More on BCIR

The Holden Republic has some comments of his own on People Power and binding referenda. He favours a system of negative or abrogative referenda, where citizens can overturn a law passed by Parliament on a straight up/down vote. I've blogged about this form of referedum here; it avoids the problems associated with positive referenda and would be particularly easy to graft onto our existing constitutional structure. If the primary goal is to restrain executive power, then this is the easiest way to do it.

Meanwhile, Span has had her own run-in with the advocates of BCIR, and wasn't impressed. One of her concerns is that "the loudest voice (whether it be loudest by virtue of numbers or money) can shout down others", but this is really a problem with any form of democratic government. The squeaky wheel will always get the grease, and so the answer is to do some squeaking of your own. If you don't, and your interests are ignored in consequence, then you have no-one to blame but yourself.

But her prime concern is the danger posed to minorities or disadvantaged groups by a majoritarian system without proper checks and balances. And I agree. No government should be able to (for example) outlaw homosexuality or deny some of its citizens the vote, whether by representative action or referendum. But the answer to that is to impose such limits. I've talked about some of the ways we can cruft this here; probably the easiest is to allow Parliament to overturn a referendum on a simple majority vote (Voters' Voice's proposed 75% is simply too high). This has the effect of making referenda "binding" only if the government wants them to be, but OTOH the informal limit of politicians having to go on the record to vote the people down should not be underestimated. Alternatively, if we eventually move to a written constitution with an enforcable Bill of Rights, then it ceases to be a problem; referenda which seek to deprive people of their rights could simply be struck down.

A losing slogan

With the US election fast approaching, the Elder Party has nominated its usual candidate and kicked off its campaign for the presidency. This year, as usual, they're using a variation on the same old slogan:

Cthulhu for President 2004: Don't settle for the lesser evil!

Unfortunately, I'm not sure that that's really going to cut it this time round. I mean, Great Cthulhu may wait dead but dreaming for the time when the stars are right to wake and draw humanity into his many-tentacled maw, but is he really worse than George W. Bush? Are his policies really worse than those of the Republican Party of Texas?

Sadly, it's no longer clear that Great Cthulhu is in fact "the greater evil"; this essential point of difference has been lost. So instead he'll just have to follow the path of every other presidential candidate, and campaign on the following slogan:

Cthulhu for President 2004: The lesser evil for once.

We now return you to your regularly-scheduled broadcast.

Police and domestic violence

New Zealand First is calling on the government to review the Domestic Violence Act in the wake of a report saying that it was ineffective. However, the reason it is ineffective is that it is not being properly enforced by Police; they just didn't take it seriously. The answer then seems to be obvious: review the Police, and find out why they are refusing to enforce the law. If it's resourcing, then find out what they need to be able to do it properly, and provide it. But if it's bad attitudes and a belief that domestic violence isn't really a crime and isn't worth their effort, then that needs to be rooted out.

Media freedom in Iraq

For a long time now I've been pointing out that the "freedom" the Americans have bought to Iraq doesn't seem to include freedom of the press. First the Americans, and now the Iraqi interim government have imposed controls on the press aimed at preventing "unwarranted criticism" of the actions of US troops or Iraqi politicians. But now with a full-scale war raging in Najaf, the regime is trying even harsher tactics to ensure that the "wrong" message doesn't get out:

The move against reporters in Najaf, designed to intimidate journalists other than those embedded with US forces into leaving the city, began when Najaf's police chief, Ghalab Jazaree, summoned reporters to announce that they had two hours to start the return journey to Baghdad.

[...]

As a group of Arab and Western journalists were attempting to meet the Governor, Adnan Zurufi, to protest against the order, a second police contingent arrived bearing a written order to all journalists in the city to leave. The journalists at the Governor's office were turned back by a plain-clothes security officer who told them: "You have been warned. You have your two hours. If you don't leave you will be shot."

I've said it before and I expect I'll be saying it again: the "new" Iraq is looking more and more like the old Iraq with every passing day.

More on a "Treaty Council"

Dr Alex Frame has been kind enough to provide me with a copy of his submission on the foreshore and seabed settlement, in which he proposes the idea of management by a "Treaty Council". It's a short but interesting read. Those worried that this sort of co-management will erode our customary right to go to the beach shouldn't be; the proposal is quite explicit that

the Council's management of the estate shall be such as to accord to all New Zealand citizens the greatest degree of public access, enjoyment and use, without discrimination on grounds of race, origin, belief or status, compatible with the Three Articles of the Treaty of Waitangi, the general laws of New Zealand, and the efficient management of the estate.

[Emphasis added]

The Council would be forbidden from selling the beaches, or from granting any lease with a period of longer than 20 years. While its not stated (this is a skeleton proposal, after all), ports and other long-term developments could easily be permitted by Act of Parliament. Current law requires this if the crown wants to sell any part of the foreshore; that bar could easily be lowered to the granting of longer-term leases.

The overall approach is one of co-operation and localism. The council would co-opt members where local issues were at stake, and not just from the Maori community. The aim would be to apply the broad principles stated above to produce a local solution for local circumstances, rather than trying to insist that "one size fits all".

As I said earlier, I like this proposal. It's co-operative rather than adverserial, has great symbolism, and allows all parties to save face. I just hope that the government has the courage to change its mind and adopt it, rather than trying to plough on with its current plans.

Save yourself $15

Following on from my comments on People Power, here's the contents page with links to the material available on the internet.

• Introduction
• NZs Urgent Need for Real Democracy - Dr Robert Anderson
• Full Democracy - Brian Beedham (The Economist) (full version)
• David Lange - Interview with Jonathan Eisen
• Geoffrey Palmer Misses The Point on BCIR - Jonathan Eisen
• Direct Democracy: Our Coalition with the People - NZ First Policy Statement
• A Sure Way to Restrict the Power of the State - The Rt Hon Winston Peters
• A Swiss Perspective - Erwin Alber
• The Greens and BCIR
• BCIR: How It Can Work in New Zealand - Steve Baron (a paste-up and slight edit of three pieces: 1 2 3)
• BCIR Q & A - Steve Baron
• Limitless Government? - Roger Kerr
• An Australian Politician Speaks Out - Russell Cooper
• BCIR Controls the Power of Elites - Steven Neitzke
• Christine Fletcher: Beyond MMP
• How I Changed My Mind on BCIR - Simon Upton
• The Referendum party of the UK
• Sleepwalking into the European Superstate - Sir James Goldsmith
• How to Fire Your MP - Wikipaedia (This being Wikipedia, it has been modified since)
• Recalling the Father of Recall - Hiram Johnson (full version)
• So Now What Happens? - Roger Monckton

It's not nearly as bad as the impression I got while reading the book, but its still a hell of a lot of second-hand material they're trying to charge for...

Good on them

A while ago I mentioned that the National Front were coming to Wellington for a demonstration. Now it seems that Wellington residents have risen to the occasion and are organising a march against racism to show them they aren't welcome.

The aim was nicely captured by one organiser, who was quoted in the Herald as saying:

This is a democratic society, they [the NF] have a right to be organised, they have the right to oppose anything. We have to show we are much better than them for society

But it's not just about the National Front - the march will also be opposing humiliating immigration policies and Maori-bashing. I guess Don Brash had better watch out...

