Title says it all. PM Jacinda Arden will not seek re-election and will leave office next month. She says she is exhausted. Didn’t see that one coming.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/ ... 5Z6GHGU4Y/

It has been a tough few years.

leader1 wrote:

Title says it all. PM Jacinda Arden will not seek re-election and will leave office next month. She says she is exhausted. Didn’t see that one coming.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/ ... 5Z6GHGU4Y/

Did she see the writing on the wall.

If she leaves politics she will get a job that will set here up for life

Do she get a pension for life when she leaves political world unlike people having to wait until they retire

She's still quite young. If she wants to devote time to her family and her personal life, that's certainly understandable. At least she is honest about it, and not pursuing power for the sake of power. It's in the tradition of the best leaders to voluntarily step down.

However she is still very popular, so she could return at a later stage of her life, when the nest is empty. It will be interesting to see if she does.

All the people who have been saying she's about to resign every month since 2019 will now claim vindication and expect to be treated as nostradamus.

Regardless of her specifically, it's probably been the hardest term for any leader since WWII. So not surprising that someone would have had enough.

It’s the mark of a good leader to step up and say they don’t have enough in the tank to stay up to task. My hat’s off to Jacinda.

From what I understand , the party that she is part of is not doing to well in the polls ?

Mortyman wrote:

From what I understand , the party that she is part of is not doing to well in the polls ?

The party was slightly trailing in December polls, but was also closing the gap after easing COVID policy, with the election 10 months out.

Ahern herself was still leading the polls as candidate for prime minister, and remains personally popular.

Covid went on too long. Nobody expected 3 years of it. So people are grumpy.
This is irrespective of any government interventions.

Initial interventions to maintain employment had an unfortunate effect of raising already extraordinary house prices to stratospheric levels.
But later interventions to bring down house prices, by raising the central bank interest rate, and winding back back some of the tax breaks on investment properties have meant that house prices have fallen back substantially, although they are on average still higher then pre covid.

This has meant a decline in the last year of household wealth for property owners.
Not popular in the property owning class.
NZ is almost unique in not having capital gains tax, very much favouring property investment over other investments.
This has distorted the economy.
One economist described our economy as A property market, with a smallish economy tacked on.
To partially address this, the government had though introduced a form of capital gains tax on investment rental properties, again deeply unpopular with already property owners, but should favour intending 1st home buyers once interest rates drop back to more recently normal rates.

Rural communities especially are apprehensive of the effects of signalled climate change mitigation measures, and signalled measures to improve run off water qualities into our steams, lakes and oceans.

And there is apprehension in some communities about increasingly implementing Treaty of Waitangi principles, and continuing with redress of the longstanding failures to comply with that 183 year old treaty.

In short, vested interests are unhappy with progressive measures that disrupt the status quo.

Over all the economy is actually in quite good shape.
Unemployment is 3.4% so that labour shortages is the biggest problem.
The GDP has grown 2.7% in the last year and is distinctly higher then precovid.
Net public debt to GDP is expected to be 21.3% in 2013 c.f. 40.7% for Australia and 94.7% in the UK.
IMF figures https://budget.govt.nz/budget/2022/well ... c-debt.htm

leader1 wrote:

Title says it all. PM Jacinda Arden will not seek re-election and will leave office next month. She says she is exhausted. Didn’t see that one coming.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/ ... 5Z6GHGU4Y/

A lot of people did, she was taking a bath in the polls, her and are well down, she's unpopular, her govt are unlikely to win the October general election, I guess she didn't want to face up to the electorate, so chose the cowards way out and is leaving early before being kicked out.

A101 wrote:

leader1 wrote:

Title says it all. PM Jacinda Arden will not seek re-election and will leave office next month. She says she is exhausted. Didn’t see that one coming.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/ ... 5Z6GHGU4Y/

Did she see the writing on the wall.

If she leaves politics she will get a job that will set here up for life

Do she get a pension for life when she leaves political world unlike people having to wait until they retire

She definitely saw the writing on the wall.

Here's the info on PM's pension. https://www.remauthority.govt.nz/member ... ministers/

Avatar2go wrote:

Mortyman wrote:

From what I understand , the party that she is part of is not doing to well in the polls ?

The party was slightly trailing in December polls, but was also closing the gap after easing COVID policy, with the election 10 months out.

Ahern herself was still leading the polls as candidate for prime minister, and remains personally popular.

Labour aren't slightly trailing, given that they could have governed along without a partner the latest polls aren't slightly down, they are well down. Typically Labour start well, have a good first term Clarks govt was a good example of this, then they start getting into identity politics and the nanny state, it's bye bye labour at that point, Kiwis don't like being told what to do.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/ ... ECMCZPNCQ/

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/48 ... for-labour

Kiwirob wrote:

A lot of people did, she was taking a bath in the polls, her and are well down, she's unpopular, her govt are unlikely to win the October general election, I guess she didn't want to face up to the electorate, so chose the cowards way out and is leaving early before being kicked out.

As she predicted, the opposition will speculate on all kinds of alternate reasons for her resignation. That's just politics. But her speech rang both true and sincere, and her popularity remains, and will remain. She's never backed away from a challenge. She just has other priorities at this stage of her life. I give her enormous credit for a tough decision.

Go woke, go broke… as the expression goes. Labour had an unprecedented electoral majority yet squandered it on woke policies (He Puapua, 3 waters, renaming everything etc) rather than actually governing and getting things done. That more than anything else has put people off.

Zkpilot wrote:

Go woke, go broke… as the expression goes. Labour had an unprecedented electoral majority yet squandered it on woke policies (He Puapua, 3 waters, renaming everything etc) rather than actually governing and getting things done. That more than anything else has put people off.

