An Irritable NZ Pawn - David Seymour Admits Treaty Principles Bill will clear the way for development
An Irritable NZ Pawn - David Seymour Admits Treaty Principles Bill will clear the way for development
And Chris Finlayson calls Seymour "immature"
This morning I discovered a post I’d written 10-11 months ago, lamenting how New Zealand’s ACT Party and their foreign and local surrogates would play out anti-Māori propaganda - which I believe they have long prepared for.
At the time, it was a plea for action and readiness from my fellow Kiwis, although that time has passed.
For those of you who haven’t seen it, I reproduce it in part here:
David Seymour and his band of right wing think tanks & donors are so sneaky, and so insidious, that only education and awareness will help us resist this populist movement.
Because, in my opinion, this is what he is doing - generating a populist movement right here in NZ: talking to the people directly, claiming he is solving their problems for them, and ignoring legislative, judicial, and constitutional experts.
It worked for them in the UK, Australia and the US.
NZ should be small fry, right?
ACT’s leader has also been on shows recently using the words “ensuring mana for everyone,” “this is about universal human rights,” and ”we have the right to unilaterally change the signed contract because it suits us.”
I’ll give him this - Who can argue against the principle of universal human rights (except those he wants to take away from, of course, but let’s not dig into it too much now.)
This is a playbook that his affiliated think tanks have run before.
But - the point is, I don’t actually want to talk about this topic.
I’m fine with Aotearoa NZ being a place where we drink a beer, and think politics is for dummies and not need to study some colonial historical document.
And most of all - I want us to notice what the Government is really doing, on top of everything they did at Christmas time.
- Cancelling the Productivity Commission under urgency so David Seymour can set up a Ministry of Regulation
- Making it easier for foreigners to buy sensitive land
- Making it easier for environmental impacts of development to be ignored
- Shane Jones going back on ocean conservation principles for deep sea trawling and fishing
- Being in bed with the tobacco industry
- Not following through on the election promises to reduce bowel cancer screening from 60 to 50 years of age
- Not addressing the 60,000 clinical healthcare workers, and a Ministry of Health that has a 10 year low headcount, while the Government scrambles to cut costs to fund tax cuts
- Cutting into our judiciary, putting court processes at risk.
And more.
That was almost a year ago, and every single day, without fail there is more littering from this government.
Do we focus on their appointment of a Zionist, anti-transgender, ACT friendly sycophant to the NZ Human Rights Commission that should help to uphold Maori rights even though this individual failed the job selection process, or do we focus on my pet peeve:
The government continuing to slash $2bn worth of spend and investments in our public health system, so doctors spend time making beds, years of efficiency/patient care measures are dumped to bring us back to -10 on the scale, and we continue to lose valued medical professionals from the public health system while hospitals languish, future costs increase, and more Kiwis suffer?
Do we focus on the government putting us in a position of breaching international trade deals by restarting oil and gas mining one month after COP, putting taxpayers on the hook for billions in decommissiong costs, and reneging our part in environmental protection for an industry that officials told the government is “dying”?
Or do we focus on the wholly “hollow” and insincere apology from Christopher Luxon and this government to those who were violently abused in state and faith based care and to which he tried unsuccessfully to have a journalist barred for asking him and his Minister hard questions about?
Or maybe we swirl around to more recent developments such as:
Forest and Bird sounding the alarm to an apathetic Kiwi audience that the government may be looking at “flogging off” our valuable conservation lands for commercial interests
SPCA criticising Luxon for being “cryptic” and refusing to commit to a public consultation process or offer information on the government bringing back live animal exports - even though Agriculture Minister Andrew Hoggard committed to releasing public information by September 2024.
How about what I predicted months ago - more public sector job cuts are coming down the line because Willis ignored advice to not borrow $12bn more for tax cuts as the number of felled positions runs close to 8000 and the economy, including construction, continues to stagnate?
How about the government’s sneaky felling of Kainga Ora after the $500,000 payment to Bill English?
Or thousands of families less are now getting Working for Family Tax Credits because unemployment has risen to a 4 year high, and less families qualify?
Nurses who now have to strike after receiving an effective pay cut offer by the government?
Or just David Seymour politicising children and education by instructing the Ministry of Education to issue orders that schools effectively not support the Hikoi or risk consequences. The Secondary Principals Council head said Seymour “casting aspersions over schools' neutrality on a political issue was unprecedented.” (Let alone extraordinary for its authoritarian direction.)
Unprecedented.
Except under this government it is not “unprecedented” anymore - it’s simply the new normal, day in, day out - manifesting in different forms, shapes and sizes but always the same underlying engine of pettiness, misapprehension and control.
As are their dog and pony shows.
Sent to me with thanks last week (M) were multiple communications from the conjoined circus of David Farrar, Don Brash, straight back to their close ally David Seymour.
Step 1:
Cultivate a large mailing list using misinformation and rage bait
Step 2:
Use the mailing list to create rage bait from one side of the house
Step 3:
On the other side, enact a process of acting on “received” complaints
Step 4:
Politicise the Ministry of Education, of which you are a Minister, to intimidate schools, students and parents
But I stand by my comment from the beginning of the year.
I’d rather be having a beer with my mates than chasing up this absolute onslaught of lies and deception coming from every corner of this government, from the Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, to Nicola Willis, to Shane Reti, to Chris ‘lobbying is good’ Bishop, to David Seymour to an unhinged conspiratorial Winston Peters.
It shouldn’t be our job - anyone’s here on Substack - or in the broader media - or you who are reading - to spend time fact checking the government every day, day in, day out.
Not like this.
Not like this.
Not like this.
Flooding the Zone with Shit
In 2018 Trump advisor Steven Bannon told a Bloomberg journalist the following strategy:
“The Democrats don’t matter. The real opposition is the media. And the way to deal with them is to flood the zone with shit.”
That’s the Bannon business model: Flood the zone. Stink up the joint. As Jonathan Rauch once said, citing Bannon’s infamous quote, “This is not about persuasion: This is about disorientation.”
Last week, NZ’s Wright Family funded “The Platform” called for state broadcasters RNZ and TVNZ to be defunded. I wonder why.
Each action by this government, on its own, would be egregious but taken together, within the current media landscape - it’s almost impossible to keep on top of — and so I would posit we are now at a time when the everyday clown show matters less - because it’s the ultimate agenda and the direction that we need to be focusing on.
And that always brings me back to the same answer of late. This is a corporate and wealth takeover of our government and it manifests in their strategic direction.
Predictions
Kiwirail
Nicola Willis has promised to make an announcement on Kiwirail by year end.