of our leaders were not given the type of vaccine we were given. Those jabbed aren’t tattooed or have other visual proof of having had the Covid vaccine. One day in the distant future we may have a death bed confession.
      
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      May 9, 2024 9:36am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        You think the politicians got a special vaccine? 🤔
        
        8 2
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        May 9, 2024 9:52am
      - Maggie Pie
        
        Hundreds on twitter saying the pollies were administered Saline in public.
        
        11 4
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        May 9, 2024 10:00am
      - newview
        
        FFS Inanout. You are clinging onto the edge of the rabbit hole by your fingernails. Think what you like about the vaccines but don’t just vomit unsubstantiated crap. I have had all the vaccine boosters and am still alive. 73% of the worlds population have had at least one shot and thirteen billion shots all up. Yes many deaths probably but a very small overall %. Don’t be a rumour monger.
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:28am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        Here are the three important questions about the safety and efficacy of the vaccines. The answers are only valid if supported by large data sets.
        
        1. Is all cause mortality and cardiac mortality elevated for those who are vaccinated?
        
        No.
        
        “… for temporal trends, no-increased risk was found for non-COVID-19 mortality, all-cause mortality, and four cardiac-related death outcomes among recipients of the three COVID-19 vaccines used in the US.
        
        https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264410X24001919
        
        2. New Zealand has a very high vaccination rate. Does New Zealand have high excess deaths over the period that the vaccines were rolled out on mass?
        
        No.
        
        During that period New Zealand had the lowest reported excess deaths of any nation.
        
        https://www.nzdoctor.co.nz/article/undoctored/cumulative-pandemic-deaths-graph-more-effective-1000-words
        
        3. Are the all cause mortality rates higher for those who received the covid vaccine when compared to those who did not?
        
        No.
        
        All cause mortality in every country shows that during the pandemic, mortality was significantly higher for the unvaccinated.
        
        This is one USA study but there are at least 100 like it.
        
        https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9786706/#:~:text=Morality%20among%20unvaccinated%20COVID%2D19,times%20higher%20among%20unvaccinated%20patients.
        
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        May 9, 2024 10:53am
      - wsk12345
        
        We have had the conversation too many times Ben. Go look at the assumptions and methodology used to calculate excess deaths and edit your answer accordingly.
        
        6 2
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        May 9, 2024 2:00pm
      - Grunter
        
        Yep – he (Bene Yu) has used cumulated deaths that stop in Jan 2023. I’ve posted the raw data from Stats NZ several time before. Excess deaths in NZ are up and it’s NOT COVID but something else…..
        
        And we have confirmed that mRNA jabs do cause heart problems, blood clots, cancers……
        
        So, what could be happening (oopps, we’re not allowed to ask that question!)
        
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        May 9, 2024 2:38pm
    - Master Mariner
      
      Interestingly enough, I submitted the very fact about 11k exemptions for vaccine too the inquiry ( Terms of reference) , Not holding my breath.
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:09pm
- kowtow
  
  Big article in Ferald by Steve Braunias on the day in court for Liz Gunn . Crown case looking very dodgy .
  
  One charge dismissed , while 2 hang in the balance .
  
  But Braunias still gets to stick the knife in and takes some very cheap shots at Gunn as having a view of NZ as repugnant , xenophobic and exclusive.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:08am
- Grunter
  
  Maggie – here’s your answer – all NZ Doctors were gagged by the NZ Govt. Not conspiracy, this is all info in the public domain.
  
  https://brownstone.org/articles/the-re-education-of-new-zealand-medical-doctors/
  
  “New Zealand doctors whose behaviour was inconsistent with the New Zealand government’s Covid-19 policy and found to be ‘guilty’ by the MCNZ were required to sign a ‘voluntary undertaking and undertake an ‘Educational Programme.’ ”
  
  The ‘Voluntary Undertaking’ that recalcitrant doctors were required to sign carried with it all the power of a gag order. The ‘undertaking’ prevented doctors from providing ‘their view, or the views of others with similar views’ about vaccination or immunisation against Covid-19.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:37am
  - Keith White
    
    Correct. And if we disagreed with TPTB and now we do not agree to re-education *and* pay for the doctor to watch us practicing to vouch to TPTB that we are now toeing the party line, we can’t get our practicing certificate.
    
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    May 9, 2024 7:26pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

So you are not allowed to shake your head in Court these days?

In the hotel she spanked him with a rolled up magazine.
Who believes this shit?

https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/national/trump-told-not-to-curse-and-shake-head-as-stormy-daniels-gives-evidence/ar-BB1m3hFj?
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May 9, 2024 8:49am
- Arthur Fleck
  
  “Superpower”. It’s pathetic just how much of a banana republic the U.S. has become. The show trials would make Stalin blush. The republic has been dead for over a century and precious few voters are even aware.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:47am
- NothingLeft
  
  Appears all the cases are failing/falling apart or at minimum will be delayed till after election.
  
  New York case had descended into farce, no chance it isn’t thrown out on appeal. At this point it is only a DNC run anti-trump propaganda event, and a tool to prevent Trump getting out and campaigning.
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:16am
  - virtualmark
    
    The two Federal cases have been delayed through the decisions of GOP-leaning Judges. So they’ve delivered for Trump. Realistically, both cases are now post-election, and if Trump wins he will surely force the DoJ to drop them.
    
    The Georgia case is still ongoing, but has been sidetracked by bad life choices by the lead DA. Realistically, it’s very unlikely a fair court would require her to be removed, and even if she is the case will just move to another lawyer in her office. But it’s a 2025 case now.
    
    The New York one will be done-and-dusted by the end of June. But Trump will surely appeal any guilty verdict.
    
    Meanwhile, although Trump and others claim the cases are stopping him campaigning it’s notable that he hasn’t campaigned on the days when the NY court isn’t in session. Last weekend he played golf and went to the Miami Grand Prix. Today he’s played golf and got a function at Mar a Lago.
    
    If you pay attention you’ll find that Trump’s not actually campaigning that much. A few rallies, with small attendances (typically <5,000 people) but a lot more days playing golf.
    
    To be honest I don't know that Trump truly wants to be President again … he'd rather play golf. But he sure doesn't want to go to jail, and so the Presidency is a path to staying out of jail.
    
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    May 9, 2024 5:00pm
    - Mike
      
      If he is re-elected he avoids jail but also no one will expect him to do any work.
      
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      May 9, 2024 5:27pm
      - Steve Otto(North Shore)
        
        So does the 10% Big Guy!!!!
        
        2 2
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        May 9, 2024 6:15pm
    - MCōs
      
      Depending on who you’re listening to he didn’t particularly want the job first time round, but it’s a bit like marmite sandwiches; once you start you can’t stop
      
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      May 9, 2024 6:43pm
Kiwiguy

https://ground.news
Does anyone else use them?
I’ve just started using them out of curiosity because they claim they “compare headlines across the political spectrum using media bias ratings driven by data.”
Each article has a simple graphic showing their analysis of the media bias.
Interested in other peoples comments and analysis on them.
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May 9, 2024 8:51am
- Ra Henare
  
  Have used ground for years to show media bias.
  Its an indicator not an authority.
  eg its says BBC Centre where in my view BBC is leftish
  
  Recently I have used 2 Israeli sources for information on the ME Conflict.
  Haaretz.com
  Ynetnews.com
  
  Two quite different views.
  One very pro Netanyahu the other not.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:20pm
- Grunter
  
  I scroll through their App most days. I find it useful. Their spectrum seems to be an OK guide, but obviously debatable. Remembering too ‘Left-Right’ is a very simple way of reflecting on issues.
  