How exactly is water infrastructure reform 'woke'? Sorry, just curious - a Kiwi friend of mine at work is constantly arguing with his 60-something dad on that very point. As he is fond of telling our Japanese coworkers, 'securing the environmental future in an island country is not political - it's necessary'

To me (from the USA), PM Arden, like other national leaders are facing, is a growing shift to more conservative social and political policies in government. As others posted here and in her speech, the odds of her being able to continue as PM were sharply declining as her party will likely lose a number of seats the upcoming Parliament elections.Then as to many what she said in her speech and posting here, the demands and stress of her job, the dealing with major crises, especially needing to take necessary but unpopular actions to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic, has taken a toll on her mental and physical health. At least she knows when to move on and allow for an orderly transition.

Aaron747 wrote:

Zkpilot wrote:

Go woke, go broke… as the expression goes. Labour had an unprecedented electoral majority yet squandered it on woke policies (He Puapua, 3 waters, renaming everything etc) rather than actually governing and getting things done. That more than anything else has put people off.

How exactly is water infrastructure reform 'woke'? Sorry, just curious - a Kiwi friend of mine at work is constantly arguing with his 60-something dad on that very point. As he is fond of telling our Japanese coworkers, 'securing the environmental future in an island country is not political - it's necessary'

Three Waters is a hot potato, essentially what the govt plan to do is nationalise water in NZ. This is tens of billions of dollars of rates payer funded resource that the govt will take over for cents on the dollar. Almost all the councils in NZ are against the idea, most of the public are as well. It's mired in racial politics with Maori being given some control over the new water management authourity.

Kiwirob wrote:

Aaron747 wrote:

Zkpilot wrote:

Go woke, go broke… as the expression goes. Labour had an unprecedented electoral majority yet squandered it on woke policies (He Puapua, 3 waters, renaming everything etc) rather than actually governing and getting things done. That more than anything else has put people off.

How exactly is water infrastructure reform 'woke'? Sorry, just curious - a Kiwi friend of mine at work is constantly arguing with his 60-something dad on that very point. As he is fond of telling our Japanese coworkers, 'securing the environmental future in an island country is not political - it's necessary'

Three Waters is a hot potato, essentially what the govt plan to do is nationalise water in NZ. This is tens of billions of dollars of rates payer funded resource that the govt will take over for cents on the dollar. Almost all the councils in NZ are against the idea, most of the public are as well. It's mired in racial politics with Maori being given some control over the new water management authourity.

And that is evil because.....they will mismanage it? Something tells me they might take greater care than some giant corporation would...

An article I read here in the USA also suggested another factor in her resignation as PM is due to growing numbers of attacks on her character as well as threats of violence as to her and her family over polices including as to handling the Covid-19 pandemic, gun regulations (after the mass shooting in Christchurch), water management, housing and tax policies. https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/19/world/ne ... index.html

Aaron747 wrote:

Kiwirob wrote:

Aaron747 wrote:

How exactly is water infrastructure reform 'woke'? Sorry, just curious - a Kiwi friend of mine at work is constantly arguing with his 60-something dad on that very point. As he is fond of telling our Japanese coworkers, 'securing the environmental future in an island country is not political - it's necessary'

Three Waters is a hot potato, essentially what the govt plan to do is nationalise water in NZ. This is tens of billions of dollars of rates payer funded resource that the govt will take over for cents on the dollar. Almost all the councils in NZ are against the idea, most of the public are as well. It's mired in racial politics with Maori being given some control over the new water management authourity.

And that is evil because.....they will mismanage it? Something tells me they might take greater care than some giant corporation would...

Water should remain in the care of the local councils.

Kiwirob wrote:

Water should remain in the care of the local councils.

The three waters was undoubtedly clumsily handled but nobody can say the way the three waters, is being managed now is satisfactory.
Local councillors aware that their jobs are on the line in elections every three years are loath to spend the required money to upgrade deficient potable water supplies and water reticulation.
Prudent replacement and required upgrades just get kicked down the road.

People actually died when the water supply to a significant town was contaminated by e coli.
Wellington is facing massive expenditure to replace seriously failing geriatric fresh, waste and stormwater systems.
This is entirely due to predictable aging induced failures.
Fix when breaks, is not an acceptable regime for critical infrastructure.

Multiple councils with small ratepayer bases are facing massive costs to bring their water supplies and sewerage disposal up to regulation standards.

The standard answer to often date is "We can't possibly afford all this, The government needs to step up"
This solution rewards the irresponsible councils and their residents, and penalises ratepayers of councils who have been billing their residents a lot more to fund the required upgrades to their systems.
But the legislation does this to a degree anyway by pooling the assets.
Here in Auckland we have been paying massively more per head for our water, and wastewater disposal to massively upgrade our three waters infrastructure.

The three waters Act is an attempt to correct this.
I suspect it was in part, it is also a preemptive blocking move to prevent local councils entering long term contractual water arrangements with private providers, such arrangements currently causing so much such grief and pollution in the UK.
And the alternative of Government providing the bulk of the funding to be administered by the same Council system that had let the current situation arise is simply unacceptable.


Whilst pollution regulations are nationwide, enforcement used to lie with Regional councils whose councillors are disproportionately drawn from the farming community who tend to be at best skeptical to Health Safety and the Environment, and at worst openly antagonistic.

This has resulted in widespread enforcement that is at best under resourced, and at worst actually obstructed.
The regional council in one prominent dairying area, suffering very serious degradation in freshwater standards, through farm runoff, actually instructed that inspections require 7 days notice, enough time to get sucker trucks in to drain effluent ponds, and aerial inspections were actually prohibited.

This has seriously offended much of maoridom whose very culture incorporates responsible water, stewardship.
Likewise the very recent flood events bringing unbelievable amounts of exotic forestry milling debris down rivers destroying valuable cropping land, and degrading their traditional food sources, maori find deeply offensive. Hence maori keen interest in exercising the shared governance written into the Treaty.

