John Key joins NZ up to the Axis

After a decade of Labour keeping NZ out of major conflicts Key has aligned NZ with the most retrogressive, openly fascist elements

Key commits NZ forces to NATO agreement

Prime Minister John Key has reinforced the ties between New Zealand's armed forces and NATO in Brussels today.

TVNZ,

5 June, 2012

Kiwi troops have been serving under the NATO banner for the past nine years as part of the coalition force in Afghanistan.

Key said the co-operation agreement signed today with NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen formalises New Zealand's commitment to the organisation.

"The arrangement is a non-binding agreement that will be used to maintain ongoing political and operational discussions and underpin any future co-operation with NATO where it is mutually desirable," he said.

"Co-operation could come in a number of areas, including maintaining ongoing political dialogue on security issues of mutual interest, offering further NATO training opportunities to our Defence Force and engagement with NATO as it moves to tackle emerging security challenges of interest to New Zealand."

On a recent trip to New Zealand the commander of NATO's military forces Admiral James Stavridis said the SAS were no longer needed in Afghanistan.

However, he said it was possible the elite troops may be deployed to help fight global threats in the future.

"All of the threats we face today are trans-national," he said. "They're global and so there's a role for all of us to work together to face them."

The remaining Kiwi soldiers who are helping to train Afghanistan's security forces are due to leave the country towards the end of next year.

Share, speaking at a regional conference on Afghanistan, called for the immediate withdrawal of foreign troops from the country and proposed that NATO use part of its military budget to help revive the Afghan economy..

Meanwhile...charter schools, increasing class sizes in state schools and increasing funding for private schools, National is destroying our education system and anything that goes by the name of 'social cohesion'

Private school funding 'at expense of state schools'

The Mana Party says the Government is pumping resources into private schools at the expense of state schools.

Reuters,

26 April, 2012

New teacher-student ratios in public schools announced by the Government in last month's Budget will result in increased class sizes and is aimed at saving $43 million a year.

Mana Party vice-president John Minto says the Government should be taking the money from increased subsidies it gives to private schools to give to state schools.

He says the extra $22 million Government funding to private schools this year allows them to keep class sizes to less than half that of public schools.

Mr Minto says educational achievement of Maori and Pasifika pupils, as well as those from poorer families, will be put at risk by larger class sizes.

He says it is very unusual for the education sector to be so unified in opposition to a policy and the level of dissent means the Government cannot ignore it.

"We've got a much more organised, coherent opposition to this policy and I think that will inevitably mean the Government has to back down all the way."