Re Labour's plan to build 100,000 homes but only reaching 14,000 - people forget very quickly about Covid and its consequent supply line issues.
I was told recently by a staffer in MBIE about the agency that was created to develop the delivery of public housing at such scale and speed. From land acquisition to planning, council consenting to public transport, utilities to materials and appliances - everything scoped in-house to solve all the issues upfront and wholistically before rolling it out all over the place - no stone left unturned.
Imagine where we'd be now if Covid had never happened, if that very sound reality had not been affected by lockdowns, materials and expertise shortages, etc...
It would've been breathtaking.
There has to be a mechanism for locking in cross-party agreements, that cannot be unpicked later on for political gain.
There have to be cross-party obligations on retaining publicly-funded amenities, entities and buildings, so hospitals, public housing, power companies, banks etc remain in collective ownership.
For my 2 cents worth we need to take some lessons from the right and have a less polite and apologetic left wing when facing down media and opposition parties - especially when it comes to scandals, and those have seemed mild in comparison to the right wings clangers. Also the noise around three waters should have been ignored as this coalition ignores anything regarding opposition to their policy implementation.
The discourse around tax needs to change. I see on so many social media posts people complaining about paying tax. They bloody need to be educated! I don’t understand how they imagine a country would function without tax paying for infrastructure that EVERYONE uses daily and is essential to modern life. The alternative of course is user pays for every minute thing and I think faced with that reality they’d change their mind quick smart about so called ‘socialism’, ‘wasteful’ govt spending and publicly owned entities.
Re: tax - that's what I hoped to capture in the "education" and "economic myths" components.
It's also related to the misinformation angle.
For example, this government knows our finances are not sustainable yet their immediate reaction is to mock the CGT - why? Because of vested interests.
Also they want to use this as an attack line against the left wing parties - precisely because of what you say.
So many people do not want to pay more taxes and most people vote based on their wallets - not what is good for the country or what's even necessary.
The cause and effect links are broken - and most people can't identify what's causing much of our malaise.
They therefore cling on to things like "Maori", which is preposterous in the scheme of things.
$3-4b in lifetime settlements for Maori - about the same as landlords get in one budget cycle.
About polite and apologetic, I'm starting to see more fire in the belly of oppositions but one thing we all need to do - in my view - is canvass right wing and 'normal' channels and watch what they are saying.
I'd wager a large majority of people are not political or news cycle tragics like I am - therefore they only absorb a headline or two [media power]
I'd personally never want to be a left wing government. I find left wing voters to be the most judgemental of their own - and demand values of them that they could only hope to discover under ancient fossils from the other side.
The other context is - the right are significantly more moneyed up and that matters from social media campaigns to their affiliates drumming up hundreds of thousands of supporters....
I don't mind people I vote for being louder either - but I take a step back in recognising that the politicians are probably doing the work of sensing out desires out in the field - so I just watch and see. The fact that it feels like some are changing their style now means they are just being strategic, which is a good thing in the face of such significant corporate media and money power.
Yes! I’ve always said I don’t begrudge paying taxes as it pays for the things we seem to take for granted.
I believe WE all own NZ. We ALL pay taxes, and the government provides and organizes what we ALL need. It’s OUR health system, infrastructure, environment, etc. It is not the Government’s to sell off.
Anti-corruption, and integrity are at the very top of my list.
I agree with you about the left being judgemental, sometimes there is a holier than thou moral stance that does not sit well with some classes so to speak. I think that bourgeois, intellectual veil needs to be dissipated somehow.
CGT/wealth tax needs to be put forward forcefully and confidently and the Labour Party needs to not shrink away and crumble under inevitable cries of envy etc. and kowtow to the landlord class. We are going down a path where the inequality will be very difficult to reverse if the left don’t have vision and the confidence to set in stone the required changes.
If I may, it has to be more than that: it must be a whole Civics subject that begins pre-contact, spans He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni (1835) and Te Tiriti, the NZ Wars, land confiscation, the early Parliament, suffrage, the two-party system, MMP and the transition from FPP, referenda - so many of us know nothing of this history and how we reached this point.
