Nationals deficit deficiencies

Yesterday, the Minister of Finance and Infrastructure, Bill English reported:

A further improvement in government tax revenue left the operating deficit before gains and losses $763 million smaller than forecast in the 11 months to 31 May, Finance Minister Bill English says.

So, the forecast was completely wrong, being $763 million wide of the mark. Nothing really new there then, with National failing miserably at forecasting anything to do with finances.

The operating deficit before gains and losses was $3.26 billion in the 11 months to 31 May – or $763 million lower than the Budget 2013 forecast of $4.03 billion. If this improvement continues until the end of the financial year, the OBEGAL deficit will be $2.3 billion smaller than Budget 2012 forecasts.

In other words there's still a deficit of $3.3 billion, despite the global recession ending over four years ago. If that's not an indictment of government incompetence, I don't know what is.

National has been a complete economic failure for New Zealand. The sooner they're elected out the better it will be for our books.

Plastic Seduction

Blatant media manipulation

It's been interesting to watch the response to the Labour party's proposal to discuss a quota system to ensure more female representation. We aren't even discussing a policy here, it's just a proposal at this stage, which makes me wonder what all the hoopla is about.

In my opinion, the issue is whether there's enough proportional representation in parliament, not whether men are better qualified or motivated than women to do the job. In fact studies have shown that women actually run companies better than men and are more likely to increase production and profits, so the disproportionate amount of men in positions of power clearly has nothing to do with ability and everything to do with sexism.

Obviously there aren't enough female Members of Parliament, especially in the current government. This fact is being completely ignored by the right wing propagandists, including female members of the National party.

Yesterday, the NZ Herald reported:

National's Judith Collins was dismissive of the proposal, saying it showed Labour women clearly were not confident of being selected under normal processes.

"It is a surprise that they have so little confidence in themselves."

The problem isn’t with females having less confidence, it’s that the system is skewed in favour of male candidates. There’s something called the old boys club that ensures a male applicant is chosen over a female one even if she's more qualified and motivated to succeed. The issue here isn't the rule change, it's the problem that the rule change proposes to fix.

Despite the howls of protest, quotas are one way to remedy gender bias. What the misogynists are completely ignoring is that such systems have been shown to work effectively in business and political organizations throughout the world, so there’s no reason it wouldn't work for Labour. The Green party for instance uses quotas to effectively ensure proportional representation, and by all accounts their system works well.

However, the true significance of Labour’s proposed rule change, or more specifically the attention it has received, has eluded most commentators. It's nothing more than a red hearing with the leaking of the 2013 Annual Conference agenda timed perfectly to take the focus off far more important issues, namely the GCSB hearing. Clearly the right wing is desperate to subvert people's attention away from topics that are damaging to John Key's credibility.

It's a similar ploy to that used by National's media lackey's when the Aaron Gilmore fiasco took the limelight off the GCSB bill, a law change that will further undermine New Zealanders right to privacy. Unfortunately the media often ignores the important stories in favour of blowing anything that makes Labour look bad out of all proportion. That's what is occurring now with the so-called "man ban" the media is focused on, and it’s pretty blatant manipulation.

Top secret America

Metadata and media bias

Today, the NZ Herald reported:

The bill is silent on metadata.

The assumption is that the GCSB currently collects it about New Zealanders, despite not being explicitly empowered to, because it is not explicitly prevented from doing so under the current law's protections against spying on New Zealanders.

Why has the media accepted John Key's claims at face value? Just because he says the law isn't clear, doesn't mean that's the case. In fact the law is very clear and encompasses all information that a New Zealand citizen transmits, including metadata.

Here's the relevant part of the Government Communications Security Bureau Act 2003 (PDF):

14 Interceptions not to target domestic communications

Neither the Director, nor an employee of the Bureau, nor a person acting on behalf of the Bureau may authorise or take any action for the purpose of intercepting the communications of a person (not being a foreign organisation or a foreign person) who is a New Zealand citizen or a permanent resident.

Metadata is a part of a person's communication that the GCSB act explicitly states the agency must not intercept. Why Audrey Young thinks otherwise isn't clear, but perhaps a little bit more consideration of the subject matter before pen gets put to paper is in order.

Citizen A with Colin Craig & Dr Wayne Hope