Keeping my part brief:

The Ministry of Education applied a brutal vaccine mandate to teachers (including Correspondence School staff) in late 2021. However – they decided that 41% of their own staff would not be covered by the mandate as they promised not to leave their offices.

The Teachers Council followed up school staff mandated out with a letter warning them about not complying with directives.

NZTSOS says that over 1200 educators and support staff lost their jobs, with many who did not comply leaving education forever.  In our data bases there are not only teachers and principals, but special education staff, school counsellors and school support staff.  We also have to remember that we had many who were mandated who complied under pressure and some were vax injured.

Here is a response to an OIA request on the situation.

29/08/2024

fyi-request-28084-1e925192@requests.fyi.org.nz

Tēnā koe

OIA: 1334434 – Vaccination exemptions for Ministry of Education personnel

Thank you for your email of 17 August 2024 to the Ministry of Education (the Ministry) requesting

the following information:

I would like information regarding the number of COVID vaccine exemptions that were

requested for MOE personnel and other educational organisations (Such as NZSTA, NZEI,

PPTA, NZPF), how many were successful, and how many people each successful

exemption covered.

Your request has been considered under the Official Information Act 1982 (the Act).

Approximately 59% of the approximately 4,352 Ministry employees were covered under the

COVID-19 Public Health Response (Vaccinations) Order 2021 when it was in effect. Exemptions could be applied for under clause 9 of the COVID-19 Public Health Response (Vaccinations)

Order 2021. Seven Education-related applications were received and processed by the Ministry,

with all decisions referred to the Minister for approval. All of these applications were declined.

The other organisations listed in your request are not subject to the Act. The Ministry does not hold records relating to staff at these organisations, and this part of your request is therefore refused under section 18(g) of the Act, as the information requested is not held by the Ministry, and we have no reason to believe it is held by another department or organisation subject to the Act.

Thank you again for your email. You have the right to ask an Ombudsman to review my decision

on your request, in accordance with section 28 of the Act. You can do this by writing to

info@ombudsman.parliament.nz or to Office of the Ombudsman, PO Box 10152, Wellington 6143.

Nāku noa, nā

Emma Drysdale

Manager Official and Parliamentary Information

The OIA request was from an outstanding former Principal who was mandated out. She followed up with this.

“I received some of the additional information I requested in the OIA request today.  41% “didn’t need” to apply for an exemption, because they claim they ‘didn’t leave their offices’.  Funny, how they were allowed to do that, yet I couldn’t use that excuse to ‘stay in my office’ AND worse got terminated for my non compliance!!! None of them got terminated!  Double standards evidenced again! “

Alwyn Poole
alwyn.poole@gmail.com
Innovative Education Consultants Ltd
Education 710+ Ltd
(both sites currently being re-done)
alwynpoole.substack.com
www.linkedin.com/in/alwyn-poole-16b02151/

Parliament has established a special select committee to consider submissions on the constitutionally important Parliament Bill. It has eight MPs, being:

• National 2
• Labour 2
• Greens 1
• ACT 1
• NZ First 1
• TPM 1

So the committee is split 4/4 between the Government and Opposition and also 4/4 between the two large parties and the four smaller ones. It will be chaired by former Speaker Adrian Rurawhe.

The bill passed its first reading unanimously. It is nice to be in a country where important constitutional issues can be dealt with in a non partisan way.

The media have moved on from Labour’s Associate Foreign Affairs Spokesperson saying that the murder, rape, torture and kidnapping of 1,000+ Israeli civilians was justified. They ran one story, and abandoned it despite the lack of apology or sanction.

Now let’s compare this to a story in 2020 involving Todd Muller. What did Todd Muller do? Did he endorse rape and murder? Did he praise torture and kidnapping as justified? No, he had some US political memorabilia in his office including a Trump MAGA cap (alongside a Hilary Clinton badge).

This resulted In an avalanche of stories, running for several days. The media went out to groups such as the Islamic Women’s Council who condemned it. Yes they asked the IWC for their views on someone having a MAGA hat in their office, yet don’t approach the Jewish Council over an MP endorsing the murder, rape, torture and kidnapping of Jews.

