Captain James
Latest addition to the family
Filed under Special Moments, Vanity
Latest Wellington bus service review an improvement on the original, but still not the last word
Greater Wellington Regional Council’s latest iteration of its proposed changes to bus routes within Wellington City was to be rubber-stamped today by the bizarrely named “Economic Wellbeing Committee” (what was wrong with the former “transport committee”?). It’s much better than was originally proposed but still has some worrying issues. See the maps and other details here.
The original February proposals, dreamt up by an overseas consultancy firm whose staff appeared not to have set foot in Wellington (they simply overlaid “new” bus routes on a map of Wellington that paid no heed of topography or bus use), would have almost destroyed the trolley bus system, the much-underused, environmentally sound pivot of the city’s bus network.
The consultants proposed replacing with diesel buses the core 11 Seatoun and 3 Lyall Bay trolley bus routes (both of which have very recently had massive investment in new, modern overhead wires) as well as closing the minor 9 Aro Street and 5 Hataitai routes.
After public consultation by GWRC, the Seatoun and Lyall Bay routes are to remain trolley buses (but along different streets to the city; Seatoun will go via the Hataitai bus tunnel as does the 2 Miramar, and Lyall Bay will be diverted along Taranaki Street, where the Seatoun route now runs).
The Karori Park trolley route (actually operated since February by diesel buses because of works on the Karori tunnel) will be linked to Island Bay rather than its present Lyall Bay (or indeed Miramar, as the consultants proposed).
It is proposed to scrap three trolley bus routes. The peak-hour only Hataitai 5 will have no replacement service at all, the weekday daytime Aro St 9 will be replaced with a diesel bus through-routed to Khandallah, and the 10 Newtown Park will be taken over by the 22/23 diesel bus that already parallels it. These are not major changes—it must be impossible to justify the expense of running a few trolley buses a day to Aro St and Hataitai for example. One hardly ever sees a passenger on an Aro St bus in Aro St; the affluent latte crowd who live there nowadays either walk, cycle or more likely drive their SUVs.
I’m still digesting the latest proposals. They appear to promote a reduced service on most of the main routes except on weekdays to Karori, Lyall Bay and Island Bay (which would remain 10 minutes to Karori and Lyall Bay and go from 12 to 10 minutes to Island Bay). Night and weekend services would be reduced despite GWRC’s claim it is introducing 15-minute services day and night seven days on the core routes. Miramar and Seatoun would be reduced from every 15 minutes to every 20 on weekdays (though becoming every 10 minutes on their new common section from Kilbirnie via Moxham Ave and the bus tunnel) but hourly (!) in the evenings.
The heavily patronised peak-hour diesel bus route 17 from Karori to the Rail via Kelburn, Victoria University and the Terrace has gone, though at least Vic students will not have to hump up the steep hill from the Terrace as the consultants proposed when they suggested sending Seatoun buses along the Terrace to replace the present 17 and 18 university buses.
Nothing in these proposals mentions resuming weekend and weekday evening trolley bus services, despite the contract between GWRC and Go Wellington requiring seven day, first bus to last operation of trolley buses . In fact the word “trolley bus” does not appear in the relevant reports before the committee today at all.
Other issues need more work, including the huge peak hour bus congestion between Courtenay Place and the Rail. GWRC has been looking at this but doesn’t quite seem to realise this has been caused by the 1991 change that let all the Newlands, Hutt and Eastbourne buses that used to terminate at the Rail go through to Courtenay Place. They should be truncated at the Rail again and transfers allowed to the frequent core route along the Golden Mile.
You can be sure you will read more about these developments here. I’m not saying they are bad. There are many good points. But having been away for three years, I need to look at them further.
Filed under Transport, Wellington
Fracking good news about fracking
After an exhaustive review of the world’s scientific literature, the independent Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Dr Jan Wright, has found that “fracking”—the hydraulic fracturing of deep oil and gas seams by pumping fluids into them to bring fuels to the surface so as to use them as an energy source—is sound and safe.
While she has a few ifs and buts and would like some regulation of fracking, Dr Wright’s killer line (oddly buried on page 73 of her report), says:
“The high-level conclusion from the work done to date in this investigation echoes, and is broadly consistent with, the reviews of fracking that have been done elsewhere in the world. That conclusion is that the environmental risks associated with fracking can be managed effectively provided, to quote the Royal Society of London, “operational best practices are implemented and enforced through regulation.”
In short, fracking is safe, as long as done with scientific best practice.
