Saturday 30 July 2011

Democracy for all

This from No Right Turn:
Greater Wellington Regional Council has decided to move to STV from 2013. Good. STV is a much fairer voting system than the bloc-vote usually used in local body elections (which is in effect a "winner take all" for a narrow plurality). Meanwhile, I'm just hoping Palmerston North City Council, which is considering a similar move, will make the right decision and adopt a fair voting system”. [Quote ends]
This is a victory for common-sense and one that I believe should happen here in Palmerston North. Democracy is not a static concept but is a living and changing activity. While some will attempt to restrain progressive changes to the accepted process of course democracy has its faults and some will seek to use those faults for their own purposes.
For years in NZ the system of first past the post was used to favour rural electorates who had fewer voters than city or urban electorates. In fact only once or twice has a party received over fifty percent of the total votes cast. The highest was the Labour Party’s victory back in the thirties when it gathered 54%.
As Grayling points out, “Democracy is only respectable when it can be made to work effectively and, even more importantly, fairly”. The goals are stable government, accommodating minorities and individuals, plus including majority interests.

A balance of MMP for national elections [which fairly represents parties] and STV for local government [which fairly represents individuals] seems to me like a sound balance.
While NZ slowly moves toward this balance other countries seem to be disenfranchising voters, for example the US which likes to see itself as the home of democracy but is slowly but surely removing the right to vote especially for the black and poorer citizens. The last term of Brush was clearly brought about by the disenfranchising of hundreds of thousands of black voters in key states.     
Of course a condition of genuine and effective democracy is an informed electorate and some major political parties and key individuals don’t actually want this to happen and that is a major concern. What they concentrate on is ‘Why not to change’ rather than the greater good. To them democracy takes second place to retaining power for they concentrate on the negative rather than the positive. Thousands of people have died advancing democracy and they deserve better from us for whom they died.

Thursday 28 July 2011

But wait there is more

Westpac and other banks may not be Rupert Murdoch [pictured] but they act like dear Rupert. Instead of phone tapping and paying off the UK police / Government illegally as Murdoch did, Westpac and other banks pile free-bees on key players in our Treasury. They shout them to Rugby matches, wine festivals, pop concerts and heaps of other activities. Now Westpac has the contract for handling all government banking business and this it’s worth millions and millions. And it continues to get the governments business. But wait there is more:
One Treasury staffer, portfolio manager Matthew Collin, took 36 gifts in 46 weeks, including rugby and racing tickets, a movie premiere, golf, rugby league, Toast Martinborough tickets and several meals. DMO head Phil Combes took 29 gifts, including dinners and lunches on big banks as far a field as London and Tokyo, and he even went to a pantomime courtesy of the BNZ late last year. But wait there is more.
The PM John Key wines and dines film mogul Warner Brothers, and Warners later host the PM in fun loving LA, outcome one movie costing the government and the country close to $100 million in tax rebates and marketing credits. Plus he changes law to keep wages low under urgency. And Key tells us that Labour is the big spender…yeah right. But wait there is more:
While all this was taking place the government instructed KiwiRail to buy Chinese built wagons and not build them in NZ, which led directly to the layoff of NZ workers at the Hillside workshop in Dunedin and else where. This had added to NZ highest rate of unemployment for many years. But wait there is still more!
    
The National government has been exposed for various deals that could be considered Murdoch in nature. 42 million loan to Mediaworks by Steven Joyce, The South Canterbury finance bail out and Gerry Brownlee’s [pictured] hiring of ex PM Jenny Shipley at a thousand dollars a day and Murray McCully’s latest appointment of disgraced ex-Nat MP Richard Worth as an ambassador, this after the various jobs for his mates were exposed as cash handouts and had to be reversed..
This kind of behaviour has become epidemic within this government and it must lead to the public having serious doubts about the ability of the government sell off plans, for it would seem that the retiring minister of justice / State owned enterprises [Simon Power] hopes to play a part in that sell off as a private individual. And if true, this has a nasty taste, since sale bonuses may well be involved. The courts may need to consider the legality of this possible behaviour.  
Now the best way to counter this trend is to ensure the National party doesn’t get the chance to sell off the family silver and it would seem that the latest poll makes that possible.  

