October 2008
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Fri, 31/10/2008 - 12:32pm
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Two new websites are now available for kiwi voters, living or holidaying overseas, who will not be in New Zealand on election day. The sites are www.kiwivoter.co.uk and www.kiwivoter.org They are pretty much mirror images of each other with some extra info for London based Kiwis on the .co.uk site. All the info needed to check eligibility, enroll, find electorates, check out candidates and vote is available from both sites. Plus there is a liberal (excuse the pun) sprinkling of ACT messages, policies etc.
I invite all overseas readers to check them out and I welcome feedback. comments, suggestions, and donations!
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Mon, 27/10/2008 - 5:40pm
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The best thing about election Billboards is that we are seen to have a presence.
The worst thing about election Billboards is that maintaining them is hard work. There are also some funny stories.
One appeared in the DominonPost this week. One Wellington family is having a battle of the billboards. The son put a small Labour sign up on the front fence himself.
Not to outdone, Dad got a builder in to put up a very large National Party billboard. A photo was taken of the Dad/son political tussle beside the billboards and published in the paper.
The article mentioned ACT so I visited this morning to ask if I could one of my billboards up too. The father of the house was out, but the Labour supporting son said his Dad would be stoked to have an ACT billboard up as well and told me to go ahead. The photo below shows the outcome.
Neighbours may well be a bit confused about the message being sent but I'm just pleased to be there in the mix!
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Mon, 27/10/2008 - 8:17am
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I've spent a fair bit of my Labour weekend doorknocking in Wellington Central and have to confess to enjoying it! A question that is routinely coming up is "Is it too late to enrol to vote?" and it is closely followed in frequency by "I can't vote - I'm out of town or overseas on election day".
Fear not, intrepid voter - solutions are at hand.
Below a summary of :-
1. How to enrol and
2. How to cast an early vote or a vote outside your electorate or a vote from overseas.
It is easier to vote from overseas this election than it ever has been before. Please pass this on to any kiwis you know living overseas who have been in New Zealand in the past three years. They are eligible to vote and I want them too, especially if they are ACT voters!
Enrolling to vote
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Submitted by Sam Bonner on Thu, 23/10/2008 - 6:04pm
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Military deaths were always notified by telegram. The most recent New Zealand military death is that of our once proud Skyhawks which are now deteriorating in the weather at Woodbourne Air Force Base.
Skyhawk Cockpits full of Water
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Wed, 22/10/2008 - 1:56pm
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I've asked the Wellington Region candidates to write a piece for Royters. We're all having interesting comments and experiences from our local campaigning - many of them good enough to share. Yesterday I spoke to the NZ Home Health Association - body supporting the 'in home' based Healthcare providers. I got a bit tongue-tied and mistakenly talked about a funding muddle instead of a funding model - a Freudian slip that went down particularly well because a funding muddle is exactly what they have.
Here's the first guest piece. It's from ACTs Mana candidate, Michael Collins.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Mon, 20/10/2008 - 11:11pm
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In 2002 the government, through Statistics NZ, randomly selected 22,000 people to take part in the Statistics NZ Survey of Family, Income and Employment. This means that 22,000 New Zealanders are being forced to divulge personal details for a compulsory government survey. If they fail to comply they face a criminal conviction and a $500 fine. All sounds very big brother, but one man was sent a highlighted copy of the Statistics Act penalties schedule when he tried to quit.
It appears that each of the chosen 22,000 has a "legal obligation" to answer questions about their personal finances and health during an annual interview with a state agent over the eight years of the survey. Consent was never gained for compliance - this certainly isn't the way I used to run pharmaceutical firm trials when nothing occurred without consent of the patient, and even then they could pull out whenever they liked. Clearly one rule for the private sector and another for the public sector.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Fri, 17/10/2008 - 5:38am
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This is the most important election issue. In light of the global meltdown and Labour and National's response to our flagging economy ACT's proposals are the only hope New Zealand has of weathering the storm that has hit. Kiwis can expect commodity prices to fall, profits will be down and with it tax revenue, and unemployment to rise. Australia will continue to outperform us and New Zealanders will continue to emigrate.
New Zealand's economy has been in recession for all of this year. The opening of the books last week signalled that there will be structural deficits for at least 10 years and low growth precdictions (0.1% this financial year).
An imcoming governnent must restore confidence by freeing people from teh burden of poor quality infrastructure, heatlh and education systems and unnecissarily high taxes and meddleing nanny state regulations.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Thu, 16/10/2008 - 10:36am
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Rodney Hide, Sir Roger Douglas, John Boscawen and David Garret came to Wellington this evening to help me launch ACT's Wellington election campaign.
Rodney and Roger covered the current financial and economic issues, John talked about the impact of the Electoral Finance Act which he led the campaign against and David spoke about law and order. My speech was on the theme of 'Bring of Our Children Home' and can be viewed at (http://roy.org.nz/content/speech-act-wellington-2008-campaign-launch-wed...). The top five candidates were joined by all the Wellington Region candidates except Lindsay Mitchell who was doing God's work at a Grey Power meeting in Hutt South.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Wed, 15/10/2008 - 12:16pm
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The Wellington Central electorate has more political meetings than most and “world famous in Wellington” is the Aro Valley meeting. It is held in a local community hall which is too small for the numbers who attend, so people line up three to four deep outside the windows hoping to get a glimpse of the action, even if they can’t hear much.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Mon, 13/10/2008 - 6:00pm
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Although campaigning in earnest began a couple of weeks ago, the weekend just gone marked the "official start" of the 2008 Election Campaign.
The opening statements of the political party broadcasts aired on Friday and Saturday nights on TV1. Each party tended to have a theme and were of variable quality. I'm a little biased of course, but here is my assessment.
