Stuff reports:

Longstanding public servants are being asked whether their friends know how to party, if they hate opera and whether they like riddles – and their answers could cost them their jobs.

The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment and the Department of Conservation are two government agencies that have used psychometric testing as part of restructures and redundancies.

But employment lawyers and psychologists say the increasing use of testing in this way – in both the public and private sectors – is “inherently problematic” and could be illegal.

News of their use comes on the back of an Employment Court decision that found a psychometric test was unfair and used “irrelevant criteria” for deciding on redundancies.

I’ve been on several interview panels for chief executives, which use psychometric testing. Generally I’ve found the test results to be very accurate, and helpful. And sometimes a candidate for a senior role has been hired without psychometric testing – and the result has been an unsuitable applicant.

So as part of a recruitment process, I think psychometric testing is very useful, for certain roles.

But I do not think it is a good fit for decisions on redundancies and restructuring. Once an employee has been working for an employer for some time, the employers and managers should be able to assess their capabilities and attitudes without needing psychometric testing.

The Herald reports:

A couple’s age gap of nearly 40 years is being cited as one of the reasons Immigration New Zealand declined an Indian man’s visa application – a move he says is “ageist”.

Balwinder Singh, 22, met New Zealander Glyn Kessell, 59, at a hair salon in Glenfield last year.

The relationship started with texts, progressed to “intimacy” within three weeks and then marriage two months later.

And just by coincidence he wants residency?

I think Immigration should be suspicious of any marriage that occurs within three months of meeting. And it is not ageist to consider a difference in ages. It is common sense.

Immigration NZ area manager Michael Carley denied the decision was ageist or racist. It was made “after an extremely detailed and thorough assessment, which included visiting Mr Singh and his wife at their home and interviewing them both”.

“The couple got married after an uncommonly short three-month courtship. It was noted during a visit to the couple’s home that their living arrangement appeared to be akin to a boarding situation.”

Not surprised.

He said Mr Singh could take the matter to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal should his appeal to Immigration NZ fail.

He might be deported if the tribunal decided against him.

But if this is true love, I am sure Ms Kessell will be happy to move to India so they can be together.

Well it seems that the Labour Leader is not too keen on his own party’s proposed man ban. Vernon Small at Stuff reports:

Labour leader David Shearer may be on a collision course with the party’s Left-wing rank and file over proposals to ensure half its MPs are women – a move that would also allow for “women-only” candidate selections.

Mr Shearer declined to comment yesterday, saying through a spokesman it was “just a proposal to conference”.

But he is expected today to say that while he is in favour of more women MPs he is not convinced a quota system or a “man-ban” in some seats is the right way to achieve that.

Yet, it is the party’s ruling Council that has proposed these. Is he not a member of the Council? Did he get outvoted? Quite possibly. Remember that the party rank and file pushed through leadership rules with a special provision to make it easier for Cunliffe to challenge Shearer at the beginning of the year. He has little support at the grass roots. So where did this idea come from?

Well I blogged last year on these proposals from Auckland Central Labour Party:

And even better Labour Auckland Central propose that if it is apparent the elections will not get at least 50% female officers, they must stop the elections and leave roles vacant. So if an electorate had no women standing for office, then they could elect no one at all!! Well done Auckland Central Labour.

So I do wonder if Jacinda is in favour of the man ban? Is this a way of stopping a challenge for the Auckland Central nomination? Or is this how they plan to stop John Tamihere winning the Waitakere nomination?

Labour added to its woes yesterday claiming in a press release it had 15 female MPs in its 34 MP line-up. It actually has only 14, even after the addition of Ikaroa-Rawhiti MP Meka Whaitiri.

So the question has to be, which male Labour MP did Labour mistake for a woman?

Josie Pagani, who stood for Labour in Rangitikei in 2011 was baffled by the move.

“I can’t understand why the Labour party would be emphasising something like this when they’re trying to get the focus on jobs and power prices and the need to get wages up, so strategically it doesn’t make sense to be talking about this right now,” she said.

“Certainly I wouldn’t stand in a seat where I felt like the implication was I couldn’t win it on my own accord without some ‘special help’,” she said.

This is the sad thing. While the motivation is good – to get more women into Parliament, it will in fact degrade and undermine female MPs. If you win a selection where men are banned from standing, then you will have less moral authority as having won your seat fair and square.

The proposals would also require the party’s list to showcase a mix of ethnicity, gender, geographical spread, sexual orientation and disability representation.