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  May 9, 2024 2:42pm
Chuck Bird

Does anyone here believe Luxon who says that solar panels and wind turbines can replace fossil fuels?
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May 9, 2024 8:55am
- kowtow
  
  The civilisation of the west is being walked into oblivion , literally , by our politicians who prostrate us the productive taxpayer on the altar of pointless virtue signalling but which will change our way of life ,losing our freedoms and choices , while being foisted with huge costs …….all the while the authoritarians grow stronger and bolder , laugh at our pointless desrtuction of our economies , military , social cohesion ……..pending whatever they have up their sleeves .
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:20am
- rockape
  
  Works for me . When I lived on board a yacht for 9 years solar and wind meant I didn’t have to run the engine three hours a day to provid3 power for auto pilot, fridge, nav gear and lights. Now living in a house my $17,000 solar system saves my $2,500 a year. So yes it’s replacing fossil fuels, not all but reduces the need.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:50am
  - Chris Nisbet
    
    Reducing the need != replacing. Not even close.
    Just wondering, is your house completely off-grid? I’m not trying to imply anything one way or t’other, just wondering what you get for your $17k.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:11am
    - rockape
      
      17k got me 12 solar panels generating up to 4.7 kw per hour. I use about 800 kw per month and my average generation from solar is around 600 kw per day. Buy back is more by a couple of cents than my night rate. Not totally off grid, I would need batteries and more panels for that and the cost benefit isn’t that good, it would treble my cost. Replacement. The replacing of one thing with another. I replace about 600kw per month from the grid with solar.
      
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      May 9, 2024 12:53pm
      - wsk12345
        
        kWh not kW. The latter is capacity (the size of the pipe or panel capacity) while for former is how many hours each is has run for on average.
        
        You install 4.7kw of capacity to produce 600kWh per month (presumably not per day as stated)
        This gives you a capacity factor of
        600/( 4.7 x 24 hr x30 days) or about 20%.
        
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        May 9, 2024 2:03pm
  - Keith White
    
    But all the services provided to allow that lifestyle for you to enjoy (and good on you for enjoying it) required fossil fuels to keep everything that you needed from onshore functional, n’est-ce pas?
    
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    May 9, 2024 7:29pm
- Arthur Fleck
  
  Amber Heard has more credibility.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:57am
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Loved how she shat in Johnnies bed… then blamed the poor dog. LOL!!
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:06am
- Chris Nisbet
  
  All he needed to do to find out just how wrong he is it look at last night’s generation.
  Solar: 0MW
  Wind: 20MW
  Battery: 5MW for a wee while, then 0
  This isn’t uncommon.
  NZ has many night’s each year where it’s dark, cold, and still.
  Businesses will put turbines where the wind is ‘best’ first. Putting turbines in other places to get the coverage up makes less sense. Littering the countryside with turbines because it’s “always windy somewhere” really need to think a bit harder about what they’re suggesting.
  Regardless of how many turbines we have we need the same amount of reliable generation to cover those times when unreliable generation fails us. As we add more unreliable generation we also need to ensure we add reliable capacity that can ramp up as quickly as the unreliable generation deserts us.
  Either that or get used to blackouts and high prices.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:59am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    I see that Transpower has issued a warning for tomorrow morning that residual generation will drop to below 200 MW. The forecast for Christchurch is minus 4 degrees.
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:26am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Could geothermal replace gas and coal? IIRC it is baseload power and is not affected by ‘dry years’ that affect hydro.
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:29am
    - cmm
      
      “Could geothermal replace gas and coal?”
      
      There’s probably not enough of it. From what EECA says, there are geothermal resources to double the amount of power from 900 to 1900MW (approx 10 to 20% of peak demand).
      
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      May 9, 2024 12:50pm
    - Chuck Bird
      
      The short answer is no. There are a few reasons. One is that fossil fuel generation can be located where the demand is. Another is that demand is increasing due to population increase, use of EVs and the use of AI.
      
      The use of nuclear is the sensible option. It is not likely that Labour or Labour Lite will support it.
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:56pm
      - Benedict Yu
        
        So why does Chris Luxon figure that we can be 100 percent renewables? Surely he has access to expert advice?
        
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        May 9, 2024 4:23pm
    - Chris Nisbet
      
      I don’t know for sure, but I suspect that geothermal would be quite hard on the equipment. No idea if there’s enough of it in NZ to replace FF. I would guess not. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that geothermal belongs to Maori (they were here first), so there would be another cost thrown in..
      I spoke to a bloke who worked on a geothermal plant up in Ngawha. He was saying they use pentane on one side of the heat exchangers, which boils at low temp. The gas is then used to turn the turbines. Lots of safety requirements because of the use of this gas. Very quiet, apparently.
      Dunno how quickly it can be ramped up/down.
      Expensive/reliable is way better than expensive/unreliable tho (IMHO).
      Let’s hope this wee scare acts as a wakeup call.
      
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      May 9, 2024 4:10pm
  - Handyman
    
    It is possible in the future that PHEV and hybrid cars will be retrofitted to run as generators feeding power into the house during black outs.
    
    It is a funny old world. Coal plants and thousands of petrol driven engines will be running flat out to make up for the utter failure of “renewables”.
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:58pm
  - virtualmark
    
    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/07/climate/battery-electricity-solar-california-texas.html?unlocked_article_code=1.qk0.aDOa.5SNsIkE259D5&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&sgrp=c-cb
    
    From today’s New York Times.
    
    If I’ve done this right that article is unlocked so you can read it.
    
    (Narrator: He may not have done this right)
    
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    May 9, 2024 4:52pm
- NothingLeft
  
  Yep. Biggest impediment is installation costs on homes, but that’s likely to drop to low levels in 5-10 years with AI robots doing the job, making covering whole roof with 20-30kW worth of $300/kW panels to ensure sufficiency even on cloudy winter days economic. And batteries are down to about $75/kWh in mass production now meaning it will be economic to have a few days power in reserve, and that EVs are going to get a lot cheaper (personally I think a range-extender petrol PHEV makes most sense)
  
  It’s going to be cheaper for people in sunny parts of the country to go off-grid for electricity – and they will probably also be able to power their cars with home charging helped along by a nice big battery.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:10pm
- Master Mariner
  
  NZ will have a serious Gas Shortage in next 5 years and in effect already has Due to the Disasterous Captains Call.
  Listening too Shane Jones ( Who gets it), Basically saying they will reduce Red tape to get operators to come back.
  He knows fully they wont UNLESS there is a serious Subsidy/ Royalty adjustment and too be honest they will probably still not come back.
  
  The Risks way outweigh the rewards.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:20pm
  - Benedict Yu
    
    The thing is that the Climate Change Commission figures that New Zealand can, literally stop using gas. Totally. So they don’t see the “shortage” as a bug. That is what they want. 🤔
    
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    May 9, 2024 4:25pm
    - Chris Nisbet
      
      Rod Carr was talking with Michael Laws the other day. He claimed that putting aside the idea that using FF was bad for the climate, not using FF made economic sense, which is why should stop using them.
      I think he’s from a different planet.
      If there were alternatives to FF that made economic sense we’d already being using them (because they made economic sense).
      
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      May 9, 2024 5:15pm
  - NothingLeft
    
    Probably infeasible to get new gas discoveries in NZ now without Govt footing bill entirely. But that would be extremely valuable to our horrendous current account deficit.
    
    Otherwise (and probably anyway) we need an LNG import terminal to be built in next 5 years.
    