A great many of those who oppose fracking also oppose the science behind such other exciting developments as the genetic modification of plants to make them grow better so as better to feed the world. Ironically, many of those same people tell us day after day that we have to “believe the science” when it comes to another of their pet beliefs, which shall remain nameless here. You all know what it is.
Surely it is time to question why these quasi-religious fanatics decry the science behind such developments as GM and fracking—the latter which has ended prospects of “peak oil” while replacing coal-fired power stations in many parts of the world with clean-burning fracked natural gas—yet they demand we “believe” without question the increasingly doubtful evidence behind their main religious belief. Why should we unquestionably “believe” one “science” that propagates Armageddon, but not so many others that are a boon to humanity?
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Filed under Climategate, New Zealand, Science
Fundamental flaws in Massey research that accuses four newspapers of bias against Labour at 2011 election
There appear to be fundamental flaws in Massey University research that says four newspapers were so biased in favour of National Party leader John Key during last year’s election campaign that then-Labour Party leader has grounds to complain to the Press Council.
The research, by Massey University Associate Professor Claire Robinson, found that the New Zealand Herald, Herald on Sunday, Dominion Post and Sunday Star-Times “all exhibited substantial bias in their selection and use of images during the election campaign, most of it in favour of Prime Minister John Key.”
According to the research, images of Mr Key featured 138 times while Mr Goff featured 80 times in the four papers. Mr Key also dominated the column centimetres, at a ratio of almost two to one.
Said Dr Robinson, a political marketing expert in the university’s College of Creative Arts: “Labour and Phil Goff have real grounds to feel they were unfairly treated in print during the last election campaign… My research suggests there could be grounds for a complaint to the New Zealand Press Council that the newspapers breached the principle of fairness and balance in their campaign coverage.”
Dr Robinson’s research looks flawed because it treats the election campaign as a two-party race between Mr Key and Mr Goff when in fact it was a multi-party contest between National, Labour, the Greens, New Zealand First, ACT, the Maori Party, Peter Dunn and Mana, to name most of the main contenders.
It is also flawed because it examines the content of just four newspapers, whereas the election campaign was a cacophony of coverage by newspapers, television stations, radio stations and countless websites, blogs, Facebook pages and Twitter feeds.
Back in the almost forgotten days of the two-party system—when National and Labour were the only major parties and usually the only ones to gain representation in Parliament—newspapers were also the dominant providers of news about election campaigns. Newspaper editors took that very seriously and would count the “column inches” devoted to the two parties every day to ensure more or less equal coverage. Reporters were sent to halls and corners all over the country to report the campaign speeches not just of the leaders but of virtually all the candidates.
This state of affairs existed from 1936—when the National Party was formed by the merger of the United and Reform parties after Labour’s first election victory the year before—until 1978 when the then Social Credit party took a big share of the vote but only one seat, beginning the pressure for a proportional representation system that was instituted at the 1996 general election.
For the first 25 years of that two-party system, there was no television. There was no commercial radio and the only “news” on the state radio stations of the day consisted of nightly readings of Government press statements. The internet was not even dreamed of. Television became increasingly important in election campaigns as the 1960s turned into the 1970s, with National’s leader from 1974 to 1984, Rob Muldoon, for years the unchallenged master of the television appearance.
All that was then. We live in a very different age, where political coverage is as dominated by trivia as most other coverage. The impact on the election of photographs and articles in just four newspapers is likely to have been minimal. The major “issue” of the election campaign was the “Teapot Tapes” saga which reflected negatively on Mr Key and propelled Winston Peters and New Zealand First back into Parliament. National barely retained power.
To judge whether media coverage of the election really was fair or unfair, balanced or unbalanced, Dr Robinson and her fellow researchers would need to look at the coverage of all the contending parties and also review the television, radio, internet and social media coverage. That would be a big task but not one beyond the capabilities of a university department with all its students to help in the work.
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Filed under Journalism, New Zealand, Politics
Why Australia discriminates against Kiwis, and why the grass is not greener across the ditch
Since my recent return to Wellington from three years living in Australia, it’s been interesting to see many media articles critical of the Australian Government for not paying welfare benefits to New Zealanders, allegedly causing hardship for some New Zealanders living in the Lucky Country. This is an issue I am surprised has taken so long to enter the public debate.
Some background. Until early 2001, New Zealanders had virtually the same unfettered right to live in Australia as Australians still have to live in New Zealand, including the right to be paid welfare benefits. This was not an issue for the governments of either country as New Zealanders living in Australia were hard workers and proportionally drew far fewer welfare benefits than Australians, and very few Australians moved here anyway so it was not an issue.