Constitutionalising the Treaty, part II

Antipodean Journal has more on the subject of Waitangi and the separation of power, but some of it seems rather confused. For example, when commenting on what JustLeft called "version 2" of our constitutional history (in which "Aboriginal title was, arguably, extinguished by the English common law that arrived with the Crown"), he says:

The problem with this version is contained in the last sentence. Where the British empire expanded into regions inhabited by indigenous peoples, the common law dictated that aboriginal rights of sovereignty pre-existed the right of the Crown. Sovereignty could be transferred by force or by treaty, but it had to be transferred.

This is simply wrong. There are no common law "aboriginal rights of sovereignty". There are common law aboriginal property rights, or aboriginal title, which predate the crown and survive colonisation unless extinguished or abandoned, but property is not sovereignty.

What version 2 rests on is an explicit denial that indigenous peoples are sovereign. You can turn up and sign a treaty with them, but according to the legal doctrines favoured by version 2, it's not a real treaty because "savages" lack the capacity to sign one, and it's also not a real cession because they have no actual sovereignty to cede. This is seen perfectly in Lord Normanby's despatch to Hobson, as quoted by Justice Prendergast:

We acknowledge New Zealand as a sovereign and independent state, so far at least as it is possible to make such acknowledgement in favour of a people composed of numerous, dispersed and petty tribes, who possess few political relations to each other, and are incompetent to act, or even to deliberate in concert

According to Prendergast, "such a qualification nullifies the proposition to which it is annexed"; New Zealand was "thinly populated by barbarians without any form of law or civil government", and hence sovereignty vested in the "first civilised occupier" to come along and plant their flag. But however morally abhorrent this doctrine may be, it's not actually incoherent; version 2 tells an internally consistent (but repugnant) story.

Further on, Rohan argues that New Zealand's nature as a unitary state has meant that we have been unable to justify the creation of a supreme court to limit state power. This is true insofar as such courts haven't been required by the political structure (by contrast, they are required in non-unitary or federal states, to mediate the distribution of powers between different levels of government). But that doesn't mean we can't have one!

We don't need to view New Zealand as a non-unitary state in order to limit the power of Parliament - all we have to do is decide that that power ought to be limited, that there are some things that the government has no right to do. We saw an effort to do this in the 80's, when Geoffrey Palmer attempted to give us a binding and enforceable bill of Rights. Interestingly, the original version incorporated the Treaty, including the following clause:

4. The Treaty of Waitangi

(1) The rights of the Maori people under the Treaty of Waitangi are hereby recognised and affirmed.

(2) The Treaty of Waitangi shall be regarded as always speaking and shall be applied to circumstances as they arise so that effect may be given to its spirit and true intent.

(3) The Treaty of Waitangi means the Treaty as set out in English and Maori in the Schedule to this bill of Rights.

Unfortunately, this foundered on numerous objections, and the binding and entrenched status was watered down by a Parliament jealous of its own sovereignty. But there's no reason why we can't try again, but I suspect we'd all want a little more idea of the balance between Kawanatanga katoa and tino rangitiratanga before doing so.

Indigeneity

What does it mean to say that Pakeha have become indigenous too? Part of it seems to be an appropriation and sharing of the Maori concept of turangawaewae. Sandra Paterson has an excellent piece in the Herald about this, and how this land is her land too...

Maori are New Zealanders too

Those who think I'm being unfair below by suggesting that those opposed to the idea of vesting the foreshore in a "Treaty Council" want a New Zealand run by and for Pakeha might want to consider this: the core of Bill English's campaign on the foreshore and seabed was the cry that "the beaches belong to all of us". He even explicitly said that "we all deserve a say". Well, Maori are a part of "all of us". It follows that they also "deserve a say" on how shared resources - such as the beaches - are managed. Denying them this say is to deny that Maori are New Zealanders too, and (by implication) saying that only Pakeha count.

This is not to say that a "Treaty Council" is the only solution. But it may just be the way out of this whole godawful mess. The symbolism of appealing to the Treaty and its spirit of partnership and cooperation cannot be understated. It's defensible on strictly liberal grounds as well as the Treaty's quasi-contractual ones; it stresses that this is a country where the beaches belong to and can be enjoyed by everyone, while holding out a hand to Maori and promising that their rights will be respected. It avoids creating outright winners and losers, keeps people talking, and (most importantly) gives everyone a say.

The more I think about it, the more I like it. If the government is going to insist on denying due process, then this is the way forward.

Picking fights

David Farrar has managed to turn my opposition to the use of information extracted by torture as evidence in a court of law into opposition to acting on it to prevent stadiums being blown up and such. Hardly. By all means, arrest people and evacuate places - but don't expect to be able to prosecute later unless you have real evidence that can be cross-examined and isn't tainted by physical and mental coercion.

He also disagrees with my position on parole. To which I'd like to point out that, sentences being finite, almost every prisoner will be eventually be released - which means we are going to have to deal with the problem of reintegrating criminals back into society one way or another. How does he suggest we do it? Continue to dump people on the street? Or just stick his fingers in his ears and pretend that there is no problem, and that if you just threaten to throw more people in prison for longer (something with "no significant deterrent effect") then the very real problems faced by former prisoners of finding alternatives to crime will just magically disappear?

As for the Treaty Council, I'm quite aware of what the foreshore decision said, and my position is that Maori should be allowed to take their claims to court just like everybody else, as a simple matter of equality before the law (hey, didn't Don Brash say something about that?) But if the government is going to deny the certainty to be found in due process, it is going to require a political solution which avoids leaving Maori with the feeling that they are being walked all over by the majority - otherwise, this is just going to fester and be relitigated whenever there is a change of government (especially if the Maori Party sticks around). Management by a "Treaty commission" is one possible solution in this vein. It's not saying "Maori own the country and Pakeha are only tenants", it's saying "we all own it, and we will manage it together". I guess someone who believes that New Zealand should be run by and for Pakeha would find that threatening, but I certainly don't.

Thoughts on People Power

What do you get when you turn a couple of loonies from Investigate magazine loose on the topic of direct democracy and binding citizens'-initiated referenda? An overpriced, vanity-published piece of shit like People Power. The book is a compilation of material, almost all of which is available on the internet for free, and most of which proves the point that the biggest problem with the idea of BCIR is the people who support it.

There's material in here from Winston Peters, stuff from the anti-EU UK Referendum Party (who seem to spend most of their time watching out for the Black Eurocopters that will take their precious pound away), and from people who seem to think that the idea of "checks and balances" is for wimps. Much of it is simply frothing about how the government has done unpopular things (varying from removing the GE moratorium to decriminalising prostitution to not sticking prisoners in windowless cells and feeding them only bread and water) and how binding referenda would put a stop to all that. Then there's the piece by Roger Kerr - a man who has consistently viewed the public as stupid proles who must be excluded from policymaking as a "special interest", and who opposed MMP on the basis that the requirement for wider democratic consultation would prevent the government from adopting necessary but unpopular policies. Now that the majority is on the other foot, he's seemingly changed his opinion. I'm sure the near-success of the Campaign for Better Government has nothing to do with it...

The core of the book is the Voters' Voice BCIR proposal. Unfortunately, this suffers from the same problems as New Zealand First's - it has loopholes you can drive a Mumak through, and little thought has been given as to how it would be integrated into the rest of New Zealand's constitutional and legal structure. Checks and balances are of course right out. It's a shallow treatment which does the idea of BCIR a great disservice.