The latest Roy Morgan poll shows a closer race. National drops 5 points, Labour is up 3 and Greens are up 2.
The results are:
·         National 49.0% (-5.0%)
·         Labour 33.5% (+3.0%)
·         Green 7.5% (+2.0%)
·         ACT 3.0% (+0.5%)
·         Maori 2.5% (-0.5%)
·         United Future 0.5% (nc)
·         NZ First 3.0% (-0.5%)
In a 122-seat parliament, you need 62 seats to govern. So National with ACT and United Future would be only four seats above that level. If over the next 19 weeks they lost more than four seats, then the Maori Party would hold the balance of power. With the Mana Party possibly winning up to four Maori seats and Labour the rest it is possible, even probable, that a victory for a Labour Greens Mana combination could stand a good chance of forming a government.
For John Key to pass laws he would need both Don Brash and the Maori Party to agree it is a good law. This may be the direct reason why the Nats have rushed into doing deals with the Act Party [National Branch] and Peter Dunne [National in drag]. The poll was taken from June 27 to July 10.
An even later poll show 49.5% support the Capital Gains Tax while 15% don’t and the rest don’t know.

Sunday 24 July 2011

‘Mass slaughter in Norway
Could it happen here? While our police and SIS attempt to stop terrorists from entering the country NZ Right-Wing Christian fundamentalists’ nut cases could be planning mass murder here in our own back-yard. No way you say…tell that to the Norwegians…

The Rightwing Christian fundamentalist [s] who brought havoc to Norway, the most successful nation in Europe and possibly the world and its Labour Government proves that no one is safe. Now that this has happened who will the armies belonging to ‘Coalition of the willing attack invade Norway to protect it from itself?.

The suspect [now confessed] 32-year-old Anders Behring Breivik is Norwegian so will the Coalition of the Willing now invade Norway to protect Norwegians from a Rightwing take over. After all Norway has oil, it is rich and is run by a popular Leftwing government, no they haven’t got weapons of mass destruction, but heck nor did Iraq.  
Oslo is the home of the Nobel Peace Award and that could be another reason for the ‘Coalition of the willing’ to get involved.
A right wing nut job has perpetrated a mass killing - the helicopter pictures of the island and all the tents were reminiscent of those from Jonestown Guyana. The Norwegians are in total shock.
An official said the attack "is probably more Norway's Oklahoma City than it is Norway's World Trade Center."

Thursday 21 July 2011

The latest Roy Morgan poll shows a closer race. National drops 5 points, Labour is up 3 and Greens are up 2.
The results are:
·         National 49.0% (-5.0%)
·         Labour 33.5% (+3.0%)
·         Green 7.5% (+2.0%)
·         ACT 3.0% (+0.5%)
·         Maori 2.5% (-0.5%)
·         United Future 0.5% (nc)
·         NZ First 3.0% (-0.5%)
In a 122-seat parliament, you need 62 seats to govern. So National with ACT and United Future would be only four seats above that level. If over the next 19 weeks they lost more than four seats, then the Maori Party would hold the balance of power. With the Mana Party possibly winning up to four Maori seats it is possible, even probable, that a victory for a Labour Greens Mana combination could stand a good chance of forming a government.
John Key to pass laws he would need both Don Brash and the Maori Party to agree it is a good law. This may be the direct reason why the Nats have done a deal with the Act Party and Peter Dunne [United Future] is keen to a a like deal. The poll was taken from June 27 to July 10.

Tuesday 19 July 2011

In the begining all things were equal...yeah yeah.