Unfortunately these ongoing failures of responsible land and water stewardship detract from the tremendous work so many rural landowners have done, and are doing at at increasing rate to reduce runoff damage and stabilise their land. This was initially largely individual efforts, but with worldwide pressure to reduce environmental footprints there is increasing industry pressure, and society pressure.
The Government Three Waters legislation is just a product of this society pressure.
Things have to change, How well this pariticular piece of legislation will work remains unknown.

leader1 wrote:

Title says it all. PM Jacinda Arden will not seek re-election and will leave office next month. She says she is exhausted. Didn’t see that one coming.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/ ... 5Z6GHGU4Y/

Prominent Conservative politicians in my country are resigning as well - they have had enough of politics. Can’t say I’d blame them.

It puts the stupid “go woke” idea from someone above completely out of touch.

And Covid going on too long isn’t something a politician can just switch on or off, that relies on the public being sensible and the virus going away, which it isn’t doing. People are still getting very sick from it.

I think Jacinda Ardern had simply some to a crossroads in her life.
Family, including the option for more children, or carrying on doing a massive job to the best of her ability.
No one can doubt her dedication, unlike so many other recent leaders whose dedication to do the best for their country, not just themselves is seriously questionable.

Good! She's NZ's version of "Wonderboy" Justin Trudeau. Their style of woke politics are hurting New Zealand and my own (Canada).

ltbewr wrote:

An article I read here in the USA also suggested another factor in her resignation as PM is due to growing numbers of attacks on her character as well as threats of violence as to her and her family over polices including as to handling the Covid-19 pandemic, gun regulations (after the mass shooting in Christchurch), water management, housing and tax policies. https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/19/world/ne ... index.html

It is pretty crazy that with the rise of extreme conservatism, the number of threats and violent acts against public officials has risen 10 fold. In the US, members of Congress have received over 10,000 threats since Trump was elected president.

And despite the conservative claims that "both sides do it", the threats are overwhelming made by conservative groups, against elected officials or administrative public servants and appointees.

We saw this in the Jan 6 testimony by election officials, as well as social media postings by some of the Freedom Caucus members. Previously they had been removed from committees for those posts, but now are being restored.

The net effect of all this is that good people are being driven out, both from the Congress and from public service. Both conservatives and liberals, and mostly the more moderate factions.

Vio wrote:

Good! She's NZ's version of "Wonderboy" Justin Trudeau. Their style of woke politics are hurting New Zealand and my own (Canada).

Proof for that assertion if NZ is not your country? Unless you are living there? What exactly has she done to you?

By the way, this woke nonsense term has to die, the conservative me or right are just as “woke” on their favourite biases. Why is that kind of “woke” okay?

Is it any wonder that people are turning off from politics when we see the extremities of both sides carry on as quoted.

So you have "woke" vs "asleep" (or maybe "asleepholes")?.

Don't know about you, but for me, I try to be wide awake when dealing with things.

Tugg

She is a hero!!! One of the best world leaders of all time. She listened to the science and the experts. She saved so many lives in New Zealand and stood against anti science leaders and anti fact leaders like Trump. She showed how to lead with empathy, science and intelligence. It is a loss to the world to lose her as a leader. She has faced sexism which is a huge pressure on women leaders. Thank you for your service.

ltbewr wrote:

To me (from the USA), PM Arden, like other national leaders are facing, is a growing shift to more conservative social and political policies in government.

Not really.

Let’s look at the other Anglosphere nations.

In the USA Democrats won the last Presidential election, held onto the Senate when they weren’t expected to and had the smallest loss in the House since JFK (traditionally a presidential winning party loses big in their first House midterms). GOP proved themselves to be inept in the House on Day one.

UK - Tories absolutely on the nose. Inept, leadership woes, people sick of them playing austerity politics for 15 years. Polls have them on track to be virtually eliminated from Parliament next election.

Canada - Trudeau won a third term unexpectedly, with the help of Block Quebec and NDP it’ll be hard for conservatives to form a majority whilst Trudeau leads the Liberals.

Australia - left wing ALP won government last federal election, now control all state governments bar NSW and Tasmania with NSW expected to change to ALP in March. PM Albanese popular, right wing opposition leader Dutton very unpopular and not helping the conservative cause.

My theory is after the combination of Trump, Brexit and Australia’s Morrison government a lot of people in the Anglosphere saw how that far right populist governments in practice are terrible, and have decided more leftist, sensible moderate governments are the way to go.

Zkpilot wrote:

Go woke, go broke… as the expression goes.

Like the post above this never really works out in practice.

Lots of examples of “anti-woke” governments being decimated after periods of being “anti-woke”. Trump’s GOP losing the White House, Senate and House in 2020 after definitely not being “woke”. Australia’s conservative “anti woke” Morrison government lost big in last May’s Australian election to the more “woke” Albanese Opposition, the even more “woke” Greens and “woke” Teal independents.

In the UK, even though the term “woke” wasn’t used when Brexit was voted on in 2016, the proponents of it are definitely “anti woke”, but it’s widely accepted today that it was a mistake and has helped ruined the country, and most certainly a Brexit referendum today would see a majority vote to rejoin the EU, a case of “Go anti-woke, go broke” for sure……

Unfortunately in the Anglosphere there are a very large number that the leader should be a white middle/upper class Englishman, or their local equivalent, to maintain, or even enhance, their privilege in their local society.
Trump, UK Tory, and Morrison's Australian supporters tend this way.
The alternate view is that reducing inequality in healthcare and education in our societies reduces internal tensions, and is actually economically more efficient as it reduces the huge economic costs of poor health, and the unrealized potential of those born into impoverished circumstances. And it is simply more just.
With the exception of a few very small countries NZ was the only country to report an increase in life expectancy in the first two years of the Pandemic. Figures are not yet out for last year, but a decrease in life expectancy is expected with the overall change over the pandemic to be near neutral. Compare this with Britain and the US that experienced substantial declines in already sub par life expectancy.
As I posted earlier the economic set back in New Zealand during covid has been remarkably modest, especially compared to Conservative Party governed Britain.

