Roderick Mulgan (Free Speech Union board member) lobbied Simeon Brown; Brown appointed him to the Medical Council. UK FSU founder Toby Young attended a private UCL eugenics conference in 2018. That's the 'free speech' movement's character reference. #nzpol

Luxon on Peters today: 'inappropriate attention-seeking comments'. Peters had told Green MP Lawrence Xu-Nan to 'go back to where you've come from'. This is the coalition National sold as the antidote to Labour's 'coalition of chaos'. #nzpol

22% of Ireland's electricity goes to data centres — more than all urban Irish households combined. Households paid €715m extra on bills 2015-2023. NZ's first big AI data centre is 140MW → 360MW at build; Mercury signed the supply deal. Look at Ireland. #nzpol

letsgodehab.bsky.social@letsgodehab.bsky.social · 4d ago

Only slightly dated but this from Ireland could well tell us our journey here in NZ. www.thejournal.ie/readme/data-...

Luxon in Rotorua: business self-reliance, no more government handouts. Luxon as Air NZ CEO: took a $900m Crown loan facility during Covid. Air NZ's earlier Crown rescue: $885m in 2002. He chaired Ardern's Business Advisory Council in 2018. Preaching austerity to businesses whose pump he ran. #nzpol

Auckland: Migrant Workers Association of Aotearoa mock-executed a Winston Peters effigy at a guillotine. Peters told Chinese-Kiwi Green MP Xu-Nan to 'go back to where you've come from' and called China a 'flatfish'. His third ethnic attack on an MP in 18 months. China lodged a formal protest. #nzpol

41% of NZ households skipped heating this year (Consumer NZ). Prices up 177% since the 1999 'reforms'. Four companies — Contact, Genesis, Mercury, Meridian — run generation and retail. Consumer NZ: 'household-level behavioural change cannot fix a market that is structurally failing'. #nzpol

1 in 3 NZ infant hospital admissions is acute respiratory illness. RSV drives a lot of it. Medsafe just approved nirsevimab (single injection, ~80% effective). Pharmac has it on the 'Options for Investment List' but not funded. Solution's on the shelf. Babies stay in hospital. #nzpol

NZF this week: Nash cut loose, Peters keeps the roadshow going. Eighty-one. Still deals. Outlasted more PMs than a haunted couch. #nzpol

Government won't invest in new power for households. Meanwhile a Singapore-owned AI data centre just bought 140MW — the constant power draw of every home in Christchurch — from Mercury, half owned by NZ taxpayers. Grid stays tight. Bills stay high. AI gets served first. #nzpol

From November 2026: Jobseeker ends for 18-19-year-olds with health conditions or disabilities whose parents earn over $65k. 2,733 affected. 69% have psychiatric conditions. Some have cancer. Upston: 'better future outcomes' if they stay close to the labour market. Better for whom? #nzpol

NZ abstains on UN reappointment of Human Rights Commissioner Türk, joining Belarus, South Sudan, Uganda. Türk has been outspoken on Gaza. US pressures allies against him. Winston Peters has spent the term calibrating NZ's positions to Trump's mood. We used to have independent foreign policy. #nzpol

Open and free to all: Just as the RBNZ's rate hike deepens the scars of youth joblessness, the Govt will remove benefits of 4,700 jobless teenagers, including 1,885 with mental health issues & some being treated for cancer #nzpol open.substack.com/pub/thekaka/...

How NZ punishes our stressed & jobless youth

Just as the RBNZ's rate hike deepens the scars of youth joblessness, the Govt will remove benefits of 4,700 jobless teenagers, including 1,885 with mental health issues & some being treated for cancer

open.substack.com

'200,000 workers faced a pay cut if the bill passed' — Fleur Fitzsimons, PSA. Government passed it. Employment Leave Bill: leave now accrues in hours (not days), casual work gets 12.5% pay-in-lieu instead of accruing leave. Van Velden: 'simpler, fairer'. For whom?

'Treaty overreach' has a data problem. Māori: 17% of the population, ~50% of the prison population, disproportionately in state care, life expectancy 7 years shorter. Not the outcome pattern of a group that's been over-served.