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    May 9, 2024 7:11pm
- miltonF
  
  With just solar panels alone it can be easily done. I think people underestimate how much power is contained in sunlight. The problem of course is storage and distribution of that energy.
  
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  May 9, 2024 5:29pm
NK

It’s awesome to see Act managing socialism better than Labour through school lunches. It’s also pleasing to see David Seymour knows quinoa (a super food by the way, one of best grains you could eat) is “woke” and fruit is better. Never thought I’d live to see the day that an Act Party leader decides what children should have for lunch.

BTW, the worst thing about David’s comments are that his diet consists of sausages, pizza, McDonalds and diet coke. He doesn’t eat fruit and vegetables. He hates vegetables.

I’m genuinely gobsmacked by all of this.

Go on, downtick away and avoid these painful truths.
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May 9, 2024 8:58am
- kevn
  
  NK… I wonder if he chows down on vitamin supplements?
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:10am
- kowtow
  
  His hands are very obviously tied by the wet Nats and populist Winston Firsts .
  
  But don’t let facts get in the way of your rant.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:11am
  - NK
    
    Why vote for Act when they’re just going to be an addendum to National?
    
    Any point of difference is gone. I’m done with the party I’ve been a member of since 1996. They couldn’t get Three Strikes through (massively watered down) and now this. There’s simply no point in putting the effort in anymore. This country is rapidly heading towards second world status, a point made by Act during the campaign. And here, with the government deciding what should be in children’s lunches, we have these policies that are leading us in that direction, endorsed by the party that should be strongly opposed to it.
    
    I’m done. Finished. You can have New Zealand, or Aotearoa, or whatever it’s called. I simply don’t care anymore.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:19am
    - MCōs
      
      The second world was a grouping of countries aligned with the ussr and china during the Cold War and no longer exists
      The first world was aligned with the US etc and the third world unaligned
      We have always been first world
      Previously we were part of the British empire, which was why we involved in Britain’s wars
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:46am
    - Sacha
      
      Where are you off to?
      
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      May 9, 2024 12:20pm
      - Keith White
        
        Malta is good. Portugal is interesting. Croatia is promising. Vietnam is perhaps counter-intuitively on a roll.
        
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        May 9, 2024 7:33pm
    - The Redbaiter
      
      NK- “I’m done. Finished. You can have New Zealand, or Aotearoa, or whatever it’s called. I simply don’t care anymore.”
      
      ACT is only a small part of the problem
      
      The main problem is global socialism as peddled by Trotsky and later organisations like Socialist International and the International Union of Socialist Youth, and a thousand other similar organisations bent on implementing Trotsky’s ideas. (ie socialism will not work unless it is global)
      
      The next major problem is academia as it is the primary source for introducing such ideas into the community.
      
      Next is the legacy media, who mostly fall under the influence of said academia.
      
      Then you have the voters, who respond to the corrupt legacy media.
      
      Political parties are only responding to the electorate. The electorates’ ideas are shaped by the media, and the media by academia and academia by global socialism/ socialists.
      
      In terms of political parties, ACT again is probably the least of our problems. The real enemy is the National party, because they are traitors, and no force can battle effectively with traitors within. Luxon is a traitor to Sid Holland’s National party and he leads a party of traitors.
      
      Next in terms of enemies is Labour and the Greens. Then we have NZ First (but on the improvement) and last of all ACT who would do much more if not for Luxon and National.
      
      Considering all that Nick, you can’t expect improvement overnight. Don’t disappoint yourself with unreal expectations. Just keep plugging away. Without dissent there is nothing. No resistance.
      
      So don’t give up. Ever.
      
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      May 9, 2024 12:35pm
      - Chuck Bird
        
        A traitor is a bit strong. He is poll-driven and does not know how science works or should work.
        
        It does not work on peer-driven consensus.
        
        It works on evidence and rational debate. David Seymour with his science degree understands that.
        
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        May 9, 2024 2:50pm
      - The Redbaiter
        
        Chuck Bird- “He is poll driven”
        
        Yes, like Groucho Marx once said. “These are my principles. If you don’t like them then I have others”
        
        Being poll driven does not work, and it works even less when you allow an entity as corrupt as the legacy media is today to be the primary influencer of public opinion.
        
        National needs a leader that can take on the corrupt legacy media and defeat them. Bring his own message to the public and make them believe in that message.
        
        It’s not Mr Luxon.
        
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        May 9, 2024 4:16pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      NK, its a coalition for fks sake. ACT cant win every battle.
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:25pm
    - Grunter
      
      NK – I totally agree, I’m equally gobsmacked by Seymour’s school lunch program – I emailed him yesterday (no reply this time, maybe because I asked if he was “out to lunch?”).
      
      If we have ACT borrowing (we are running deficits remember!) $478m pa to provide “FREE” school lunches then we are pharked as a country with no hope.
      
      They (coalition Govt) can no longer claim that the adjustments to tax breaks “are not inflationary because they are funded from reduced spending” That is clearly crap! You have just expanded lunches to pre-schoolers FFS!
      
      Hardworking young families have enough headwinds – now they have to pay to feed some other kids lunch!
      Thank you David Seymour!! You may as well join National.
      
      And if this is any indication of what next week’s Budget is going to look like, then we may as well get Swarbrick to run the cutter and bring forward the catastrophic end to the nuthouse! Get it over and done with….
      
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      May 9, 2024 2:59pm
  - Lenticular
    
    ACT expanding and centralising the state doing a basic parenting job means that you should vote for them more!
    Not less!
    More!
    
    I mean sure, it wasn’t in the coalition agreement, but he couldn’t, you know, stick to his principles!
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:49pm
- Cassandra
  
  Some kids do need food at school. Sending the police to track down errant parents is not going to work – in the meantime the child goes hungry? Seymour is trying to handle the cards he’s been dealt.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:25am
- Benedict Yu
  
  I think that David Seymour has made a mistake. He wanted to target the lunch programme. He found it too hard. Why does he think that “centralisation” will work? The last government centralised everything. It failed.
  
  Here is what I would do
  
  Make school lunches universal.
  
  Decentralised provision.
  
  For decile 7 to 10 schools full cost recovery from parents.
  
  Decile 4 to 6 schools 50 percent cost recovery.
  
  Other schools free.
  
  David Seymour has made a mistake.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:28am
  - cmm
    
    The other thing is to integrate it into the school education programme so that kids learn from it, and that would probably reduce wastage, theft and labour costs.
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:50am
  - Flossie
    
    Wouldn’t the costs, both monetary and social, of collecting that recoverable part of lunch money far outweigh any financial gain?
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:16am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      I doubt it. We make people pay $5 for a prescription at the pharmacy. What’s the difference? Add it on to the “school donation” from parents.
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:50am
    - artemisia
      
      Parents pay $8 a day for a scoop of mac and cheese and an apple? And that’s for only one child. Doubt it even at higher decile schools, where BTW not all families are well off. But good luck collecting it.
      
      I remember Mary Holm in one of her money columns checking with IRD about not paying the pension to people still working. She was collecting angry emails from people who said it wasn’t fair or right. IRD answer was it would cost more than the savings.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:59am
  - imalwaysright
    
    “Make school lunches universal”
    
    What’s next?
    
    As Steve said, do we send them home with their dinner?
    
    NZ seems to be hell bent on accelerating our descent to third world status
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:36am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      ““Make school lunches universal””
      
      Well they are universal in just about every developed country. I would not call Taiwan, Japan, France, and South Korea ‘third world’.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:19am
      - imalwaysright
        
        The difference between those countries and this one is the prevalence of dead beat parents.
        