However, it's not all bad. There's several informative articles in there (notably those from the Economist and Simon Upton), and both Christine Fletcher and David Lange have obviously grappled with the deeper issues (though it would be nice if Eisen would shut up and let his interviewee talk, rather than insisting on interviewing himself). But these pieces are a definite minority, and don't justify the cover price. Save yourself $15 and read it on the net instead.

Interesting

Select committee hearings have turned up another interesting possible solution to the foreshore and seabed row: vesting the foreshore in the Treaty.

The idea is from constitutional lawyer and author Alex Frame, and would involve the stablishment of a "Treaty Council" to manage and oversee the foreshore for the benefit of all New Zealanders:

The constitution of the proposed Treaty Council is intended not only to assure Maori real representation in the decision-making process... but to draw on Maori wisdom and concepts so as to produce a better management regime for the foreshore and seabed than could be arrived at by the executive branch of Government through its existing mix of agencies.

I like this idea - it captures the idea that this is not a country where you can own the beach, but a country where they are for everyone, while making significant concessions to Maori. If the government is going to insist on extinguishing customary title, then this would be a far, far better way to do it.

Null and void

The California Supreme Court has annulled all the gay marriages performed in San Francisco earlier this year on technical grounds. However (and this is notable) it has not addressed the wider issue of the clash between the state constitution (which outlaws discrimination) and the proposition which defined marriage in heterosexual terms only. That issue goes before a lower court next month, so there's still hope for a just decision.

And if not, well, I guess California gays can always take their "pink dollar" to a state which respects them, like Massachusetts.

Giving the green light to torture

The British Court of Appeal has ruled that British courts can use evidence extracted by torture, as long as British agents had not "procured" or "connived" at it. Turning a blind eye, or not inquiring too closely as to how the information was gained is perfectly acceptable, however. The British government has of course welcomed this monstrous decision, with David Blunkett (the British version of John Ashcroft) saying that while they (obviously) "unreservedly condemn the use of torture",

"it would be irresponsible not to take appropriate account of any information that could help protect national security and public safety".

Sorry, but no. Torture has no place in any legal system, and the willingness to use information extracted by those means makes a complete mockery of any condemnation. Gareth Peirce, a solicitor in the case, is right: Britain has completely lost its way, legally and morally...

Iraqi death penalty causes problems

Danish troops in Basra are now refusing to hand over captured Iraqis because they may face execution. Meanwhile, the British have caved as usual, and are claiming that the EU ban on their country extraditing peopel to face execution or facilitating the death penalty in any way somehow does not apply to their activities in Iraq.

I guess we can expect the Danes to go home at the end of their stint in Iraq unless they see some progress. Unlike the British, they take the EU's human rights provisions seriously.

As for New Zealand, I've yet to see any indication of a condemnation of Iraq's reimposition of the death penalty from the New Zealand government, or any reaction at all to the regime's use of torture. How much longer will we remain silent?

Inside Al-Qaeda’s Hard Drive

There's an interesting article with the above title in The Atlantic this month, by a journalist who acquired a couple of computers stolen from Al Qaeda's office the night before the fall of Kabul. He's spent over a year translating and decoding the files and interviewing former jihadis to find out what it all means. The result is an unprecedented insight into the operations and office politics of Al Qaeda in the runup to September 11th.

Here's the money quote:

Perhaps one of the most important insights to emerge from the computer is that 9/11 sprang not so much from al-Qaeda's strengths as from its weaknesses. The computer did not reveal any links to Iraq or any other deep-pocketed government; amid the group's penury the members fell to bitter infighting. The blow against the United States was meant to put an end to the internal rivalries, which are manifest in vitriolic memos between Kabul and cells abroad. Al-Qaeda's leaders worried about a military response from the United States, but in such a response they spied opportunity: they had fought the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, and they fondly remembered that war as a galvanizing experience, an event that roused the indifferent of the Arab world to fight and win against a technologically superior Western infidel. The jihadis expected the United States, like the Soviet Union, to be a clumsy opponent. Afghanistan would again become a slowly filling graveyard for the imperial ambitions of a superpower.

Like the early Russian anarchists who wrote some of the most persuasive tracts on the uses of terror, al-Qaeda understood that its attacks would not lead to a quick collapse of the great powers. Rather, its aim was to tempt the powers to strike back in a way that would create sympathy for the terrorists. Al-Qaeda has so far gained little from the ground war in Afghanistan; the conflict in Iraq, closer to the center of the Arab world, is potentially more fruitful. As Arab resentment against the United States spreads, al-Qaeda may look less like a tightly knit terror group and more like a mass movement. And as the group develops synergy in working with other groups branded by the United States as enemies (in Iraq, the Israeli-occupied territories, Kashmir, the Mindanao Peninsula, and Chechnya, to name a few places), one wonders if the United States is indeed playing the role written for it on the computer.

Only an American would even wonder. From down here, it looks absolutely clear that that is exactly what is happening. The United States has been played; their desire for revenge and not to look "weak" in the face of terrorism has led them to be Al Qaeda's best recruiters, and their pursuit of military rather than political "solutions" is doing more than anything else to bring about Osama bin Laden's dream of a fundamentalist "war of civilizations" between Islam and the west.

The "gay agenda"

Leading an "ordinary domestic life", just like anybody else. How can anybody find that threatening? How can anybody find it objectionable?

Parole

The killer of David McNee was on parole, and there's already the usual howling about why we let people out of prison on parole. I think a better question is why the hell was someone on parole living under a bridge and having to work as a prostitute? Don't we ensure that these people have somewhere to go and something to do?

The problem is not with parole, but the criminal underfunding of those who supervise it. People cannot be successfully reintegrated into society if they are just dumped on the street with the clothes they stand up in and a few dollars and told to get on with their lives. If we want this to work, we need the probation service to be actively assisting those on parole (and those at final release), ensuring that they have homes and jobs - and this means funding them to do it. Otherwise, passive neglect is simply going to lead to more problems.

Every prisoner will theoretically be released from prison at some stage, and so the problem of reintegration has to be addressed. Parole is a good way of doing it if we do it properly. And if we are not going to do it properly, and we allow prisoners to drift back into criminal activity through neglect, then we have no-one to blame but ourselves.

Supersize Me

I'd like to think that this movie will help me kick my McDonald's addiction, but if Fast Food Nation didn't do it, then I doubt this will. Still, it was a scary movie - if only for showing how much larger American portions really are. 1.2 L of Coke with your burger? Would you like a catheter with that?

Constitutionalising the Treaty

Antipodean Journal has an interesting post about the Treaty and the separation of powers, in which he argues that the Treaty's status as "the legal basis of Crown sovereignty in New Zealand" requires "an independent authority capable of judging Parliament's fulfillment of its responsibilities" - in other words, for judicial review of laws to ensure consistency with the Treaty. JustLeft follows up with a post on our two versions of constitutional history.

I don't have much to add (yet), but here's a couple of thoughts: firstly, the Treaty is obviously not the legal basis of the crown's sovereignty, for the simple reason that there can be no such basis. Sovereignty does not flow from law; it flows from popular consent. And that means the consent not just of Maori, but of Pakeha as well. Ths doesn't mean that the Treaty is irrelevant - it is a potent symbol of consent, and the legitimacy of the government will inevitably be judged by how well it lives up to its end of the bargain - but those parts of it dealing with cession and sovereignty are essentially only of historical interest.

