NZ is absent from global group which questions WHO study – our health officials (we are told) were much too busy on Covid duty

The US and 14 other governments earlier this week issued a statement raising concerns about the recent World Health Organisation (WHO) study into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic.  This was an interesting group: the US, Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Israel, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, the Republic of Korea, Slovenia, and the United Kingdom.

New Zealand?  Er, no.

Apparently, we didn’t have the time to read even the executive summary which had been with officials, along with the main report, in the Ministry of Health for some time.

We are told by Beehive insiders that the ministry, which we all know is singly focused on defeating Covid, hadn’t the chance to study the document.

The report is mildly critical of China, stating that the review team hadn’t had full access to background documents and records.

The High Court finds fault with the Waitangi Tribunal (and a breach of The Treaty) while Jackson is congratulating it

Our Beehive bulletin

While Maori Development Minister Willie Jackson was addressing members of the Waitangi Tribunal,  the High Court was setting aside a tribunal decision to return $800m in state-owned land to an iwi because it had failed to follow tikanga Māori and breached the Treaty

Good grief!

The tribunal breached “the Treaty”?

Apparently so.

According to Newsroom:

Crucially, Justice Francis Cooke declared the tribunal had been in breach of the Treaty of Waitangi and not followed tikanga when it decided lands transferred to state-owned enterprises or in Crown forests in the central North Island should be returned to the Ngāti Kahungunu iwi.

The disputed tribunal ruling on the $800m of public lands accordingly has been overturned (although the judgement may be appealed).

Jackson’s speech to the tribunal members, telling them what a splendid job they were doing and giving them an idea of the future work that lies in store for them, was posted on the Beehive website along with –

Good news for horticulture: govt is ploughing $8m into research to develop leaf protein concentrate

Damien  O’Connor, the  minister  who earlier this year distinguished himself   by  telling  the Australian  government to  show  more “respect” in its  dealings  with  China, has  at  last won a  battle in  Cabinet. He  got  his  colleagues,  some of  whom are always reluctant to do  anything to help the country’s primary industries and  farmers, to  agree  to  support a new programme to lead New Zealand’s plant protein sector development.

The government is partnering with Lincoln-based  Leaft Foods on a $20m research and development programme that could put NZ on the map as a leading leaf protein concentrate producer.

Through its Sustainable Food & Fibre Futures fund, the Ministry for Primary Industries is contributing $8m to the five-year programme to develop technology that extracts edible protein from NZ grown green leafy crops.

Leaft Foods’ technology will be used to produce high-quality protein in the form of gels or powders that can be used in a range of foods in the fast-growing global market for plant proteins.

Critiques of Govt’s contentious housing package raise questions about whose advice was sought

So  what happened  to  “go hard, go  early”?  Does  anyone  expect house  prices  (which have risen   more than $100,000  since  early 2020) to  start falling?

The  Ardern government’s   housing  package aroused  curiously mixed  reactions, hardly  any  of them  providing  a  glimmer of  light  to  would-be first-home buyers that house prices will  be  falling  any time  soon.

From one side, the warning came that rent controls could not be far behind. From the other,  “market forces” and the evils of neo-liberalism had  at  last been corralled.

Over  on the  Left, Chris Trotter  sees a housing crisis ripping apart the country’s weakest and most vulnerable communities.

“While the detail of the Labour government’s housing package has been sufficient to unleash the very worst impulses of NZ’s landlord class – whose screams of rage and wild threats of social vengeance have pretty much confirmed the rest of NZ society’s worst fears concerning‘property investors’ – it is the rank insubordination of the nation’s elected leaders which most rankles neo-liberalism’s true believers”.

May the force be with you – and it will be when tourist taskforce’s vision (influenced by Te Ao Māori) is turned into policy and practice

At a NetHui in Auckland in 2015, Māori discussed and shared their ideas about whether tikanga Māori crossed over to the internet.

A Lincoln University philosopher said it does, according to one report of the proceedings.

Indigenous Digital Philosopher, Karaitiana Taiuru says, “We’re kanohi ki te kanohi, you know their mauri, you can touch something and get the mauri and the internet, it’s nothing, it’s te kore and it’s hard to try and quantify that.  But if you use the internet for the right purposes then it will have mauri.”

Here at Point of Order we trust we are putting the internet to the right purpose by drawing attention to the cultural and spiritual thrust of the recently released Tourism Future Taskforce Interim Report. It says:

This is a taskforce and report that from day one has been inspired by the Te Ao Māori perspective.

The wisdom and guidance received from Māori leadership has been incredibly significant to the thinking along the journey towards these [the taskforce’s] recommendations

The concept of “mauri” looms large in the taskforce’s vision for the tourist industry. 