She could have declared an emergency, suspended parliament and installed herself as dictator for life

Vio wrote:

Good! She's NZ's version of "Wonderboy" Justin Trudeau. Their style of woke politics are hurting New Zealand and my own (Canada).

Something tells me NZ will be better off. She was horrible.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

Three waters has been a mess but that's hardly a damming indictment.

Three waters is one of many messes

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

She led Labor through some pretty bumpy unexpected disasters like Covid and the largest mass murder in NZ history. Overall the economy is solid with problems that are endemic in the OECD and not NZ specific. She has put up not just with the normal bollocking that politicians get but multiplied tenfold for the crime of being female. Yes, women get many times worse abuse than male politicians ever get. Of all the times to hand over the reigns this is a solid time to do it. Enough time for the next person to get into the groove and put their case forward.

Helen and Shipley weren't given as much stick, especially Helen because she was far more competent and fit to lead than Ardern.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

People forget that she was elected as leader of the Labor party with basically weeks to go before the election when the previous leader, Andrew Little, saw the writing on the wall and resigned. This took Labor from likely loosing yet another election to winning.

She was given the job 3 months before the election, not weeks. She's doing exactly what Little did, saw the writing on the wall and jumped. If you remember Labour only won because they gave in to Peters requests for Deputy PM, a job which National with the most seats in Parliament wouldn't give him.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

Labor have some good options like Wood, Hipkins, and Allen. But like most parties there's not much depth beyond that.

National have made gains not because they're showing something better but more because people are unhappy with Labor. There's a saying that has some truth to it that parties in NZ don't win elections, governments lose them.

Do I like all the choices she's made as Labor leader? Of course not. Could we have done a lot worse? *Glances at Bridges and Collins* Oh, we could have done terribly.

Overall she's been a solid PM and has mostly shown leadership where needed.

I think Bridges would have been a solid choice, people mostly criticised him because of his voice, I've heard on Newstalk and in a Stuff article people are calling for the next PM to be Maori, well we could have had Bridges as PM, but Maori don't think he's Maori enough, but oddly enough back Kelvin Davis who is whiter than I am.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

Edit: to give people some idea of the torrent of abuse that she's had to deal with. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/48 ... ct-anybody Even her young daughter is the target of the abuse sent to Ardern. This isn't "Your policies are awful" stuff. This is "Go f**cking die" and "I hope you get r***d" stuff. Years of it.

[/quote]


People from the left were hurling terrible abuse at Key, if he's brought up in the media today the abuse continues.

Toenga wrote:

Unfortunately in the Anglosphere there are a very large number that the leader should be a white middle/upper class Englishman, or their local equivalent, to maintain, or even enhance, their privilege in their local society.
Trump, UK Tory, and Morrison's Australian supporters tend this way.

The best chance NZ had of electing a Maori PM was in 2020, Simon Bridges is Maori as was his deputy Paula Bennett. I voted for him, Maori didn't because most Maori don't consider him Maori enough. Same with Winston Peters, too well spoken and not maori enough.

The UK now has an Indian/Pakistani PM and has had plenty of blue collar PM's over the years. I don't think you will find many upper class PM's in NZ or Australia.

Toenga wrote:

The alternate view is that reducing inequality in healthcare and education in our societies reduces internal tensions, and is actually economically more efficient as it reduces the huge economic costs of poor health, and the unrealized potential of those born into impoverished circumstances. And it is simply more just.

The best chance NZ had of electing a Maori PM was in 2020, Simon Bridges is Maori as was his deputy Paula Bennett. I voted for him, Maori didn't because most Maori don't consider him Maori enough. Same with Winston Peters, too well spoken and not maori enough.

The Maori Health Authourity is going to be interesting, there are already Maori Health Trusts providing health services across the country, these trusts are run by local iwi, staffed by Maori, they struggle to get Maori to seek medical help, Covid also showed this, despite pleadings from Maori leaders many Maori refused to be vaccinated. What's infuriated a lot of people is that the Maori Health Authourity will have oversight over Health New Zealand, why if you're looking after your own people you don't need oversight over the rest of the population? What about other Polynesian who have the same issues of mistrust as maori do with medical professionals, they suffer from many of the same health issues they aren't covered by the Maori Health Authourity, in my head it would make sense for the Maori Health Authourity also provided services to the Polynesian community as well.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

Three waters has been a mess but that's hardly a damming indictment.

She led Labor through some pretty bumpy unexpected disasters like Covid and the largest mass murder in NZ history. Overall the economy is solid with problems that are endemic in the OECD and not NZ specific. She has put up not just with the normal bollocking that politicians get but multiplied tenfold for the crime of being female. Yes, women get many times worse abuse than male politicians ever get. Of all the times to hand over the reigns this is a solid time to do it. Enough time for the next person to get into the groove and put their case forward.

People forget that she was elected as leader of the Labor party with basically weeks to go before the election when the previous leader, Andrew Little, saw the writing on the wall and resigned. This took Labor from likely loosing yet another election to winning.

Labor have some good options like Wood, Hipkins, and Allen. But like most parties there's not much depth beyond that.

National have made gains not because they're showing something better but more because people are unhappy with Labor. There's a saying that has some truth to it that parties in NZ don't win elections, governments lose them.