NZ last of 37 OECD countries on real wage growth 2021-26. Purchasing power down 6.4%. RBNZ was already tightening; coalition chose fiscal contraction on top of it. Workers absorbed both. Andrew Dickson calls the 'productivity gap' a national fantasy. Top-5 wealthiest in the 1950s.

South Wairarapa: 500 homes cut off by Tūranganui bridge washout. 7,500 ratepayers on 653km of road. Nick Leggett (Infrastructure NZ): at current pace, NZ takes 2000 years to renew state highway bridge stock. Rob Taylor (Deputy Mayor): 'almost a national crisis'. Undersold.

Seymour on the under-16 social media ban: 'very unwise'. Same David Seymour who Snapchat-messaged teens (including a 14-year-old) from 2014 on. Two out of three coalition parties oppose (ACT + NZF). Stanford's bill goes to Cabinet 'soon'. Reads like personal advocacy.

Mercury (51% Crown-owned) just spent $53m for 12.7% of DataGrid — a Singapore-owned AI data centre planned for Southland. Taxpayers now hold ~$27m of exposure to a project Mercury has also agreed to feed 140MW. State-owned generator picking AI compute over investing in much-needed energy generation.

Greens' AGM: tax the wealthy, nationalise energy, moratorium on 50MW+ AI data centres. Latest Better Taxes poll: 61% NZers want the wealthy to pay more tax. Of ACT voters: 86%. Of National voters: 83%. It ain't just the Greens.

CCC recs rejected by the coalition, brief timeline: • 2024: ag emissions removed from ETS • Oct 2025: methane target cut (24-47% → 14-24% by 2050) • Dec 2025: net-negative 2050 rejected; shipping/aviation excluded • Jul 2026: NDC1 'not compatible with Paris obligations' Pattern's set.

A Summary of the Climate Change Commission‘s report. My #cartoon today #NZpol #ClimateChange #ClimateTargets

Climate Commission today: EV owners save ~$7,500 over 5 years, heat pumps ~$640/year on power. Barrier is upfront cost. Commission's fix: targeted finance, clearer signals. Government's fix: nothing on the shelf. Households absorb the difference — again.

Luxon: 'on track for net zero, may even do it a few years earlier'. Climate Commission this week: budget three 'could not be met with current plans and policies'. NZ at risk of missing all targets. Government rules out offshore credits, cuts domestic tools. On track for what, exactly?

Stuart Nash: Labour minister sacked 2023, resurfaces as NZ First candidate, resigns today after calling Katie Nimon 'lazy' for being on maternity leave. Luxon: 'not a minister in my government'. Peters accepts. Two political deaths in three years — some people cannot help themselves.

NZF conference: Shane Jones cautioned against being 'hobbled' by 'demographic engineering' concerns. Floor speaker: 'globalist governments have degraded our economy'. 'Globalism' is 1930s coded language. 'Demographic engineering' is Great Replacement. Call it what it is.

Journo: Mr Prime Minister you still think New Zealand can achieve net zero by 2050? PM: Yes, maybe even a few years earlier J: Yet you are doing nothing to reduce NZ's emissions? PM: No, we expect a science-based solution to emerge soon J: So you're funding NZ scientists to do this? PM: Oh, God no

Three solar plans in one month. National: 3.8% council-rates loan, 10-30 years — worse than a bank. Labour: $160m, $3k kickstart for low/mid income, plug-in solar for renters. Greens: $980m, zero-interest to 90%, panels on half our state houses. You get the panel you pay for.

Simeon Brown is laying out the messages you will hear all year on the other place. These messages are well-rehearsed and will be relentlessly pushed. Labour have failed miserably to stop these reckons becoming embedded as facts in the national psyche. So, another quick recap of reality... [🧵1/n]

Willis blames Trump for 4.1% CPI — 'the Trump spike, driven by petrol'. Half true: US-Iran war pushed oil, fuel accounts for ~1.2 points above target. Domestic inflation still sits at 2.9%. Government costs +21%, GP fees +20% (Edmonds). Trump can eat the fuel. The rest is yours, Nicola.

200,000 households can't afford to heat their homes. Greens' answer today: $980m KiwiPower — 90% zero-interest loans for household solar + batteries, panels on half our state houses within four years, 50,000 low-income upgrades.