        The motives of the countries you cite are legitimate and in the best interest of their society, not a reaction to children being neglected and the parents’ virtual blackmail of the society at large.
        
        As our standards are dictated by the worst of our society, we will continually adjust until we hit the bottom where there are no standards .
        
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        May 9, 2024 11:28am
  - MCōs
    
    The decile system has been replaced by something else now and either what happens if a kid’s carers don’t pay their bills because everyone in a particular area is equally prosperous
    Does the kid get turned away?
    Not in NZ they wouldn’t and the whole system collapses
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:09am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      “The decile system has been replaced by something else now..”
      
      Yes I am aware. Someone can figure that out.
      
      Yes some parents won’t pay. Most will pay, just like most currently pay the school donation. Even for the parents on full cost recovery, it is probably $20 per week. And for that they don’t need to mess about with lunches every day.
      
      My point is that this programme wither needs to be univeral, or confined to the most deprived kids. I can guarantee that over the next 3 years, David Seymour will spend much more time than he wants to worrying about school lunches.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:16am
      - Flossie
        
        I don’t consider the five minutes a day I used to spend making my kids’ school lunch an imposition even as a full time worker. And my kids were not even out of primary school when they were quite capable of making their own.
        
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        May 9, 2024 12:57pm
      - Benedict Yu
        
        Yes I understand. However we have a choice. Embrace the culture of universal “school lunches” like most countries. Or target school lunches to children in real need. I fear that David Seymour has got us stuck somewhere in the middle with a planned Soviet style approach to meal provision. I am quite surprised and I predict that it will fail.
        
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        May 9, 2024 4:30pm
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        Deciles have been replaced by Equity Index
        
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        May 9, 2024 8:51pm
  - Lenticular
    
    Holy smokes its not even taken you 48 hours to accept and now affirm this new expansion of the state because ACT is doing it.
    
    How about: provide a tax cut of $20 / week for anyone with school age children who will sign a form saying, “I understand that any half decent parent feeds their children and if I don’t it’s my fault that they turn out badly”.
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:58pm
    - Mike
      
      You write as if you once thought ACT had a set of fixed principles. It has always been led hither and yon by various bright ideas thought, usually erroneously, to be wildly popular.
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:19pm
    - Benedict Yu
      
      You clearly misread my comment. I think that David Seymour has made an error of judgement.
      
      You will never find me supporting anything simply because “ACT has done it”.
      
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      May 9, 2024 4:32pm
- Nigel Kearney
  
  A few years back ACT would have found this all very easy.
  
  Bulk fund schools, and let the schools decide for themselves whether they can lift student performance by providing lunch, paying teachers more, or something else. If there is a lunch, each school can decide how to deliver that. Also, reform welfare so we stop producing future generations of dysfunctional families.
  
  They can’t compete with the left on handing out stuff and should not try. By trading their principles for votes, they will end up with neither.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:53am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Indeed. We now have ACT moving to “centralise” lunches, Soviet Union style. David will regret it. 🙁
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:17am
    - Lenticular
      
      No he won’t, look at the comments here, you’ve all interpreted this to mean you need to vote for him more. Not less, more.
      
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      May 9, 2024 12:59pm
      - Grunter
        
        Not me – I am now an “Undecided”. Have voted ACT ever since they started.
        
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        May 9, 2024 3:07pm
      - Benedict Yu
        
        I don’t even know what that means.
        
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        May 9, 2024 6:38pm
  - Cassandra
    
    I doubt that this is an issue which will concern voters. And evaluating the programme is a good idea. I like the idea of bulk funding schools for everything, let the adults on the ground make the decisions. Schools will be able to do it just as cheaply as a centralised contract, ,possibly using volunteers. We had mums make the sarnies at Otahuhu Primary during the polio epidemic, my first exposure to marmite and lettuce, an acquired taste.
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:01pm
I remember when

School lunches:
They have been in the media a lot in the last couple of months and their main disadvantage is that they are too late.
We have had school principals on Tv telling us that the children’s performance has improved because of them.
Really.
Sixty percent of the school day is over by lunchtime and some schools only have one period after lunch.
If hunger is affecting their performance pupil’s needs would be better suited by breakfast.
These was happening at a number of schools with support from Sanitarium and Fonterra.
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May 9, 2024 9:12am
cmm

There’s a bit of a trend emerging in the Christchurch area – EV drivers driving without their headlights on to save their precious range.

How much do they save? 20km? 10km? Maybe only 5km?

LED headlights use around 50W (+ or – quite a variance). Your car uses approx 150 to 200Wh per km.

Therefore running your headlights for an hour only uses about 200 metres or so of range (quite a variance so maybe 100 to 300 metres).

C’mon people stop letting your NZ science curriculum show.
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May 9, 2024 9:14am
- kowtow
  
  ‘EV drivers driving without their headlights on to save their precious range.’
  
  They pretend they’re saving the planet ( they like the subsidies) but are a menace to themselves and everyone else on the road.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:38am
  - Albie
    
    I understand that if you own an EV and cold weather has reduced the range on a trip, you need to turn the heating off. Similarly, if it’s hot and you are running the aircon on a road trip and a bit of range anxiety is setting in, you need to turn it off. Oh wait, problem with that- you can’t open the windows because that will increase drag.
    It’s little wonder the gloss is coming off these planet saving transport devices.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:06am
    - cmm
      
      Heating is certainly going to damage range. IIRC, heating/aircon can run up to 7kW – over 100 times the power used by lights. That’s on top of the problem that batteries have in the cold.
      
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      May 9, 2024 10:40am
    - kowtow
      
      That smug smile they had is going the way of the gloss…….
      
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      May 9, 2024 12:32pm
- MCōs
  
  When I lived in London fifty years ago drivers had the curious habit of driving round at night with only their parking lights on.
  I remember a letter to an editor wondering if they thought they were going to save on their monthly power bill?
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:53am
- peterwn
  
  They could retrofit headlamps that run off calcium carbide as originally used for Model T’s railway carriage lighting etc.
  Calcium carbide + water ->acetylene
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:38pm
- miltonF
  
  Christ CMM. Grasping at straws. Are you really that desperate? Headlights have essentially zero effect on the range of an EV. Why would EV drivers turn them off? Did you have any stats to support your argument? Of course not.
  
  I often see ICE cars driving around without their lights on. Do I jump to a conclusion and assume they are trying to save 1-2 cents on petrol? No, I make a more rational assumption that they forgot to turn their lights on. What makes your comment SO much funnier is that most EV’s have headlights that automatically turn themselves on in the dark. I can almost guarantee that this occurs more often in ICE cars.
  
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  May 9, 2024 5:46pm
- info@cruzpro.com
  
  cmm, you are right. The lights on an EV draw very little power compared to the drive motor. It is very dumb to not use your lights when you should be using them
  
  We have an EV and turn the lights on every trip night or day.
  
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  May 9, 2024 5:58pm
wsk12345

Out at a function with a bunch of 40s and 50s women. Conversation turned to upcoming overseas holidays and the need to go get up to date on their covid and flu jabs before they go.

I incredulously asked if they regularly got flu jabs….wothout exception they all did. All but one had had flu in the past decade because “the vaccine isn’t perfect”. I said “wow amazing, I had no idea that people my age got the flu jab, but then I don’t get the flu either.” I was told en masse that I was “just lucky” and I should have it to keep the vulnerable in the community safe. “It’s selfish not to.”