Do I like all the choices she's made as Labor leader? Of course not. Could we have done a lot worse? *Glances at Bridges and Collins* Oh, we could have done terribly.

Overall she's been a solid PM and has mostly shown leadership where needed.

Edit: to give people some idea of the torrent of abuse that she's had to deal with. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/48 ... ct-anybody Even her young daughter is the target of the abuse sent to Ardern. This isn't "Your policies are awful" stuff. This is "Go f**cking die" and "I hope you get r***d" stuff. Years of it.

I’m sure the conservatives are just joking, they don’t really mean it, right, conservatives here huh?

You guys have to own what these people are doing. Your are either against them or you are part of that.

Toenga wrote:

Kiwirob wrote:

Water should remain in the care of the local councils.

The three waters was undoubtedly clumsily handled but nobody can say the way the three waters, is being managed now is satisfactory.
Local councillors aware that their jobs are on the line in elections every three years are loath to spend the required money to upgrade deficient potable water supplies and water reticulation.
Prudent replacement and required upgrades just get kicked down the road.

People actually died when the water supply to a significant town was contaminated by e coli.
Wellington is facing massive expenditure to replace seriously failing geriatric fresh, waste and stormwater systems.
This is entirely due to predictable aging induced failures.
Fix when breaks, is not an acceptable regime for critical infrastructure.

Multiple councils with small ratepayer bases are facing massive costs to bring their water supplies and sewerage disposal up to regulation standards.

The standard answer to often date is "We can't possibly afford all this, The government needs to step up"
This solution rewards the irresponsible councils and their residents, and penalises ratepayers of councils who have been billing their residents a lot more to fund the required upgrades to their systems.
But the legislation does this to a degree anyway by pooling the assets.
Here in Auckland we have been paying massively more per head for our water, and wastewater disposal to massively upgrade our three waters infrastructure.

The three waters Act is an attempt to correct this.
I suspect it was in part, it is also a preemptive blocking move to prevent local councils entering long term contractual water arrangements with private providers, such arrangements currently causing so much such grief and pollution in the UK.
And the alternative of Government providing the bulk of the funding to be administered by the same Council system that had let the current situation arise is simply unacceptable.


Whilst pollution regulations are nationwide, enforcement used to lie with Regional councils whose councillors are disproportionately drawn from the farming community who tend to be at best skeptical to Health Safety and the Environment, and at worst openly antagonistic.

This has resulted in widespread enforcement that is at best under resourced, and at worst actually obstructed.
The regional council in one prominent dairying area, suffering very serious degradation in freshwater standards, through farm runoff, actually instructed that inspections require 7 days notice, enough time to get sucker trucks in to drain effluent ponds, and aerial inspections were actually prohibited.

This has seriously offended much of maoridom whose very culture incorporates responsible water, stewardship.
Likewise the very recent flood events bringing unbelievable amounts of exotic forestry milling debris down rivers destroying valuable cropping land, and degrading their traditional food sources, maori find deeply offensive. Hence maori keen interest in exercising the shared governance written into the Treaty.

Unfortunately these ongoing failures of responsible land and water stewardship detract from the tremendous work so many rural landowners have done, and are doing at at increasing rate to reduce runoff damage and stabilise their land. This was initially largely individual efforts, but with worldwide pressure to reduce environmental footprints there is increasing industry pressure, and society pressure.
The Government Three Waters legislation is just a product of this society pressure.
Things have to change, How well this pariticular piece of legislation will work remains unknown.

That all sounds lovely in theory, but that’s not how it is perceived by the public, nor how it would work in reality. Also the Havelock North outbreak is the only serious one in how long? About a century in the whole country. 3 deaths which weren’t actually definitely caused by the outbreak.
It’s not a serious nationwide issue. Extra funding is… which is something central government could easily do rather than centralising the whole thing and then going that step too far and handing control over to iwi in an undemocratic race based flawed policy.

Toenga wrote:

Covid went on too long. Nobody expected 3 years of it. So people are grumpy.
This is irrespective of any government interventions.

And she still gets a lot of blame for it.

Toenga wrote:

Initial interventions to maintain employment had an unfortunate effect of raising already extraordinary house prices to stratospheric levels.
But later interventions to bring down house prices, by raising the central bank interest rate, and winding back back some of the tax breaks on investment properties have meant that house prices have fallen back substantially, although they are on average still higher then pre covid.

The whole situation is unbelievably messed up. The property market has been significantly over inflated for years and it was always going to crash at some point. Unfortunately, when the balloon has been so badly over-inflated, measures to deflate it (without bursting the bubble) have to be done delicately and have little chance of near term success. The RBNZ has been fairly incompetent here too. Kept interest rates too low for far, far too long. They're always lending limitless cash to the banks for residential property without strings attached ("hey, 25% of this money has to be for lending to businesses") only ads flames to the fire. The foreign buyer ban from the government did reduce demand, as did the various bright line test measures, but it wasn't enough. Not nearly enough.
.
National still refuses to acknowledge the issue of the housing bubble and with a market correction taking place, it's likely that they'll reverse all the measures Labour took to reduce demand and bring us back to the days of uncontrolled migration in a hope to boost house prices again. Chris Luxton owns seven properties (or was it seven "investment properties"?) so you can be sure that he's not going to take any policy actions that do anything other than raising prices further.

Remember that the previous National government refused to even keep statistics on how much real estate was being bought up by foreigners.

But Labour has failed on controlling house prices. I remember a couple of years ago they even came clean and JA admitted that policy goals wasn't to reduce house prices, but to keep them static. Shameful.

Toenga wrote:

This has meant a decline in the last year of household wealth for property owners.
Not popular in the property owning class.

I wonder how much of the issue is due to all the Wealthy Boomers who voted for Labour in the last election due to the government's successful handling of COVID. Since they voted Labour, Labour spent their current term trying to appease said Wealthy Boomers (ie dropping any big ideas).

