“We will give these young Kiwis the kick start they need to get back on the right track. This job experience will help them develop strong work ethics and make them more attractive to employers. We will get them ready for work.
“They will be carrying out important environmental and community work. Right now the Department of Conservation is struggling to meet its goals in the face of funding and staff cuts. Councils and others are also crying out for help.
“With an estimated 10,000 taking part each year, the Ready for Work scheme will cost $60m a year. This will result in large savings to the Government over time. It’s an investment we need to make for our young and for society.” More>>
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Climate Change: Historic Paris Agreement Comes Into ForceClimate Change Minister Paula Bennett has welcomed the historic Paris Agreement, which comes into force today. More>>
Education Policy: Seclusion In Schools To Be Made Illegal
Education Minister Hekia Parata has today announced that she is proposing to make the use of seclusion in schools illegal.
Ms Parata’s proposal will make it illegal for schools and ECE services to use seclusion, which is defined as the practice of a student being involuntarily placed alone in a room at any time or for any duration, from which they cannot freely exit or believe they cannot freely exit. More>>
Gordon Campbell: On The Latest McCully Fiasco
It is 2008... The solution on offer seems to be a black ops exercise run by Murray McCully, without most of his Cabinet colleagues or the public having the foggiest idea about what he might be up to. What could possibly go wrong? More>>
Statistics NZ: Unemployment Rate Falls To 4.9 Percent As Employment GrowsThe unemployment rate fell to 4.9 percent in the September 2016 quarter (from a revised 5.0 percent in the previous quarter), Statistics New Zealand said today. This is the lowest unemployment rate since the December 2008 quarter. More>>
Environment And Conservation: Changes To Our Oceans Pose Serious Concerns
New Zealand’s oceans, coasts, and marine wildlife are under growing pressure, according to the first national report from the Ministry for the Environment and Statistics New Zealand about the marine environment. More>>
Gordon Campbell: On The Last Rites For The TPP
Most of the time, Prime Minister John Key tends to bet on the boredom factor canceling out any need for him to touch base with reality when he talks about the TPP. Who cares? Who’s listening? Is it dead yet? More>>
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Royal Society: Increased Number Of Projects A total of 117 research projects have been allocated $65.2 million (excl. GST) of funding in this year’s Marsden Fund grants, which support New Zealand’s best investigator-initiated research in the areas of science, engineering, maths, social sciences and the humanities. More>>
Gordon Campbell: On Britain’s Landmark Court Ruling Against Uber
The shockwaves from Uber’s defeat last week in a British court have reportedly already begun to wash up here in New Zealand with some local drivers thinking of taking a similar class action. More>>
Trade: NZ Trade Deficit Widens To A Record In September
Oct. 27 (BusinessDesk) - New Zealand's monthly trade deficit widened to a record in September as meat exports dropped to their lowest level in more than three years. More>>
Animal Welfare: Cruel Practices Condemned By DairyNZ Chief
DairyNZ chief executive Tim Mackle says cruel and illegal practices are not in any way condoned or accepted by the industry as part of dairy farming. More>>
DIY: Kiwi Ingenuity And Masking Tape Saves Chick
Kiwi ingenuity and masking tape has saved a Kiwi chick after its egg was badly damaged endangering the chick's life. The egg was delivered to Kiwi Encounter at Rainbow Springs in Rotorua 14 days ago by a DOC worker with a large hole in its shell and against all odds has just successfully hatched. More>>
International Trade: Key To Lead Mission To India; ASEAN FTA Review Announced
Prime Minister John Key will lead a trade delegation to India next week, saying the pursuit of a free trade agreement with the protectionist giant is "the primary reason we're going" but playing down the likelihood of early progress. More>>
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Postnatal Depression: 'The Thief That Steals Motherhood' - Alison McCulloch
Post-natal depression is a sly and cruel illness, described by one expert as ‘the thief that steals motherhood’, it creeps up on its victims, hiding behind the stress and exhaustion of being a new parent, catching many women unaware and unprepared. More>>
Gordon Campbell: On News From The US Election Eve
Here’s a somewhat scary headline from October 30 on Nate Silver’s 538 site, which summed up the statistical factors in play at that point: “The Cubs Have A Smaller Chance Of Winning Than Trump Does” More>>
David Swanson: Of All The Opinions I've Heard On Syria
It's all Assad's fault and the U.S., ISIS, al Nusra, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and anybody who will help should overthrow him come what may. It's all a U.S. crime, and Syria, Russia, and Iran should fix it with bombs. More>>
Julien Troussier: Loving Trump