Vernon forgot youth and age also. The proposed rule says:

The Moderating Committee shall be bound by the need to arrive at a list which fairly represents tangata whenua, gender, ethnic groups, people with disabilities, sexual orientations, and age and youth.

Gingas will be upset that they are not yet on the list of groups that must be on the list. Labour are following Greens down the path of having quotas for their list ranking, so I’ve graciously given up some of my time to calculate how they can best balance their list, as I previously did with the Greens.

I hope Labour finds this useful as they can just pop candidates into the slot reserved for them. The data used to compile this balanced list for them is:

• Gender – 50/50 split as mandated by their proposed quota
• Ethnicity – based on 2012 Stats NZ population estimates, which are based on 2006 census data
• Sexuality – have assumed 5% of population gay (includes lesbian) and 3% bisexual
• Disability – data from 2006 Disability survey which shows 17% of NZ disabled, and using their major categories in proportion to prevalence
• Age – based on 2012 Stats NZ estimates for adults aged between 18 and 70.

I see Grant Robertson is a supporter of the new proposed rules. Sadly for him, he will have to be demoted to No 5, and Jacinda rise to the No 2 spot.

You wonder whether a Labour Government will also introduce this to the wider public and private sector? They could insist of a 50% female quota for Cabinet, and also require the public service to have female only selections for public sector chief executives. And why not a gender quota for private sector company boards also?

A good post by Josie Pagani on this issue:

I’m not against quotas.

In Afghanistan, young girls are denied education because there aren’t enough women leaders. Women are victimised and systematically deprived of security, livelihood and other basic rights because they are women. In that context quotas for female representation in parliament are one of the most pressing issues facing that country. 

Quotas have a place as temporary measures. They’re a kickstart to getting women into powerful positions. They have their place.

But in New Zealand? I would prefer Labour to be talking about incomes, jobs, power prices, housing. Instead here we are once again trying to defend the merits of a policy to  people who are open-mouthed in amazement at Labour’s priorities. Here we are using precious political oxygen trying to explain why it’s not really a ‘man ban’. We have so much more to do for women than this.

A strong women candidate does not need the handicap of people thinking she has only been selected because she is a woman, not because she is qualified.

Quotas and bans say that Labour women are not good enough to be selected ahead of men on our merits. I wouldn’t want anyone to think that of me. Helen Clark and Julia Gillard were capable of winning elections without removing men from the contest. We are not helpless dearies who need a bit of a leg up from a fixed race. 

Quotas for women will undermine all women MPs. They’ll be seen as tokens.

The democratic principle at the heart of progressive politics is that any person is as good as another, we all deserve a fair go. Quotas say that what we are is more important than the content of our character or our ability to represent Labour values.

Andrew Geddis blogged here on Pundit that even David Cameron supports women-only pre-selection. But if the UK Conservatives can adopt gender quotas then there is nothing intrinsically progressive about the idea. It’s just something you do instead of making the meaningful changes that are needed to bring more qualified women through. 

Also the UK has FPP. MMP allows a party to have a more diverse caucus. But quotas are a sign of no confidence in the party’s ability to balance up the complex mix of skills, geography and diversity. It is saying we want you to make sure half the caucus are women, regardless of the fact that the last woman in may be massively less competent than the man who misses out.

Labour subtly discriminates against parents. Meetings are scheduled right around bath time or over entire weekends. Pandering to internal blocs is valued over talent developed in community contexts. 

We should be seeking out the women in our communities who go on school camps, sit on their school board or coach local sports teams. We should be head hunting women in the workplace who are proving themselves every day alongside male counterparts. You can’t expect these female leaders to play the silly palace politics needed to get ahead in the Labour party.

Fix childcare. Fix flexible work hours. Fix private sector recruitment so that talent gets promoted there, too, and then recruit leaders from there, from the school gates and the weekend sports fields, instead of from the internal power blocs. And value parenting as much as political parties value political networking. I would like to see all that before they put another fix in to the selection process.

Quotas and a man ban are a snake oil solution. They are an easy fix, that does nothing to get to grips with the underlying reasons why we have fewer women MPs.

Anyway me quoting something Josie says with approval, will sadly send her down three or four places on Labour’s list, regardless of quotas! They may have to reclassify her as a man, to prevent her being selected!

Stuff reported yesterday:

Sport broadcasting in New Zealand continues to fracture with MotoGP shifting to free-to-air television.

The New Zealand broadcast rights for the rest of the 2013 MotoGP motorcycle racing season have been secured by Sommet Sports TV.

The new Freeview outfit, whose channel is provisionally up and running but set to launch officially in 10 days, will offer live coverage of the 2013 MotoGP series and highlights programmes.

