Posts by Phil Lyth
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thankfully, 3 News did not try to own that Facebook page - just a discreet note that it was 'associated with them"
and wow, the RIP Pike River Miners page drew 300,000 people within a few days
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And by implication you are saying that holders of statutory offices did not enter into a contract.
Correct, 100% correct, in relation to Parliament.
Suppose a person stands for Parliament, becomes an MP, and then the Remuneration Authority produces a determination halving MPs' salaries, there is not a damn thing the MP can do. They cannot sue.
So the Association of Former MPs is on non-existent ice when claiming they have some sort of guarantee of continuation of travel perks.
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Hard News: Moving targets, in reply to Dismal Soyanz,
100% unadulterated bulldust.
As the unquestioned authority on Parliament, McGee, says "members [of Parliament] are in law neither employees nor self-employed"
No contract so no retrospectivity.
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Dunno, its John Key and Lockwood Smith who are "relaxed" about rules that will allow Pansy Wong to keep a lifetime entitlement to business class travel when she leaves Parliament. At our expense.
That will go down well with the voters on Struggle Street.
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disgruntled
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The president of the Association of Former Members of Parliament, Graham Kelly, said this week that the association would defend any attempt to strip the perk from ex-MPs, describing it as a legal entitlement and part of their conditions of employment.
Bunkum. Utter bunkum. MPs are not employees. And the Association cannot provide one document to back that claim, because there is nothing.
Oh, and Twitter, it was fascinating being able to see the MPs talking to one another using their iPad / iPhone / Blackberry
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A range of MPs were tweeting on Saturday about the perk, including Tau, Heather Roy, Metiria, and Chris Hipkins. There may have been others too.
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I can’t help feeling the ingrained racism of NZ in this
Nonsense, this is very equal pillorying and blowtorch application. Think back to Rodney Hide, Roger Douglas and Chris Carter.
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@Andre, no, Field and Roger McClay lost their entitlement when convicted. Awatere Huata wasn't in Parliament long enough to get the perk.
@barnacle, no there has never been anything to say that the travel perk for former MPs would continue forever. As Russell notes, it started in 1972. The perk, along with other expenses and allowances, is provided for in the Speakers Determination, a document which is regularly amended. And just as it can be amended to increase things, so it can be amended to decrease or remove them.
MPs have been well paid while in office. We don't need any more people like Dean Eyre.
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heard anecdotally from someone who scrutineers in a well-heeled area that this is already the case to some extent, and there are many who vote for the NP candidate and party vote Green.
Here you can see that 16,549 people voted Green list & National electorate.
Whereas 74,330 voted Green list & Labour electorate and 52,485 gave both votes to the Greens.