Secondly, having the crown be "the sole arbiter of its own justice" has led to gross injustices in the past, is leading to injustice now over the foreshore, and will lead to further injustices in the future if Don Brash gets elected. But we do not need to make the Treaty fully justicable in order to put a stop to that. "Treaty clauses" in legislation go a long way towards preventing future breaches, and provide Iwi with a course of action if their rights are threatened. The problem is that the government can always set out to consciously violate the Treaty, as it has done over the foreshore and seabed issue, under cover of "Parliamentary sovereignty". Entrenching the Treaty would (almost certainly) prevent this, but I can't see that happening in isolation; it would be as part of a general shift to a justicable, written constitution with general human rights provisions. Unfortunately, the people in favour of this sort of a move seem to also be the ones who want to write out the Treaty and pretend that it never happened (or that only Article One happened)...

There is however another way to view the Treaty: not as our constitution, but as our Declaration of Independence. A mission statement, a goal to strive for, something that should guide our laws "so that effect may be given to its spirit and intent". This suggests an approach similar to that suggested by David Slack in Bullshit, Backlash, and Bleeding Hearts: looking at every piece of legislation to see what Treaty issues come up and how they are best addressed, and using specific clauses to do so rather than a catchall appeal to "Treaty principles". This keeps power in Parliament, not in the courts. On the other hand, it doesn't solve that central problem of enforcability.

The real problem though, as JustLeft points out, is reconciling the two stories of our constitutional history. I don't have any answers to this, except to encourage people to study the subject, in the naive belief that the facts speak for themselves. Failing that, we may just have to wait for nature to take its course. There's a cynical story about scientific progress, that the balance shifted from the corpuscular to the wave theory of light chiefly because the advocates of the former theory had died. Sadly, social progress often works in the same way, through attrition rather than argument.

More on Iraq torture

While it hasn't yet been picked up by the major media, the Oregonian is continuing to push this, with an editorial entitled Iraq incident requires answers:

the United States government should make it clear to those in the Iraqi government that our massive support has some conditions regarding their human rights record.

Indeed, the only means that the United States has of promoting the future good conduct of the Iraqi regime is to apply real diplomatic and political pressure now.

That applies to us just as much as the Americans - yet we are staying silent. Why isn't Phil Goff issuing statements demanding that the Iraqi government respect human rights and prosecute those responsible for torture? Why are our troops still there? Will we be sending a reconstruction team to help out Mugabe in Zimbabwe as well?

The one good thing to come out of the whole Iraq debacle, the one thing that allows anyone to argue that the war was justified, is that Saddam is gone and his regime of torture ended. Now it turns out that the US killed 13,000 Iraqi civilians simply to replace one bunch of despotic torturing bastards with another - and is killing more every day to keep them in power. We should not be a part of this. Supporting torturers goes against everything our country is supposed to stand for. The only assistance we should be giving in Iraq now is to human rights NGOs and war crimes investigators.

Not good enough

Ethnic Affairs Minister Chris Carter is seeking to amend the Identity Bill to ensure that current New Zealand residents are not disadvantaged by the extension of waiting times. It's a good step, but not good enough. The extended waiting times for citizenship are fundamentally at odds with our values as an open, welcoming, and generous country. They should be scrapped rather than mitigated.

Protests and counter-protests

Progressives in Wellington have stepped up to the plate to oppose Destiny Church's "enough is enough" hate-rally against gays, by organising a couple of counter protests. The first, on the theme of "hate is not a family value", starts at Te Aro Park. The second is a rally for human rights at Parliament at 11:30. Both are on Monday, August 23rd - the same day as the Destiny Church event.

If you're in Wellington and support civil unions, then please go to one of these events.

Getting the story straight

The government can't seem to get its story straight over Amokura Panoho. In Question Time today, John Tamihere claimed (or rather, agreed with the claim) that the meeting which sparked the complaint against Ms Panoho had been held on government time:

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Could the Minister tell the House and the country whether his concern about this person’s attendance was that the person in question was attending business in respect of the Tariana Turia party, at the time she should have been, and was employed to be, doing work on behalf of the New Zealand taxpayer?

Hon JOHN TAMIHERE: Yes.

Yet later, Steve Maharey seems to be denying it:

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Is it a fact that a substantial number of the people who attended that hui were there whilst being paid by the taxpayer to be somewhere else - namely, at their job - and if it was wrong for Ms Panoho to be in that situation, which I think most people would accept, then what is being done about the remainder of those who left their job that day to attend that hui at the taxpayers’ expense?

Hon STEVE MAHAREY: I advise the member that the meeting was in the evening...

Who's right? Well, Ms Panoho's former employer seems to back Maharey. Does this mean that Tamihere's vindictiveness has led him to lie to Parliament?

Work and leisure

Commenting on today's good news about unemployment, JustLeft says:

Now the challenge should be: how do we get our labour force participation rate up to Scandinavian levels of around 80% of the working age population, compared with the current 66.7%?

But why on earth would we want to do that? We work to live, we do not live to work.

Labour force participation is in many ways a negative statistic, in that it directly represents the tradeoff between work and leisure. High labour force participation comes directly at the expense of doing something else. And to the extent that people would rather be doing something else (whether it is raising kids or writing a book), that is a Bad Thing.

I have no doubt that most people prefer to work (for a certain value of "work"); we all need something to do with our lives, ideally something enjoyable and meaningful (or at least not too crap). But simply pursuing a high participation rate without pausing to think what it means is putting the cart before the horse. Instead, we should be trying to ensure that everybody who wants a job can get one, and that those jobs pay well enough for people to follow their other preferences as well. The aim is to enable people to lead the lives they want, not to force them into shitty work so that politicians can crow about "good" economic statistics.

Identity Bill

The Identity (Citizenship and Travel Documents) Bill passed its first reading last week. The bill will make a number of changes to the Citizenship and Passports Acts, some of which are sensible and justifiable - tilting the balance so that people with serious criminal convictions will not generally get citizenship; fixing a loophole which had deprived some Tokelauans of their New Zealand citizenship - and some of which aren't. The provisions of greatest concern are those extending the length of time people must be resident in New Zealand before becoming eligible for citizenship, and allowing the government to refuse or cancel passports on security grounds.

The first strikes at the heart of what this country is all about, and shifts us from being an open, generous and welcoming nation to one with a fortress mentality based on distrust. It seems to be driven primarily by the Australians, who are worried that "undesirables" (meaning non-whites) can use New Zealand as a "back door" to Australia by the cunning ruse of becoming New Zealanders. It's mean-spirited and tells immigrants "we don't want you". Is this really the way we want to be advertising New Zealand to the world?

The second provision relating to passports is more concerning. While it has been tightened significantly (the Minister can now only cancel or deny a passport if a person intends to commit a terrorist act, WMD proliferation, or unlawful activity causing devastating economic damage to New Zealand for commercial gain), it is still a gross violation of the presumption of innocence and effectively punishment on the basis of suspicion. As I've said before, suspicion is not enough; if the government wants to take people's passports away, they should have to go to court and get a judge to OK it.

While it is not presently part of the bill, the government also plans to move an amendment (after the select committee process, to prevent public scrutiny) removing the automatic right of citizenship by birth. Their "justification" for this is that a handful of people apparently come here specifically to give birth so that their children are New Zealand citizens (hence pregnancy tests for Tongans). Again, this is a matter of who we are as a country - and I don't think its worth undermining our fundamental values of inclusiveness for a tiny "problem" like this. If people want to come all that way so their kids can be part of our family, then let them.