In my role as a journalist for the then Dominion newspaper, I attended the 2001 meeting in Auckland between Prime Minister Helen Clark of New Zealand and Prime Minister John Howard of Australia. The two prime ministers were from opposing points of the political compass but had a good rapport. Howard came to that meeting with a problem he wanted Clark to help solve. Australia then (and still does) admitted well in excess of 100,000 migrants every year, migrants who had to meet the criteria for age, education, job prospects and the like that Australia set. However, there was an unexpected back door. New Zealand at the time also welcomed migrants but—in Australia’s view—had lesser criteria. New Zealand granted citizenship to new migrants after three years. That citizenship grant meant the new New Zealand citizens had the automatic right to live in Australia. And many thousands of such migrants-turned-NZ citizens were flying to Australia as soon as they gained New Zealand citizenship.
Howard argued that Australia’s generous immigration policy was being subverted through a New Zealand back door and he put to Clark a proposition to shut the door a little. He asked her to agree that New Zealand citizens henceforth moving to Australia would not be entitled to Australian welfare benefits and similar entitlements. New Zealand citizens would still be allowed to move to Australia (by being automatically granted a visa when previously none was required) but they would not be entitled to welfare and other benefits.
Clark agreed. At the press conference where this deal was announced, I asked Clark if New Zealand would impose a similar restriction on Australians moving here and she said “no.” New Zealand has long needed every good immigrant it can get to offset the decades of Kiwis moving to Australia so she obviously did not want to put any barrier in the way of the few Aussies who want to move here.
Well, the few days between that announcement and its taking effect certainly demonstrated what Howard was worried about. At my children’s primary school, three of the teachers and more than a dozen families left immediately to beat the deadline. All those I cite were from South Africa and had recently got New Zealand citizenship. There was a similar flood of recent New Zealand citizenshippers from many countries from all over New Zealand to Australia in the few days available before the entry requirement was changed.
The point I am getting to here (and I love this long-form blogging format where one can mount an argument in more than 140 characters) is that Australia changed its rules for migration to New Zealand not because of any belief that New Zealanders were benefit bludgers (the evidence is to the contrary) but because Australia was concerned, probably correctly, that New Zealand’s immigration policies were at a lower bar and thus allowing people rejected by Australia to get in via the back New Zealand door. Such migrants were and are of little benefit to New Zealand if all they want is to use us as a staging post for Australia.
Nonetheless, the 2001 Australian policy change is now affecting at least some of the 650,000 New Zealand citizens who call Australia home (it only applies to NZ citizens who moved to Australia after February 26 2001). As Australia’s economy has finally been affected by the Global Financial Crisis, unemployment there has risen slightly and NZ citizens have found themselves ineligible for the dole. It’s been reported that some are sleeping on the streets.
As far as the New Zealand media goes, more traumatic is the effect of the 2001 policy change on Kiwis in Australia with long-term health issues. All of us over there are covered for most day-to-day health issues (I was immediately granted a Medicare card that gives discounts for doctor visits and prescriptions) but New Zealanders with chronic health problems are not entitled to expensive taxpayer-funded treatment.
The NZ media has made much of the case of Kiwi Hannah Campbell, 20, whose family moved with her to Queensland in 2006. Hannah was diagnosed with cerebral palsy as a baby. She cannot walk, speaks only a few words and requires fulltime care. Her parents expected the Australian health system would pay the bills (which would be the case in New Zealand if they had stayed here) but the Australian health system has refused to. Is the Australian response unreasonable? Let it be a warning.
Judith and I spent three fantastic years in Australia (we used Melbourne as a work base to travel to every state in Australia and also to many places around the world) and we had jobs. We went there because Judith was offered a better job in Melbourne than either of us had here at the time. It took me four days after we flew over to find work myself. We came back because I was offered a fantastic job back in Wellington that trumped what we had over there. But neither of us were under any illusion that we could enjoy life there without paying work.
We met huge numbers of Kiwis there, from our personal banker to the guys who shifted our furniture from one house to the next, to work colleagues, to the fantastic couple we met on the Puffing Billy train in Melbourne’s Dandenong Ranges (she was Maori, he was of Greek heritage, they were both from New Plymouth but now lived in Melbourne and she said with joy that their kids were “Pollywogs” because of their heritage; could you get away with saying that in New Zealand today?).