They quoted political expert Dr Siouxsie Wiles on why what Muller did was reprehensible. They also quoted neutral academic Shane te Pou. They wrote columns on it. They did a couple of dozen stories, until finally Muller agreed to hide the hat from view. They followed up with articles on how the hat is a symbol of racism and white supremacy. They got comments from the Race Relations Commissioner.

So consider all that coverage over a hat, and compare that to the lack of coverage of an MP who claims murder, rape, torture and kidnapping was justified – and is an official spokesperson for the party on these issues.

The PSC announced:

Acting Public Service Commissioner Heather Baggott has today announced the appointment of Andrew Coster to the position of Secretary for Social Investment and Chief Executive, Social Investment Agency.

This is a very smart appointment. As a police officer Coster had to deal with the impact of offending, generally by people who were raised in families with significant risk factors.

The Social Investment role is the opportunity to stop offenders being created. Rather than have wasteful untargeted spending, this role is an opportunity to help direct spending to where it will do the most good.

The 3rd health target is for 95% of ED patients to be admitted, discharged or transferred within six hours. This is a critically important one that saves lives.

From 2015 to 2017 it was at around 92%. Over the next five years it fell to a terrible 70.9%, and in the transition year to 68.8%.

This may be one of the hardest ones to turn around, but one of the most important ones.

I blogged yesterday on how Labour’s Associate Foreign Affairs Spokesperson, Damien O’Connor, retweeted a tweet that Hamas had every right to do what they did on October 7th which is the day they murdered, raped, tortured and kidnapped over 1,000 Israeli civilians.

The media treatment of this has been incredibly light. Don’t get me wrong – NZ Herald, Stuff and Radio NZ did run stories on it – but simply reporting that there has been criticism, and that the tweet has been deleted.

There has been no apology, and no statement from the leadership denouncing his views. So we must assume that the official position of the Labour Party is that they agree with O’Connor that the murder, rape, torture and kidnapping of 1,000 Israeli civilians was justified – but that O’Connor shouldn’t have stated his belief publicly.

There was no coverage of this by TVNZ. There have been no editorials or op eds condemning what O’Connor retweeted. There has been no hunting him down on camera to demand him to clarify his views. There has been no asking other Labour MPs if they agree with him. There has been no questions (that I can see reported) to the leadership asking if they will sack him, whether his views are the views of Labour etc.

Now compare this to a recent incident where an attendee at a Matamata quiz night, where the theme was black and white, turned up in blackface. No one there objected, but someone got offended by a photo on their Facebook page. How it is inadvisable to wear blackface, so a story could be warranted but look carefully at the story:

A Waikato RSA is under fire after a community member turned up to a quiz night at its club rooms in blackface, then the club told people who objected, “it’s humour”.

Matamata RSA president Dennis Greaves told the Herald there was nothing offensive about the guest’s costume.

“It was a fun night and we had lots of people painted in white faces. Is there any disagreement with people turning up in white faces?”

Greaves said he saw no need to speak to the person who was wearing black paint on their face.

“To us, we’re a small community and to us, it was not offensive.

“It is only people with nothing better to do than to pick on stuff like this which is not really warranting worrying about it,” he said.

“The Matamata RSA do not see it as an issue because it was a fun night and that was all that was intended. There was no racial slur or anything like that.

“It was a black and white night and it was up to them how they come dressed.”

Now the story at this point was fine. It reported some people online were offended by the local RSA stood by the quiz night, But look at the next sentence:

The Herald has also sought comment from the national RSA body.

This is when they go from reporting news to creating it. This is what the media do if they agree with the complainants – they escalate it in the hope of finding a pressure point, and it worked. The next day:

The Matamata RSA has apologised “unreservedly” for any offence caused afterphotos emerged of a man at a quiz night in a minstrel costume, days after it said there was no harm in wearing the outfit to a fancy dress event.

So in this case the media kept on with the story, until they achieved the desired backdown. But with Damien O’Connor supporting murder, rape, torture and kidnapping they drop the story after one day.

Now compare the difference between the two situations.

1. In one case the person complained about is a local in Matamata who attended a quiz night from the local RSA. In the other it is an elected Member of Parliament who is the official Associate Foreign Affairs Spokesperson for Labour.
2. In one case they wore blackface to a black and white themed quiz night. In the other case they endorsed a tweet which said the murder, rape, torture and kidnapping of over 1,000 civilians was justified.

