If National wins ...

[Daytr]

Kelvin is certainly making a name for himself EZ. Seems Northland MPs are leading the charge.
When was the last time you heard from a National Northland MP? Oh yeah Mike Sabin & Dr Reti one under police investigation the other accused of blackmail. Nice ...

[BlackPeter]

Daytr, here is an article from Jamie Whyte about foreign house buyers. I challenge anyone to find an ounce of common sense in here. The numbers are meaningless, he calls it a 'simple example'. It's worse than that. He's just grumpy that National will have to cave in and do the sensible thing. The market didn't win. I hope he gives better advice in his consultancy.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/property/n...y+23+July+2015

Ah well - if you look through the comments to this article - some people seem to have understood his example, but I agree, it is certainly not one of his finest pieces of analysis, it certainly does not address the problem - but I don't think it is core ACT policy either.

However - sad thing is the past leader of ACT does not need to shine to outscore than current leader of Labour. Anybody else watched Little loosing his rag in the recent TV3 interview? Just embarrassing - imagine this guy wants to be PM - really?

http://www.3news.co.nz/nznews/video-...#axzz3gefCDJex

EZ - somehow it is a sad reflection on your party if you think that Labours only chance to get back into government is by continuously tearing everybody else down. Why don't you try instead to lift the bar inside your organisation - hey, this would do our country a service!

Actually - to be fair, Kelvin Davis made recently a quite good figure when highlighting some issues in our prison system. Obviously still early days, but he might be worth his money ... just a pity, that there seem to be more Cunliffe's and Little's than Davis' and Shearer's in the once grand old party.

[RGR367]

...................

Daytr, here is an article from Jamie Whyte about foreign house buyers. I challenge anyone to find an ounce of common sense in here. The numbers are meaningless, he calls it a 'simple example'. It's worse than that. He's just grumpy that National will have to cave in and do the sensible thing. The market didn't win. I hope he gives better advice in his consultancy.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/property/n...y+23+July+2015

You may not, but as a "foreigner" (sic) before becoming a naturalized Kiwi, I found the logic in it. And no matter these much talked data on foreigners buying houses in Auckland is used but as long the proper adjective of "chinese" sounding names are used, it will go down as being racist to most of us coming from Asia. We might not have paid attention to it much if it was coming from Winston P or NZF Party though

[elZorro]

You may not, but as a "foreigner" (sic) before becoming a naturalized Kiwi, I found the logic in it. And no matter these much talked data on foreigners buying houses in Auckland is used but as long the proper adjective of "chinese" sounding names are used, it will go down as being racist to most of us coming from Asia. We might not have paid attention to it much if it was coming from Winston P or NZF Party though

RGR367, sorry about my wording earlier. I meant overseas buyers of course. It doesn't matter where the overseas pressure on existing house stocks are coming from, it obviously distorts the prices that Aucklanders have to pay for existing houses that might be in their range of affordability. We need more housing stocks there, that's obvious. Allowing overseas buyers to build houses is much more sensible, but they should all be shut out of the existing housing sales if they don't already live here, or are intending to live here very soon. Lowered interest costs today are going to mean the solution to this problem needs to be found - fast. The market is not perfect, in this case it needs a helping hand from politicians.

[elZorro]

Ah well - if you look through the comments to this article - some people seem to have understood his example, but I agree, it is certainly not one of his finest pieces of analysis, it certainly does not address the problem - but I don't think it is core ACT policy either.

However - sad thing is the past leader of ACT does not need to shine to outscore than current leader of Labour. Anybody else watched Little loosing his rag in the recent TV3 interview? Just embarrassing - imagine this guy wants to be PM - really?

http://www.3news.co.nz/nznews/video-...#axzz3gefCDJex

EZ - somehow it is a sad reflection on your party if you think that Labours only chance to get back into government is by continuously tearing everybody else down. Why don't you try instead to lift the bar inside your organisation - hey, this would do our country a service!

Actually - to be fair, Kelvin Davis made recently a quite good figure when highlighting some issues in our prison system. Obviously still early days, but he might be worth his money ... just a pity, that there seem to be more Cunliffe's and Little's than Davis' and Shearer's in the once grand old party.