Omfg. I would really like to have female friends but it’s so hard.
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May 9, 2024 9:21am
- Flossie
  
  I know what you’re saying. I have plenty of acquaintances who religiously get their vaccinations and when they (invariably) get ill they insist it would have been sooooo much worse if they hadn’t. Amongst others I know who like me don’t bother there is no noticeable difference in the numbers getting flu. Most people who get a cold will tell you incorrectly that they have the flu
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:59am
  - mandk
    
    If you can get out of bed, you haven’t got the flu.
    
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    May 9, 2024 10:13am
- Arthur Fleck
  
  I know plenty of males who think the same way.
  
  Pets are better company.
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:09am
- info@cruzpro.com
  
  The wife and I both got our flu jab a few days ago. I was surprised to be asked whether we wanted the free jab ( we’re both over 65 years old) which only lasts a few months or the $50.00 jab, which is supposed to be effective for a year.
  
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  May 9, 2024 5:50pm
  - Benedict Yu
    
    FFS. This place is becoming insane.
    
    There is one flu vaccine approved in New Zealand each year.
    
    https://www.immune.org.nz/vaccine/influenza-vaccine
    
    There is not a better vaccine for rich folk.
    
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    May 9, 2024 6:33pm
    - Ghost
      
      The page you have linked to lists 5 vaccines, only Influvac Tetra Is funded
      
      There are five quadrivalent influenza vaccines for 2024.
      
      Brands: Influvac Tetra, Flucelvax Quad, Fluad Quad, FluQuadri, Afluria Quad
      
      Influvac Tetra, FluQuadri and Afluria Quad are all inactivated influenza vaccine, split virion, egg-based vaccines.
      
      Flucelvax Quad is an inactivated subunit influenza vaccine, cell culture-based vaccine.
      
      Fluad Quad is an inactivated influenza vaccine, surface antigen, adjuvanted, egg-based vaccine.
      
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      May 9, 2024 6:43pm
- miltonF
  
  It’s the definition of insanity. Repeating the same actions and expecting different results.
  
  I honestly think this is one of the big problems with modern western society. Everyone is afraid to call out insanity. We’re too “nice”.
  
  This is what needs to be said. “So you keep getting the flu shot every year, yet you keep getting the flu. Are you retarded or something?”
  
  Harsh, but true.
  
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  May 9, 2024 5:58pm
- NothingLeft
  
  They’d be afar better off losing weight (average kiwi is fat) and taking Vit D, K2 and Zinc daily.
  
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  May 9, 2024 7:08pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  All off on overseas holidays during climate change, yet all are getting the flu vax.
  
  Methinks their thinking is muddled
  
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  May 9, 2024 8:58pm
thirteenstars

Gratified to hear David Seymour say this morning that the school lunch program is being evaluated long-term and the fundamental question needs to be asked, is it even the government’s responsibility to provide lunch at school?

So, what the situation appears to be is, the program is revamped for the next two years, saving $107 million per year, and an advisory group is being formed to evaluate things going forward.

What heartens me is that a senior government minister is asking the principled question: should the program even exist? Which goes to the deeper question: what has gone so horribly wrong with NZ society and family life that parents either cannot afford or can’t be bothered to provide a simple low-cost lunch for their children?

Basic sandwiches, a piece of fruit, slice of cheese and a handful of raisins should not be beyond any parent’s means. I suspect lunches have fallen prey to the same disease as all food which is hyper-convenience and food fashion. Look into any overflowing supermarket trolley. Jars of expensive this and cans of heat-and-eat that. Bags of “roasted veges”. Gourmet pizzas. It all amounts to an upmarket TV dinner mentality. Then the inevitable complaint that food is expensive, kids don’t have lunch and the government must provide.
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May 9, 2024 9:25am
- Ian Boag
  
  2 1/2 years from now is in the middle of the election campaign. School lunches will be trashed as part of the NACT campaign platform. Yeah right.
  
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  May 9, 2024 9:45am
- Arthur Fleck
  
  A lot of kids would turn up their noses at sandwiches and fruits, etc, because their diets consist predominantly of processed, packaged convenience foods. I think this a result of having time-poor parents who both have to work just to keep their heads above water.
  
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  May 9, 2024 10:14am
- Sacha
  
  Trouble is, Mothers go to work. They don’t have time to make lunches –
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:27pm
  - Inandout
    
    Sach, make them the night before and put in fridge.
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:48pm
  - Flossie
    
    My mother worked full time when I was at school in the sixties. It’s hardly a new phenomena.
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:00pm
    - Ghost
      
      Both my parents worked. Always lunch made for me if I wanted it. High school I’d make my own.
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:03pm
  - cmm
    
    Bullshit.
    Making lunch takes far less time than checking Tiktok or doing your nails or a thousand other things that “time starved” parents do have time for.
    
    Getting pregnant takes longer than making a sandwich. Got time for that though.
    
    After the age of 10 there’s no reason why kids can’t make their own lunch.
    
    What is wrong with people expecting kids to do stuff? By the age of 12 our kids could prepare a whole meal no problems. eg. Make pizza from scratch (making the dough from flour, water, salt and yeast all the way through topping it, baking it and serving it).
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:25pm
- Grunter
  
  He’s still agreed to spend $478m pa to keep it going. So let’s say at best he kills it off in 2-3 years time. Thats $1.4 Billion of lunches in the meantime. That all needs to be borrowed. It is money the Govt dos not have.
  
  Seymour is now part of the problem in my book! Very soft
  
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  May 9, 2024 3:15pm
  - thirteenstars
    
    Your figures a woefully incorrect.
    
    “Under the Coalition’s revised progamme it will cost $234.8 million for the 2025 school year – a saving of $107m on what the previous government’s programme was estimated to cost.”
    
    Which will also be the cost in 2026, so the committed total is $470 million. Not $1.4 billion.
    
    Seymour is not so much part of the problem as part of a coalition. Without him there might not have been any reduction at all. National is notoriously squidgy on anything that might upset the natives and school lunches is probably one such thing.
    
    In his interview today with Sean Plunket he makes it clear he believes school lunch is not the responsibility of the state but he says that in the context of a coalition, a reformed programme is where it must sit for the next two years but a discussion will be had as to appropriateness of continued government funding.
    
    https://theplatform.kiwi/podcasts/episode/david-seymour-on-school-lunches-woke-foods
    
    If you want perfect to be the enemy of the good, have at it, but you’re unlikely to get either.
    
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    May 9, 2024 5:21pm
    - thirteenstars
      
      Link to the first quote above:
      
      https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/516276/free-school-lunches-year-7-students-and-above-to-shift-to-alternative-model
      
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      May 9, 2024 6:30pm
Dudley Quaffquaff

It’s a surreal situation when I find myself siding with Tory Whanau and against Chris Bishop. But I am beyond ropeable at the latter’s declining of Wellington’s request to remove the heritage listing of several useless, ugly old liabilities of buildings which are taking up valuable space in the city.

He says it’s because he’s been presented with no evidence that they’re not heritage. But how can it possibly be “proven” that a building isn’t “heritage”?

It’s already only too apparent that so-called heritage experts will slap the label on anything at the drop of a hat, subject to no transparency, constraints or objective criteria and regardless of the cost that their say-so inflicts on building owners and other civic priorities. If the requirement for removing the designation is that you find a heritage expert who’s willing to say that something isn’t heritage, then effectively Bishop is saying that everything currently so designated, stays designated.