And again the media wonder why trust keeps declining.

The second health target is to get the two year immunisation rate back up to 95%.

As you can see the rate was very close to 95% under National. It dipped slightly in the transition year to 91.9%. Then it plummeted from 2020 to 2024 to 77.9%. A huge job ahead to get it back to where it was.

The immunisation rate is now so low, that we arguably no longer have herd immunity to some of those childhood diseases.

ACT released:

ACT has obtained a copy of AUT’s policy for funding researcher travel, which allocates 30 percent more points to travel applications for researchers who identify as Māori, and 20 percent more for Pasifika.

“This policy will put some academics at a disadvantage relative to others, simply because they have the ‘wrong’ ancestry,” says ACT Tertiary Education and Skills spokesperson Dr Parmjeet Parmar.

It is important to note this policy applies entirely on the ancestry of the staff member, and not on the topic. They could be a lecturer in mathematics, and they would get a 30% loading due to their ethnicity.

Another way of looking at this is that researchers who are European and Asian get a 23% penalty for their ancestry.

The Spinoff has a lengthy story on how $500,000 of taxpayers money was given by MCH to Narrative Muse, a digital arts recommendation platform for books, movies and TV. So what has been the outcome of the $500,000:

• a book club offer that 12 participants signed up to
• 575 followers on X; 2,963 followers on Instagram; 120 on TikTok
• 6,500 registered (not active) users based in NZ
• No member of Booksellers Aotearoa NZ has reported that Narrative Muse has had any discernible, traceable or material impact on book sales at all

Tech startups often don’t succeed, but that is why investors should invest in them, not taxpayers.

Damien O’Connor is Labour’s Foreign Affairs Spokesperson and he retweeted an assertion that Hamas had every right to do what they did on October 7th. This of course is the day they murdered, raped, tortured and kidnapped over 1,000 Israeli civilians.

This view should disqualify him from being a spokesperson for Labour on Foreign Affairs.

Over this week I am going to blog the data on the five health targets the Government has set for the health system. Each of them tells a very interesting story when we look at the data for the last nine years.

All data comes from the fact sheets published by Health NZ.

The target is 90% of cancer patients start treatment within 31 days. As you can see it went from 83.8% to 88.5% by June 2017. In the transition year it was static at 88.6%. Then over the next five years it dropped to 84.9%. In the latest transition year it dipped down to 84.2%.

ACT MP Parmjeet Parmar writes:

From next year, the University of Auckland will require all first-year students to complete a ‘Waipapa Taumata Rau’ course covering the Treaty of Waitangi and traditional Māori knowledge systems. …

Finally, the course risks a dangerous uniformity of perspective on Treaty issues.

Whatever you may think about the current Treaty principles debate, it’s clear these issues are controversial and politically contested.

Having a small group of academics in consultation with local iwi prepare a course on Treaty issues will leave graduates with a narrow, one-sided view of the history of the Treaty and its implications for our rights and democracy.

I would go as far as calling the planned courses a form of indoctrination.

As a university student learning about the scientific method, I was taught that knowledge is contestable.

This is actually a huge threat to academic freedom and freedom of thought on campus.

In most disciplines, you will come across a variety of views on the issue. Takes economics – you’ll have some lecturers who are Keynesian, some who are monetarist, some who teach Milton Friedman etc etc. Over the course of your degree you will be exposed to different views on economics. The same will apply in law to a degree, philosophy etc etc.

But here the University as an institution is going to state an institutional view of the Treaty of Waitangi, that will be mandatory for every student to attend, and take on board if they want to get a degree. There will be no diversity of views taught to student s through the mandatory paper. And it is inconceivable that any individual academic or course would dare to have a view that was at odds with the mandatory paper. To do so would get them cancelled.

So this is a very big deal. Mandatory papers should be for fundamental stuff such as ethics, plagiarism etc – not a highly controversial and contested political issue.

The latest Ipsos UK poll finds net favourability, in order, is:

1. Princess of Wales +56%
2. Princess Royal +53%
3. Prince of Wales +52%
4. The King +38%
5. The Queen +14%
6. Duke of Sussex -18%
7. Duchess of Sussex -32%
8. Duke of York -55%

Such a huge variation between the most popular and least popular.

Almost amusing Labour feigning outrage over the Dunedin Hospital rebuild, when you look at the history of it.