BP, Labour is wary of Patrick Gower, they have been for a while. I am not a statistician, but I have been involved in mini-trials, gathering data for papers, and I know that these people take pride in not overstating the figures. If anything, the figures are always understated, and the significance of them is given a number, a correlation or a standard deviation for example. That tells someone learned in the craft, how good the data is. Patrick Gower knows none of this, and he mentioned the phrase "cooked up the figures". That is certainly a red rag to a bull for someone who has been involved in the work, and I think Andrew Little was justified in his response on behalf of the team. Patrick Gower didn't have the data, he wouldn't know what to do with it anyway, therefore he cannot know if the data was 'cooked up' at all. That is not how a proper unbiased reporter should behave.

Labour would have used external information from their own electorate databases to bolster and check the data, National has similar data gathered from the electoral roll, and are using it to deliver targeted newsletters.

Kelvin Davis is doing a great job, there are many Labour MPs who are doing good work in their portfolios too. Time to shine a light on this National govt.

[craic]

I happens every time with Labour. They form a committee to work out which is the head and which is the tail of their dog. Then, as soon as they have explained to the public which end is which, the tail starts wagging the dog and they are back in the confused state again. Now it seems that the collar might be a better fit on Davis. Although highlighting the nasty side of NZ prisons is hardly new. It was going on under several Labour regimes as well in the last few decades. Fortunately the voters are likely to prefer a proven winner in the money markets.

[winner69]

Kelvin Davis. I was thinking he might be the man to turn Labour's fortune around

But he being a real plonker the last few days. No longer on my radar as a Labour leader after his performance on Radio NZ this morning

http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/pr...serco-contract

(Disclosure: don't really know what plonker means but it sounds a neat word)

[blackcap]

your not wrong there winner... he was terrible. Totally unsubstantiated and insinuations all round. I think its a union driven probe and unfortunately Kelvin Davis is the fall guy..

[Daytr]

Yeah I agree Winner, KD didn't come across well. A little agricultural is the term I would use to describe his performance. Although that didn't stop Shane Jones.

Craic, yes prisons always have some contra-ban & dodgy behavior, however if you think the level of basic partying, organized fight clubs & this dropping people off balconies onto concrete floors is anywhere near acceptable, I suggest you look at moving to the 3rd world. And no I don't think our prisons have always been this poorly run or necessarily the non Serco prisons are either. It appears the MT Eden Serco run prison is out of control.
Not a bad gig if you can get t. Take tax payer money & just don't do the job you are paid for. Hmm lets see mental health, social housing providers next. I wonder what tax payer money will be ripped off there. And then, hello TPPA, more corporatization at the tax payers expense. We will end up like the US with a government that is insolvent whilst corporations are ripping off government contracts, paying no tax & paying huge salaries & dividends.

[westerly]

Ah well - if you look through the comments to this article - some people seem to have understood his example, but I agree, it is certainly not one of his finest pieces of analysis, it certainly does not address the problem - but I don't think it is core ACT policy either.

However - sad thing is the past leader of ACT does not need to shine to outscore than current leader of Labour. Anybody else watched Little loosing his rag in the recent TV3 interview? Just embarrassing - imagine this guy wants to be PM - really?

http://www.3news.co.nz/nznews/video-...#axzz3gefCDJex

EZ - somehow it is a sad reflection on your party if you think that Labours only chance to get back into government is by continuously tearing everybody else down. Why don't you try instead to lift the bar inside your organisation - hey, this would do our country a service!

Actually - to be fair, Kelvin Davis made recently a quite good figure when highlighting some issues in our prison system. Obviously still early days, but he might be worth his money ... just a pity, that there seem to be more Cunliffe's and Little's than Davis' and Shearer's in the once grand old party.

Actually I thought Little was fairly restrained given Gower comes across as a fairly obnoxious reporter at his best. TV3 did it's own survey of probably hand picked Asian names to give it the result it wanted.
TV3 news is on a par with the major newspapers and TV1-- pathetically shallow.
The right side of the political spectrum is creating a New Zealand where anyone with a social conscience in public life is continuously under attack.
The Greens, Labour, NZ First are all subject to continuous opposition. As are anti liquor, anti sugar, and other public health advocates. We cannot have anything interfering in the ability of big business to pay less tax and make as much money as possible.
Andrew Little is being subjected to the same continual media and blogging attacks faced by Shearer, Cunliffe, and Norman. Strangely the Maori party seems immune.
As for Jamie Whyte, what he conveniently forgets is that the $800,000 he is quoting as a house price while probably nothing to a wealthy Asian looking for a new life is so far out of reach for the average Kiwi it is laughable.

westerly