The development confirms a second sporting asset has been wrested from Sky Television, 16 days after the subscription giant dramatically lost the New Zealand broadcast rights for the English Premier League football to previously unknown group Coliseum Sports Media.

Also Telecom announced yesterday:

TELECOM BROADBAND CUSTOMERS GET SPECIAL ACCESS TO BARCLAYS ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE (BEPL)

• Telecom the official Telecommunications & ICT Partner for PremierLeaguePass.com
• All 50GB broadband plans upgraded to 80GB at no extra cost – means fans can view more content, including BEPL

Football fans who are customers of the country’s biggest broadband provider Telecom New Zealand will be offered some of the most affordable access rates to the Barclays (English) Premier League (BEPL) via its nationwide broadband network and PremierLeaguePass.com. 

Telecom is offering existing broadband customers a 15 per cent discount1 on the PermierLeaguePass.com ‘Season Pass’, and they can also go in to a draw to win one of 1,000 free ‘Season’ passes. 

New Telecom broadband2 customers signing up for the mid-range plans on a 12 month contract can choose a free ‘Season Pass’ with access to all 380 live games available from PremierLeaguePass.com.

It’s great to see both greater competition in securing “broadcast” rights, but also the business model changing more towards online access so you can watch them at your convenience – not just when a broadcaster decides to show them.

A few people have been demanding that the Government must step in and regulate Sky Television, because they have been so successful at securing good content. I think the  announcements of the last fortnight show how misguided those calls were – in fact they seem like tall poppy syndrome. Regulation should be a last resort – not a first resort.

I’m a very happy Sky customer, but I’m delighted other providers are winning some rights against them. Competition makes companies stronger – and benefits the consumer.

By coincidence I’m co-facilitating a session next Wednesday at Nethui which will be discussing where video on demand is going, and what the future may look like in a few years. I think it is a hugely exciting area. We’ll have most of the broadcasters there, plus other providers like Quickflix. Will hopefully be a great discussion.

Have just published Curia’s monthly newsletter summarising the public polls in NZ, Australia, UK, US and Canada. Note Labour have dropped for three months in a row.

The executive summary is:

Curia’s Polling Newsletter – Issue 69, June 2013

 

June saw three political polls published in New Zealand – a Digipoll and two Roy Morgan polls.

The average of the public polls has National 15% ahead of Labour – 2% more than in May. The seat projection is centre-right 62 seats, centre-left 57.

The return of Kevin Rudd in Australia has seen Labor rebound in the polls, so far, but the Coalition retains a narrow 2% lead on average.

In the United States President Obama’s approval rating slips, and he gets a negative rating on foreign policy for the first time.

In the UK Labour leads the Conservatives by 8% and the UKIP continues to outpoll the Liberal Democrats.

In Canada the honeymoon has ended quickly for new Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, as they drop 5%. However on current polls they would still be the biggest party and lead a minority government.

The normal two tables are provided comparing the country direction sentiment and head of government approval sentiment for the five countries. The mood has improved in Australia and Canada.

We also carry details of polls in New Zealand on Maori names, Labour and National leadership, the GCSB, Sky City, Fluoride, Fiordland plus the normal business and consumer confidence polls.

This newsletter is normally only available by e-mail.  If you would like to receive future issues, please go to http://listserver.actrix.co.nz/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/polling-newsletter to subscribe yourself.

The Telegraph reports:

Stuart Prebble, a former ITV television executive, said the BBC had probably been too swayed by the views of politicians, who were also reluctant to discuss immigration for fear of causing offence.

The Washington Post reports:

The Egyptian military removed President Mohamed Morsi from power Wednesday and suspended the constitution in moves it said were aimed at resolving the country’s debilitating political crisis.

In a televised address to the nation after a meeting with a group of civilian political and religious leaders, the head of the powerful armed forces, Gen. Abdel Fatah al-Sissi, said the chief of Egypt’s constitutional court “will assume the presidency” on an interim basis until a new presidential election is held. Sissi said the interim president will have the right to declare laws during the transitional period.

I have mixed feelings on this. I am no fan of Morsi, but I don’t see that he had done anything recently to require military intervention. There was no civil war, there were no human right abuses. There were just protests against him.

It’s good that the military will hold new elections, but what happens if the people elect Morsi again, or someone else the military do not like?

Hopefully Mohamed ElBaradei will win a fair election, as he looks to be the best bet for a Government that is tolerant and relatively secular.