It’s 3am. Cannot sleep. Restless. Slide to unlock. Open the New York Times App. Look for the latest incident. He did it again. He lashed out. Fear. Anger. Outrage. I needed to see this. I needed to check that the madness was still there. More>>
Werewolf: Living With Rio’s Olympic Ruins
Mariana Cavalcanti Critics of the Olympic project can point a discernible pattern in the delivery of Olympics-related urban interventions: the belated but rushed inaugurations of faulty and/or unfinished infrastructures... More>>
Gordon Campbell: On The Politicising Of The War On Drugs In Sport
It hasn’t been much fun at all to see how “war on drugs in sport” has become a proxy version of the Cold War, fixated on Russia. This weekend’s banning of the Russian long jumper Darya Klishina took that fixation to fresh extremes. More>>
Keeping Out The Vote: Gordon Campbell On The US Elections
I’ll focus here on just two ways that dis-enfranchisement is currently occurring in the US: (a) by the rigging of the boundary lines for voter districts and (b) by demanding elaborate photo IDs before people are allowed to cast their vote. More>>
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Haiti: $5 Million To Kick-Start Aid In Wake Of Hurricane Matthew
UN emergency fund allocates $5 million to kick-start assistance in wake of Hurricane Matthew More>>
Not Helen Clark: António Guterres Favourite For Next UN Secretary-General
Former Portuguese Prime Minister António Guterres has emerged as the clear favourite to become the next United Nations Secretary-General following the sixth secret ballot held today by the UN Security Council, which is expected to take a formal decision tomorrow and forward Mr. Guterres’ name to the 193-Member General Assembly for final confirmation. More>>
Preliminary Results: MH17 Investigation Report
The Joint Investigation Team (JIT) is convinced of having obtained irrefutable evidence to establish that on 17 July 2014, flight MH-17 was shot down by a BUK missile from the 9M38-series. According to the JIT there is also evidence identifying the launch location that involves an agricultural field near Pervomaiskyi which, at the time, was controlled by pro-Russian fighters. More>>
At The UN: Paris Climate Agreement Moves Closer To Entry Into Force
The Paris Agreement on climate change moved closer toward entering into force in 2016 as 31 more countries joined the agreement today at a special event hosted by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. More>>
Gordon Campbell: On The End Game In Spain (And Other World News)
The coverage of international news seems almost entirely dependent on a random selection of whatever some overseas news agency happens to be carrying overnight... Here are a few interesting international stories that have largely flown beneath the radar this past week. More>>
Amnesty/Human Rights Watch: Appalling Abuse, Neglect Of Refugees On Nauru
Refugees and asylum seekers on Nauru, most of whom have been held there for three years, routinely face neglect by health workers and other service providers who have been hired by the Australian government, as well as frequent unpunished assaults by local Nauruans. More>>
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Non-Natural History: Dinosaur Eggs 'Discovered' At Auckland Gardens
Auckland Botanic Gardens plant curators have unearthed what are thought to be prehistoric dinosaur eggs in the Gondwana Forest section of the expansive garden in Manurewa... In fact, the “dinosaur eggs” are part of an innovative, larger-than-life dinosaur performance and display featuring a raptor, a crested therapod and a towering Tyrannosaurus Rex. More>>
For The Birds: Kōkako Crowned Bird Of The Year
The Kōkako has been crowned New Zealand's Bird of the Year after two weeks of close competition and heated campaigning. More>>
New Zealand Geographic: Photographer Of The Year Announced
Shaun Jeffers, has won the Landscape category at the New Zealand Geographic, Photographer of the Year awards for his stunning shot of the glowworms at the Waitomo Glowworm Caves! More>>
Howard Davis: Review - 'I, Daniel Blake' - Ken Loach's Bleak Masterpiece
'I, Daniel Blake' is a bleak masterpiece, a chilling and moving story of two people striking up an unlikely friendship under extremely adverse circumstances. It is both a polemical indictment of a faceless benefits bureaucracy that strips claimants of their humanity by reducing them to mere numbers, and a celebration of the decency and compassion of ordinary people who look out for one another when the state has abandoned them. More>>
Howard Davis: Review - A Girl Named Mo
Moana Ete brought her three-piece band A Girl Named Mo to Wellington's intimate and iconic Bats Theatre last week for a five-night residency. Each show was recorded and filmed live for the release of her debut album 'Platonic/Romantic' on Loop records later this year. More>>
Gordon Campbell: On Bob Dylan's Nobel (And The Surplus)
So Bob Dylan has just won the Nobel Prize for… Literature? Wow. I’d be just as happy if he’d won for his work on particle physics (“One Grain of Sand”, “Simple Twist of Fate”) or got the Economics prize for his work on the theory of contracting (“Don’t Think Twice Its Alright”) ... More>>
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