Posts by linger
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Hard News: On Science, in reply to NBH,
Up until the late 1980s, yes; but government funding has been slowly decaying in real terms since then (and proportionally more used for admin rather than actual research).
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scientific synergy (probably real).
This.
If anybody was at all serious about improving the application of scientific research in NZ, they’d have to be encouraging interdisciplinary work (which amongst other things expands the range of possibilities for application of solutions in apparently unrelated domains).The apparent strategy for achieving this at present is to have one person left doing all of the research...
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OnPoint: 3 News Exclusive Investigation…, in reply to NBH,
older students don’t have better completion rates than younger ones
But is that the right metric? i.e., is their purpose in taking university courses actually to complete a degree?
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OnPoint: 3 News Exclusive Investigation…, in reply to Lucy Stewart,
OTOH, I do have some considerable sympathy for that reaction, because the country may arguably have "made some investment" in the individual's training -- but in many cases, no investment in guaranteeing local jobs using the resulting knowledge & skills; and once you start to commodify education by placing a monetary value on it, you are basically encouraging students to view it as theirs rather than the country's, regardless of who ends up paying for how much of it.
(Full disclosure: I managed without a student loan, but only through a large amount of luck, a considerable amount of part-time work, and eventually, a generous scholarship. I know things got much worse after my time as a student; so I don't at all begrudge those students who needed a loan taking full advantage of it.) -
Right!
From Wikipedia’s page on Anderton:
When Anderton disobeyed party instructions to vote in favour of selling the Bank of New Zealand (which Labour had explicitly promised not to do), he was suspended from caucus. In April 1989, believing that Labour was beyond change, Anderton resigned from the party. […]
On 1 May, Anderton announced the creation of the NewLabour Party[…]. In the 1990 general election Anderton retained his Sydenham seat […]. He was the first MP in New Zealand political history to leave an established party, found another and be re-elected to Parliament representing that new partyMeanwhile, Peters went the independent route, again before MMP:
He served as Minister of Maori Affairs in the Bolger National Party Government before being sacked in 1991 and losing party endorsement for his Tauranga seat. He returned to Parliament as an independent, then formed his own party, New Zealand First.
(Wikipedia: that's how easy it is to fact-check...)
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Legal Beagle: Referendum Fact Check #5:…, in reply to izogi,
Did this even happen under FPP?
Not clear what you mean by “this”.
crossing the floor? Yes – e.g. Marilyn Waring under Muldoon.
(As National had only a 1-seat majority, this was enough of a threat to provoke Muldoon into calling the 1984 snap election.)
going independent/ forming new parties? Not as far as I remember.(though ... when did Winston leave National?)
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Legal Beagle: Referendum Fact Check #5:…, in reply to Jeanette King,
Your strategy may have some chance of backfiring given that:
(i) apparently the majority of the electorate support National; and
(ii) FPP is more than fair to major parties, such as National.
Plus the government should be given as little room as possible to stack the deck in the second referendum (e.g. by offering an FPP with fewer MPs).
Hence it would probably be preferable to choose a system very similar to MMP on the second question (e.g. STV, as Graeme suggests). -
So should the job have gone to the other Chris Finlayson?
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(Bugger, missed the edit window.) Re “faux outrage” – I should note that Craig is at least consistent in being outraged by this particular use of urgency. But I remember he tried to defend other uses by National early in their term, which were, to my mind, more egregious, on bills more deserving of public scrutiny and considered input (affecting education and job security).
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Hard News: We interrupt this broadcast ..., in reply to Craig Ranapia,
I can’t share your faux outrage on this occasion. The key fact to remember is that Duynhoven had been chosen as an elected representative, and so the change was one that, in my opinion, respected the voters somewhat more than tossing out the result and re-running the election would have. (And yes, I'd have supported National doing the same thing in the same circumstances.)
From Wikipedia:
In 2003, it was alleged that Duynhoven might have accidentally violated an electoral regulation, thus depriving him of his seat. This claim arose after Duynhoven applied to resume his citizenship of the Netherlands. His father was from the Netherlands, and Duynhoven had possessed citizenship from birth, but had temporarily lost it due to a change of Netherlands law. According to electoral law, applying for foreign citizenship would require Duynhoven to vacate his seat. The law was seen by many as misguided, however, and Duynhoven, with his huge majority, was almost certain to re-enter Parliament in the event of a by-election. As such, the government passed an act retroactively amending the law.