Like many I watched the ISC hearings over the TV live-streams. Dotcom really made a speech more than a submission. New Zealand must be the only country in the world where a convicted criminal who is the subject of an extradition warrant to the US gets to debate security issues with the country’s Prime Minister for 25 minutes.

At least it was a step up from yesterday when the PM had to endure Penny Bright demanding that he hand over details of all his bank accounts to her!

The Herald reports:

Prime Minister John Key last night described former Megaupload tycoon Kim Dotcom as a “conspiracy theorist” after the internet mogul again claimed that the Prime Minister knew about him before his Coatesville mansion was raided in January 2012.

Mr Dotcom called the GCSB bill that Mr Key is promoting “morally indefensible” and said that, in reality, NZ’s foreign spy agency was a subsidiary of the National Security Agency (NSA) in the United States.

Mr Dotcom told TV3 last night that he would produce evidence during his extradition hearing to the US that Mr Key had lied about not knowing of him before the raid.

That hearing could be next year.

Earlier, Mr Key told reporters that Mr Dotcom “is a well-known conspiracy theorist. He has never ever found a piece of evidence to support that.”

Dotcom has been claiming for almost a year to have this evidence. If he had it, I have no doubt that he would have released it by now. There is no court rule that prevents him.

Near the end of the 20-minute session, Mr Shearer asked Mr Dotcom if he thought Mr Key had known about Mr Dotcom before the raids.

Mr Key said he hadn’t. “You know I know,” Mr Dotcom said.

“I know you don’t know actually, but that’s fine,” Mr Key said.

“Why are you turning red, Prime Minister?” Mr Dotcom asked.

“I’m not. Why are you sweating?”

“I’m hot.”

That was comic.

There were some useful submissions that day from other submitters on important issues. KDC’s submission was not one of them.

Waldo Kuipers at Microsoft blogs on the issue of protecting student privacy.

New Zealand’s schools work hard to earn the trust of their communities. As part of the important work they do, schools need to collect and hold a large body of confidential and private information about children and their families.

The 2020 Communications Trust ICT in Schools survey suggests that if digital records and email are not already used extensively in every New Zealand school, they soon will be.

In recent years some schools have taken a step further, and are starting to send information to computing services outside the school grounds for storage and processing.

In the hands of teachers who have been supported with skills development and the freedom to innovate, new devices and cloud services present wonderful opportunities to prepare students for the future.

Microsoft had Curia do a survey of parents on their expectations. The results were:

• 95% want schools to require providers of computing and Internet services to commit by contract that they’ll only use student data to deliver services to schools, not for the companies’ own purposes.
  
• 97% of parents want schools to ensure student data is used only for education, and not for commercial exploitation.
• 99% of parents indicated their belief that schools’ duty of care should apply to the computer and Internet environment they provide for student learning.

The Dom Post editorial:

When it comes time for the Local Government Commission to ponder the future shape of local government in the Wellington region it could do worse than consider the fate of the Wellington regional amenities fund.

The fund was established last year to promote artistic, cultural and environmental events and attractions in the wider Wellington region.

Five councils – Wellington, Hutt City, Upper Hutt, Kapiti and Masterton – agreed to contribute funds to it. Three – Porirua, South Wairarapa and Carterton – declined to contribute, despite their residents also benefiting from the amenities and events it was established to support.

This is our problem. The Regional Council has a very limited mandate. This means anything else that should be done regionally can only be done if all eight Councils agree to it. Madness.

I support two tiers as we have at the moment, but as part of the one organisation. That way we don’t have a huge amount wasted on Councils liaising with each other, suing each other.

Things which should be done regionally should be under the ambit of a Greater Wellington Council. Things which should be done regionally should be under the ambit of local councils.

Wellington is blessed with any number of natural advantages, but it can no longer afford to rest on its laurels.

The region is competing with Auckland, Sydney, Brisbane, London, Beijing and countless other cities, for investment, people and skills.

It needs to put its best foot forward and operate as a single region rather than a loose collection of feuding duchies.

Indeed.

Labour continues lurching to the left, and stealing policies of the Greens. This time they are stealing the Greens policy for gender quotas for candidate selection, but they have gone even further than the “fruit loops” and are proposing a “man ban”, where an electorate can apply to have a women only selection!

Whale has been leaked the proposed new Labour Party selection rules. They are embedded below.

The rule mandating a quota for women is:

New Rule 289A.  For the 2014 election the Moderating Committee shall, in determining the list, ensure that for any percentage of party vote likely to be obtained, and taking into account the electorate MPs likely to be elected with that level of Labour support, the resultant Caucus will comprise at least 45% women.  For the 2017 and subsequent elections the percentage shall be at least 50%.

