The Good News:

On the 27th and 28th of October 2012 Ngai Takoto and Te Rarawa are settling their Treaty Claims with the Crown. This is after the Waitangi Tribunal threw out Ngati Kahu's attempts to intrude on their claims area. I understand that Te Aupouri will also follow. The hold up was totally unnecessary and entirely the negotiators of the Ngati Kahu Runanga to blame. However they are away now. I wish them well with their claim and I know that with the people at the helm of their respective waka they will make a good start. However since it has taken so long (25 years?) they have a lot of opportunities to make up for. Kia Kaha koutou.

The Lost Opportunity:

Ngati Kahu having had their claims to bits and pieces of the other three iwi disallowed by the Tribunal are having to wait now for a decision on the remedies application against the Crown. While I don't know what exactly this entails, I do know that this is going to mean a long delay in Ngati Kahu's settlement; a totally unnecessary and expensive one. The Runanga is now in financial strife because of their various and expensive adventures into the High Court and the remedies hearings at Kareponia Marae. They want ALL the "fish money" allocated to marae to plug the gap in their budget. They say it happened because they were trying their best to get a settlement for all of Ngati Kahu. This nonsense is a cover for incompetence and bad faith negotiations. They are in fact responsible for this and Ngati Kahu are yet to hear them admit it. 

Hobit Economics

Hollywood Economics

Soon after his DotCom red face and apology the PM is off to Hollywood to drum up business for the film industry. He claims that the Hobit Movie employed 3000 jobs. Before you say WOW, are those 3000 still employed now that the Hobit movie is finished? Of course not. Don't forget that the contribution to our GDP is minus the tax break and tax payer contribution to Warners of some $40m. Most of that money went offshore. This is the kind of market economics that fairy tales are made of. In the meantime our coal mines are closing and miners are laid off, not to mention Mataura Freezing Works redundancies and other horrors. And our PM goes off to Hollywood. He has no vision, plan or sense of direction. Once a merchant banker always one. He's whistling in the wind if he thinks that is the way out of the recession. 

Poverty? What Poverty?

Don't think I've gone gaga. I know what poverty is. I was born into it like so many of my post-depression generation. Then the 1950s and 60s full employment lifted most NZers out of it to be one of the top five per capita income nations by the 1950s. Now we have studies and statistics indicating that there is child poverty in NZ on a proportionately large scale especially for the usual Maori and Pacific Island population. The problem is poverty generally is invisible and child poverty is visible only if you happen to see it as concerned teacher, social worker, community person or even policeman. I have seen men scouring the bins for food or the footpaths for cigarette butts outside a bar. That to me is more than poverty but signs of mental illness and social  

neglect. However, I find it hard to look past the huge number of the latest vehicles on our roads and streets to get a clear impression of poverty. The whole country is clogged with them. They don't only belong to the top 20% of income earners. So what is poverty and how is it measured? Or rather, how should it be measured? 

He Wai

"He wai" was a call that the orator used to get the group up to embelish his speech with a waiata. Now "wai" This is an issue caused by the sale of state assets like Mighty River Power. Really is there any need to sell power assets in order to balance the books or whatever? They are making money for "everyone" not some faceless already rich investor who will rachett up power prices in order to make on the investment. The National Government is just trying to avoid the obvious remedy for fiscal problems; increase taxes beginning at the top of the income food chain and working down towards a tolerable level of income earners ($60k?) .From about there then reduce taxes. Those with less than $20K income should not pay anything. They already pay enough on GST.

Whose "wai" is it anyway? There's a water company who reticulates water down to Taipa from  Peria and sells it to a horticultural company (it was Kerifresh) for their orchards and gardens. The main source of this water are the springs at the base of Maungataniwha. Is it their "wai?" They no doubt got resource consent from the regulator the Northern Regional Council or whoever. Is it their "wai" then? If  it's no one's water as our capitalist PM says then why is he privatizing the use of it by selling Mighty River Power?

If I could quote from a local letter writer to the Taupo Times; "When the rain falls on his roof it is his water just as it is for his neighbour of whatever ethnic gender. When it runs into Lake Taupo it is Tuwharetoa water because they own the lake bed and have title to it. However the Crown has put a gate at the exit into the Waikato River. This raises it about a meter. That is the Crown's water, except that it is sitting on Tuwharetoa water which makes it Tuwharetoa's. " If the PM says it's nobody's water, then why is it being sold in the super market? That 'nobody' is not selling only the plastic bottle and obviously thinks it's his/hers. I say that the wai is a "red herring'. The real issue is who owns Mighty River Power et al? I believe everybody does and should continue to do so.