Beware, Mr Big – we are being encouraged to blow the whistle on anything suspicious under new Customs initiative

Our Beehive bulletin

Customs Minister Meka Whaitiri officially launched Customs’ new outreach campaign, Border Protect, in Opua at the weekend.

This campaign is aimed at encouraging Kiwis to blow the whistle, if they suspect something untoward is going on – they should report potential suspicious activities to Customs “and help protect New Zealand”.

The only other news on the Beehive website told us the PM has unveiled a new Memorial to acknowledge the contribution of Pacific nations to military conflicts and the bonds shared with New Zealand.

The Pacific Islands Memorial Te Reo Hotunui o te Moana nui a Kiwa recognises the close relationship between Aotearoa New Zealand and other Pacific nations, acknowledging the region’s contribution during times of conflict and the shared history that strengthens our bond today, Jacinda Ardern said.

The Memorial is an addition to the Pukeahu National War Memorial Park.

Whaitiri went further north to speak to community and industry representatives at the Bay of Islands Marina, where she emphasised that Northland remains a key focus for Customs because it has one of the most accessible parts of New Zealand’s coastline and Opua is the main hub for international yacht arrivals and departures.

Opua was a splendid choice for the  launch.   

Tinetti’s teaser – to whom was she talking when she delivered a Moot Speech about teaching and truancy?

Our Beehive bulletin

Oh goody – a guessing game has been provided by the clever people who post announcements, speeches and what-have-you on the Beehive website.

It was delivered in the name of Associate Education Minister Jan Tinetti – by her press secretary, perhaps? – in the form of a teasing headline.

Learning Support, Curriculum, Attendance – NZPF Moot Speech

NZPF?  Which one?

We put the challenge aside while checking out the other news from the Beehive,

• Amelia Setefano and Marina McCartney have been selected as inaugural recipients of the Ministry of Education’s Tagaloa scholarship, which supports Pacific Doctorate and Masters study.
• Three Auckland schools are benefitting from a $1.3 billion nationwide school redevelopment programme. May Road School, Onehunga Primary School and Albany Primary School are getting new classrooms to replace those in poor condition, and will benefit from investment in projects to support expected increases in student numbers.

And now to identifying the audience to whom Tinetti delivered her NZPF Moot Speech.

The possibilities (because you could say learning and attendance are involved in all of them) include: 

Davidson posts a press statement on housing (hurrah) but Nash is quiet about the role of animism in vision for the tourist industry

Our Beehive bulletin

There was great excitement in the Point of Order office this morning when one of the team checked the emails.  He bellowed the news to his colleagues as if it were a headline:  “Davidson breaks her duck”.

Yep.  She had runs on the board, if you regard her Beehive website as the official scoreboard for this sort of thing.  .

Our excitement almost distracted us from other Beehive news, including the welcoming of a Tourism Futures Taskforce report which sets out a long-term vision and direction.

It emphasises the need to prioritise sustainable tourism that enhances community wellbeing, tourism Minister Stuart Nash said.

In fact it does much more than that by promoting a fundamental cultural and spiritual transformation – social engineering is another way of putting it – for the tourism sector.  For example:

“We have Mauri – we carry a life force that connects all living things. Our Mauri is what binds us to the land.”  

In other words, the future of the tourist industry should be based on animism, or the belief that objects, places, and creatures all possess a distinct spiritual essence.

And where did the taskforce get that idea? The report makes no secret of the answer:

“This is a taskforce and report that from day one has been inspired by the Te Ao Māori perspective. The wisdom and guidance received from Māori leadership has been incredibly significant to the thinking along the journey towards these recommendations”.

Nash has already signalled the industry is about to undergo a transformation, as the government prepares for borders to re-open and international visitors to return when it is safe.

The Taskforce report is HERE. 

In other news from the Beehive:

• Conservation Minister Kiri Allan declared the North Island kokako has been brought back from the brink of extinction. Protection of this species began in the late 1990s, after the kōkako population dropped to as few as 330 breeding pairs – around 1000 individual birds –scattered across the North Island.  There are now 2000 breeding pairs.
• Three ministerial speeches have been delivered (see below for further information).

As we said, these posts were crowded out in our considerations by what seemed to be the triumph of Marama Davidson getting runs on the board.

But not only did we find a record of the statement that had been emailed to us this morning, when we visited the website.  We found records of other announcements and speeches in Davidson’s name  –

Release

26 MARCH 2021

$4M to reduce homelessness in five locations

Associate Housing Minister Marama Davidson today announced funding support for new initiatives that will prevent and reduce homelessness in Whangarei, Auckland, Napier/Hastings, Rotorua and the Hutt Valley.

 Speech

15 MARCH 2021

Speech to the 65th United Nations Commission on the Status of Women Side Event, March 15 2021

Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā tātou katoa.

