NZ parliament quietly passes warrantless surveillance Bill

Not exactly passed in the middle of the night but certainly with undue urgency. Eternal shame on the NZ Labour Party for (predictably) going long to vote this in.

Martyn Bradbury says this is a "slur on our democracy". I would say, "what democracy?"

See also: 

Putting the fox in the hen house in charge of investigating the crime scene - Dirty politics and deep corruption in New Zealand

New Zealanders sleepwalk into fascism

New Zealand passes its ‘anti-terrorism’ legislation

Just two weeks after it was introduced, the Government's new anti-terrorism legislation has passed its final reading.

Radio NZ,

10 December, 2014

It was pushed through under urgency last night and passed by 94 votes to 27 with the Greens, New Zealand First and the Maori Party voting against it.

What price for freedom?

The legislation aims to intercept local supporters of the Islamic State group and would allow the SIS to carry out surveillance without a warrant for 24 hours.

It also allows the government to cancel of passports for longer, from one year to three years, where the person poses a risk to security.

John Key with US President Barack Obama earlier this year. The US is leading an alliance against Islamic State.

During the earlier part of the debate, the New Zealand First leader, Winston Peters, berated the Government for what he considered its slack immigration policies.

He loudly chastised a National Party MP for heckling him during his speech.

"He's got no idea who he's brought in from the Middle East, and they bring them in in their thousands ... look ignorance is not bliss."

National's David Bennett took umbrage with Mr Peters' comments calling his speech 'disgusting'.

"New Zealand is a country made up of people from different religions, different races and different cultures and people have come to this country at different times and they are all New Zealanders.

"How dare that party say that it holds up New Zealand security when all it wants is the 1950s."

Labour's Phil Goff was similarly unimpressed.

"We should not cast a slur on any individual because of their ethnicity and their religion.

"If we can create a decent society that does not marginalise and alienate any of our communities, then we will not have the problem of terrorism."

Both Phil Goff and his colleague David Shearer stressed that the Government must more work more closely with the muslim community.

The Minister responsible for legislation, Chris Finlayson, responded to those calls during his final speech.

"I take those matters very seriously and I pledge to work with local communities over the next period including during the period of the broader review."

"Our democracy" ?

Labour sell us out on warrantless surveillance

By Martyn Bradbury

the Daily Blog,

10 December, 2014

Isn’t it depressing that Labour are selling us out by voting for warrantless spying by an agency caught out smearing them?

Last night Labour do what they always do, over compensate on Security issues. So terrified are Labour at being perceived weak on National Security issues, they have folded and rolled over for Key’s mass surveillance state.

Because mass surveillance reminds the sleepy hobbits of muddle Nu Zilind of Kim Dotcom, Labour aren’t interested in protecting us from State Spies and are more interested in putting as much distance between themselves and Snowden’s revelations as possible.

It’s the politics of cowardice.

The claim that the SIS won’t spy on activists with this new warrantless spying is a joke. The SIS can spy on people for terrorism purposes or if they threaten economic or commercial interests. The Government claim that by removing the commercial and economic interests from warrantless spying that’s a safe guard, but if those commercial and economic interests can claim what is happening to them is being done via ‘terrorism’, they can be sed.

The other supposed safe guard is that the surveillance will need to gain a warrant to reach evidential thresholds, but that’s only true if the SIS wants to gain evidential thresholds, they could just be doing it for intelligence gathering, in which case they won’t need it for evidential thresholds.

This is the spy agency recently outed working with the PM’s Office to falsify information to smear the Leader of the Opposition months before an election on a far right hate speech blog. They have abused their power to the point of being a coup, and here we are giving them 24 hour fishing expeditions to break into our homes, plant spy cameras and film us.

The real shock is that these powers were already given to the bloody Police after they were caught illegally spying in the Urewera case. But because the Police feel squeamish about using those powers to spy on activists and religious groups, the SIS is being given these powers.

Labour have failed us to cuddle up to muddle Nu Zilind who are still all confused and frightened about mass surveillance and who instinctively cling to authority for reassurance.

Ramming warrantless spying through with no proof whatsoever of a real threat and telling us they are protecting us is a Police State, it is not a democracy.

May history damn us for our spinelessness, may history damn us for our apathy. If a Labour Party try and close a legal loophole where abusive parents were getting away with assaulting their children, that’s Nanny State gone mad and requires hundreds of thousands on the street. The National Party allow the spy agency they used to rig the 2011 election the power to break into our homes and film us, and not a fucking whimper.

This is what happens when Seven Sharp is the new standard for public debate.

These powers are a stain on our democracy.

Some of the debate in parliament

So too, the inevitable further slide of the economy as a result of a world sinking into depression- sinking oil and other commoditiy prices ( as a result of them suddenly being in 'oversupply'

Government deficit higher than forecast

The Government's operating deficit is $260 million higher than forecast, owing to lower revenue and higher costs than expected.

Radio NZ,

10 December, 2014The Government's financial statements for the four months until the end of October have the deficit, excluding gains and losses, at a billion dollars.

Tax revenue was 5% lower than the Budget forecast at $97 million, due to reduced GST and source deductions.

Petroleum royalties were also $84 million dollars less than forecast.

However, that was partly offset by higher than expected individual and corporate tax.

Government spending was $24 billion, or 5% higher than forecast.

That was was caused primarily by the Crown's signing a $103 million Deed of Indemnity for Solid Energy.

Net debt was close to forecast at $61.9 billion, or 27% if GDP

Fonterra slashes milk payout - down 60c to $4.70

NZ Herald,

10 December, 2014

Fonterra said it had cut its farmgate milk price forecast for the current season to $4.70 per kg of milk solids, down from previous forecast of $5.30 a kg, representing an estimated $6.1 billion reduction in farm income since the boom season of 2013/14.

The giant dairy co-operative said that, when combined with the previously announced estimated dividend range of 25-35 cents per share, its cash payout would be $4.95 to $5.05 for the current season.

Some market commentators had expected Fonterra to revise up its dividend forecast, but the co-op said it would look at the dividend outlook when it announces its interim result next year. The New Zealand dollar dropped on the back of the milk price news to US76.85c from US78.07 just before the announcement.....