Toenga wrote:

NZ is almost unique in not having capital gains tax, very much favouring property investment over other investments.
This has distorted the economy.

Toenga wrote:

One economist described our economy as A property market, with a smallish economy tacked on.
To partially address this, the government had though introduced a form of capital gains tax on investment rental properties, again deeply unpopular with already property owners, but should favour intending 1st home buyers once interest rates drop back to more recently normal rates.

It's a House of Cards. Values are so inflated and real estate speculation such a big part of the economy that you get into the situation where the government can't afford for house prices to head back towards a "normal" level because a lot of households will be significantly underwater. Additionally, you're in a situation where financing real estate is sucking up more and more of the economy.

Toenga wrote:

And there is apprehension in some communities about increasingly implementing Treaty of Waitangi principles, and continuing with redress of the longstanding failures to comply with that 183 year old treaty.

Three Waters was a huge mistake politically. Whilst nearly all of the opposition to it is based on BS, it unquestionably opened up a can of worms that really didn't need to be opened up. T'was an absolute gift for the racists who loved the divisiveness of the mid 2000s.

Toenga wrote:

In short, vested interests are unhappy with progressive measures that disrupt the status quo.

The wealthy are very unhappy.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/ ... J7B4TGAUI/

Aaron747 wrote:

Zkpilot wrote:

Go woke, go broke… as the expression goes. Labour had an unprecedented electoral majority yet squandered it on woke policies (He Puapua, 3 waters, renaming everything etc) rather than actually governing and getting things done. That more than anything else has put people off.

How exactly is water infrastructure reform 'woke'? Sorry, just curious - a Kiwi friend of mine at work is constantly arguing with his 60-something dad on that very point. As he is fond of telling our Japanese coworkers, 'securing the environmental future in an island country is not political - it's necessary'

It's not "woke" but people who like to use that word saw the co-governance provision as an opportunity to ignite a culture war. Ask nearly anyone who opposes Three Waters and they will be absolutely clueless as to what is actually happening, other than maybe a token "they're giving the waterpipes to Maoris".

Back in reality, there's very much water related issues that need to be solved - and the legislation will go some way to solving them, but politically it didn't go very well at all. And there were much bigger fish that should have been fried instead. Shame that the government didn't play things different by attacking WaterCare. Doing that would have made it much easier to sell the legislation.

People getting upset about "woke"ness of the current government might want to google which was the only party to form a government with the Maori Party and further google how it was that the Maori Party came to be.

ltbewr wrote:

An article I read here in the USA also suggested another factor in her resignation as PM is due to growing numbers of attacks on her character as well as threats of violence as to her and her family over polices including as to handling the Covid-19 pandemic, gun regulations (after the mass shooting in Christchurch), water management, housing and tax policies. https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/19/world/ne ... index.html

Unfortunately, since COVID the weirdos have really upped the nastiness and misogynistic attacks on her and she get's blamed for everything in a "thanks Obama" kind of way. I have a farmer neighbor who blames her for.......daylight saving.

In the aftermath of the anti-vaxxers taking over parliament, all the conspiracy nuts went absolutely wild about her. There was a conspiracy about her husband being a paedo and being jailed for it (due to him not making public appearances for some period of time). There were all sorts of conspiracies about her trip to the US.

https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/08-06 ... n-new-york

I always thought that New Zealand was much better than Australia in terms of the way that Women in the Public Sphere are treated. I honestly thought that all the s#it that Julia Gillard had to deal with would never happen here. Sadly, whilst not as bad as that, the past few years have proven that we really aren't much better at all. Certainly awakens some ghosts of the past.

Toenga wrote:

The three waters was undoubtedly clumsily handled but nobody can say the way the three waters, is being managed now is satisfactory.
Local councillors aware that their jobs are on the line in elections every three years are loath to spend the required money to upgrade deficient potable water supplies and water reticulation.
Prudent replacement and required upgrades just get kicked down the road.

Exactly. Unfortunately the government has done a terrible job making their own case for change.

Toenga wrote:

People actually died when the water supply to a significant town was contaminated by e coli.

Something that nobody seems to mention.

Toenga wrote:

Wellington is facing massive expenditure to replace seriously failing geriatric fresh, waste and stormwater systems.
This is entirely due to predictable aging induced failures.

Meanwhile in Auckland, the previous government's policy of mass migration (ie growing the size of the city by ~50,000 people a year for nearly a decade) has resulted in stormwater and wastewater infrastructure being vastly substandard. It was amazing how little upgrades there were in terms of water infrastructure until 2018/2019. Watercare (which in it's current form, yet another "blessing" from National/ACT) is absolutely hopeless, very inefficient and deeply unpopular with literally everyone.

Toenga wrote:

Fix when breaks, is not an acceptable regime for critical infrastructure.

Toenga wrote:

Unfortunately these ongoing failures of responsible land and water stewardship detract from the tremendous work so many rural landowners have done, and are doing at at increasing rate to reduce runoff damage and stabilise their land. This was initially largely individual efforts, but with worldwide pressure to reduce environmental footprints there is increasing industry pressure, and society pressure.

A huge amount has been done in this area, but lets not pretend that the vast majority of the farming community didn't only do so whilst kicking and screaming.

Avatar2go wrote:

It is pretty crazy that with the rise of extreme conservatism, the number of threats and violent acts against public officials has risen 10 fold. In the US, members of Congress have received over 10,000 threats since Trump was elected president.

And despite the conservative claims that "both sides do it", the threats are overwhelming made by conservative groups, against elected officials or administrative public servants and appointees.

Unfortunately a lot of the QAnon BS makes it's way here. The fact that the country did pass comprehensive gun control reform here in the wake of the Christchurch terrorist attack added fuel to the conspiracy nuts.