Release

24 FEBRUARY 2021

Government delivers 1,000 more transitional housing places

The Government has added 1,000 more transitional housing places as promised under the Aotearoa New Zealand Homelessness Action Plan (HAP), launched one year ago.

 Speech

28 NOVEMBER 2020

Opening Address, Pacific Women’s Watch (New Zealand) Annual Conference on Disability – Creating a level playing field between ALL women in Aotearoa New Zealand

One of the greatest opportunities to improve the wellbeing of New Zealanders is to reduce New Zealand’s high rates of violence and ultimately to reduce and stop family violence

We are sure we found nothing on the site when we looked just a few days ago, prompted by a question in the House, and reported we had found a blank slate.

But maybe we were wrong – and maybe Davidson has been wronged by critics who question what she has achieved (although Davidson could take lessons from Kiri Allan on how to keep the press up with the play with a steady flow of press releases).

Her announcement today was the allocation of more than $4 million of funding support for new initiatives intended to prevent and reduce homelessness in Whangarei, Auckland, Napier/Hastings, Rotorua and the Hutt Valley.

This is the first round of funding from the Government’s $16.6 million Local Innovation and Partnership Fund, which is a key part of our Homelessness Action Plan.

The fund allows Government to partner with local providers or organisations who are doing innovative work to reduce homelessness in their area.

It also allows the government to pitch for political support among Maori and gays.

As Davidson said:

“The initiatives funded in this first round have a strong focus on Māori, rangatahi and the rainbow community.

“They offer new and tailored strategies to disrupt the cycle of homelessness for communities experiencing discrimination and isolation.”

For example, one of the recipients, Rainbow YOUTH, will partner with the housing and homelessness sector in Auckland to reduce the barriers LGBTQIA+ face when accessing mainstream housing services. Another, a partnership between Te Taiwhenua o Heretaunga Trust and Whatever It Takes in Hastings, Napier will provide support, positive relationships and connection using tikanga Māori to help people who have experienced long-term homelessness and move people into permanent housing.

Round two of the Local Innovation and Partnership Fund is expected to open in mid-2021.

The full list of successful applicants for round one funding is below.

Successful Local Innovation and Partnership Fund grant recipients

• Takiri Mai o Te Ata Collective in partnership with Petone Budget Service Inc
• Te Taiwhenua o Heretaunga in partnership with Whatever it Takes Trust
• RainbowYOUTH in partnership with Te Ngākau Kahukura and Auckland Council
• One Double Five Whare Awhina Community House in partnership with Mahitahi Hauora, Whangarei Youth Space, Ngati Hine Health Trust and Pehiaweri Marae
• Kāhui Tū Kaha in partnership with Auckland Council Auckland Housing First Collective, South Pacific Pride, Arohanui ki te Tangata and Northland Urban Rural Mission
• Te Taumata o Ngati Whakaue Iho Ake Trust in partnership with Manaaki Ora Trust
• Lifewise in partnership with Auckland City Mission.

Latest from the Beehive

26 MARCH 2021

Taskforce emphasises sustainable tourism

Milestone for kōkako as population soars

$4M to reduce homelessness in five locations

25 MARCH 2021

Speech

Third Reading Speech – Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill

Speech

2021 ANZSOG First Peoples conference final session speech

 Speech

Learning Support Coordinators forum – Speech

If you can now buy a house (thanks to the govt’s policies) you may balk at your power bill (thanks to the govt’s policies)

As  the  Ardern government grapples  with  the  housing  crisis  it inherited — and which  it compounded in its 3 ½  years in office — it looks like it  will have  another  on  its hands in  the  energy  sector.

When   it  sought the  plaudits  of the  climate  change  warriors   and   other  Greenies  by placing a   ban   on exploration   for  natural gas,  it did not  appear to  realise that supplies of   natural gas already were running down fast.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was quoted at the time  as  saying “I don’t think  they  (the petroleum exploration industry)  was blindsided”.

She  insisted  the  country  knew  the  Labour Party  wanted to  move away  from fossil  fuels.

So  what  have been  the consequences?

NZ  imported more  coal  in 2020  than in  2017  and 2018  combined.

A speech about NZ’s response to Covid-19, the pecking order for vaccines, and race-based ideas on who should be top of the list

Our Beehive Bulletin

Covid-19 dominated the latest news from the Beehive when we checked earlier today.

Associate Health Minister Minister Ayesha Verrall delivered a speech to an international audience of medical people.

And Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins announced the Government has confirmed strict criteria for early vaccinations for people who need to travel outside of New Zealand on compassionate grounds or for reasons of national significance.

This announcement struck a sour note with the Maori Party, which unabashedly promotes race-based ideas for deciding what the pecking order should be.

The party has its dander up over the decision to allow national sports teams to be vaccinated early if they are travelling overseas for a big event.

According to RNZ, Māori Party co-leader Rawiri Waititi said this is putting sports teams over indigenous people.