Something didn’t seem quite right about the government’s address to the nation on Wednesday. Here we had deputy prime minister, Winston Peters, telling us how the Ministry of Health had asked the government to shut the borders to everyone, including Kiwis. I was surprised to hear him say
Many of you will have heard how the government is considering giving every adult $1500 and every child $500 to stimulate the economy. This is a bold proposal. For a start, it is likely to cost somewhere between $12 billion and $15 billion, so it is not an insignificant sum.
Nobody could call Simon Bridges a great leader of the opposition. It is the worst position in politics, with him becoming leader straight after an election loss. No one wants to go there, but there he is. He is a smart man, but he doesn’t have great communication skills,
It is interesting how, now that we have a Labour government, the reports on people living in their cars have completely dried up, and yet the housing crisis is worse than ever. Now, with the government’s generous wage subsidy package, we could all be forgiven for thinking that Jacinda
Just before we went into lockdown, I heard how the Department of Health was recruiting retired health workers. Most of these people had allowed their registrations to lapse, but the Health Department was able to deal with that. It seemed that they were able to effect the re-registrations in most
Today (Tuesday 21 April) we have 5 new cases of COVID-19. We have a total of 13 deaths, all older people with underlying health conditions. This is sad for their families, but in world terms, our numbers are very low. Whether we were never going to be badly affected, or
We are locked into a plan that has most of us on welfare one way or another, and we are also locked into an economic meltdown. The meltdown is just starting, but it has the potential to become very severe indeed. In the early 1990s, we had a bad recession
The Green Party really does have very little grip on reality. First of all, Julie Anne Genter is proposing ‘pop-up’ cycleways and footpaths, in order to make social distancing easier, when we all know that the best way to practise social distancing is to stay in the car. These ‘pop-up’
I neither support nor condemn the government’s decision to put the country into lockdown to reduce the ravages of COVID-19. There are arguments both ways; either we sacrifice the lives of older and infirm people for the sake of a healthy economy, or we do everything we can to
One of the best things about the COVID-19 pandemic is that everyone has forgotten about climate change. We are all much more worried about getting sick; about infecting others or being infected by others; of looking after elderly parents or relatives and trying to survive financially. Times are tough for
Governments – all governments – operate at such a high level, that when they try to design a package specifically to aid small business, they almost inevitably fail miserably. The intentions are always good, but those that usually work at the macro level always struggle with looking at things from a micro
I was fortunate to have done most of my globe trotting when I was young. A few trips to Europe, mostly by train in my teens and early twenties, followed by a couple of years living in Hong Kong gave me plenty of opportunity for travel, and by the time
One of the things that Jacinda called for as the COVID-19 crisis worsened was the end to all political parties campaigning and scoring political points. It seemed to be a reasonable request; the government needed to be able to make sensible decisions and having the opposition shout down every move
The rot is setting in, and sadly, after tourism, it may be construction that is next to be badly hit. Most construction projects operate on relatively small margins (that can disappear altogether if anything goes wrong), frequent cash payments that pay suppliers, contractors and salaries, but not much else, and
Editors note: Due to technical issues yesterday that prevented our articles from being viewed by most of our audience I have made the decision to republish them today. I am developing a strong respect for Grant Robertson. I never rated him much as a finance minister, simply because he has
I am developing a strong respect for Grant Robertson. I never rated him much as a finance minister, simply because he has no background in finance or economics, but clearly Grant is one of the very few ministers who has worked hard to get on top of his portfolio. While
