Labour govt 2020-23

[Balance]

Using the App for this doesn't mean anything for your data!
A vaccine passport doesn't need to know where you have been - just needs to know your vaccine status.
Jumping widely at unfounded conclusions!

Remember CGT? Kiwibuild? Ihumatao? No new taxes?

You simply cannot trust anything that comes out of the mouth of the spin-mistress Cindy.

[Balance]

I thought you wanted that - restrict the movements of un-vaccinated people?

Absolutely as these anti-vaxxers are mostly the scum of the Earth. Nothing wrong with treating scum that way.

Same way we treat criminals - those who are hell bent on undermining the greater good of society should and must be treated differently.

What's your point again?

[Bjauck]

Britain wants to look good, especially the politicians. They're after a photo op rather than good trade deals.

There's no country to trade with for thousands of miles so they have to turn to Australia/NZ. Which is good for us though and we hold the cards on this one.

LOL, I think many in Johnson and his Conservative party have almost worn themselves out by giving the middle finger to other countries. Protectionism is far more on their cards. But I agree a meaningless photo op with a former loyal Dominion would mean they can pretend that Global Britain is a goer.

[Panda-NZ-]

Brexit combined with protectionism won't really work. especially since they have all this new social care stuff to fund.

UK farmers don't have workers anymore (plus the reduction in eu subsidies) which shows they're willing to make some detrimental changes to the sector. Australia's trade deal includes agriculture.

[jonu]

The murky agenda is being drip fed into the spotlight

https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/natio...?ocid=msedgntp

If 20-30% of the population don't take the Covid jab, where does leave businesses that want their custom?

Are pubs and cafes going to ban a chunk of their customers?

Are the unvaccinated doomed to becoming unemployed?

Are we to have an underclass caste in NZ?

Whether you are happy to take the Covid vaccine or not, these issues should deeply concern you. They are fundamental to how we view our society.
What will be the next issue the government will use to impose restrictions and effectively change the Citizen status of a section of society?
We are approaching the endgame of an 18 month programme of propaganda from the government which included 100 million in bribes to Media.

Make your opinions known where ever you have opportunity. Don't be shy about letting your MPs know. Write to members of parliament and tell them the country will not abide it.

[Panda-NZ-]

He is indeed good looking. Makes up for the genetic issues of spanish royalty, although the king of spain is pretty fine too.

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/lifes...de-effect.html

[iceman]

A good Herald article today about how we became to be at " the end of the queue". Shows Minister Hipkins has been blatantly lying to us but that is not unexpected.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/...5RWMJIX5IBQRA/

Here is an excerpt:
To properly understand New Zealand's negotiating footing with Pfizer it's necessary to turn the clock back to last year.
Starting in May, and picking up pace in June, July and August, dozens of countries inked advance purchase agreements with pharmaceutical companies with promising plans: Pfizer, AstraZenica, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna and others.

Pfizer signed such deals with countries large and small: the United States, Britain, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Israel and Canada to name a few.
New Zealand, however, had no purchasing plan at the time. In late May, ministers announced a Covid-19 vaccine strategy, but it was little more than a $37 million pot of money to sprinkle around domestic vaccine research and manufacturing capability. There was no provision for the advance purchase of any international medicine at all.
In fact, it wasn't until August 10 last year that the New Zealand Cabinet finally took the steps necessary to begin negotiating.

Hipkins himself, with ministers Megan Woods and Winston Peters, brought a paper to Cabinet outlining the need for the Government to think about what it was willing to pay for vaccine doses, and how it would weigh that against securing early delivery.

"Vaccines for early delivery will be more expensive (e.g. $75-150 per dose) compared to later delivery (perhaps less than $15 per dose)..." the paper reads.

"Officials have modelled a small set of simplified hypothetical portfolios to get some idea of how costs might add up. This modelling suggests the size of funding required is highly sensitive to the number of early access vaccines we choose to purchase."

Cabinet was clearly asked to weigh up the value of paying for early doses of vaccine and it agreed funds of some $600m to start the process.

At the same meeting, a negotiation team of bureaucrats within the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) was agreed, as was funding of $500,000 to bring in outside help (a further $133,000 was ultimately larded in to buy an outside PR consultant to fashion ministers' "procurement 'messaging"). The half-million dollars bought a handful of Bell Gully lawyers, among them lead negotiator and Bell Gully partner Simon Watts.: "To properly understand New Zealand's negotiating footing with Pfizer it's necessary to turn the clock back to last year. Starting in May, and picking up pace in June, July and August, dozens of countries inked advance purchase agreements with pharmaceutical companies with promising plans: Pfizer, AstraZenica, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna and others.