So this is a fully fledged quota for women. No more having to compete on merit. If Labour looks to get 50 MPs, then at least 23 of them in 2014 must be women, and from 2017 at least half of them must be women.

Note that the 50% quota is a minimum. Under this rule a caucus of 75% women and 25% men would be fine, but a caucus of 48% women must not be allowed.

New Rule 248A. An LEC may request that NZ Council determine that only women may nominate for the position of Labour candidate for their electorate. Such approval overrides the right granted in Rule 251 for any member to be eligible for nomination.

This is the one that takes the cake. Labour wants electorates to be able to ban men from even seeking selection for that seat. I don’t think even the Greens are that deranged.

I fervently hope that the Labour Party conference adopts these new rules. It will help marginalise them and make them more unelectable. Imagine having to campaign for a party that bans men from seeking selection in some seats!

I suspect some MPs will speak out against these changes, as they tried to do with the change to the leadership election rules. But the fervent activists will no doubt ignore them again.

Labour Party Rule Changes 2013 Final by Cam Slater

Stuff reports:

Ambitious plans for Hamilton to lead councils nationally in rolling out an $18.40 per hour minimum “living wage” are in doubt after official estimates of its cost nearly quadrupled.

The council voted in May to introduce a living wage over two years, from this year, on the strength of a February estimate it would cost $168,000 to lift pay rates for 80 permanent council staff now paid between the minimum and living wages.

But management now say the resolution covers 144 staff, and a revised estimate shows the cost will be at least $643,000.

Maybe the Councillors could cut their own pay, to cover the cost? Why should ratepayers have to fund their mistake?

Managers have also warned that the policy could become a can of worms, with Living Wage campaigners promising to review the wage amount annually.

Scenarios costed for city councillors show that a $1 increase to the living wage rate by July 1 next year would lift the two-year cost to $959,000.

So the Council has agreed to automatically lift their wages to whatever level some two person outfit in Lower Hutt determines is the living wage? If they say it is now $25 an hour, they’ll just pay everyone that and send ratepayers the bill?

Management have recommended that council give itself the right to refuse further increases to the living wage rate unless it first considers the impact.

Which implies the Council has just voted to write a blank cheque every year, based on what this self-appointed group determine should be the “living” wage.

Stuff reports:

A teacher has lost his job after mistakenly broadcasting pornography to his classroom.

In a decision published yesterday, the Teachers’ Disciplinary Tribunal censured the unnamed teacher for the few seconds of adult content he broadcast in November 2011, but stopped short of cancelling his registration.

The man himself was so shocked after the clip that he simply continued to teach the year 12 class without mentioning the offending material.

After pupils raised the porn clip with their student counsellor, the teacher immediately confessed and resigned.

The mistake occurred after he viewed the pornography at home on his personal work laptop.

He was streaming a PowerPoint presentation from his laptop on to the school smartboard when it switched over to the next file, which happened to be pornographic.

That reminds me of when I replied to an e-mail from my former flatmate, with a humourous quip which included use of the c word. Sadly for her she had her laptop hooked up to a data projector which was video-conferenced into a group from Singapore. My e-mail came up in Outlook preview for around three seconds, including the immortal words “Did you spell c**t wrong?”

Talking of the Teachers’ Disciplinary Tribunal decisions though, can anyone find them online? I’ve had a look through the Teachers’ Council site and can only find decisions prior to 2007.

A female gym teacher was not so lucky after being accused of sexually grooming a 12-year-old girl, texting her obsessively and rubbing her thigh.

The tribunal censured the woman, who is not named, for serious misconduct and stripped her registration.

The decision showed she and the pupil exchanged 1500 texts over a month, with the teacher using “obscene and abusive” language.

So why is she not named?

A male teacher caught with his underpants around his knees next to a 16-year-old female pupil in the back of his car was stripped of registration. When asked by police what he was doing, he responded that they were discussing “family matters”.

Family matters? Only if you’re Tasmanian!

The House remains in urgency. However by leave it does still have question time. So the House will debate laws from 9 am to 12 pm, 1 pm to 2 pm, question time 2 pm to 3 pm, laws from 3 pm to 6 pm and 7 pm to midnight.

