Hard News: A few (more) words on The Hobbit
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Despite their connections with evil foreign multinationals and unpatriotic subject matter? Good on you.
Craig: The 'evil foreign' and 'unpatriotic' words are yours. I'm not a nationalist. It doesn't stop me from taking pride in my surroundings and from enjoying more things in the Wairarapa than the bleeding obvious.
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Oh, hey, hi Jan!!! (You are the same Jan I worked with at RNZ? All those years ago?)
Yes, I'll have another go at linking another day. I just found Jam Hipkins a bit of fun this morning, amongst all this angst.
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Yes, I am, Hi Jacqui! Nice to read your posts and I liked your links - however inelegantly displayed!
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The wearing of these should now be compulsory in NZ.
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@Scott, I certainly see what you're saying, and read that way I can see where your view and mine diverge. The problem I have with the interpretation you propose is that the Bill's (non-existent) language around judges examining the contract for service doesn't preclude a conclusion that, actually, it's an employment agreement.
Were a judge to look at a contract for service that was really an employment contract in drag, as was pretty much the case with Bryson as I understand it, I can see at least one avenue for the judge to find that the person is "party to, or covered by, an employment agreement that provides that the person is an employee". After all, the determination that a person is an employee under s6(1)(a) is a matter of fact under s6(2).
Matthew, I understand the point you're making, and I'm not saying you're wrong, because I'm not sure in practice how judges approach employment law disputes.
But I would expect that a judge, when asked to make a determination on an issue, will look to see what the legislation says in order to provide a framework for his or her decision. In my view the legislation, once the bill is passed, will be clear. If you're a certain type of film worker and have signed a contract for services then you're not an employee, regardless of what the substance of the arrangement is.
The Bryson decision seems to have sent a cold shudder down the spines of some in the film industry (probably without good justfication). I'm pretty sure the intention of the legislators is to prevent another such case.
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But thankfully, sane voices - Peter Cox for one - wanting to wait for confirmation about things.
Oh no! Just after I had a bit of a rant!
But thanks Jacqui. I hope you'll forgive my last somewhat heated post as a general level of disgust for the way certain ideologues have tried to turn a great community of friends into 'baddies and goodies' for the sake of their own ideological stupidity/class warfare rubbish, putting them good people against each other and damaging them both.
When you have people who are clearly from 'The Standard' or 'Kiwiblog' posting on 'theatreview', then you know something has gone horribly wrong.
I'm looking forward to never having to deal with them again.
The film industry, including the actors, and the members/unions who actually have something real at stake from the survival of this industry, will sort this out thanks very much. We're having a conversation now, and I'm looking forward to the idiots buggering right the hell out of it.
(which I'm sure they will as soon as they find some other 'cause' to vent their spleen's onto. Do any of these people actually DO anything by the way?)
And thanks, Deep Red, for the videos :)
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I've seen reports, now, that the Govt. is saying it was not asked by WB for the law change to clarify the employment position:
[From Parliament]
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: Warner Bros did not put any requirements on us to do anything. The New Zealand Government has recognised that there were employment issues that needed to be sorted out, and we are going to move to clarify those. We think that the last 7 weeks have been shameful as far as the support for the film industry is concerned, and we are going to urgently move to fix that situation.
PJ did take the fight against Bryson all the way to the Supreme Court, and lost. So who would blame him for being somewhat upset about this, and for wanting another go, and for asking the Govt. to recognise his distress?
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This position for example, was rarely encountered.
Please... seems to me like we have a fairly standard Herald bingo card:
1) A badly written editorial completely innocent of anything resembling research, fact-checking or a coherent argument.
2) Brian Rudman engorged on his own condescending, irony-free bloviating. (BTW, darling, when you're denouncing imaginary sexism try not to pat the poor feeble lady-brains on the head while you're at it. It is 2010 not 1950.)
3) A gossip column masquerading as media analysis from John Drinnan. (Russell might have something to add on this score, as Drinnan seems to have a problem with Russell in general and Media7 in particular.)
It's a pretty serious market failure that The Herald is insulated from its own dizzying mediocrity, by the fact that (re-)establishing a competitor would require a proprietor with Tardis-like pockets and an addiction to red ink. Good luck finding a newspaper-loving sugar daddy nowadays...
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The way Peter Jackson was targeted?
It's not like the head of the CTU called him a spoiled brat, or he's been described as a slave-owner, a feudal lord, a crap director, a shame on New Zealand's cultural landscape. And it's not like he's been targeted to try and gain leverage over industry-wide agreements he has no power to negotiate.
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The Bryson decision seems to have sent a cold shudder down the spines of some in the film industry (probably without good justfication). I'm pretty sure the intention of the legislators is to prevent another such case.
I don't think equivocation such as "pretty sure" is even necessary in this case. It's obvious that Bryson is weighing heavily on the learned legal minds of Key et al, and this law is meant to stop it happening again. It's even possible that the very existence of this new section means that nobody will try and bring a Bryson-type case again.
