Kwerky Kiwi

Let's support our kiwi kids being given an authentic kiwi education.

Back education that works for all tamariki All tamariki deserve an education where they can learn, feel included and access learning support when they need it.  However, the Government is taking public education in the wrong direction and tamariki are being left behind.   Schools, kindergartens, and early childhood centres have fac...

Fascinating. Really take time for this. Im going to purchase the book anyway so this was a bonus.

Around the Treaty in 80 Pages: Ross Calman Makes History Accessible Watch now | 🎧 #13: Weaving our Worlds podcast with Melanie Nelson: Ross Calman’s new book Te Tiriti o Waitangi distils centuries of history, debate, and protest into a clear, accessible guide. In this episode, he talks about early encounters, the rushed translation, the signing debates, and why...

Hi all. Personalities aside.
THIS is what I find the most disgusting and short-sighted about the National Party.
They are rich enough to never have to live with the consequences of their own actions in selling what we have purchased with our shared investment over generations
- are you?

For the most part, people objected to these sales of public assets but ince they are in a path, the NATS DONT EVER LISTEN to the people who's best interests they are charged with looking after. Under neoliberalism bot main parties have sold our stuff- but ChatGPT shows National WAYEEEE ahead on ASSET sales.
Now they ate gunning down our public health system. Don't be fooled by their deceit. The reason it isn't working is a direct result of their actions.

Over the past 50 years, New Zealand’s National and Labour governments have pursued different approaches to public asset sales. National governments have generally favored privatization and asset sales more than Labour governments, which tend to prefer state ownership of key assets. Below is an overview of key public asset sales under both parties during this period.

Public Asset Sales by National Governments:

1. 1980s-1990s (Lange Labour & Bolger National Governments)
• Air New Zealand (1989, partially sold): Initially privatized, though the government later repurchased shares in the early 2000s under Labour.
• Telecom NZ (1990): Sold under the Bolger-led National government for NZ$4.25 billion, one of the largest privatizations in New Zealand’s history.
• New Zealand Rail (1993): Sold to private owners, though later repurchased by the Labour government.
• State Insurance (1990s): Sold by the National government.
• PostBank (1989): Sold to ANZ by the Lange Labour government (which preceded the Bolger government).

2. 2008-2017 (John Key-led National Government)
• Mighty River Power (2013): The government sold 49% of its shares in this state-owned electricity generator and retailer.
• Meridian Energy (2013): 49% of Meridian, another electricity generator, was sold by the government.
• Genesis Energy (2014): National sold 49% of the electricity generator.
• Air New Zealand (partial stake sale, 2013): The government reduced its stake to around 53% in a partial sell-down.
• Solid Energy (proposals for sale, partial restructuring): While not a direct sale, Solid Energy faced significant restructuring and financial difficulties, leading to its eventual liquidation.

Public Asset Sales by Labour Governments:

Labour governments have historically been more cautious about asset sales and have sometimes reversed National’s privatizations. However, there have been some sales, especially in the 1980s during the Rogernomics era under Finance Minister Roger Douglas. Key asset sales during Labour governments include:

1. 1984-1990 (David Lange-led Labour Government)
• PostBank (1989): Sold to ANZ during the late stages of the Labour government.
• New Zealand Steel (1987): Sold to Equiticorp for $327 million.
• Petrocorp (1988): Sold to Fletcher Challenge.
• Shipping Corporation of New Zealand (1989): Privatized.
• Telecom NZ (Prepared for privatization): Although sold by National, the preparations for the sale began during the Lange government.

2. 1999-2008 (Helen Clark-led Labour Government)
• Few direct sales of public assets: Labour was largely focused on retaining public ownership. Notably, Labour re-nationalized some assets:
• Air New Zealand (2001): Labour repurchased a controlling stake in Air New Zealand after it faced financial collapse.
• KiwiRail (2008): Labour re-nationalized the rail network and rebranded it as KiwiRail after private owners struggled to maintain profitability.

3. 2017-present (Jacinda Ardern-led Labour Government)
• No significant public asset sales: The Ardern government has generally not pursued large-scale privatizations. Instead, it has focused on public investment, particularly in housing, health, and infrastructure.

Summary:
• National Government: Significant privatization occurred, especially during the 1990s and early 2010s, with assets such as Telecom NZ, Mighty River Power, Meridian Energy, and Genesis Energy being partially or fully sold.
• Labour Government: Labour has historically been more cautious with privatization. While some sales occurred in the 1980s under Rogernomics, Labour has re-nationalized key assets such as Air New Zealand and KiwiRail. The Clark and Ardern governments did not pursue large-scale privatization.

National has NEVER bought public asset back that I know of and they are deregulating to sell off public water assets, privatise public health etc. Labour has a far greater responsibility for Public assets, stewardship, service and co governance from my experience.