I'm not a details, details person so I hope to catch the broad brush with "history" and experts can fill in the particulars.
I think these are all important aspects. And it's for a reason that Republicans in the USA have tried to erase history from their classrooms in the last few years.
Agree with your point about not being “too wordy”. I find much left wing comment, although “pedantically accurate”, to be “too wordy”. The right wing commentators are masters of the quick attention grabbing quip.
The political malaise is so widespread and deep seated it is impossible to nutshell it. Intellectualising the issues will not sway the electorate. Money/finance as we know it is passe. Bitcoin is BS. However, humankind is on the threshold of expanding discoveries and by 2030 we will wonder what on earth we were worried about back in 2025
How long is it since Colombo "discovered" America ? How long is it since airlines became part of our daily lives? How long will it be before interplanetary discoveries and travel put Colombo's effort in the shade...
At any given time, info seems to cluster in my head in themes that simplify down to a single message.
The most recent has concerned oligarchs.
Or maybe I mean the super-rich, or at least billionaires, of which NZ has quite a few (and their number is growing here at the rate of about four per week, say Oxfam). A billionaire has net worth of over one thousand million dollars, an amount which is beyond comprehension.
“New Zealand is a wealthy country and has more than enough resources to provide a dignified life for all. According to the recent Global Wealth Report 2023, New Zealand has the 4th highest median wealth per adult amongst the 217 territories and countries reported on.”
The fourth highest median wealth?
I checked, and we’ve dipped a bit to fifth or sixth in the recent charts, but this is still basically true.
Apart from tax havens and curiously, Belgium🙂, New Zealand is the country where an individual will pay the least tax on wealth. They will pay zero tax on capital gains, wealth or inheritance. If they’re effectively not ‘waged’, but just flick assets around, they will pay no tax at all. We are feeding the rich.
Rich people are not all wicked, I know. However, it’s a system. Oxfam is onto it, in new report, ‘Takers, not Makers’, detailing how the world’s rich got to be rich and how it works. Firstly, the majority didn’t work for their dosh: 60% derived their wealth from inheritance, power itself, or cronyism. Each billionaire’s wealth grows by US$2m a day on average. And due to the way wealth works, particularly debt, and the outcomes of colonialism, the poor pay the rich: in 2023, the Global South paid over $30 million per hour to the richest 1% in the Global North. It is hard to digest, but it is fact.
Oligarchs and the super-rich are now eating the world much faster than ever before. Oligarchs and the super-rich generally don’t care about GDP, or societal wellbeing. They like privatisation, and they don’t like what gets in the way of unbridled exploitation of a country for their own enrichment. They don’t like regulations that protect their prey, including safety catches, human (incl. indigenous) rights, or the other bits that we value.
The past few days I’ve caught up with George Monbiot in the Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/profile/georgemonbiot, particularly the one about oligarchs (‘class war’), the one about tearing up the machinery of government, and the one about how Trump could trigger a global collapse (by removing all the safety machinery). Through all of these, I’m seeing the parallels with what is happening here - - the dismantling of what protects us, and the opening up of the widest possible avenues for predators to simply devour what we have. It all just seems to have one theme: removing barriers to privatisation and exploitation. It’s as long and as short as that, and it is as scary as hell.
The other day, I started the car about 6.30pm with the car radio on,and broke into an RNZ panel show to hear a chap called Tim say, in so many words ‘There is one single problem in NZ, and that is wealth distribution’. It went down like a lead balloon. But it’s being said a lot right now. I think it bears saying, repeatedly, everywhere.
Jacinda was a politician and leader of courage, but decades ahead of her time.
Her Cabinet and Caucus lacked guts and knowledge to plow ahead with government investments and full employment of Kiwis. Some of the MP's were just numbskulls (I know, from chatting with them). However, a numbskull with a heart & soul is better than a Tory with a 150 IQ.
We will need more like her before one of them actually understands the purpose of the NZD currency. I'm only guessing, but had her administration had this knowledge they might have become far too popular, and let it go to their heads! This could have inflated hat sizes.