It’s an incomprehensible position for a Government that was supposed to be slashing through the RMA red tape thicket so as to make development and new build easier and cheaper. I can only hope it’s because Bishop has got so many other things to think about at this stage that he has just quickly taken and regurgitated advice on this point for the moment, and will in due course get round to actually thinking about it. Meanwhile there are some other wins for Wellington to be getting on with
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May 9, 2024 9:57am
- Nigel Kearney
  
  Yep. He has given the bureaucrat’s answer when we were hoping for the human being’s answer.
  
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  May 9, 2024 11:07am
- greybeard
  
  “But how can it possibly be “proven” that a building isn’t “heritage”? “.
  What ?
  Surely the same criteria to determine that a building IS “heritage” are the self-same criteria which prove the opposite?
  
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  May 9, 2024 11:15am
  - Dudley Quaffquaff
    
    If there were clear, objective criteria, transparently and accountably applied, then sure.
    
    In practice the only criteria appear to be “because some self-appointed busybody says so”, and you will never find one of those who is prepared to say that they think other people should be allowed to do with their own property as they think fit
    
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    May 9, 2024 11:33am
    - Dudley Quaffquaff
      
      Rather like racism, come to think of it.
      
      Genuine racism is an actual problem which needs to be addressed, just as genuine heritage is a thing which deserves care and preservation.
      
      But when you let anybody and everybody state that anything is racism without any kind of standard or objectivity, then the whole concept becomes meaningless or, worse, actively damaging to the social cohesion and value we were originally seeking to protect.
      
      Just as the Race Relations Commissioner should be just as ready to state what is not racism and stamp on incidents where the accusation of “racism” is used without justification, as they are to call out instances of actual racism – so too the heritage authorities should be just as ready to state that something isn’t heritage as they are to decide that it is.
      
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      May 9, 2024 11:47am
Close Hen Counters

Went to son’s university graduation yesterday at spark arena – uni of Auckland faculty of business and economics. There was a lot to unpick
1. The pageantry and seeing our son graduate was incredible, he worked incredibly hard for his double major degree and now has a fabulous job
2. The chancellor in one sentence was able to poison the ceremony insinuating that commerce is now accountable to the Māoris, sustainability and climate change .. it was early in the piece and was wishing I had slipped in some alcoholic contraband
3. We were clearly told you can do a quick call out/ hola to your graduate but that was it and you were not to shout out when the next graduate was waiting to cross the stage
4. There were idiots amongst us who had no care for the rules or others there. Six Asian girls stopped the ceremony to have selfies with the chancellor, at least three screaming banshees, three families did prolonged hakas, one waiata, two Polynesian wailing episodes and one Maori did a war dance next to the chancellor. .. place was riddled with security yet nothing was stopped – for what was such an important event for many ruined by a few
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May 9, 2024 10:26am
- Colville
  
  CHC.
  You really should have asked for advice of a hardened uni eventer..
  
  Hipflask is a lifesaver. Not to be shared, if she wants to partake bring her own. And that is after 3 pints prematch.
  
  Earbuds…listen to Ytube if it really gets dire…
  
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  May 9, 2024 7:47pm
bjools

Labour’s comical ali to speak at the Oxford union.
https://www.labour.org.nz/news-hon_willie_jackson_to_debate_at_the_prestigious_oxford_union
I hope they mistake him for an Aussie.
God help us.
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May 9, 2024 10:32am
mandk

Whenever I see anything titled: “reimagining …”
I know it is going to be full of nonsense.

This one comes from the NZCTU
https://www.reimagineaotearoa.nz/
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May 9, 2024 10:49am
- Swifty
  
  Run a mile from that stuff.
  
  They will destroy us if they get a chance.
  
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  May 9, 2024 11:26am
- Dudley Quaffquaff
  
  Not necessarily. Robert Wiremu’s remaining of the Mozart Requiem for Voices New Zealand was awesome
  
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  May 9, 2024 11:29am
Flossie

Just saw a headline on one of the newspaper’s site saying we’re to be urged to save electricity as the cold snap could create a power shortage. I wonder if EV owners will turn off their heat pumps in order to make sure the car is fully charged?
Surely this is going to happen more often in future.
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May 9, 2024 11:06am
- Tom Hunter
  
  My suspicions about this were raised months ago as I started getting weekly little “attaboys” or warnings about my power usage going up and down, together with helpful (useless) advice on how I could reduce consumption.
  
  What were they prepping me for I wondered?
  
  I’m sticking with my first guess. Squeezed by the Net Zero plans of our governments on the consumption side and the uselessness of solar/wind on the supply side, power prices will now relentlessly march upward and all these little reminders are the power companies desperately trying to manage their customers and not get beaten up by them.
  
  At this post you can see the graph of Aussie Power Prices (in constant dollars) from 1955 to 2017 as an example of where we’re going. Forty years of steadily reducing prices, followed by rising prices from when “alternative energy” projects started being pushed.
  
  See Mercury’s New Zealand’s journey to net zero.
  
  We’re on a journey all right, but with no heroes involved, no hope, and a seat in hell at the end of it – Dantes version that is, most likely the Ninth Circle.
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:41pm
  - Chris Nisbet
    
    Proponents of useless wind/solar argue that we will “reap the savings” once we get to 100% renewable.
    Mike Fuge from Contact says so in this article…
    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/509582/contact-energy-warns-of-much-higher-power-bills-from-2025
    
    I don’t believe him. Not even a little bit.
    
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    May 9, 2024 5:38pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I’d fill up a good thermos with very hot water tonight…if you want a decent cuppa tomorrow morning
  
  When we get a Ministerial Statement in Parliament warning that we are in the poo-poo wrt energy supply, it’s time to listen.
  
  The reality is that we have been faced with the latest projections and information from the Gas Industry Company, which have outlined there has been a significant downgrade in production from our gasfields in New Zealand—a 28 percent decline in just the past three months on what was projected to be produced.
  
  https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/hansard-debates/rhr/combined/HansDeb_20240508_20240508_16
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:51pm
  - cmm
    
    Camping gas stove is a better idea.
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:16pm
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      Oh, of course…. burn some gas, produce CO2 and warm the planet.
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:40pm
  - Chris Nisbet
    
    Oh, so FF is the problem. They should pull the other one. Not saying it isn’t an issue _now_, but we could have been shoring up supply years ago.
    
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    May 9, 2024 3:32pm
- Tom Hunter
  
  Further to my comment above, Blackouts are coming – and that’s the plan.
  
  That’s looking at the USA, where there are growing concerns about the impact of “The Unreliables” on the power grid network, but most Western nations are facing this problem and we here will not be an exception.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:52pm
- thirteenstars
  
  They put it down to an “unusual cold snap” and suboptimal wind generation conditions.
  
  Oh, really? It got cold and the wind won’t blow. Like it was impossible to foresee such an occurrence, which happens many times every winter.
  
  Stupid and malicious children are running the world. This government better use its time in office wisely and build some serious generation (hydro, gas, coal) capacity using that fast track legislation.
  
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  May 9, 2024 3:50pm
- info@cruzpro.com
  
  Most all EV’s are charged at night when power prices are lower and plenty of energy is available.
  
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  May 9, 2024 5:16pm
  - MCōs
    
    I wouldn’t have thought too many people would be charging their cars at 7-9am
    
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    May 9, 2024 9:23pm
Maggie Pie

TRENDING ON SKY

CNN reporting …… Prez Biden has stalled the latest delivery of thousands of bombs to Israel, amid fears they would be used by the country in military operations against Raffah.

Seems not everyone in the Administration is happy about it…..

https://twitter.com/RepBrianMast/status/1787969422415507517
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May 9, 2024 11:12am
Chuck Bird

Everything Jacinda Ardern ‘tried’ had been a failure : David Seymour

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQDdbmZbObQ
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May 9, 2024 11:36am
- Grunter
  
  Apparently not….the annual bill for School Lunches $478m!!
  