I feel so betrayed by this government and by the foolish people who are still asleep- thinking they can't do it. Um... why not?
They've already privatised multiple public assets guys. Have people forgotten that we pay some of the highest energy bills in the OECD because -was it Bolger or Shipley who sold our public power grid? .
They have lied to everyone, deceived you since the election campaign.
PPP is the American Healthcare model- ask yourself why that wealthy CEO of a health insurance company was really shot by a desperate man-
Because public health is such a great investment (ie it's only not working because this government has starved it of support and manipulated it by making it too hard to employ staff) - they have profit focused buyers lined up around the block. Be smart, if they can make a profit- why are we to believe its 'broken'?

On Friday, Luxon and Reti were at Ormiston Private Hospital to talk up the benefits of private money in public health.

Luxon and Reti said we were going to enter into more public private partnerships i.e. privatisating health, and paying to use more health services from private clinics.

Reti said ~10% of electives are currently done in private facilities and talked up the prospect of increasing that # significantly.

I wanted a journalist to ask about costs - of course, everyone knows that it’s possible to use private facilities - but why are they intentionally starving the public health system of funds, while saying they want to pay private facilities more?

Would it not make more sense to invest in the public health system now, rather than axe critical public health services, cut health technology investments, spend $268,000 ($3720 per page) to come up with a Dunedin hospital cost estimate that was immediately debunked by Dunedin’s Mayor, and effectively cut frontline and back office health practitioners?

If we care about our health system, the money they are cutting now needs to be paid back in the future with interest - i.e. they are actively adding to our public infrastructure deficit - and worse - losing top talent that could be helping us solve complex health cases.

Two months ago, a report in the NZ Medical Journal said it was impossible to cut $1.4bn from our health budget without impacting frontline services.

So last week the Government quietly upped the cuts to healthcare a round $2 billion instead.

How does this make sense?

For NZ - I mean.

Besides Chomsky’s observation, the NZ Company Directory provides other clues to the scene

One of the Health Commissioner Lester Levy’s directorships is in a jointly owned private health company called NZ Cylotron.

Cylotron is a product of Mercy Radiology and Cyclowest.

Mercy Radiology is a private radiology clinic.

Cyclowest operates in the private nuclear medicine space, and partners with radiology services. They say “Private providers such as Cyclowest are working to fill the demand gap”.

That sounded similar to what Reti and Luxon said at last week’s press stand up.

In total, Lester Levy has 64 current or past shareholdings and Directorships listed. He has also advocated to run healthcare as a business.

And the former Health Minister Shane Reti owns shares in a private hospital through “Reti Holdings”.

While Christopher Luxon liquidated 3 investment properties in 2024 and is now flush with cash for new "investment opportunities"

I’m not suggesting anything is not above board - but this is also what the Ministers rely on.

Plausible deniability.

I am highlighting that public service is usually protected from real or perceived conflicts of interest for a very important reason:

The public need to have confidence and trust in public officials.

Once they don’t, it becomes a slippery slope down the ladder of democratic norms and trust.

Full article / video - October 2024
Mountain Tui Billboard

Ok well I just found out that several more bills are up for submissions now. All very quietly put before Parliament under shelter from the TPB. That they havent been reported by media is concerning enough.

We missed the crime amendment bill- submissions closed last night. The CAB aims to give government powers to stop people from protesting in future. ... who can argue that the right to protest is another of those important democratic rights citizens should have.
This government aims to make it illegal. I wonder how Groundswell will feel about being jailed alongside Treaty supporters? That will test their commitment to -'same treatment'- won't it?
Fyi I use the word 'same treatment'' because it's a simple fact that equality is never possible when two people start from different places. Even in this instance- farmers in Groundswell start with more asset behind them to pay fines... same treatment won't ever be equality- will it.

It appears they are pushing bills through thick and fast in hopes people can't keep up.

Have a look- I'm going to start reading at the top and work my way down the list... hopefully some aren't too bad- here's the link to the list of bills currently up for submissions. Don't just read the title and think it's nothing- you can't rely on an innocuous sounding title to reflect the actual content. I will look for 'credible' expert synopsis of them as I go and put them up.https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/sc/make-a-submission/

Ok well I just found out that several more bills are up for submissions now. All very quietly put before Parliament under shelter from the TPB. That they havent been reported by media is concerning enough.

We missed the crime amendment bill- submissions closed last night. The CAB aims to give government powers to stop people from protesting in future. ... who can argue that the right to protest is another of those important democratic rights citizens should have.
This government aims to make it illegal. I wonder how Groundswell will feel about being jailed alongside Treaty supporters? That will test their commitment to -'same treatment'- won't it?
Fyi I use the word 'same treatment'' because it's a simple fact that equality is never possible when two people start from different places. Even in this instance- farmers in Groundswell start with more asset behind them to pay fines... same treatment won't ever be equality- will it.

