This government is not comfortable with a trade-off between COVID-19 and the economy or the environment and the economy. It’s either one extreme or the other with no meeting in the middle. One whiff of community spread and we will be sent back to lockdown, region by
Dr Eric Crampton Nathan Smith nzinitiative.org.nz Most of the country is still reeling from the drastic lockdown response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The major cities are hurting, but it’s not until one travels to rural New Zealand that the simmering economic issues appear. Chief economist Eric
Dr Eric Crampton nzinitiative.org.nz An old Australian tourism ad highlighted empty gorgeous beaches, wide-open spaces and asked viewers, “So where the bloody hell are you?” The ad was top-of-mind as our family toured the South Island over school holidays. Up to a million Kiwis live
As a Tasmanian, I have to admit that it gives me at least a tiny thrill of schadenfreude to watch another state cop a shellacking for once. Victoria is the sick man of Australia. A leper with a “Kick Me” sign pinned to its back. But the shameful pleasure of
Danielle van Dalen maxim.org.nz The COVID-19 pandemic saw New Zealand enter its second nationwide state of emergency in March 2020. This gave the Government access to levels of power not seen in New Zealand since the 1950s, perhaps ever. As a nation, we got lucky this time
NZ Initiative nzinitiative.org.nz Wellington, 23 July 2020 – New Zealand needs to ‘raft up’ with other COVID-free countries while building stronger border capabilities, according to a new report by The New Zealand Initiative. And a voucher programme for helping returning Kiwis cover the cost of managed isolation could
Prof Worzel It was a tactic used during the last days of the Roman Empire. The ruling powers provided free ‘bread and circuses’ to the people to distract them from the harsh reality that resources both moral and physical were running perilously low. Rome’s once renowned military might was
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COVID Plan B covidplanb.co.nz In a stunning interview, Professor Carl Heneghan from the Centre for Evidence Based Medicine at Oxford says: “If you follow the New Zealand policy of suppressing it to zero and locking down the country forever, then you’re going to have a problem… This
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What is becoming undeniably clear in the Wuhan pandemic is that the worst depredations of the virus have been enabled by the stupidity and incompetence of governments and health bureaucracies. Besides the original epicentre in China, there’s the horror-show in New York, run by a Democrat governor and
Sir Stephen Tindall signed a letter to governments, asking them to tax millionaires more. His timing in signing that letter could not have been worse. Now everyone that knows about it will call him out for the hypocrite that he is, asking to be taxed more while workers in his
We face an economic disaster, the likes of which most have never experienced in their lifetime. The financial blowout is the result of Jacinda Ardern’s decision to lock down healthy people and businesses, as well as the policies of her socialist Labour Government’s out-of-control spending and
Michael Plank, University of Canterbury Alex James, University of Canterbury Audrey Lustig, Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research Nicholas Steyn; Rachelle Binny, Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research and Shaun Hendy Stringent border controls and mandatory quarantine give New Zealand a good chance to remain free of COVID-19 for months to come, according
Conspiracy theories flourish where those in power lie and obfuscate. The Wuhan pandemic has been characterised by official lies and cover-ups from its very beginnings. But if the Chinese government and its cronies at the WHO lied and misled the world and generally screwed up royally, other governments and
I generally listen to Newstalk ZB, on the basis that they are slightly less wet and biased than the other news media. I am a big Hosking fan, but most of the rest of them leave me reasonably cold, or at best only lukewarm. So imagine my surprise when I