Everyone has to be brought along and the underpinnings of it supported by transparency and education - hence my use of the word values
You’ve shown your values but I’d wager many who vote for NACT1 might translate the application of those differently
As you already know - there are different levels to planning - the principles are conceptual so how do we translate those down?
Policy management applies to different areas unless we devolve that aka to the libertarian ideal of small government or perhaps a more indigenous framework of local communities
For me the devil is in the detail and I personally think this is where the issues lie - and must be addressed
I appreciate the sharing of these principles
They’re great
I remember Susie once used the word this progression may be organic - and it may well be
Over the next 5 years perhaps there will be new paradigms and discoveries that upend many assumptions - and new models may evolve into our consciousness
My approach here is based on current dynamics and context only
And the constant reflection I have on not only those that I might agree with - but the many who choose to vote for the Coaltion partners…and the extremism that is being cultivated every day
It’d be good to find commonality one day again if it’s possible and that’s what I hope for too
Re Labour's plan to build 100,000 homes but only reaching 14,000 - people forget very quickly about Covid and its consequent supply line issues.
I was told recently by a staffer in MBIE about the agency that was created to develop the delivery of public housing at such scale and speed. From land acquisition to planning, council consenting to public transport, utilities to materials and appliances - everything scoped in-house to solve all the issues upfront and wholistically before rolling it out all over the place - no stone left unturned.
Imagine where we'd be now if Covid had never happened, if that very sound reality had not been affected by lockdowns, materials and expertise shortages, etc...
It would've been breathtaking.
There has to be a mechanism for locking in cross-party agreements, that cannot be unpicked later on for political gain.
There have to be cross-party obligations on retaining publicly-funded amenities, entities and buildings, so hospitals, public housing, power companies, banks etc remain in collective ownership.
An excellent point, Archives Rock.
💯👍🏾Agree there should be at least minimum thresholds to overturn public good measures or some such - like 60% or more of ALL MPs?
I think that’s the entrenchment threshold!
For my 2 cents worth we need to take some lessons from the right and have a less polite and apologetic left wing when facing down media and opposition parties - especially when it comes to scandals, and those have seemed mild in comparison to the right wings clangers. Also the noise around three waters should have been ignored as this coalition ignores anything regarding opposition to their policy implementation.
The discourse around tax needs to change. I see on so many social media posts people complaining about paying tax. They bloody need to be educated! I don’t understand how they imagine a country would function without tax paying for infrastructure that EVERYONE uses daily and is essential to modern life. The alternative of course is user pays for every minute thing and I think faced with that reality they’d change their mind quick smart about so called ‘socialism’, ‘wasteful’ govt spending and publicly owned entities.
Great points.
Re: tax - that's what I hoped to capture in the "education" and "economic myths" components.
It's also related to the misinformation angle.
For example, this government knows our finances are not sustainable yet their immediate reaction is to mock the CGT - why? Because of vested interests.
Also they want to use this as an attack line against the left wing parties - precisely because of what you say.
So many people do not want to pay more taxes and most people vote based on their wallets - not what is good for the country or what's even necessary.
The cause and effect links are broken - and most people can't identify what's causing much of our malaise.
They therefore cling on to things like "Maori", which is preposterous in the scheme of things.
$3-4b in lifetime settlements for Maori - about the same as landlords get in one budget cycle.
I find that most people don't seem
About polite and apologetic, I'm starting to see more fire in the belly of oppositions but one thing we all need to do - in my view - is canvass right wing and 'normal' channels and watch what they are saying.
I'd wager a large majority of people are not political or news cycle tragics like I am - therefore they only absorb a headline or two [media power]
I'd personally never want to be a left wing government. I find left wing voters to be the most judgemental of their own - and demand values of them that they could only hope to discover under ancient fossils from the other side.
The other context is - the right are significantly more moneyed up and that matters from social media campaigns to their affiliates drumming up hundreds of thousands of supporters....