But lawyers (no offence) are nothing if not devious. Pending an actual judicial decision on what the new section means, I don't think the Bill does much to clarify the situation. -
3410,
Thanks, Geoff.
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Warner Bros did not put any requirements on us to do anything. The New Zealand Government has recognised that there were employment issues that needed to be sorted out, and we are going to move to clarify those.
In which case, why the urgency? Why the frantic, unseemly need to ram this change through almost literally overnight, rather than taking a measured, considered approach?
I guess it could just be that National can't help themselves, and cannot envisage changes to employment legislation taking place through the normal process - could lead to outcomes that're good for workers, and we can't be having that! - but it smells very bad that this is being done as a hastily-written, under-examined amendment to a very fundamental piece of employment legislation. -
Speaking as a Wellingtonian, I've always taken Brian Rudman with a grain of salt. He's disdainful about the rest of the country, especially Wellington, and the rest of the country are justifiably disdainful about him in return. Thankfully, not every Aucklander is Rudman.
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Funny, I feel the same way about the entire Harold ;-)
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Hey, Jacqui - I was talking more about industry insiders' post - like Simon Bennett, for example - and also the statement by Jed Brophy that was posted a few days ago.
I would have thought that concerns raised in that statement might carry some weight in the media's attempt to uncover the truth*, or at least to look at an alternative point of view.
*which is what they should be doing, imo -
Oh yes indeed - why the urgency? Hear, hear, Matthew.
I also find Mr Brownlee's "shameful as far as the film industry is concerned" total crap.
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but it smells very bad that this is being done as a hastily-written, under-examined amendment to a very fundamental piece of employment legislation.
I've had the debate on in the background, and I've chortling at MP after MP standing up to denounce this brutal assault on Parliamentary democracy...
... but voted to ram through a retrospective amendment to the Electoral Act under extreme urgency -- no select committee scrutiny or public submissions, of course. And why? To avoid a by-election in New Plymouth neither Labour nor National had the will or the ready cash to fight.
I guess the legislation that controls who is qualified to be a legislator, and how we elect them, isn't that "fundamental" after all.
As Idiot/Savant might say: Fuck the hypocrites.
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@ Petra: There were quite a few people who could be called "insiders" who were surmising. I think that's quite dangerous. (Found myself on several occasions writing what I "thought" was going on, and had to delete same. Just my opinion, after all, and until I got all the facts - and even now, I suspect there are many pivotal things that are not common knowledge - I would prefer to keep my own council, even though steam kept escaping out of my ears with rage!!:))
There are things one hears, and they may be true, but will it help to make those things public? It may scratch an itch to shout them out, but the itch will return......ooeerr, someone stop me, PULLLEEEASSE!!
(Where's Ian Dalziel when you need him?)
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so select committee scrutiny or public submissions, of course
Miss a "no", Craig?
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@craig
True, but broken record now. They're almost each as bad as the other, that's a given. They're politicians, after all. -
Hi, Jan. Seems like others have responded, so I won't post redundantly.
And I'm enjoying a busy day after a woefully quiet week. Yay!
Also, hopelessly off-topic, but does anyone know if Simon Grigg is ok? I know he's in Indonesia, and he hasn't posted anything to his blog since Tuesday (and I don't know whether that's a NZ time stamp or an Indonesian one).
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Point taken, Jacqui. :)
Which is why I almost always say "I think" rather than "it is". I know how completely wrong I can be - I have the history to prove it! lol
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Miss a "no", Craig?
Not now. (God bless the edit button.)
Also, hopelessly off-topic, but does anyone know if Simon Grigg is ok? I know he's in Indonesia, and he hasn't posted anything to his blog since Tuesday (and I don't know whether that's a NZ time stamp or an Indonesian one).
I'm sure Simon is fine -- he's got a healthy dose of cockroach DNA, that boy. Probably busy working and/or being horribly dissolute. :)
True, but broken record now.
Nah... if they're going to be shameless hypocrites, it is on the rest of us to make sure the bullshit detector has both an attention span and a memory.
Personally, as I've said elsewhere, I find that Electoral Amendment (Harry Duynhoven Arse-Covering) Act more outrageous, but mileage obviously varies on that score.
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Brownlee is an easy target, because he is universally despised by all on the left. I get that. But he must have done some good in the NZAE/CTU/Spada meetings, because Peter Conway of the CTU thanked him 3 times (count that, 3 times!) in one segment on TVNZ a few nights ago.
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Peter Conway was a star on that interview. But I suspect maybe he went a little too far with the old Brownlee thanking. I would imagine some of his members may have - shortsightedly, I think - not been thrilled about that. They should be bloody grateful for that interview though. It's been the saviour of the CTU in the public eye as far as I'm concerned.
And, just in case for the tiniest moment we forgot who the REAL ASSHOLES are:
See, now THAT makes me want to pick up a picket sign, and keep the Writer's Guild CTU dues up to date...
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