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics ... risks.html

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

People forget that she was elected as leader of the Labor party with basically weeks to go before the election when the previous leader, Andrew Little, saw the writing on the wall and resigned. This took Labor from likely loosing yet another election to winning.

This is something I still find amazing. Nothing changed policy-wise between Andrew Little's leadership of the Labour Party and Jacinda Ardern's, yet it's popularity doubled overnight and was enough to get them a good enough election result to take power through coalition. I appreciate that Andrew Little has the personality and charisma of a dead possum (whilst Jacinda is very charismatic and a good public speaker), but I'd have hoped that people would be voting more for policy than for personality.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

Labor have some good options like Wood, Hipkins, and Allen. But like most parties there's not much depth beyond that.

Things would get super nasty if Allen were to become leader. I think she's still recovering from cancer though, so doubt a leaderhip run is about to happen. Like with Grant Robertson, I don't think Labour can win an election with an LGBT leader. A lot of Labour voters are Pacific Islander Christians who are quite socially conservative.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

National have made gains not because they're showing something better but more because people are unhappy with Labor. There's a saying that has some truth to it that parties in NZ don't win elections, governments lose them.

Like Labour's Front Bench, National's doesn't really have a lot of talent. They've been able to hide this somewhat by being out of the spotlight, but that will likely change come election time. Not sure it will make a difference though.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

Do I like all the choices she's made as Labor leader? Of course not. Could we have done a lot worse? *Glances at Bridges and Collins* Oh, we could have done terribly.

Never forget Todd Muller

I note that Judith Collins got promoted back to the front bench a few days ago. This could get interesting.

ZaphodHarkonnen wrote:

Overall she's been a solid PM and has mostly shown leadership where needed.

I'm not a Labour supporter but the PM has done an ok job. I expected much, much more from them but see the opposition as worse (and, more importantly, not having solutions to the issues they keep raising). Under Labour average wages rose twice as fast as under the previous government and they've done a lot of work to strengthen workers rights and unions. Lots of good stuff for the Forestry Industry too and the Provincial Growth Fund has done a lot, which are both pet issues for me.

Not sure if it's enough to win my vote, but I'll think about that properly when we're closer to the election.

cskok8 wrote:

She could have declared an emergency, suspended parliament and installed herself as dictator for life

Missed opportunity.

Kiwirob wrote:

Helen and Shipley weren't given as much stick, especially Helen because she was far more competent and fit to lead than Ardern.

Not sure about Shipley, but hard disagree on Helen Clark. There was an enormous amount of misogyny abuse directed her way constantly from attacking her for being childless, 'Ditch the bitc#' bumper stickers, the derogatory "Auntie Helen" label and a whopping amount of misogyny about her appearance in the wake of the Placard Scandal (which itself was a self-own from Labour, entirely brought on by themseles). I remember this very well and my peers and I were very much part of it. Quite shameful. There was also that nasty rap song, but I can't remember the source of it.

Helen could be very nasty though, which Ardern isn't. I don't remember Shipley being nasty, but I could be wrong.

Kiwirob wrote:

People from the left were hurling terrible abuse at Key, if he's brought up in the media today the abuse continues.

What terrible abuse gets hurled at Key? People pointing out that he was corrupt? People mentioning him fondling the lady's Pony Tail against her will?

Kiwirob wrote:

The best chance NZ had of electing a Maori PM was in 2020, Simon Bridges is Maori as was his deputy Paula Bennett. I voted for him

What on earth are you talking about?? Simon Bridges got rolled by Todd Muller (and Nikki Kaye) in May 2020 because he has the same amount of charisma as Andrew Little which reflected in the polls. He was never the leader of his party going into an election.

Kiwirob wrote:

Maori didn't because most Maori don't consider him Maori enough. Same with Winston Peters, too well spoken and not maori enough.

Nonsense. Winston was [and still is] hugely popular amongst the Maori community.

sierrakilo44 wrote:

ltbewr wrote:

To me (from the USA), PM Arden, like other national leaders are facing, is a growing shift to more conservative social and political policies in government.

Not really.

Let’s look at the other Anglosphere nations.

In the USA Democrats won the last Presidential election, held onto the Senate when they weren’t expected to and had the smallest loss in the House since JFK (traditionally a presidential winning party loses big in their first House midterms). GOP proved themselves to be inept in the House on Day one.

UK - Tories absolutely on the nose. Inept, leadership woes, people sick of them playing austerity politics for 15 years. Polls have them on track to be virtually eliminated from Parliament next election.

Canada - Trudeau won a third term unexpectedly, with the help of Block Quebec and NDP it’ll be hard for conservatives to form a majority whilst Trudeau leads the Liberals.

Australia - left wing ALP won government last federal election, now control all state governments bar NSW and Tasmania with NSW expected to change to ALP in March. PM Albanese popular, right wing opposition leader Dutton very unpopular and not helping the conservative cause.

My theory is after the combination of Trump, Brexit and Australia’s Morrison government a lot of people in the Anglosphere saw how that far right populist governments in practice are terrible, and have decided more leftist, sensible moderate governments are the way to go.

This is true and I don't see it changing because in all of these countries which can be compared against each other the conservative parties can't help themselves going to the extreme fringes and it leaves the liberal parties unchecked. Winning as a conservative should be dead easy, be a cultural libertarian and promise to run the government efficiently with minimal waste.

As a Canadian I don't think there are a lot of Canadians who are absolutely thrilled with Trudeau (I certainly won't vote for him again, the liberals possibly under a new leader) but the conservatives have struggled with the moderate voters for the last few elections. Not necessarily because of their economic policies but the fact that they give a voice to the more extreme wing of their parties.