The remaining laws are:

• the committee stage of the State Sector and Public Finance Reform Bill
• the committee stage and third reading of the Plumbers, Gasfitters, and Drainlayers Amendment Bill and any bills into which it may be divided
• the committee stage of the Taxation (Livestock Valuation, Assets Expenditure, and Remedial Matters) Bill
• the committee stage of the Airports (Cost Recovery for Processing of International Travellers) Bill
• the committee stage of the Administration of Community Sentences and Orders Bill
• the committee stage of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (Covered Bonds) Amendment Bill, and
• the committee stage of the Medicines Amendment Bill.

None of these are hugely controversial. It is good that while the Government is using urgency, they have granted leave for question time to remain – and also have not sought to bypass select committees on any bills, It is effectively just extended hours.

I’ve been sent a copy of the appeal by the Lombard Four to the Supreme Court – Lombard Appln Leave to Appeal SC 2 July 2013

I have no particular view on the findings of guilt in regard to the charges. The courts have determined guilt, and that is also one issue being appealed to the Supreme Court.

The issue of more interest is whether custodial sentences are appropriate, when the court has specifically said they accept there was no dishonesty involved. I’ve got no problem with white collar criminals getting custodial sentences when they have defrauded people. But is a custodial sentence appropriate when the court has accepted there was no dishonesty?

The Lombard case involved “honest misjudgments” as opposed to other cases of gross negligence, related lending etc.

It is appropriate directors are held liable for their governance of a company that fails. But are custodial sentences appropriate when there was no fraud or deliberate deception?

Simon Collins at NZ Herald reports:

Members of an expert think-tank set up to guide Sir Owen Glenn’s $2 million inquiry into family violence say the only way for the inquiry to continue now would be for Sir Owen to step out of the process.

At least 14 of the 25 original NZ-based think-tank members have now quit following a report on Sunday that Sir Owen was accused of physically abusing a young woman in Hawaii in 2002.

“It’s made the credibility of anything coming out of the inquiry pretty much irreversible. You can’t get that kind of credibility back,” said veteran anti-violence advocate Kirimatao Paipa. “If he [Sir Owen] takes his name off it and leaves his money … then maybe we can salvage something out of this.”

Sadly I think his good intentions are now doomed. No matter who remains involved, the departure of so many means that whatever report it produces will not be able to build wide-spread support. He runs the risk of spending millions of dollars on a report that will not lead anywhere.

Mind you looking at the views of some of those who have departed the inquiry, I suspect that they were going to conclude that all child abuse is the result of poverty, colonialism, and correctional smacking. I’m not making this up – that is what one of the experts said on the radio. So even without this fiasco, I was sceptical that the inquiry would really confront the difficult issues such as whether abused children should be looked after by the extending family (who may also be dysfuntional) or be placed with total strangers (which is less than ideal). Likewise would it have confronted issues such as how to stop abusive parents having more children? Far too easy to blame it all on poverty.

Anyway the “experts” now seem to be saying that the only way forward is for Sir Owen to hand over great wads of money as a blank cheque to them, but to have no actual role in anyway with the inquiry – and to remove his name from it – plus remove his appointed board.

Gisborne District Councillor Manu Caddie and human rights campaigner Marama Davidson said Sir Owen and the former Supreme Court judge who now chairs the inquiry’s governance board, Bill Wilson, should go.

“If the inquiry has any future, changing the name and board membership is required. Sir Owen and Bill Wilson will need to give up their places on the board …”

I think Sir Owen deserves better than this. There are many other good causes in New Zealand he can support. Those who have left the inquiry will just continue to snipe at it and him from the sidelines.

The Herald is not having a good week. Not only do they run a sob story from a Green Party candidate, without revealing his affiliation – they also had Brian Rudman got it entirely wrong regarding Maggie Barry and the City Rail Link.

Rudman wrote on Monday:

I’m guessing that North Shore National MP Maggie Barry will have experienced a true “Oh bugger” moment when she first heard of her leader’s shock u-turn in favour of building the Auckland City rail link.

In her shoes, who wouldn’t have? Contemplating your own demise has a way of concentrating the mind.

I bet she’s wishing she’d observed the advice of a long-time National PM, Sir Keith Holyoake, who advised new MPs to breathe through their noses for their first term. In other words, the way to avoid terminal embarrassment is to keep your lips zipped until you learn the rules.

But in the sweet euphoria of post election victory, back in November 2011, playing dumb was the last thing on Ms Barry’s mind. She told her local paper to pass on the message to Auckland Mayor Len Brown that there would be a CBD rail link before a new harbour crossing “over our dead bodies”.

The only problem for Rudman is Barry was speaking about a rail link between the airport and the CBD, not the City Rail Link – which is an entirely different project.