If you feel strongly about any of this, then you can make a submission on the bill. Twenty copies, by Friday, 10th September, to:

Michele Charleton
Government Administration Committee Secretariat
Parliament Buildings
Wellington

(No postage required)

If you need help with a submission, there's an online guide here.

Follow up

A US Senator is following up on yesterday's news about the Oregon National Guard being ordered to return prisoners to their torturers. Apparently, he thinks that the US Army are in Iraq to prevent torture, not to assist it...

Let them in

Terry Dunleavy calls for Samoans to be granted visa-free entry to New Zealand. I agree. Samoa is as much a part of our family now as Australia, and we should recognise that.

Unfortunately, it seems that the Prime Minister disaggrees, citing concerns about overstayers. Needless to say, if we had visa-free entry, there wouldn't be any overstayers (by definition).

Responses

I contacted the Minister of Foreign Affairs' office for comment on whether the government's policy towards Iraq would be changing in response to that regime's use of torture, but was told that they have no comment to make as the Minister is out of the country. Instead, I was told to check MFAT's website. And right there at the top of their overview on human rights is this:

New Zealand is strongly committed to the protection and promotion of international human rights, as embodied in the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, and in the key human rights treaties.

We are living up to that statement over Timor; it's time we lived up to it in Iraq. Our active support and assistance of a regime which uses torture is grossly incompatible with our values and with ordinary human decency. The government should communicate its utter disgust to the Iraqi government, and we should withdraw our troops immediately. Otherwise our country's reputation - and its soul - will be tarnished for good.

Fuck Iraq, part II

Those appalled at my strong reaction to Iraq's reinstatement of the death penalty, and who think that we should continue to support the Iraqi regime, may want to consider this story about what goes on in the "new Iraq" (stolen from Daily Kos):

The national guardsman peering through the long-range scope of his rifle was startled by what he saw unfolding in the walled compound below.

From his post several stories above ground level, he watched as men in plainclothes beat blindfolded and bound prisoners in the enclosed grounds of the Iraqi Interior Ministry.

He immediately radioed for help. Soon after, a team of Oregon Army National Guard soldiers swept into the yard and found dozens of Iraqi detainees who said they had been beaten, starved and deprived of water for three days.

In a nearby building, the soldiers counted dozens more prisoners and what appeared to be torture devices -- metal rods, rubber hoses, electrical wires and bottles of chemicals. Many of the Iraqis, including one identified as a 14-year-old boy, had fresh welts and bruises across their back and legs.

The soldiers disarmed the Iraqi jailers, moved the prisoners into the shade, released their handcuffs and administered first aid. Lt. Col. Daniel Hendrickson of Albany, Ore., the highest ranking American at the scene, radioed for instructions.

But in a move that frustrated and infuriated the guardsmen, Hendrickson's superior officers told him to return the prisoners to their abusers and immediately withdraw. It was June 29 -- Iraq's first official day as a sovereign country since the U.S.-led invasion.

They may also want to look at what we are supporting:

There are more pictures here if you can stomach them.

The new boss is the same as the old boss; We are now supporting torturers and murderers. Is that what our country stands for now?

The worm turns

An Iraqi judge has issued arrest warrants for Ahmed and Salem Chalabi.

Former IGC member Ahmed Chalabi is wanted on "financial charges", including counterfeiting. I guess old habits die hard. His nephew, Salem Chalabi, is wanted for organising the murder of a political rival.

I guess the US should have been a little more careful about the pawns they picked...

Fuck Iraq

Iraq has restored the death penalty for murder, drug dealing, and "endangering national security".

Fuck them. A country which institutionalises murder is not worth risking a single New Zealander's life. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs should make our disgust absolutely clear, and also make it clear that once our soldiers have left in a month, there will be no further assistance unless there is significant progress on this front.

Coalitions and MMP

I watched Jeanette Fitzsimmons being interviewed on Agenda yesterday morning, and one thing I was struck by was how much of the conversation around relations with other parties was based on the idea of a formal coalition between the Greens and Labour. Frankly, I'm not sure that this is the MMP paradigm anymore. At the moment, we have a minority government supported by another party on confidence and supply, but without an automatic majority on legislation. Looking at the polls, either major party would need the support of at least three others to gain a majority, which means that the current situation is likely to continue and become more pronounced. Which is a good thing, because it means that legislation will require a far broader consensus to pass, and therefore be moderated somewhat. At the moment Labour can pick and choose, meaning they can effectively pass whatever they want (they just have to go to the right party). But if they need the agreement of multiple parties across a broad range of the political spectrum, the result is likely to be acceptable to far more of the electorate.

In this situation, minor parties don't just have to work with the larger parties, but also with each other. The result is likely to be loose agreements aimed at influencing the government's broad policy direction and gaining consultation rights in exchange for confidence and supply. The real power will come from the consultation process over legislation, and the ability to threaten a veto. While formal coalition is still possible, it has to be acceptable to other minor parties, who may be wary of one of their number gaining increased influence. At the same time, it will also be less meaningful - when other people have a veto on legislation, who has control of the policy development process matters a lot less. One thing that is certain is that a formal coalition agreement of the sort seen in 1996 simply will not be possible. Labour and the Greens could agree to work towards certain goals, but unless those goals are acceptable to the other minor parties, they won't make any real progress.

I'm not sure whether this will be a long-term trend or not. But it certainly looks like being the reality for the next Parliament, and both our parties and political reporters should adapt to it.

National Front Condemnation Two-Faced

According to the Dominion Post, the National Front have condemned the attack on Jewish graves at Makara. But at the same time, their leader is talking of a Jewish "conspiracy" on an internet hate forum.

News of the attack was posted to the "Stormfront" forum. One participant immediately speculated that it was a "hate hoax" and "of Jewish origin". The National Front's leader, Kyle Chapman, posting under the name of "NZTrooper", immediately replied:

Yep, they get the media from one attack, then they think "this works", so they do more themselves.

The National Front is being entirely two-faced on this matter, issuing a condemnation for public consumption while continuing to spread hate among its members.

Speaking out

In my post below on hate speech, I said that if the government doesn't like racial hatred, then they should speak out against it. And that's exactly what they're doing over the vandalism of Jewish graves at Makara cemetary. Chris Carter is seeking a formal Parliamentary condemnation of anti-Semitism, and Michael Cullen, Keith Locke and Peter Dunne have all denounced it.

By contrast, the National Front's Kyle Chapman seems to be implying that this is a "hate hoax", done by Jews to get sympathy and media attention. What a prick.

I feel another submission coming on...

Parliament's Government administration committee is holding an inquiry into whether we need further legislation against hate speech. I don't think we do. We already have laws against incitement, and strong laws against discrimination, and those are enough.

The same arguments expressed in my post on holocaust-denier David Irving apply here. Restricting hate-speech lends credibility to the haters, by allowing them to claim that we are afraid of them, and allowing them to cast themselves as the aggrieved and oppressed party. It deprives us of the ability to challenge and defeat their views, and instead allows them to fester in the shadows. The answer to undesirable speech is more speech, not less. Those who dislike speech or publications vilifying certain groups should speak out in their defence, not use the law to punish unwelcome opinions.