I don't mind people I vote for being louder either - but I take a step back in recognising that the politicians are probably doing the work of sensing out desires out in the field - so I just watch and see. The fact that it feels like some are changing their style now means they are just being strategic, which is a good thing in the face of such significant corporate media and money power.
Yes! I’ve always said I don’t begrudge paying taxes as it pays for the things we seem to take for granted.
I believe WE all own NZ. We ALL pay taxes, and the government provides and organizes what we ALL need. It’s OUR health system, infrastructure, environment, etc. It is not the Government’s to sell off.
Anti-corruption, and integrity are at the very top of my list.
Excellent Charlotte!!
I agree with you about the left being judgemental, sometimes there is a holier than thou moral stance that does not sit well with some classes so to speak. I think that bourgeois, intellectual veil needs to be dissipated somehow.
CGT/wealth tax needs to be put forward forcefully and confidently and the Labour Party needs to not shrink away and crumble under inevitable cries of envy etc. and kowtow to the landlord class. We are going down a path where the inequality will be very difficult to reverse if the left don’t have vision and the confidence to set in stone the required changes.
Yes! And education in schools about the importance of voting.
So true! I'll update!
PS Thanks for reading it Angela - this one was a little tedious :-)
It wasn’t tedious. It was nice and simple to understand. 😊
If I may, it has to be more than that: it must be a whole Civics subject that begins pre-contact, spans He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni (1835) and Te Tiriti, the NZ Wars, land confiscation, the early Parliament, suffrage, the two-party system, MMP and the transition from FPP, referenda - so many of us know nothing of this history and how we reached this point.
I'm not a details, details person so I hope to catch the broad brush with "history" and experts can fill in the particulars.
I think these are all important aspects. And it's for a reason that Republicans in the USA have tried to erase history from their classrooms in the last few years.
Absolutely, but I agree with MT. To get the points across (at this early stage), it can’t be too wordy, or else people may disengage.
Really though, that should be basic curriculum at school… 🤷♀️
Agree with your point about not being “too wordy”. I find much left wing comment, although “pedantically accurate”, to be “too wordy”. The right wing commentators are masters of the quick attention grabbing quip.
The political malaise is so widespread and deep seated it is impossible to nutshell it. Intellectualising the issues will not sway the electorate. Money/finance as we know it is passe. Bitcoin is BS. However, humankind is on the threshold of expanding discoveries and by 2030 we will wonder what on earth we were worried about back in 2025
I like this as it's something I feel is possible too. Do you want to expand on that a little or is here not the place?
How long is it since Colombo "discovered" America ? How long is it since airlines became part of our daily lives? How long will it be before interplanetary discoveries and travel put Colombo's effort in the shade...
Yes I like that - sometimes I think we are so divergent that maybe a solution or perspective will have to come from elsewhere
Thanks for sharing your perspective
A late entry – (bizzy). Sorry it’s long.
At any given time, info seems to cluster in my head in themes that simplify down to a single message.
The most recent has concerned oligarchs.
Or maybe I mean the super-rich, or at least billionaires, of which NZ has quite a few (and their number is growing here at the rate of about four per week, say Oxfam). A billionaire has net worth of over one thousand million dollars, an amount which is beyond comprehension.
It started when I read the Salvation Army submission on the 2024 Budget Policy Statement https://www.salvationarmy.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tsa_sppu_bps_2024_submission_apr2024.pdf.
The Aha paragraph said:
“New Zealand is a wealthy country and has more than enough resources to provide a dignified life for all. According to the recent Global Wealth Report 2023, New Zealand has the 4th highest median wealth per adult amongst the 217 territories and countries reported on.”
The fourth highest median wealth?
I checked, and we’ve dipped a bit to fifth or sixth in the recent charts, but this is still basically true.
The second Aha Moment came here: https://assets.nationbuilder.com/tja/pages/509/attachments/original/1726691392/High_earner_tax_rates_-_Final.docx.pdf?1726691392
Apart from tax havens and curiously, Belgium🙂, New Zealand is the country where an individual will pay the least tax on wealth. They will pay zero tax on capital gains, wealth or inheritance. If they’re effectively not ‘waged’, but just flick assets around, they will pay no tax at all. We are feeding the rich.