This follow up story in the North Shore Times makes it clear Maggie was referring to the airport-CBD rail project. With regards to the CBD rail loop, she said:

Basically I support the City Rail Link, but only if the business case ultimately stacks up.

Now it is possible Rudman never saw the follow up story. I guess too much too hope for that he would check. But will he now do a retraction with the same prominence as his original column, or will there be some grudging clarification which no one will see?

Maggie commented on Facebook:

During the 30 years I was a Radio and television news presenter and as a senior feature writer for the Listener, I never really expected the same rigorous standards of fact checking from populist columnists as I did from professional journalists. Some columnists are the print mediums version of shock jocks who opine and shamelessly push their own politically biased agendas and don’t much like the facts to get in the way of their stance. Mondays column wasn’t an example of Brian’s finest work but maybe when you’ve been in the job for a long time you think you can get away with tossing off any old purple prose to fill your word allocation. While Brian no doubt had a lovely time dreaming up punishments for a crime I didn’t commit, I take the future vision of Auckland’s transport more seriously than that and judging from the universally positive feedback to the PM’s announcement from my constituents, so does the North Shore electorate. No dead bodies on my side of the political divide Brian.

The decent thing for the Herald to do would be to give Maggie a full right of reply, with the same prominence as Rudman’s article. But many media hate admitting they got it wrong, so I won’t hold my breath.

Does anyone who gets the print edition of the Herald know if they have done a follow up on the Max Coyle story, informing people he is a Green candidate? And there was their housing story that featured the Labour Party vice-president who posed as a house buyer and just happened to say all her problems would be fixed by Labour’s policies. Never saw any follow up to that one either. No wonder fewer people trust the media.

Stuff reports:

InternetNZ has appointed its former policy manager and one-time Labour Party candidate Jordan Carter as chief executive.

Carter had been serving as acting chief executive of the non-profit society since January following the sudden departure of former boss Vikram Kumar, who quickly went on to secure the role of chief executive of Kim Dotcom’s new online storage service, Mega.

InternetNZ said 36 candidates had applied for the position.

Carter stood down from InternetNZ in May 2011, after seven years at the organisation, when he was confirmed as a Labour-list candidate in the November 2011 general election. He was 40th on Labour’s list and missed the cut-off.

He today ruled out a return to politics “in the next few years” and said he would not be standing in the 2014 election.

He did not believe his decision to stand for Labour in 2011 would cause complications in InternetNZ’s relations with the current Government.

“I have been involved in this sector for so long, people know my roots are in the ICT policy area. It is completely transparent what my political views have been but they don’t colour what I do professionally.”

InternetNZ president Frank March said Carter had a deep understanding of internet policy and research and was “fully across the intricacies of regulation concerning the internet and ICT more generally.”

Carter said an “open and uncapturable internet” was essential to New Zealand’s prospects.

I think Jordan will do an excellent job, and he did well to beat out many top class candidates who applied.

I’ve worked closely with Jordan on Internet issues for well over a decade. He has a superb grasp of policy, a strategic mindset and is also an excellent administrator. The nice thing about InternetNZ is that it has members from all over the political spectrum, united in their belief that the Internet should remain open and uncaptureable and sharing InternetNZ’s goal of protecting and promoting the Internet in New Zealand. In 2005 I was the Acting President, and Jordan the Acting Chief Executive for a couple of months. We also happened to be rival campaign managers for National and Labour in Wellington Central. We would meet or talk several times a day on InternetNZ issues – and then inevitable see each other in the evenings at Meet the Candidate meetings as wee would vocally support our chosen candidates. It was surreal, and amusing.

I don’t see Jordan’s political background as a big issue. I was always grateful that when David Cunliffe was Labour’s ICT and Comms Minister he would work with me on Internet issues, despite my National background.  I was very supportive of Cunliffe’s efforts to bring in anti-spam legislation, and to increase competition in the telco sector by requiring operational separation of Telecom.  Part of politics is working in good faith with people on issues you agree on, even when you disagree on other issues.

So congrats to Jordan and InternetNZ. Next week is the annual Net Hui in Wellington, which as usual already has a large waiting list, as (off memory) already over 500 people registered to attend. Hope to see many people I know there.

The Press reports:

Christchurch City Council Chief Executive Tony Marryatt is taking leave.

The council has issued a statement announcing Marryatt was taking leave “pending further discussions with the council”.

General manager city environment Jane Parfitt will be acting chief executive.

I’ve not been a long-term Marryatt hater, like some people. I thought the issue around his salary was a beat up. However he has on a number of occassions demonstrated judgement not up to the job – in my view.