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  May 9, 2024 3:20pm
slightlyrighty

If you thought we were soft on crime, you haven’t read about Canada.

For the record, the Canadian Justice Ministers official car has been stolen….

3 times…..

in the last 3 years….

Canada is what NZ would be if Jacinda had got a thrid term….
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May 9, 2024 11:43am
- Mike
  
  Really? We’d be the 16th largest economy in the world?
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:47pm
  - Libertarians are right
    
    No. We would be a mess where the insane Leftist politicians are trying to bring in retrospective online hate speech laws that would allow them to go after their opponents for (totally legal at the time) stuff they said 10 years ago.
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:08pm
    - Mike
      
      Oh, should we compare NZ and Canada on other measures – economic freedom, democracy, human rights, etc?
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:36pm
      - Libertarians are right
        
        Yes please. I don’t think that’s the win you seem to think it is.
        
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        May 9, 2024 3:02pm
    - Mike
      
      LOL. You don’t know how lucky you are.
      
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      May 9, 2024 5:19pm
Maggie Pie

RANDOM IMPERTINENT QUESTION

Prior to David Seymour’s intervention on behalf of taxpayers…..was it troo Labors ‘Free-Lunch-In-Schools-Programme’ mainly catered to Chinese and Taiwanese students?

https://twitter.com/TheShad78631449/status/1787688867807809801
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May 9, 2024 12:08pm
- Benedict Yu
  
  You ae clearly trying to wind me up. No Chinese person would eat that rubbish.
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:15pm
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Trying to wind you up was furtherest from my mind… Kung Fu Panda 😀 😀 😀
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:28pm
  - Inandout
    
    BY, they commonly wear masks so wouldn’t know how they consumed food.
    
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    May 9, 2024 12:51pm
- Mike
  
  Why is sushi ‘woke’?
  
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  May 9, 2024 12:20pm
Paul

Things we did not know about the Hamas leadership: They already have a State !
Mousa Abu Marzouk: “Most of Hamas’s leaders are Jordanians. They have Jordanian passports. All this talk [about Hamas leaving Qatar] is nonsense. If Hamas’s leaders would move [out of Qatar] – although nobody is talking about this – they would move to Jordan. That this where their people are. These are the passports they have. Most [Hamas leaders] are Jordanian citizens. So hundreds of people with Jordanian passports would move to Jordan.
https://www.memri.org/tv/hamas-snr-official-mousa-abu-marzouk-leadership-natural-place-is-jordan-qatar-america
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May 9, 2024 12:48pm
- mandk
  
  The Jordanians wouldn’t want them.
  They expelled the PLO in 1971.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:04pm
  - Mike
    
    Hamas and the PLO are different things.
    
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    May 9, 2024 1:12pm
    - Chuck Bird
      
      Please explain.
      
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      May 9, 2024 1:21pm
      - Mike
        
        The PLO is an overarching political organization, dominated by Fatah. Hamas was created to oppose Fatah, is not part of the PLO, and to some extent was supported by Israel to weaken the PLO.
        
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        May 9, 2024 1:33pm
      - Colville
        
        Mike.
        So its the peoples front of judea and the judean front of people??
        
        Couldnt make that shit up??
        
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        May 9, 2024 7:51pm
    - mandk
      
      The point is that they are Palestinians and neighbouring Arab countries don’t want them.
      
      The Palestinians are troublemakers, and Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain know it.
      
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      May 9, 2024 2:48pm
      - Mike
        
        Just trying to help Chuck.
        
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        May 9, 2024 3:22pm
- kowtow
  
  There’s footage from Gaza of multiple men with their legs shot . Alleged to be thieves by Hamas .
  Then surrounded by jeering throngs .
  
  MSM ?
  
  Greens ?
  
  Uni protesters ?
  
  Crickets.
  
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  May 9, 2024 1:32pm
Maggie Pie

ELECTRICITY SHORTFALL

NZME reporting that Transpower are requesting people even refrain from charging their PHONES tomorrow morning between 7-9am, due to “insufficent power generation” to meet demand….on what they predict will be NZ’s coldest morning 🙁

Thank goodness we’re on gas.
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May 9, 2024 2:33pm
- mandk
  
  Of course, in Wellington it won’t be a problem because all those wind turbines on the Western Hills will be spinning like tops //
  
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  May 9, 2024 2:51pm
- Ghost
  
  Kids no longer need to charge their phones for school problem solved?
  
  Anything about not using the spa pool? Oh wait don’t worry I won’t pay attention to such advice
  
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  May 9, 2024 2:53pm
- Blog-aholic
  
  I’d go as far as to suggest it is more of the same doomsaying gaslighting BS we get daily.
  
  7 1
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  May 9, 2024 2:59pm
- Maggie Pie
  
  On a brighter note, it’s being suggested this could lead to a possible 50% reduction in those receiving the ‘Winter-Energy-Payment’ next year 😎
  
  4 3
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  May 9, 2024 3:10pm
- alex Masterley
  
  Jesus wept.
  One would have thought that the power generators (and Transpower) would have worked out we are at the arse end of autumn, that it might get cold and that more generation would be needed.
  One would also have thought that the said power generators (and Transpower)would have looked at the weather forcast and seen there was an enormous high pressure zone about to sit on top of us bring clear skys and little wind.
  Proper prior preparation prevents piss poor performance in my world but not in the one Transpower, or the generators world.
  
  13 2
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  May 9, 2024 3:27pm
  - Ghost
    
    Thanks Cindy and her captains call
    
    10 1
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    May 9, 2024 3:43pm
    - kowtow
      
      Wasn’t it Helen Clark’s regime that started the anti coal generation at Huntly ?
      
      4 2
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      May 9, 2024 4:34pm
    - kowtow
      
      And I don’t want to hear Shane Jones blithering on about exploration. His mob backed the Capt’s Call.
      
      In fact they annointed the Captain.
      
      8 3
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      May 9, 2024 5:08pm
  - kowtow
    
    End of autumn cold ?
    
    These people are part of the Blob , they prolly have ‘faith’ in global warming and believe all the shite around these wokster days ……
    
    4 2
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    May 9, 2024 5:14pm
- kevn
  
  Maggie… Spare a thought for all those EV owners holding their breath.
  
  6 1
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  May 9, 2024 3:45pm
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Careful if you’re out there on the roads tonite kevie.
    There’ll be a lot driving home later without their lights on.
    
    4 3
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    May 9, 2024 4:04pm
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Really? I doubt that any EV owners are giving the supply of electricity a thought let alone “holding their breath”. The hyperbole here is a little out of control. 😅
    
    5 0
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    May 9, 2024 5:36pm
  - kowtow
    
    I heard they have to hold their breath cos the windscreen demisters don’t work.
    
    2 2
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    May 9, 2024 5:54pm
- greybeard
  
  I bet that all of those empty high-rise office blocks in Auckland & Wellington are fully lit all tonight.
  
  3 1
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  May 9, 2024 4:31pm
  - MCōs
    
    Cleaners don’t work in the dark
    
    0 2
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    May 9, 2024 9:36pm
  - Ghost
    
    There is no problem with capacity tonight, no one is being asked to save power tonight. It’s tomorrow when people are being asked to reduce their usage for 2 hours
    
    1 1
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    May 9, 2024 9:52pm
- info@cruzpro.com
  
  Cellphone chargers draw very little power, about 5 watts. Not charging your cellphone between 7-9 am is not going to help much.
  