Restrictions are simply unjustifiable on liberal grounds. According to Mill's law,

the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection

An opinion has to cause actual, concrete harm in order to be suppressed. Simply making people feel bad does not meet this standard. Incitement to immediate violence can be banned, as can harassment, and hate speech is good evidence when proving discrimination. But villifying a group, saying that they are evil, ungodly, unnatural or conspiring to take over the world is not sufficient. It is offensive, but giving offence is not harm. It inspires hatred, but there is no right not to be hated.

A free and democratic society is one that does not tell its citizens what opinions they are allowed to hold. If the government is concerned about hate speech, then government ministers should speak out against it. But they should not ban people simply from expressing an opinion, no matter how vile and unjustified.

Censure

Haami Piripi has been censured by the Maori Language Commission, but it's not good enough for National who say that it is an insufficient punishment for a "blatant breach of the rules".

Unfortunately, as I've said earlier, the usual rules governing public servants don't apply to Mr Piripi (nor, as far as I can tell, did they apply to Don Brash when he was campaigning around the country for right-wing economic policiy while Governor of the Reserve Bank). He works for a Crown Entity, not a core government department, and therefore is not bound to public service neutrality.

Those rules are currently in the process of being changed to allow the State Services Commisioner to lay down codes of conduct governing Crown Entities, but they haven't been changed yet. Under the circumstances, without a clear policy forbidding Mr Piripi's actions, a censure is probably the best that can be done without inviting an immediate personal grievance suit.

But hey, why should Gerry Brownlee let the facts get in the way of things?

Smears and retractions

The Amokura Panoho saga just gets worse. The government's initial response to the storm was to resort to smear tactics, with Trevor Mallard alleging that Panoho misused Labour Departmnent equipment and tried to recruit staff. He was forced to swiftly retract. And now this morning, John Tamihere has likewise retracted his claim that Ms Panoho campaigned for the party on government time, after the Secretary of Labour went on the record as saying that he accepted Ms Panoho's word that that was not the case.

Unfortunately, despite the government's retraction of its attempted smears, Ms Panoho is still out of a job, and apparently considering legal action.

I'm not sure if she'd be able to make a case for constructive dismissal, and because she resigned there's little chance of her getting her job back, but she has a strong moral case. The government has acted like the mafia, using public service neutrality as the instrument of a vendetta to intimidate and punish those who "betray" it. That stinks.

Public servants should not be treated like this. The flip side of public service neutrality is that the government is supposed to do its utmost to protect public servants from politically inspired claims. And yet here it is government ministers that are making them.

The Secretary of Labour is right - Ms Panoho has acted honourably throught this whole affair. Sadly, the same cannot be said of the government.

Update: Those coming from Hard News may want to check out my two previous posts on this issue: Tony Soprano would be proud and political neutrality.

"A safe, humane and professional detention operation"

That's how the US describes its Carribean gulag at Guantanamo Bay. The Red Cross, however, begs to differ:

Repeated abuses allegedly suffered by three British prisoners at the hands of US interrogators and guards in the Guantánamo Bay detention camp in Cuba could amount to war crimes, the Red Cross said yesterday.

The organisation, which maintains a rigidly neutral stance in public, took the unusual step of voicing its concerns in uncompromising language after the former detainees, known as the Tipton Three, revealed that they had been beaten, shackled, photographed naked and in one incident questioned at gunpoint while in US custody.

Once upon a time they were the people who criticised other nations over human rights; now they've sunk to the torturer's level. It's a far bigger victory for terrorism than destroying any number of skycrapers - and the Americans have done it to themselves.

Another victory for gay marriage

In Washington state:

A Washington state court Wednesday ruled today same-sex couples must be allowed to marry.

King County Superior Court Judge William Downing said that the state Constitution guarantees basic rights to lesbian and gay people -- and that those rights are violated by a state law prohibiting same-sex couples from marrying

It will go all the way to the state Supreme Court, but this is an important first step.

New Fisk

Saddam’s cameraman is still haunted by images of war

Interesting reading

Dr Paul Dalziel: The Treaty of Waitangi and Dr Don Brash

Fighting all the way

Flag-burner Paul Hopkinson and friends have plead "not guilty" to disorderly behaviour charges stemming from their latest flag-burning exercise.

Good. The charges stem purely from flag-burning, something the High Court has already found to be protected under the Bill of Rights Act 1990. Laying a different charge is simply an effort by the police to get around the court's judgement. Hopkinson should fight this all the way.

Political Neutrality

There's been more shit flying around this morning over the resignation of Amokura Panoho, with more people noticing the apparent double standard. There's a long list of MPS - Pita Paraone, Parekura Horomia, Mita Ririnui, Mahara Okeroa - who have stood for election and held their jobs throughout. Presumably they just didn't walk into the candidacy on nomination day, and played some role in party organisation beforehand. Likewise, Ms Panoho stood for election in 1999 as a candidate for Mauri Pacific (Tau Henare's doomed party) and it was not a problem (though again, she had to take leave during the campaign). So what makes this case different?

The simple answer is a complaint. And that's where the whole thing really starts to smell, because that complaint has clear elements of both self-interest and revenge. The complaint was laid by proxies for John Tamihere, who coincidently represents the same electorate that Ms Panoho was active in, and who is looking to be facing a brutal battle with the party she is supporting for control of the seat. Then there's the revenge factor - it is clear that some in Labour are annoyed at the formation of the Maori Party, and are pulling out all the stops in an effort to crush it. This apparantly extends to attempting to ruin the careers of public servants.

The rule for public servants is that they must be politically neutral - but this isn't just a matter of fact, but of perception. And therefore its clear that complaints make a difference. Parekura Horomia was higher up the ladder than Ms Panoho, yet his activity in the Labour Party was not a problem because nobody complained.

The problem is that Labour aren't the only people who can play this game. Supporters of the Maori Party are no doubt making a list and checking it twice before making their own complaints - and standing ready to contact the media if any are dismissed, because there's no better story than a double standard. And the result of this will be to make the lives of public servants utter hell.

Despite the requirement for political neutrality, public servants also have a right to political participation. How this interacts with the job is very much a matter for judgement, and is resolved through discussion with management and ultimately in the conscience of individual public servants. Ms Panoho displayed enormous professionalism when she chose to resign rather than fight an obvious political beat-up; she put the interests of the public service before her own. Other public servants make even greater sacrifices (the new State Services Commisioner, Mark Prebble, has reportedly sacrificed his relationship with his own brother (former ACT leader Richard Prebble) in the pursuit of perceived neutrality). We should not be rewarding them by turning the public service into a political battleground.

Michael King

I'd never read a Michael King book before although I'd seen the interview he did with Kim Hill shortly before he died and thought he was pretty switched on. Despite this I'd never had the inclination to read much NZ history but I got given the Penguin History of New Zealand for my birthday a couple of months back and I'd slowly been working my way through it. Finally after some determined reading in the wee small hours over the weekend I knocked the bastard off. Its only now that I fully understand the tragedy of Michael King's death.

Up until now my knowledge of New Zealand history has had more holes in it than a National Party press release. I got a few bits and pieces in 5th form history and occasionally I'd bump into it if it happened to coincide with some other interest. But otherwise our history was just filled with boring stories about stuffy old dead white guys (the brown guys not getting much of a look in). I had some vague ideas about the crown having shafted Maori way back in the distant past, and even did alright on David Slack's treaty quiz, but important events like the Maori Land Wars in the 1860s slipped under the radar. I suspect its the same for most other people my age especially if you happened to go the one of the most lilly white schools in conservative Christchurch like I did.