The decision to give an extra day’s leave per month to all staff, without even informing Councillors, was one example.

The consenting failure has to be his responsibility – both the lack of capacity, the inability to improve enough, and the downplaying of the seriousness of it.

This afternoon’s planned meeting with four Government ministers has been cancelled.

Instead, councillors have been called to a special meeting of council at 12.45pm tomorrow when a resolution will be put to invite the local government minister Chris Tremain to install a Crown manager to oversee the council’s consents department.

Following the meeting, councillors will meet with the minister who will discuss the terms of reference for the Crown manager.

Mayor Bob Parker said it was “crucial that the community and the Government have complete confidence in the robustness of the consents process”.

This is a smart move by the Council – a crown manager, just for the consenting function. This should mean that the Council can be assisted to get its processes and resources sorted out, so they can regain the ability to authorise consents.

As a sign of how bad it may be, the Insurance Council says:

Christchurch buildings constructed using faulty council consents may have to be demolished, the Insurance Council of New Zealand (ICNZ) says.

International Accreditation New Zealand (Ianz) this week said it would revoke the council’s consents accreditation on July 8, prompting a council and Government scramble to ensure consents can continue to be issued in the rebuilding city. 

The council had granted consents that Ianz found ”did not meet the requirements of the Building Code”.

ICNZ insurance manager John Lucas said today that the Ianz revelations were ”quite startling”.

Recently consented buildings should be audited on a case-by-case basis by an independent authority, he said.

”If insurers have started work on developing a new property, rebuilding a house or repairing a house, and then partway through that construction period there’s a delay because they find out later the building consent was issued incorrectly, then that’s going to stop that project,” Lucas said.

”It may cost the parties a lot of money because the project may have to be demolished and rebuilt, or there may be some very expensive remediation costs involved.”

Non-compliant foundations were the most likely to be an issue, he said.

Now who is it that has been calling for the Govt to be more hands off in Christchurch?

Summertime view of Whale Bay, Tutukaka Coast, North Island. New Zealand photography by Sarah Sisson.

Yet again I find myself drawn to another warm beach image….

The landscape photography eBook that has consumed my life for the past month is now in the hands of the designer and should be hitting the ‘shelves’ late this month.

In more uncharacteristically collaborative news – Sarah & I will be instructing at the first of celebrity HDR photographer Trey Ratcliff’s New Zealand Photo Adventures in late October (don’t hate me @Beautox! ;-).  Check out the details – not cheap, but certainly a world class experience.

Cheers – Todd

Free Wallpaper Download

You may download the large version of today’s image from this link:   Password = wwp

Canvas Prints

This image is available on the website, – I have also just loaded last week’s Cathedral Cove image .

Thanks for your support!

Cheers – Todd [www.sisson.co.nz] 

Went up Te Ahumairangi (Tinakori) Hill this morning for the first time since the storm. I think there were some signs up saying the tracks were impassable. This wasn’t quite the case, but it did involve a fair amount of climbing, on squeezing under fallen trees.

Fairly easy over that one.

Under that one.

The dog went under that one, and we went over it!

This was very thick to get through.

Under and over these ones coming up.

And the main Northern Walkway route has basically a trail of destruction on it towards the end.

The Herald reports:

Begging could be banned throughout Auckland under a bylaw being drafted by the council – a move described as overdue by advocates and fascist by those targeted.

An initial draft of the bylaw banned asking for money, food, other items or soliciting donations “in a manner that may intimidate or cause a nuisance to any person”.

But after public feedback, commissioners appointed by the Auckland Council and Auckland Transport have recommended all begging be banned.

The total ban was sought by business associations, including Heart of the City, and an upmarket department store, which said a hard core of beggars intimidated shoppers.

“We have too many examples of behaviour being defended under the guise of exercising a public right to occupy public spaces,” said Heart of the City chief executive Alex Swney.

NZ has a generous welfare system. We provide benefits, family and child support and accommodation assistance. There is no need for anyone to be begging. The few who do, tend to have issues of addiction or worse.

Simon Robinson, begging for money on Queen St yesterday, said he did so for about three hours a day, and felt he had the right to do so.

The 43-year-old, who began begging five years ago after his debts got on top of him and lives in a boarding house in Mt Eden, said banning begging was a “bit fascist” and “stepping towards a police state”.

“I used to shoplift, so it’s either that to get food, or sit there begging and not being a nuisance, and as soon as someone gives me $20 to get a decent meal and a couple of cans of beer, I’m off.”

Need more be said.