In Canada the conservative leader Pierre Poilievre actually speaks about the economic issues that people care about (cost of living, out economic future, housing etc.) all pressing issues in these countries. However he has been tarnished by being supportive with the freedom convoy (not something I completely disagree with but a different discussion) and being supportive of things like crypto. He scares older liberals who don't face the cost of living issues that my generations has to face head on. If you can't get those who are 50+ on board with your message then you are doomed.

The New Zealand Labour Party Finance Ministers Cullen, and now Robertson, are financial conservatives,
The Clark Govetnment played down government debt considerably, against increasing National calls to instead reduce taxes.
National was elected during the GFC lowered income taxes but raised GST to compensate, in doing so shifting more of the tax burden on to the lower paid.
Robertson continued paying down government debt at the same rate as the Key government right up to Covid which meant when it struck we had a very comfortable buffer of available increased borrowing ability.
Luzon to his credit, has now withdrawn his election bribe of lowering income tax, due to our now covid caused more elevated debt levels, but still very low by world standards.

Under Labour we have gained, or retained, all our international Aaa or AA+ credit ratings..

Our Covid border lockdown was actually far less onerous then conservatively governed Australia which actually prohibited their citizens leaving without a permit. We were always free to leave, but re entry, like to Australia required a booking to capacity limited, and fee payable 14day, later reduced MIQ system. Never the less over 230 000, equivalent to 4.5% of our population came through our MIQ system.

For Australia this percentage was about 3%.

One has to wonder what percentage of Americans re entered the USA during the 2020 to the end of 2021. probably less then the percentage of returning Kiwis processed through our MIQ system.

One has to suspect that it is the more socially liberal policies and practices, gay rights, sexual equalities, and indigenous rights, and remedies, that are at the heart of the motivation behind the vehement dislike of her by some locally and offshore.

Australia has virtually no indigenous representation and women are seriously under represented, ( they have only ever had one woman PM) in their government, compared to NZ where Maori and women are represented at rates near identical to those in our general population.
Conservative religious dogma, probably has a lot to answer for.

NIKV69 wrote:

Vio wrote:

Good! She's NZ's version of "Wonderboy" Justin Trudeau. Their style of woke politics are hurting New Zealand and my own (Canada).

Something tells me NZ will be better off. She was horrible.

How many Kiwi colleagues/relatives/friends do you have? How many times have you been to NZ? Something tells me you might know very little about the situation there.

Aaron747 wrote:

How many Kiwi colleagues/relatives/friends do you have? How many times have you been to NZ? Something tells me you might know very little about the situation there.

Yet all the Euros here that have never been to the USA know better than people that actually live in the USA about the situation here. What about her polling? They live in NZ don't they?

NIKV69 wrote:

Aaron747 wrote:

How many Kiwi colleagues/relatives/friends do you have? How many times have you been to NZ? Something tells me you might know very little about the situation there.

Yet all the Euros here that have never been to the USA know better than people that actually live in the USA about the situation here. What about her polling? They live in NZ don't they?

That wasn’t the question. Just wondering if you have sources about the Ardern term as PM other than NYP.

FYI people abroad in the English-speaking world get much more news and info about the US than we get about them.

NIKV69 wrote:

Aaron747 wrote:

How many Kiwi colleagues/relatives/friends do you have? How many times have you been to NZ? Something tells me you might know very little about the situation there.

Yet all the Euros here that have never been to the USA know better than people that actually live in the USA about the situation here. What about her polling? They live in NZ don't they?

I have family in the USA and US news is widely, widely reported in media outside the US. I also have access to multiple US based news services.

I’m an Australian, and my country has an unsurprisingly close relationship with NZ.

I’m pleased you provided a source to perhaps partially support your outrageous statement upthread about Ardern and Pelosi. Most people whose perspective are not firmly on the right are also happy to acknowledge fault where there is evidence.

Aaron747 wrote:

That wasn’t the question. Just wondering if you have sources about the Ardern term as PM other than NYP.

FYI people abroad in the English-speaking world get much more news and info about the US than we get about them.

The question was clear and it was rhetorical. As for your news point it's also a stretch.

Kent350787 wrote:

I have family in the USA and US news is widely, widely reported in media outside the US. I also have access to multiple US based news services.

I’m an Australian, and my country has an unsurprisingly close relationship with NZ.

I’m pleased you provided a source to perhaps partially support your outrageous statement upthread about Ardern and Pelosi. Most people whose perspective are not firmly on the right are also happy to acknowledge fault where there is evidence.

Again I am sorry she is cutting and running once the tide turned but I will not entertain this notion that I am not allowed to have an opinion about NZ. It's really insulting and totally wrong as well. If you want to continue with this pro forma forum posting dogma go right ahead but I am done here.

NIKV69 wrote:

Aaron747 wrote:

How many Kiwi colleagues/relatives/friends do you have? How many times have you been to NZ? Something tells me you might know very little about the situation there.

Yet all the Euros here that have never been to the USA know better than people that actually live in the USA about the situation here. What about her polling? They live in NZ don't they?

I live in the U.S. and conservatives have turned it into a pit. New Zealand has done extremely well under Jacinda Arden and she is one of the best leaders of the century. I am so impressed with New Zealand under Arden and they are the role model for freedom. She stood for equality, intelligence, empathy, strength, perseverance, science, facts, and truth. Trump was an embarrassment to the U.S. and the free world and we are still living with the consequences today in the U.S.

NIKV69 wrote:

... but I will not entertain this notion that I am not allowed to have an opinion about NZ. It's really insulting and totally wrong as well. If you want to continue with this pro forma forum posting dogma go right ahead but I am done here.

I have no idea what you're talking about here. Everyone is able to express an opinion. But if your opinion is at odds with evidence, don't be surpised if you're called out to provide evidence to support your contrary opinion.