And then I read Michael King... suddenly our history became interesting and readable and I want to read more. Its not that Michael King has turned me into a history geek... I've got past dismissing history as "1066 and all that" and I've always been happy to read dusty old tomes about other country's history especially if the country had a decent history of violence to attract my interest. Its more that he answered the "so what?" question that kept other books on the shelf and linked dead white (and brown) guys to the reality of 21st century NZ. I suspect I'm not the only person to have this reaction to Michael King.

No other NZ historian has done this and that is the tragedy of his death.

Bad habits

What are the consequences of signing up for the "coalition of the willing" and sending troops to Iraq? First, your soldiers die. Second, your citizens get taken hostage. And third, your intelligence officers learn bad habits from the Americans:

Denmark's defence minister has recalled several senior commanders of its battalion in Iraq, as an investigation into alleged prisoner abuse widens.

Soeren Gade said there were doubts about the officers' judgement, stemming from claims of mistreatment made against an intelligence officer.

[...]

A statement by the military command on Monday said the officer, who has not been named, could face charges of torture.

Reports say he is accused of refusing to let prisoners have water and forcing them to stay in stressful positions.

What's interesting is that the difference this reveals between the Danes and the Americans. The Danish officer is accused of using techniques that the Americans don't bat an eyelid at - "stress positions" are an acceptable interrogation technique as far as they're concerned, as is using starvation or thirst (or denial of pain killers, for that matter). But the Danish response is to threaten to throw the book at him and charge him with torture. Compare this with the American response, where soldiers accused of far more serious behaviour face only minor charges (assault, dereliction of duty), and their Military Intelligence accomplices avoid prosecution altogether...

Drugs and female circumcision

Simon Pound does his nut about the British government's plans to "vaccinate" children against drug addiction, comparing it to female circumcision:

Clitorises make woman unruly and lustful. Cocaine makes the proles unruly and troublesome. Can't have that. Lets chop off their pleasure sectors to make them pliant. Sure it denies the pleasure their bodies were built for, but this is for their own good.

That's a disturbingly apt comparison. My own thoughts on the issue are here.

Doing my bit

I've just sent away my submission on the Civil Union and Relationships (Statutory Recognition) bills. Those of you who were thinking about it but haven't got round to it yet still have until Friday...

Tony Soprano would be proud

So what's the difference between Maori Language Commission CEO Haami Piripi and the Labour Department executive forced to resign because she was a member of the Maori Party? Simply that, unlike Mr Piripi, Ms Panoho was a member of the core public service, and therefore subject to the Public Service Code of Conduct.

Public servants are required to be politically neutral, and to be able to enact both the policy of the government of the day and the policies of future governments. However, this does not necessarily preclude membership of political parties. It does however require avoiding the appearance of a conflict of interest.

What gives this whole thing a foul odour is the political context. Ms Panoho's resignation was apparently sparked by a compalint about her behind-the-scenes involvement in the Maori Party's Tamaki Makaurau branch - a complaint made by staff of MP John Tamihere, who is coincidentally the current MP for that electorate. So we have a sitting MP and Minister using the Public Service Code of Conduct in an effort to nobble his electoral competition. No matter which way you look at it, that's fairly ripe.

But there's also a vindictive aspect. Labour's attitude to the Maori Party has been characterised by vindicitiveness and outrage that Maori might be unhappy with Labour's treatment of them. The complaint against Ms Panoho is putting supporters of the Maori Party on notice that their change of allegiance will cost them dearly. Tony Soprano would be proud.

Public servants are permitted to belong to political parties. Frequently they are permitted to be involved "behind the scenes" in strategy and organisation. The limit is generally being publicly identified with a party, or stepping forward into the limelight as a spokesperson or candidate (though even that usually results in a mere leave of absence during the election, rather than a forced resignation). Labour's vindicitve actions invite retaliation - they aren't the only people who can lay complaints - and the result is going to be more resignations, either forced by previously tolerated political activity, or in disgust at perceived double standards. Overall, it is our public service which will be the loser.

Faith in the market

Obviously our shipping companies have no faith in the free market.

That's the only interpretation one can make of their claim that up to 30,000 passengers won't be able to get across Cook Strait at Christmastime.

Normally, we're supposed to believe in the ability of the market to provide and fill market niches - to the extent that our Commerce Act doesn't even require real competition, but simply the possibility that someone could theoretically enter the market. Yet here, we're expected to believe that there will be 30,000 people - a third of the Interislander's Christmas volume - willing to stump up for an overpriced fare to get to Wellington, and that noone will try and part them from their money.

Yeah, right.

If the District Council lowers the speed limit, then it simply provides someone else with the opportunity to take up the slack. I'd have thought that the Inter-Islander's competitors would welcome that opportunity, not decry it.

Caught in the act of crying wolf

Those suspicious of the uncanny timing of Al Qaeda activity - terror alerts seem to occur whenever Bush is down in the polls - may be interested to know that major US newspapers are reporting that the latest hysterical alert is based on data from before 9/11:

Most of the al Qaeda surveillance of five financial institutions that led to a new terrorism alert Sunday was conducted before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and authorities are not sure whether the casing of the buildings has continued, numerous intelligence and law enforcement officials said yesterday.

More than half a dozen government officials interviewed yesterday, who declined to be identified because classified information is involved, said that most, if not all, of the information about the buildings seized by authorities in a raid in Pakistan last week was about three years old, and possibly older.

"There is nothing right now that we're hearing that is new," said one senior law enforcement official who was briefed on the alert. "Why did we go to this level? . . . I still don't know that."

[Emphasis added]

It looks like the Bush administration has finally been caught in the act of crying wolf - and that the intelligence and law enforcement communities have finally gotten sick of their attempts to boost the President's polling by sowing fear.

Demonstrating hate

The National Front have set the date for their demonstration in Wellington: October 23rd. They'll be demonstrating specifically against "the Assian Invasion campaign" [sic]. Anybody down there want to organise a counter-demonstration?

Structures

What's the best way to describe the present political economy of New Zealand?

In broad terms, I think the answer is "a social democratic superstructure on neo-liberal foundations". Up until 1984, we were a broadly social democratic nation, commited to full employment and a welfare state. That changed with the election of the Fourth Labour Government in 1984. The "reforms" implemented by that government and its successor form the foundations of our modern economy: an open, deregulated and globalised market; macroeconomic policies aimed at price stability rather than full employment; and a reduced role for government in the economy.

Despite being elected to provide a change of direction, the Fifth Labour Government (meaning both the Labour-Alliance coalition of 1999 and the minority government we've had since 2002) has largely left these foundations intact. It has tinkered - some additional regulations here, a reversal of an ideological nationlisation there - but it has not made any significant changes. It has remained commited to an open economy, pursued a free trade agenda, and continued to pursue price stability (though it has tweaked the Reserve Bank's Policy Targets Agreement a little). Perhaps the biggest changes have been to the role of government, with the revival of industrial policy through the Ministry of Economic Development, the (opportunistic) acquisition of Air New Zealand and the railway track, and the establishment of KiwiBank. But while the present government wants to play a larger role in the economy, it is still fundamentally commited to market provision and the SOE model.