In August 2017, National announced a rebuild with a projected cost of $1.2 to $1.4 billion, with it to be open between 2024 and 2027.

A week later new Labour Leader Jacinda Ardern announced they would start work on it so quickly, if elected, construction would start by 2020. This turned out to be a promise like Auckland Light Rail and Kiwibuild.

Three years later, Labour announced a preferred design in September 2020, with a decision on the business case in February 2021. Key details were 89,000 sqm (down from 105,000), the new hospital will provide approximately 421 beds (352 in current), including 30 ICU beds, and 16 theatres.

In June 2022, construction finally began – two years after Labour promised. Cost was now $1.47 billion.

In December 2022 there was a budget blowout and Labour cut one ward, two theatres and 450 workspaces.

By April 2023, the cost was $1.68 billion, and opening delayed until 2029.

By March 2024, it was $1.88 billion. In May 2024 it was reported to have reached over $2 billion and the latest estimate is it might reach $3 billion.

So not only did Labour fail to meet their own promise of starting construction by 2020, they also left the project in a state that it won’t be complete until 2029 – two to five years later than National had planned. And they oversaw cost blowouts which saw even them have to scale the rebuild back – and now they complain that the current Government isn”;”t going to write a blank cheque for it.

Stuff reports:

Key details about the operation remain unclear, including whether Israel intercepted and sabotaged an existing pager shipment or executed a scheme in which Israeli intelligence entities actually manufactured or assembled devices packed with explosives.

The New York Times reported this week that Israeli intelligence both built the devices and created front companies to deceive Hezbollah. 

If the NY Times is correct, Israel not only managed to wound several thousand terrorist bent on their destruction, but sold Hezbollah the pagers, so actually made a profit from it!

So all the useful idiots who donate to Hezbollah, actually had their money go to Israel who appears to be the major supplier of tech to their avowed enemy.

If this was a film, you’d think it was unbelievable.

Joel McManus writes:

It was a mess, and it speaks to the core of Whanau’s greatest weakness: she has terrible political instincts. …

Ironically, the airport sale may not have been needed at all if Whanau had been willing to scrap the $330m Town Hall repairs – or at least pause them until the central government came to the party or another funding source could be found. 

That would have been sensible. I am sure there is not shortage of local MPs who would have sponsored a local bill allowing the Town Hall to be demolished.

There are some parallels to another left-leaning politician with a history of saying weird stuff and making unforced errors: Joe Biden. While members of the Democratic Party felt deep loyalties to the US president, it eventually became clear that he was an electoral liability who needed to be replaced by a different candidate. Green Party members in Wellington must surely start asking the same question. 

Normally a Mayor would be happy to be compared to the US President, but in this case I doubt it!

CNN reports:

Self-service kiosks at McDonald’s and other fast-food chains have loomed as job killers since they were first rolled out 25 years ago. But nobody predicted what actually happened. …

Instead, touchscreen kiosks have added extra work for kitchen staff and pushed customers to order more food than they do at the cash register. The kiosks show the unintended consequences of technology in fast-food and retail settings, including self-checkout. Chains are now experimenting with artificial intelligence at drive-thru lanes, and the experience with kiosks holds lessons for them.

Today, instead of replacing workers, companies deploy kiosks to transfer labor to other tasks like handing off pickup orders, help increase sales, easily adjust prices and speed up service.

This makes sense to me. I always use a kiosk as I like to be able to browse what is available, without the pressure of having a staff member waiting for me. I often end up ordering more. So this creates more work for the store, and staff who once used to take orders, are now in the kitchen etc.

It its a good reminder that we shouldn’t fear automation and/or AI. It will impact jobs, but it will create jobs also.

Link here: https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=534247402295436

Tried to embed and failed.

Audio below – courtesy of “Ghost”.

The Herald reported:

The Green Party is clear to expel Darleen Tana from Parliament after the High Court declined Tana’s application for judicial review.

The decision paves the way for party delegates to meet and decide whether to use the waka-jumping law to oust Tana from Parliament, where she now sits as an independent MP.

This is as I predicted. It seems highly likely that the Greens will vote to expel her.

Personally I still want the law scrapped. If parties select dud candidates, they should bear the consequences of their laxity rather than being able to just shuffle them off.