  8 2
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  May 9, 2024 4:59pm
Chuck Bird

Megyn Kelly Brings Receipts on Stormy Daniels’ Inconsistencies on the Stand and in Past Interviews

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UevyHSXL3go
2 2
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May 9, 2024 3:31pm
softail 1450

Can I use an old classic unique Kiwi saying to clearly state the condition of our energy needs thanks to that talentless virtue signalling horrible Dame Jacinda Ardern and her rabble of a government? “ you are living in Guatemala now Mr Ropata” ,we are on a slippery slope to 3rd World status folks, what a damn shame 😢😢
11 1
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May 9, 2024 3:52pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Stop Co-Governance. Julian Batchelor.

Tikanga must never be part of New Zealand Law.
Are we to be governed by Māori mystical law?
Maori had no Laws pre 1840, just superstition for control.

https://stopcogovernance.kiwi/blog/tikanga-what-it-is-and-why-it-must-be-stopped-from-becoming-law-in-new-zealand/?
5 2
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May 9, 2024 4:17pm
Maggie Pie

Heard that horrible lefty Jason Walls on ZB earlier critizing the Finance Minister’s “Darkest before the dawn” speech. Then he plays a nasty comment from the Ginger Whinger. SHEESH!!

The pair of them make my flesh crawl. Especially when I think about Chippie putting that queer woman-hating Shaneel Lal on Labor’s payroll as an ‘advisor’
12 3
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May 9, 2024 4:19pm
Hugh Jarse

So now we have an energy crisis at the start of winter created by Jacinda’s captains call. Can the power companies turn off the labour leaderships power supply first ?.

Will the media call Hipkins to talk about the energy crisis ?, very quick to seek his opinion on every other thing going on here or will they give him a free pass ?
15 1
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May 9, 2024 4:32pm
- Maggie Pie
  
  HDPA just wondered if Cindy ‘has any conceivable idea’ just how much carnage she created in this country before hoofing it overseas… and is still swanning around on the taxpayers tit 🙁
  
  There’s been heaps of people on ‘X’ saying she shold be charged with crimes-against-humanity.
  
  19 3
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  May 9, 2024 4:54pm
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Have you watched the entire Nuremberg trials? I have. They were crimes against humanity. Honestly I don’t know what gets into you.
    
    5 5
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    May 9, 2024 5:33pm
    - Mike
      
      She’s just catching up with lazy memes from 2020 and 2021. Don’t judge her too harshly, she really is a bit limited.
      
      2 8
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      May 9, 2024 5:39pm
    - Maggie Pie
      
      The ‘Nurenburg Trials’? They happened about 30 years b4 i was enen born! Perhaos you need to bring youself up to date with the 1998 Statue of Rome b4 wondering got into ME!
      
      SHEESH!!
      
      6 3
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      May 9, 2024 5:45pm
    - Maggie Pie
      
      Andi see where that milkey had to pike his nose in to thigs that dont cocern him. Thort this time of nite hed be busy having a shower with Ross 🙁
      
      5 3
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      May 9, 2024 6:51pm
  - softail 1450
    
    MP ,Just Arderns photo appearing anywhere is a crime against humanity in my opinion, it’s a near impossibility to find anyone who will admit to voting for the loser these days but like all labour losers she’s at a better place now whilst we smoulder in her wreckage back at home.
    
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    May 10, 2024 6:46am
- Benedict Yu
  
  FFS. It is not an “energy crisis”. Every winter Transpower issues a few of these notices. IIRC there has been one case of load shedding in the last 5 years and it was minor.
  
  Shouting catastrophe does not advance rational debate.
  
  7 2
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  May 9, 2024 5:31pm
  - Hugh Jarse
    
    Funny the Energy Minister would disagree with you Benedict, but that could be just politicking. However we are needing to reduce power use in industry and households in the second week of May, not sure how you classify that, business as usual, normal cycle ?We have the rest of the winter to go yet, it is not normal for us to be here at this stage of the year. Before being so critical of my terminology it might be better to wait and see how the rest of the winter pans out.
    
    2 1
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    May 9, 2024 9:49pm
  - Paul
    
    Humans don’t generally have rational debates, with BY moderating we would be reduced to literally, figuratively and politically correct lecturers talking to their peers.
    
    0 0
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    May 10, 2024 1:34pm
Albie

If we had a media that would track her down and ask her the question regarding her “Captains Call”, she would say they had it all in hand with Lake Onslow and more wind and solar, but that pesky covid bug got in the way and buggered all of their grand plans.
9 1
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May 9, 2024 5:20pm
- Mike
  
  I’d be interested to read an account of what new oil or gas supplies would have been fuelling new generation within 6 years of the decision to issue no new exploration licenses.
  
  4 6
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  May 9, 2024 5:43pm
  - Albie
    
    I would too Mike. This whole debacle needs to be out in the open. Energy availability at competitive pricing affects everything.
    
    8 1
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    May 9, 2024 6:20pm
  - Paul
    
    I thought Oil and Gas exploration was a lottery?
    You would be reading fiction, or Nostradamus? Is that what you are interested in? That is very touching, that you share your leisure pursuits here.
    
    0 0
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    May 10, 2024 1:44pm
- MCōs
  
  If the aluminum plant was to shut down which the owners threaten to do periodically unless the taxpayers fork out more money the power from the Manapouri power station could be made available to keep the lights on.
  I understand it’s a long way from where the power is needed blah blah, but this country didn’t get where it is today without solving some difficult problems
  
  2 1
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  May 9, 2024 9:53pm
  - marcw
    
    It is unlikely Tiwai Point will close any day soon. Current London Metal Xchange price of high grade aluminum is over ₤4000 / tonne. Tiwai was (marginally) in trouble when the price was down to ₤1800 about 4 years ago.
    
    3 0
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    May 9, 2024 10:02pm
Albie

Just read David’s post thanking Labour for nothing re the pending power shortage tomorrow.
Can I also add that I can’t see anything improving under National, with Luxon’s mission to continue down the Net Zer0 BS as well as pledging to build 10,000 EV charging stations? The mind boggles.
8 1
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May 9, 2024 5:42pm
Scooter

15 year old boy dies in his sleep during trip to Rarotonga, doctors suspect blood clots. I wonder when his last vacc was, even the mother questions that. Not surprising our news media have taken out that part of the item.

https://www.cookislandsnews.com/internal/national/regional/local/health/new-zealand/travel/breaking-news/nz-family-devastated-by-teenagers-sudden-death/
6 6
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May 9, 2024 6:27pm
- Ghost
  
  Not the time. The family are grieving, let them have their moment before you use their sons death
  
  4 0
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  May 9, 2024 9:25pm
- MCōs
  
  Plane trips can cause deep vein thrombosis which are blot clots in the leg that can detach enter the lungs causing pulmonary embolism that can quickly be fatal.
  I found that out when I had a dvt. Gives you quite a fright.
  The point being don’t jump to conclusions
  
  4 0
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  May 9, 2024 10:08pm
  - MCōs
    
    BTW
    My experience was years before covid-19
    
    2 0
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    May 9, 2024 10:10pm
  - Ghost
    
    I had a Superficial thrombophlebitis a few weeks ago in my leg. I’ve not had the vaccine.
    
    2 0
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    May 9, 2024 10:15pm
Ghost

Sigh

A private school in New South Wales has moved to change its yearly “Mother’s Day Stall” into a “Family Gift Stall” to be more inclusive – but some mums aren’t keen on the idea.

Article
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May 9, 2024 9:24pm

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