Pfizer signed such deals with countries large and small: the United States, Britain, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Israel and Canada to name a few.
New Zealand, however, had no purchasing plan at the time. In late May, ministers announced a Covid-19 vaccine strategy, but it was little more than a $37 million pot of money to sprinkle around domestic vaccine research and manufacturing capability. There was no provision for the advance purchase of any international medicine at all.
In fact, it wasn't until August 10 last year that the New Zealand Cabinet finally took the steps necessary to begin negotiating.

Hipkins himself, with ministers Megan Woods and Winston Peters, brought a paper to Cabinet outlining the need for the Government to think about what it was willing to pay for vaccine doses, and how it would weigh that against securing early delivery.

"Vaccines for early delivery will be more expensive (e.g. $75-150 per dose) compared to later delivery (perhaps less than $15 per dose)..." the paper reads.

"Officials have modelled a small set of simplified hypothetical portfolios to get some idea of how costs might add up. This modelling suggests the size of funding required is highly sensitive to the number of early access vaccines we choose to purchase."

Cabinet was clearly asked to weigh up the value of paying for early doses of vaccine and it agreed funds of some $600m to start the process.

At the same meeting, a negotiation team of bureaucrats within the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) was agreed, as was funding of $500,000 to bring in outside help (a further $133,000 was ultimately larded in to buy an outside PR consultant to fashion ministers' "procurement 'messaging"). The half-million dollars bought a handful of Bell Gully lawyers, among them lead negotiator and Bell Gully partner Simon Watts."

[Bjauck]

Brexit combined with protectionism won't really work. especially since they have all this new social care stuff to fund.

UK farmers don't have workers anymore (plus the reduction in eu subsidies) which shows they're willing to make some detrimental changes to the sector. Australia's trade deal includes agriculture.

The UK government had promised to pay its farmers the equivalent of the EU subsidies. I am not sure whether the agricultural component of the OZ-UK deal amounts to much, What there is may be available in the Oz-EU deal being negotiated, and which the UK would have been part of if it remained in the EU. Likewise, they may be struggling to produce a meaningful NZ-UK FTA.

[Panda-NZ-]

The UK government had promised to pay its farmers the equivalent of the EU subsidies. I am not sure whether the agricultural component of the OZ-UK deal amounts to much, What there is may be available in the Oz-EU deal being negotiated, and which the UK would have been part of if it remained in the EU. Likewise, they may be struggling to produce a meaningful NZ-UK FTA.

They will be phased out according to this article by 2028.

Within a decade, taxpayers will stop paying farmers on the size of their farms, now roughly 233P per hectare and comprising a third of farm incomes. This has been a massive distortion in favour of rich landowners. By 2028 farms are expected, says Eustice, to be “sustainable businesses that do not need to rely on public subsidy”. But lest that leads to arable degradation and the erosion of nature, and further exacerbates the climate crisis, the present subsidy is to be redirected to what the plan rightly called “public goods”.

https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...sh-agriculture

[jonu]

I posted this on the Corona Virus....Cultural Side Effects thread, bit given it is Labour currently driving the bus, I think it is appropriate here.

Quote Originally Posted by JBmurc View Post
The 4 stages of a communist takeover - demoralization, destabilization, crisis, and normalization.



It certainly feels we are headed towards a place that is more authoritarian. I think that will look different that what we remember as Communism, but the effects may be as dire.

The power crazy fools taking parts of the world down this path under the smoke screen of the greater good and our protection, are oblivious to these same powers being used against them. Different regions could swing hard Right or hard Left, it won't make much difference because at the extremes the spectrum becomes circular and there is little to tell them apart.

I recommend this clip published 12 months ago. Watch it and reflect on how our government, and those of many countries, are corralling their constituents down a path of Collectivism ie "The Common Good Before the Individual Good" (that's a quote from Hitler). Again, this was published 12 months ago, before vaccination passports were being touted not only for international travel, but for ordinary domestic freedoms.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvPKTVK10JE

The thrust of the argument is that the rights of the individual must remain greater than the rights of a collective. Every time that golden rule is violated bad, extremely bad, things happen.

Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.
Louis D. Brandeis Former Assoc. Justice of the US Supreme Court