Labour - Theme of trust, Helen Clark looked tired, backward looking and filmed on the cheap.
National - Had the right idea with an original campaign song and forward looking.
Greens - appealling to the hearts of voters, especially parents
Maori party - an uplifting piece, concentrating on hope for the future
NZ First - Winston talking about 'Poor me' with a passive-aggressive finale.
United Future - Peter Dunne predictably talking about trust and common sense.
Progressive - Promises, promises but no hint at how they'd all be paid for.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Wed, 08/10/2008 - 4:01pm
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The announcement of National's Defence Policy yesterday gave no additional indication of what might happen with Vote:Defence after a change of government than the discussion document released months ago did.
The policy says National will take a "fresh look at New Zealand's defence capability and analyse spending" and its aim is to maximise effectiveness and ensure the Defence Force could work with international partners. The announcement was a little short on the detail of how any of these things might be achieved, despite mention again of Wayne Mapp's long promised 'White Paper'.
The policy can be found at http://national.org.nz/files/2008/defence.pdf
It's not often that I agree with Phil Goff - and never on the sale of the Skyhawks and Aermacchis - but he made some valid points in his media release following Wayne Mapp's launch of the National Party Defence Policy (See http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0810/S00155.htm).
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Wed, 08/10/2008 - 10:40am
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Yesterday one could have been forgiven for thinking that the Air Force King Air fleet had moved up a rank, but this is not the case. The Prime MInister, unable to take a scheduled flight from Wellington to Invercargill due to weather conditions, got the RNAZF to fly her from Ohakea to Invercargill. So the person who disbanded the Air Combat Force is happy to use Air Force planes when it suits her.
The PM was speaking to a Grey Power Group and visiting a factory - the sort of campaigning every other MP is doing around the country in the run-up to the election. Miss Clark claimed she was on Prime Ministerial duties but to my knowledge no International Treaties were signed in Invercargill yesterday, no foreign dignatories entertained. She was out asking people to vote for her party and abusing her postion to give herself an unfair advantage over every other political party.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Tue, 07/10/2008 - 1:44pm
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As news of the worsening global credit crunch continues, the books were opened yesterday showing the real picture of the New Zealand economy, and the picture isn’t a pretty one.
* Government debt will leap from under 20% of GDP to around 25% by 2012.
* Cash deficits are predicted for each of the next ten years, blowing out
to about $6 billion a year.
* There’s nothing left in the kitty – Labour has spent the family budget with
little left to bribe voters with (a blessing in disguise?).
* Unemployment is predicted to rise to just above 5% by 2010.
* House prices are tipped to fall.
* Most alarmingly, economic growth with current policies will be almost nil (0.1%)
this year.
After a decade of surpluses Finance Minister Michael Cullen takes the country to the election with the outlook a decade of deficits, highlighting his financial mismanagement of the country.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Tue, 07/10/2008 - 1:41pm
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ACT Icon's Richard Prebble, Sir Roger Douglas, Catherine Judd and Ken Shirley threw their support in behind ACTs campaign at the Icon's Lunch held in Wellington on Sunday. Catherine Judd and Ken Shirley claimed not to be Icons but their contributions to the party and ongoing support say otherwise. Roger Douglas's determination to deal with the 'Unfinished Business' of he 1980's by coming back to parliament undoubtedly make him an Icon. Richard Prebble has long had a reputation as a practical businessman who set world standards in his management of State Owned Enterprises. Richard gave the heads up about the global credit crunch which he described as a tidal wave yet to hit New Zealand. New Zealand's current economic performance however can't be blamed on the international situation but is a result of 9 years of mismanagement by Labour.
Photo of Icons
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Sat, 04/10/2008 - 3:16pm
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I will be participating tomorrow in a Radio New Zealand debate "New Zealand in 2020" so have been turning my mind to the elements of a comprehensive vision for New Zealand . Although there is plenty to be optimistic about if the right policies are in place it is harder to be visionary at a time when the world’s financial system is showing symptoms that are frighteningly similar to the US share market collapse of 1929. The 1929 collapse led to the Great Depression which in turn led to worldwide economic collapse and thus, indirectly, to the rise of fascism in Europe. The snowballing of human misery grew into an avalanche of despair leaving few in the world untouched.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Fri, 03/10/2008 - 11:51am
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On Sunday I'm hosting the triennial Icon's lunch in Wellington. We have a magnificent three-course lunch and are bringing together a feast of iconic ACT speakers. Come along and be inspired. Our Icons are :-
Hon Richard Prebble – Former ACT Party Leader and Labour Cabinet Minister, and master of Standing Orders.
Hon Sir Roger Douglas – ACT Co-founder, former Minister of Finance, and now ACT’s Candidate in the Hunua electorate.
Catherine Judd – Former ACT Party President, and successful Wellington businesswoman.
Hon Ken Shirley – Former ACT Deputy Leader, Whip, and Labour Cabinet Minister.
Tickets for this event are $50, and can be reserved by contacting Andrew Falloon – andrew.falloon@act.org.nz (027 696 1845).
What: Pre-election “ICONS” Lunch.
Where: “Hippopotamus” Restaurant, Museum Hotel, Cable St, Central Wellington.
When: Sunday 5 October. 12.30, to be seated for a 1pm start.
Cost: $50 per ticket.
RSVP: andrew.falloon@act.org.nz, 027 696 1845.
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Submitted by Heather Roy on Fri, 03/10/2008 - 11:29am
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Here's the line-up from Back Benches on Wednesday night - Sue Kedgely, Stephen Franks, Myself and Grant Robertson. We had a boistrous crowd which added to the entertainment side of politics! The programme can be viewed on the TVNZ website.
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