It appears they are pushing bills through thick and fast in hopes people can't keep up.

Have a look- I'm going to start reading at the top and work my way down the list... hopefully some aren't too bad- here's the link to the list of bills currently up for submissions. Don't just read the title and think it's nothing- you can't rely on an innocuous sounding title to reflect the actual content. I will look for 'credible' expert synopsis of them as I go and put them up.

Make a submission - New Zealand Parliament Parliament's decisions affect all New Zealanders. Have your say and influence the laws passed by Parliament. You can get involved by making a submission.

Time for mass industrial action and protest against the Privatisation of our Health System

Last night's news featured a segment where the plan to partially privatise our Health Services was exposed and put to Dr Cigareti who said there are advantages and disadvantages to privatisation - one big advantage was raising capital - but to nearly all New Zealanders who know where privatisation of Public Health Services ultimately leads to - this is the road to mass harm and deaths for vulnerable and low income New Zealanders who cannot afford private healthcare.

The poor will die in a ditch in huge numbers in future, mostly Māori and Pacific Peoples and people who don't have huge savings and those who are too old to work - they made bad choices according to Atlas Network neoliberal ideology ( see David Seymour ) - so it's their own fault if they cannot afford private healthcare ...and the market is always right.

Here on G News the reaction was swift and strong - it's time to down tools, a nationwide strike - the Government must go - it's the end of social democracy and the welfare state - unless there is strong complementary protest action now to join the 35,000 who marched in Dunedin on Saturday.

It's time to wake up to the creeping privatisation of Health and see through the soundbites - the way National hides the reports, hides behind commercial sensitivity - and creates a few months of delay to settle down the media focus - as it marches forward with it's zombie Atlas Network neoliberal ideology at massive social cost.

The deaths should sit on the shoulders of these MPs according to Linda Smillie, registered nurse who spoke at the massive march in Dunedin - well we ain't seen nothing yet...

The soundbites sold in elections are always about the outcome not the how to get there - like National will bring back 6 hours wait time targets - but there is no mention of funding and how to fix chronic worker shortages of decrepit hospital facilities that are not fit for purpose after decades of underfunding.

We all know what the Tories did in the UK to the NHS and we all know the same Atlas "Tufton Street" think tanks are connected to the those Tories and to the NZ Initiative - and to National and Act.

On 11 September 2023 RNZ morning report put the questions to an Emergency Doctor who said every shift was done with not enough staff in facilities that were not adequate - and the real question was the next logical one - the question that came AFTER the soundbite.

What happens when the targets are not met?

Privatisation is waiting in the wings and it's easy to look back in media reports and find on 15 December 2023 - how RNZ reported that "A multi-billion-dollar company wants the government to hurry up and help it build hospitals, in what could be a seismic shift in health infrastructure."

The article goes on to say, "Sharemarket-listed Vital is one of the country's biggest hospital landlords. It has spotted an opportunity in National's coalition agreement with ACT that commits the government to explore taking long-term leases with privately-owned health facilities."

So as I said - there's a queue of market pressure behind the scenes - hidden from view as Bishop, Willis, Luxon and Cigareti orchestrate the manifestation of privatisation - and ultimately long after their self praise and clumsy sophistry has died down - we the public will wear the enormous prices and costs to keep shareholders getting richer from our sickness until we simply are denied healthcare by the cost barriers.

Welcome to the future we create for our country and ourselves by sitting on our arses and doing nothing about this when we could have.

The predictable response from Luxon is to laugh and say that's rubbish and how he gets it - cos he is wealthy and sorted - and it's not like his family is going to be denied the best medical care that private Health Insurance can buy.

David Seymour will insist it's nothing to do with ethnicity nor the effects of impoverishment from generations of colonisation all through the 20th century and into the 21st. It was each and every child's fault they were born into poverty and if that group must die young well that is the market working perfectly in a liberal democracy.

Sir Bill English once had a tax cut to sell the poor but now it's Social Investment - the way the rich help the poor while privatisation of the welfare state carries on alongside it.

Yes the excuses not to invest in our Health and simply privatise and ratchet up the prices for shareholder and profit - are long and multi dimensional but we have seen that movie too - and we know Willis chose tax cuts for Landlords rather than to deliver on promises to Dunedin and now the manufactured cost blowout involves the signature "we can't show you the evidence in the report" and the "there will be a two month delay" tactics that National use to privatise - just like they did at Kāinga Ora.

Just like they will over the port side infrastructure costs with the Ferries.

It's time the Unions started talking and coordinating and organising around Health - and it's time we all joined in if we want our public health services to remain and be improved.

People are at the limits now - they say no more and I am there.

I am there too, let's do this New Zealand.

Time for mass industrial action and protest against the Privatisation of our Health System

Morena

G :)

It's time to learn something new.

Here y' go guys!

Men's fashion.