Rich people are not all wicked, I know. However, it’s a system. Oxfam is onto it, in new report, ‘Takers, not Makers’, detailing how the world’s rich got to be rich and how it works. Firstly, the majority didn’t work for their dosh: 60% derived their wealth from inheritance, power itself, or cronyism. Each billionaire’s wealth grows by US$2m a day on average. And due to the way wealth works, particularly debt, and the outcomes of colonialism, the poor pay the rich: in 2023, the Global South paid over $30 million per hour to the richest 1% in the Global North. It is hard to digest, but it is fact.
Oligarchs and the super-rich are now eating the world much faster than ever before. Oligarchs and the super-rich generally don’t care about GDP, or societal wellbeing. They like privatisation, and they don’t like what gets in the way of unbridled exploitation of a country for their own enrichment. They don’t like regulations that protect their prey, including safety catches, human (incl. indigenous) rights, or the other bits that we value.
The past few days I’ve caught up with George Monbiot in the Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/profile/georgemonbiot, particularly the one about oligarchs (‘class war’), the one about tearing up the machinery of government, and the one about how Trump could trigger a global collapse (by removing all the safety machinery). Through all of these, I’m seeing the parallels with what is happening here - - the dismantling of what protects us, and the opening up of the widest possible avenues for predators to simply devour what we have. It all just seems to have one theme: removing barriers to privatisation and exploitation. It’s as long and as short as that, and it is as scary as hell.
The other day, I started the car about 6.30pm with the car radio on,and broke into an RNZ panel show to hear a chap called Tim say, in so many words ‘There is one single problem in NZ, and that is wealth distribution’. It went down like a lead balloon. But it’s being said a lot right now. I think it bears saying, repeatedly, everywhere.
Sorry it’s long to Mountain Tui is a misnomer.
I will come back and read this soon with sincere gratitude for this sharing which I will absorb with interest.
Jacinda was a politician and leader of courage, but decades ahead of her time.
Her Cabinet and Caucus lacked guts and knowledge to plow ahead with government investments and full employment of Kiwis. Some of the MP's were just numbskulls (I know, from chatting with them). However, a numbskull with a heart & soul is better than a Tory with a 150 IQ.
We will need more like her before one of them actually understands the purpose of the NZD currency. I'm only guessing, but had her administration had this knowledge they might have become far too popular, and let it go to their heads! This could have inflated hat sizes.
Fair points
Wow, that's a serious size can of worms your opening Tui.
Think we have to be a bit careful about barking at every passing car before we go back to first principles.
That's why I truly believe in the international green movements 4 pillars
1. Look after this planet, so our grandchildrens grandchildren can enjoy its fruits, as we do.
2. Look after the people of this planet so we all can live a life of contentment and dignity.
3. Devolve the decision making to the lowest common denominator. So as people can have some control over their destiny.
4. Don't make war.
Applying these principles would mean that every time a law is enacted they would need to be proven to abide by the four pillars.
Then we get to the details
They’re good principles.
Everyone has to be brought along and the underpinnings of it supported by transparency and education - hence my use of the word values
You’ve shown your values but I’d wager many who vote for NACT1 might translate the application of those differently
As you already know - there are different levels to planning - the principles are conceptual so how do we translate those down?
Policy management applies to different areas unless we devolve that aka to the libertarian ideal of small government or perhaps a more indigenous framework of local communities
For me the devil is in the detail and I personally think this is where the issues lie - and must be addressed
I appreciate the sharing of these principles
They’re great
I remember Susie once used the word this progression may be organic - and it may well be
Over the next 5 years perhaps there will be new paradigms and discoveries that upend many assumptions - and new models may evolve into our consciousness
My approach here is based on current dynamics and context only
And the constant reflection I have on not only those that I might agree with - but the many who choose to vote for the Coaltion partners…and the extremism that is being cultivated every day
It’d be good to find commonality one day again if it’s possible and that’s what I hope for too