Border, quarantine Chris Trotter (Interest): When ‘light-handed regulation’ turns out to mean ‘no regulation at all’ Bryce Edwards (Democracy Project): Political Roundup: Fallout from the Covid border blunder Richard Harman (Politik): The Covid-19 culture clash Stuff Editorial: Breach may have come at critical time for containment Andrew Dickens
Jacinda Ardern once said it was possible to never lie in politics, which are now quite possibly words she wished she had never uttered. This past week has seen a veritable potpourri of lies issue from her lying mouth. We were told that the military was being called in to
Chris Penk The BFD is serialising National MP Chris Penk’s book Flattening the Country by publishing an extract every day. What becomes of the “non-essential”? A government whose chief virtue is PR can normally be relied on to have “good optics”, as they say in spinning circles. The
Ananish Chaudhuri Simon Thornley Michael Jackson covidplanb.co.nz The recent fiasco that allowed people to leave quarantine without testing, risking the spread of COVID-19, highlights how nebulous the government’s claim of total elimination always was. The government, in projecting thousands of deaths that never eventuated, has continued
Here is the definition of the role of a Prime Minister. The Prime Minister determines the general direction of Government’s activities and ensures coordinated and purposeful work of the Cabinet of Ministers. The last half is worth repeating: ENSURES COORDINATED AND PURPOSEFUL WORK OF THE CABINET OF MINISTERS. If
Border restrictions, quarantine Tracy Watkins (Stuff): The only way to restore confidence is to order an urgent inquiry into our border failures John Armstrong (1News): David Clark is Minister of Health in name only after calamitous Covid-19 testing bungle Andrea Vance (Stuff): If there must be anger, direct it
We watched in disbelief as mobs looted and vandalised in America, attacking and beating people, wrecking their businesses and murdering those that tried to stop them. The catch cry is “Justice for George”, but the police officers who were involved in George Floyd’s murder have already been brought to
The government stumbles from one mistake to another as we all wait for the daily corrections and U-turns on policy. It has all the hallmarks of Boris Johnson making policy up on the hoof much to the anguish of his cabinet. Johnson still looks ill, lacking his normal bounce
Just when you thought it was safe to go back outside, China proves itself as the country that keeps on giving. Euroweekly News reports. Over 1,000 flights into and out of Beijing have been grounded today, after the alarm was raised over fears of a new outbreak of coronavirus.
Chris Penk The BFD is serialising National MP Chris Penk’s book Flattening the country by publishing an extract every day. Disconcerting developments It is worth remembering throughout all of this that the unbelievably cavalier attitude of the government right up to (and including) mid-March had got our country
The pedestal was never high enough for you, was it? You swaggered on stage and addressed the nation every day for two months convincing many that under your watch, we would be protected from the unmitigated calamity of COVID-19. You claimed that without your immediate intervention up to eighty
Now would be an excellent time for a political leader (with a steely backbone) to step forward with a COVID management plan in hand. The coalition government is completely out of ideas after promising much and delivering ineffective quarantine management and testing. Please don’t ask what happened to “test,
So what happens now? Now that we know that a birthday party was held in a quarantine hotel, and the birthday child blew out the candles and pieces of cake were handed out to all party attendees? Now that we know a wedding was held in a quarantine hotel: not
Chris Penk The BFD is serialising National MP Chris Penk’s book Flattening the Country by publishing an extract every day. None of your business Perhaps the most telling remark on either side of the argument about the lockdown’s length came from Labour’s minister for employment, Willie Jackson.
