23 Comments

A deodorant salesman can't admit it just masks the stink for a while...

Expand full comment

What I try to reconcile is the adulation he receives from his voters and so the support and alternate world view is real.

Agree what they are doing stinks, but it's a pity we don't share the same noses anymore, Robin.

Expand full comment

Nicola living out her girlhood dream of being room monitor and teacher's pet

Expand full comment

Destroying the public service can’t be an accident, their goal is to have nothing working so that they can privatise anything that might produce a cashflow for their mates. If ‘bottom feeders’ have their lives ruined so be it, parallels with Israeli precision attacks that ONLY kill lots of innocents…

Expand full comment

Education is on its knees.

Health is on its knees.

Police are heading to a fiscal cliff.

But who gets the money? We already know.

Charter schools will be able to boast about better performance under little to no transparency and fight for more money again next time.

Healthcare will be gradually privatized.

Prison populations will grow and the private builders of prison services will make bank.

And Luxon and Willis will tell the story (already written) of a glowing performance under very trying times.

Expand full comment

If we consider how most rich right wingers get their wealth, either by inheritance or by screwing the system in business, then it is of little surprise that they have such disdain for the rest of us.

In my 55 years of work, I once saw an altruistic boss. He ran his motor factors as a form of cooperative and his staff were loyal to a fault. After he died too young, his son enlisted an ‘advisor’ from a large accounting firm. Within 5 years all the loyal staff were gone and the business sold. The son moved to Spain…..

This cruel, cynical government hates none supporters. The damage will run deep for many years.

Expand full comment

There is a real bullying at play but it's not un-ironic that I'd bet many of their supporters have little money too. But as long as someone else is getting punished, it seems OK to too many.

It was nice to meet an altruisitc boss - I miss values like that Tony and hope there are people out there who recognise its value too.

Expand full comment

Much like the cries of some Trump supporters when they were getting the blowback of his policies in action. "He's hurting the wrong people!"

Expand full comment

“As long as it’s them!!!”

Expand full comment

Just a few more steps along the inexorable path to serfdom.

Think back to early England and its landed gentry and you'll see their end goal.

Expand full comment

🙋🏽‍♀️The members of the Coalition-of-Cruelty are totally divorced from the real world, as this latest "thing" again exposes. I don't expect THEM personally to have experienced the current reality of workplaces, but there are 10,000's who could tell them if they cared to listen! In my small circle I know remote workers who live in one city in Aotearoa & answer to a Head Office elsewhere (the ultimate WFH) plus know of technical people who live in one COUNTRY & answer to Head Office in another COUNTRY ... such is the technology that is rapidly changing what is possible because of what is available. ZOOM type technology alone enables quality engagement from "attending" funerals to global meetings of friends, colleagues, scholars, voters, AND WORKERS!

I am more worried about social things that develop when you physically share a workspace, but that goes the other way as well - neuro-diverse people need quieter spaces, and bullies lose much of their power without proximity, plus the PERSONAL social upside of spending more time with family & having a more flexible ability to deal with small emergencies & contingencies, and having coffee breaks with friends & neighbours etc.

It seems more to do with the workers gaining some quality of life & autocrats like Lux-flakes & Willis seeing it as a loss of POWER over them. Come to that - why do I have to put up with MY employees (Luxon, Willis, Seymour, Peters et al) doing their reporting to ME via a press conference instead of coming to my home so we can discuss what I expect of THEM & assess their performance? Unrealistic? Out of touch? Hmmm.... 😜

Expand full comment

Yes. I also think, Cindy, that this is an attempt to get in front of the Wellington is dying narrative that is becoming unavoidable and omnipresent.

https://wellington.scoop.co.nz/?p=163796

A lot of their moves are to create and get in front of storylines. Perhaps in their minds - after being lobbied by local businesses - they genuinely think it will make Wellington city appear more alive and less businesses failed.

But yes, overall, they are not interested in the realities on the ground in my opinion - nor the nuances of good management.

Expand full comment

Money is the new God!

Expand full comment

Dogma over peoples lives. I think this is the plan, cut direct costs and obfuscate responsibility to ministry CEO’s to come up with diamonds from the pressure. That is all they have.

Expand full comment

100%

Expand full comment

"So why?" you ask. Maybe because the Government is draining what American politicians call the swamp. Get rid of Labour Party appointees and replace them with hard working people like us 😜

Expand full comment

Today's team meeting: how do we feel about the return to the office diktat? Meh. There aren't enough desks for everyone since we moved to a flexi working policy.

Expand full comment

I’m thinking all of this will just cost more money and attention and working out. Which is again an extra burden they are pushing down unnecessarily (in lieu of business lobby groups)

Expand full comment

Absolutely NO evidence that working from home is less productive than going in to the office. That's why we have the internet!

Expand full comment

If it was genuinely outcomes based management, the criteria would be based on results - and not a directive informing employees they should return to the office and support local businesses - the very businesses that this Government has helped to crash. Silly and designed to create a narrative for their voter base.

Expand full comment

So who is running communications for the LGTPM bloc?

Nobody?

Expand full comment

Seem weak and un-coordinated.

Expand full comment

It is distressing, selfish, evil even! They are hell bent on destroying our beautiful country!!

Expand full comment