Once we were innocent new born babes. We had needs that had to be met so as to survive. Some have suggested that all are born equal and that all consequently have an equal chance to make something of their lives…except of course… it’s a fairy tale.
The major factor in deciding ones destiny is who your parents are and in what kind of society they lived. If you were born in South Africa in the sixties and were black and poor your chances for success were almost zero. If you were born in the forties in New Orleans or London and you were black and poor your chances were also zero, but it was a slight improvement to being born black in South Africa.
The other key issue was if your parents were affluent or not, your chances of survival improved dramatically if your parents were financially independent, had good housing and access to educational and healthcare opportunities. Clearly the one thing we can’t control is who our parents are, that is a given.
After the great depression of the thirties New Zealand attempted to construct, but not always willingly, a society that gave the newly born no matter who, a possibility for a real future. It wasn’t entirely fair or just but it had those goals, some were still rich and others poor.
The then Government reinvented the first steps in ensuring that the gap between individuals was reduced. Those same farsighted leaders created State housing, universal medical care and free and compulsory [up to age 15] education, even university was free. They created infrastructure which we owned, like power, roads, banks etc. Our tax system was progressive and fair.
At that time we honoured our sportspeople not by paying them millions but by recognising their abilities and skills. Heroes weren’t those who ripped off others and got rich on the backs of others. We respected those who did well by honest means; back then, most were willing to pay taxes based on a truly progressive system:
So while you will be swamped by PR spin about the dangers of boat people arriving in their thousands, radical Maori taking over the country, or how buying your own assets will pay the bills [how silly is that], don’t be fooled just remember these simple three points: the tax system: employment: a fair wage structure. Today the wealth gap has grown wider and success is measured in money terms. We now know the cost of everything and the value of nothing. New Zealand has gone down in the equality stakes and according to world measurements the gap between rich and poor here has and is growing at a rapid rate.
 Maintaining social equality via: the tax system, employment and a fair wage structure are the stepping stones for a just and fair social system. Improving these is what this coming general election should be all about.
2.
One of the ways often suggested for managing the worlds’ resources is to control the worlds’ population. So as we run out of oil for example we reduce the population to reduce the demand for oil. The same would apply to food and every thing else. Before setting off down this path we need to answer some fundamental questions.
Who produces the most children? Answer the poor. Who controls and uses the most oil? Answer the rich. Conclusion: by preventing the poor from having children we don’t save oil. Action: make the poor rich so they have fewer children, but this would mean they would use more oil. Answer: find a replacement for oil. Outcome: many of those who have got rich by exploiting the oil shortage would become poor…and have more children. My conclusion: create the climate that creates less poor [redistributing wealth]: population problem partly solved. Seek to solve the peak oil problem by creating alternative energy sources.
To solve the food shortage, make the rich poorer so that they eat less [only joking] and so on. Population control by law [as in China] or population control by murder as practiced by the Nazi’s is surely not acceptable.  
3.

As for the Capital Gains Tax, here's a list of people who now all agree with Labour…at least to putting it on the agenda for serious consideration.
The Dominion Post, NBR, Herald on Sunday, Gisborne Herald, Waikato Times, The Greens, The IMF, The OECD, and columnists Paul Little, Mike Hosking, Gordon Campbell, Anthony Hubbard, Patrick Smellie, Vernon Small, Corin Dann, Andrea Vance, John Hartvell, Matthew Hooten, John Roughan, Duncan Garner, John Armstrong, Bernard Hickey, plus Gareth Morgan, Sam Morgan
plus Academ
ic tax experts, economists and TreasuryAnd here's the list of people who agree with John Key...John Key, Peter Dunne, ACT and the IRD.
Labour has now released their tax policy: a capital gains tax (with some exceptions, including the family home), a new top rate applying to those earning over $150,000 [39cents], no GST on fresh fruit and vegetables, and a $5,000 tax-free bracket.
Peter Dunne, who earns $209,100 as a Minister outside Cabinet, and who owns an investment property in Taupo, calls it a "desperate, ignorant attack on [his?] achievement". Dunne of course pays nothing if he simply hangs on to his property in Taupo.
This means that, 90% of New Zealanders will be better off. Over 98% of Kiwi’s will pay less personal income tax, and the vast majority of us will never encounter these new taxes at all.
The Labour Party has done the right thing in balancing the tax system. Sam Morgan was paid 700 million by Fairfax Ltd for Trade Me and never paid one cent in tax. Sam agreed that was wrong. The Labour plan is both prudent and necessary at this time. It is still very conservative but at least it closes the biggest loophole in our taxation system.
You now have a clear choice…sell off our assets and see the profits go off shore under National or make the wealthy pay their FAIR share. The choice is yours.