Kitteridge Report suggests "unclear legislation" allowed for GCSB to illegally spy on New Zealanders. But the real responsibility lies elsewhere
The Kitteridge Report on New Zealand's intelligence agency, the GCSB, is written in polite bureaucratic language but the activities it documents amount to a gross breach of the GCSB’s responsibility to the New Zealand public.
The story behind the massive leak of documents revealing the extent to which the world's wealthy go to avoid and evade tax and New Zealand's part in the investigations
News has been coming out of Washington DC recently of a massive leak of tax haven information. I have spent the past 15 months working on this project, helping to dig through the leaked material to find what should be publicised.
What is investigative journalism, really, and why is it important? Nicky Hager shares his Bruce Jesson Lecture, presented at Auckland's Maidment Theatre on October 31
Each time I go walking near my home I pass an old war memorial inscribed with the words "magna est veritas, et praevalebit": Truth is great, and will prevail. The words date from 1917, in the middle of the First World War, and were obviously attempting to reassure the locals that their sons and brothers were dying in a noble cause.
The news declared that the National Party had had a 'historic' election victory on Saturday but, if that was true, National Party people would be looking happier. The reality is much more complicated
Here's the bullet-point version, to begin:
And so the saga of the Brash email invesigations ends, not with a bang, but with continued denials by those exposed
When my book The Hollow Men was published over three years ago, the National Party-aligned PR man Matthew Hooton wrote a furious newspaper column saying that the source material for the book had obviously been illegally hacked and that he and others were going to investigate and bring me to justice. Time has proved him wrong on both points.
As the Key administration prepares for the opening of parliament for 2010, where is the plan and wisdom required for good governance? And where's the opposition? Here's a report card – in plain language
With the government's announcement on sending the SAS to Afghanistan due any day, it's time to stop pretending. They will say yes. And John Key will be responsible for any deaths
An 11 month legal battle with political consultants Crosby/Textor during an election year reveals the trouble with our defamation laws
* Please see radio transcript and table at the end of this post
I have just been through an 11-month defamation case, finally settled this week. I am happy with the result – I won on all points of substance – but am also concerned that my and my lawyer's time could be wasted month after month on a case that from the start had so little merit.
The latest reporting on Don Brash's "stolen emails" has again exposed National's political spin machine and a media with a curious attitude towards the public's right to know
I recommend being at the centre of a news issue for getting a close up view of how the news media operates. It is not always a pleasing or uplifting experience, but it is informative.
Leaked Cabinet plans list the government's infrastructure projects and show that even facing the worst economic crisis in half a century, the government intends to restrain its spending
