Supreme Court flip flop... Queen’s Counsels quiver... old friends part company... horseracing interests dissolve... charges of “apparent bias” upheld... Where will the inquiry into the conduct of Supreme Court judge Bill Wilson take us next?
The days are past when appointment to the judiciary compelled social and civic isolation,” according to the New Zealand Guidelines for Judicial Conduct.
Afghanistan’s president Hamid Karzai has been threatening to join the Taliban. He should be encouraged to do it and we should leave his country quickly
This month, New Zealand dispatched its 16th rotation of troops to the Provincial Reconstruction Team base in Bamyan Province. Our SAS unit in Kabul must also be almost due for rotation. We are unlikely to hear about that changing of the guard until it has happened.
What do Housing Minister Phil Heatley and North Shore City mayor Andrew Williams have in common – beyond a couple of bottles of wine?
Try the following for starters: media witch-hunts, a penchant for hyperbole, significant differences with John Key, an ability to embarrass Rodney Hide, and strong survival instincts – and, sometimes, they can be dangerous to be around.
Social development minister Paula Bennett promises a benefit reform that brings “an unrelenting focus on work”. But just how sharp is that focus going to be?
Promising to tighten the screws on welfare bludgers is the stuff that gets chat radio humming, but actually doing it is much more difficult, particularly when unemployment is still on the rise in an economy that is tottering out of a recession.
Aucklanders are giving the government’s super city plan the kind of reception that makes a lead balloon look positively stratospheric. Can Rodney Hide and Steven Joyce pull the Key coalition’s irons out of the fire?
Debate over new legislation normally drops under the radar once it moves into a select committee for a quiet makeover. The government’s grand plan to unite the warring suburbs, cities and districts of Auckland into a united super city is turning into a grand exception.
A newspaper photographer catches Willie Apiata walking home from an observation mission. John Key promises a new policy of openness about the SAS. The elite troops get involved in the first major fire fight of their mission. Where does the openness go?
The lid lifted briefly on SAS operations in Afghanistan last January. Then it slammed straight down again.
Auckland is heading for a real “Toyota Moment” – a head-on collision into the reality of out-of-control growth, with Rodney Hide in the crash dummy’s seat
The old Toyota ute was close to indestructible.
John Key and Bill English are sending out mixed signals about the next government budget while public confidence in New Zealand’s economic recovery wanes. Why?
The TVNZ Colmar Brunton poll tells us that public confidence in New Zealand’s economic recovery is slipping. Last November, 68% of respondents were optimistic about our economic prospects.
John Key expects more mining in Crown land, which includes our national parks. Is this going to be his year for living dangerously?
To date, caution has been the mark of the John Key government. At mid-term, he now seems ready to take some risks and spend some political capital.
The stand-off between teachers and politicians over the introduction of national standards in schools is simply a side-show in a much bigger struggle over who controls the country’s education system
The idea of setting and measuring standards in schools is seductively simple, so why is it proving so difficult?