But we never saw Australia as some kind of paradise. The grass was not greener—often it was burnt brown. The wages were not obviously higher, though they were adequate. Food cost more than here, even though there is no GST on fresh meat and vegetables—though wine was far cheaper and beer cost much more, because of the odd tax system on alcohol.
It is good to be back home, though neither of us have any rosy glow about New Zealand after so much time away.
- An Australian Government fact sheet on New Zealanders in Australia is available here
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Filed under Australia, New Zealand, Travel
The Toorak tram on a Friday night
Today’s Sunday Star Times has a travel junket article on Melbourne (not online, I will link if it turns up) that advises you to stay at the Como hotel (well this is a junket funded by the hotels and restaurants featured) on the corner of Toorak Road and Chapel Street, a corner I am familiar with after three years recently living in Melbourne. And then author Stephanie Holmes says you can go downtown from the Como by taking a “short walk” to South Yarra station and catching a train. Did Melbourne’s train company also fund this junket? Just why anyone would walk all the way to South Yarra station and catch a train to town is beyond me, when Melbourne’s famous and very busy Number 8 Toorak tram goes right past the hotel being promoted (and also past South Yarra station, where in the morning peak hour, thousands of people get off the trains to complete their journeys to work by the Number 8 and vice versa in the evening peak).
There’s even a catchy song about the Number 8 tram. It even mentions the Chapel Street stop! Toorak is Melbourne’s poshest suburb so that’s why the song refers to “cultured pearls.”:
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Filed under Australia, Humour, Journalism, Transport, Travel
Yo! It’s Buy Nothing Day today!
From Kim Hill’s programme today I learnt it is Buy Nothing Day. Being Kim, her very first guest was one Kalle Lasn, the founder and editor of Adbusters magazine, which promotes the Occupy movement and other miserablenesses including Buy Nothing Day. About as futile as Earth Hour one would think.
Kim, bless her, gave her guest a carefree 24 minutes to denounce capitalism, which he accused of causing greed, terrorism and global warming and urged us all not to buy anything today, to teach those filthy capitalist shopkeepers a lesson.
What Kim might have mentioned but did not is that from 1945 until 1980, this day—being Saturday—was indeed a “buy nothing” day. Sunday was the same for the whole century until 1990. Almost all shops were forbidden to open, with petrol stations and dairies among the few exceptions and even dairies were not allowed to sell many items that were allowed to be sold on weekdays.
A running joke of the time was the foreign visitor who went back home and said “I went to New Zealand but it was shut.”
There were exceptions to the Great New Zealand Weekend. Parnell Road in Auckland, New Brighton in Christchurch and a few other privileged places that were able to convince the government of the day they were “tourist areas” were allowed to remain open on Saturdays and Sundays, when they whacked up their prices and creamed it from the shopping-starved folk who flocked there.
Yes New Zealand was a dull boring place back then compared with now. You could genuinely have fired a cannon down Lambton Quay, Willis Street or Courtenay Place and not hit anyone because nobody was there.
The five-day shopping week was the result of attempts to improve the lot of shop assistants, who worked horrendous hours —sometimes 14 hours a day every day bar Sunday until the passing of the Shops and Shop Assistants Act in 1892 which forced shops to close for half a day on one of the six opening days (usually Saturday). The Shops and Offices Act of 1904 forced shops to close at 6 pm on weekdays but with one late night (usually Thursday or Friday) until 9pm. When the 40 hour week (remember that?) was introduced in 1945, even the remaining half day of Saturday shopping was forbidden.
During the second half of the 1970s, owners of small to medium sized shops demanded the right to open on Saturdays, saying it was unfair shops in, say, Parnell Rd could open but not those in nearby Broadway Newmarket or Queen St. Once Saturday shopping resumed in 1980 and the sky did not fall, retailers—now including the big ones—pushed for Sunday opening too and got that in 1990, when the law was changed to allow shops to open 24 hours a day, seven days a week except for Christmas Day, Good Friday, Easter Sunday and until 1pm on Anzac Day, the only times shop assistants can now rely on a break, arguably making them worse off even than before 1892, because shops were not allowed to open on Sundays then.
Given the average New Zealander’s love of shopping, it’s unlikely Buy Nothing Day will ever take off here, let alone anywhere else with an open society. There was no shortage of crowds when I wandered through Wellington’s Golden Mile this morning. The place was humming.
- Te Ara, the online Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, has an interesting section on shopping hours which I drew on during the preparation of this article.
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Filed under Consumer issues, Justice and Law, New Zealand