Rather than attacking the foundations, Labour's policies have focused on ameliorating the worst effects of the neo-liberal economy. What people absolutely hated about the "reforms" was that they shafted the poor for the benefit of the rich. Tax reform (most notably the introduction of GST) benefited the wealthy while shifting the burden of taxation onto the less well-off; the pursuit of disinflation caused mass unemployment; the Employment Contracts Act drove wages down, while cuts to welfare benefits forced beneficiaries to increasingly rely on foodbanks. As Brian Easton put it, equity was largely abandoned as a goal of public policy.

With Labour, it is clear that equity is a consideration again. One of their first acts in power was to hike the top tax-rate to increase revenue and redistribution. Another was to raise the minimum wage - and not just once, but repeatedly, by $2/hour over the course of their term. The gradual reuniversalisation of primary health care through PHOs and the redistribution of the "working for families" package are further examples of this - Labour is trying to ease the inequality and suffering caused by the market.

The other significant change in this area has been the repeal of the Employment Contracts Act - except that "repeal" is really the wrong word. The replacement Employment Relations Act retains the underlying liberal paradigm of individual-centred bargaining and relationships governed by contract law; it simply crufts greater support for unions and collective contracts onto the top of it. It is in a sense Labour's economic policies in a microcosm: retain the foundations while trying to mitigate the worst effects.

Is this limiting of social democracy to the economic superstructure a betrayal of Labour's principles? I don't think so. According to Steve Maharey, the goals haven't changed at all:

Our goal is still the egalitarian project that has motivated all social democratic parties: the full development of every individual however disadvantaged they are by birth or circumstances

Instead what has changed is how those goals are achieved: Labour is now far more willing to work with the market. This is really what they've done all along - the First Labour Government made a similar compromise by eschewing state ownership of the means of production in favour of working within (and mitigating the worst effects of) the existing economic structure. Partly that was a matter of pragmatic electoral politics (they would never have been elected otherwise), but there's also an acknowledgement that we don't necessarily need to rebuild the foundations to create a just society. Michael Joseph Savage and his successors built a just society on top of the market in the 30's and 40's. If they get another term, Clark, Cullen and Maharey may manage to rebuild it for the 21st century.

Reminder

Submissions on the Civil Unions and "Omnibus" bills are due on friday.

Biodiesel

A British company wants to set up a plant in Northland to make Biodiesel. For those unfamiliar with the technology, biodiesel is renewable fuel made from any animal or vegetable oil or fat - in this case, from waste animal fat. While it runs normally in any diesel engine, it's normally mixed with ordinary diesel to make a blended fuel.

Mixing biodiesel into fuel in New Zealand would be a good thing from a sustainability point of view, and it would help meet our obligations under the Kyoto Protocol. Unfortunately its more expensive than petrodiesel, and so it just isn't going to happen economically. Which is why the British are wanting either a market guaranteed by regulation, or a big fat subsidy to set up.

We have another option though: carbon credits. Biodiesel is carbon neutral (all the carbon in it originally came out of the atmosphere), and using it would meet the same aims as the renewable energy projects the government currently subsidises this way.

Of course, carbon credits might not be enough to make the project financially viable - in which case we can afford to wait a few more years. Other companies (notably meridian Energy) have also studied biodiesel production in New Zealand, and may come up with a better and more economically viable plan.

More American Hypocrisy

At the moment, the US is making a lot of noise about blocking the production and spread of fissile materials used to make nuclear bombs. So you'd think that they'd be in favour of including a tight verification and inspection regime in a treaty designed to outlaw production of weapons-grade uranium, right?

Wrong.

Inspections, while fine for lesser nations like Iraq, Iran and North Korea, would "compromise key signatories' [i.e. the US's] core national security interests", and should therefore be removed from the treaty. Americans wandering around other countries' nuclear facilities is fine, but the thought of other people doing the same to the US is unthinkable.

And then they have the gall to complain that international arms control treaties are ineffective...

Civil service ethics

When a "top civil servant" makes outrageous comments in a submission to a select committee which are not only embarassing to the government of the day, but also call into question their political neutrality, you expect them to resign or be sacked, right? That's what the ideal of a "neutral civil service" means, right?

Wrong. Or rather, right if that civil servant is a member of what is termed the "core public service" (government departments, offices of Parliament, the Police and SIS), and very possibly wrong if they are employed by a Crown Entity.

What's a Crown Entity? It's what used to be called a "quango" - a quasi-government organisation, set up for a specific purpose, often under its own enabling legislation. There's a wide range of these things, set up for a wide variety of purposes. They cover everything from the LTSA and ACC to the Human Rights Commission, your local hospital and school.

Some of these organisations are more "government" than others, and so not all of them should be covered by the Public Service Code of Conduct. While it seems fair to have employees of the LTSA bound by it, depriving your local school board of the right to criticise government policy would be just a little harsh.

What about the Maori Language Commission? It was established under the Maori Language Act 1987, to promote Te Reo Maori and provide the odd bit of policy advice. That's more towards the government end of the spectrum. The problem is that the Act is absolutely explicit: no member of the Commission or employee "shall be deemed to be employed in the service of Her Majesty for the purposes of the State Sector Act 1988" (Schedule 2, s. 8.). What this means is that they're not public servants, no way, no how. As an employee, Haami Piripi is (legally), completely in the clear.

All the Minister can do is express their displeasure to the Commissioners (Mr Piripi's employers) - who can tell him to go swivel if they want to (that's really why there is a board structure: to insulate employees from everyday interference from the Minister). The Minister can then start sacking them for "misconduct", but fired Commissioners continue to serve until their successor is appointed, and the appointment process is not something you can do in an afternoon. More importantly, if the government starts doing that, it will inextricably link membership of the Commission (or any other Crown Entity) to supporting the government on the foreshore & seabed issue, meaning that they may find themselves with a sudden shortage of Commissioners and applicants.

All around, it's a no-win situation for the government. Crack down and risk further alienating Maori. Fail to do so and face cries of "special treatment" from the Opposition. All they can do is hope that the matter resolves itself within the Commission - that Piripi either resigns or is fired by the Commissioners. Otherwise, they're stuck on the foreshore without a paddle.

New Fisk

’Can’t Blair see that this country is about to explode? Can’t Bush?’

WTO: More of the same

The media are trumpeting the WTO having reached an agreement to revive the trade talks stalled at Cancun, but it's just more of the same. The wealthy countries - the US, EU, and Japan - have agreed to eliminate farm subsidies "at a date to be set". In exchange, the poor countries - who have generally already lowered their barriers to imports - have agreed to a further opening of their markets. Everyone is hailing this as a triumph, but it's just the same old deal we've seen countless times before. And every other time, the rich countries have reneged on their end of it - and then, to add insult to injury, come back next time demanding further concessions to do what they'd already agreed to do in the first place.

The elimination of agricultural tariffs and farm subsidies would be of enormous benefit to developing nations, being worth far more than all the money given in direct aid payments. But I'll believe it when I see it.

Greens damn dams

There was a minor kerfuffle last week in response to the release of the Ministry of Economic Development's report Identification of Potential Hydroelectric Resources. The Greens claimed that his meant that a dam was "coming to a river near you", but I have to agree with the government in thinking that they're jumping at shadows.

An earlier report on Power generation Options for New Zealand noted that:

New Zealand has at least 1000MW - and possibly 2000MW - of additional hydropower capacity, which may be economic and has limited environmental impact. The most recent studies were done 15-20 years ago. To determine the order in which schemes should proceed - and those that should be ruled out - a comprehensive study of hydro resources is needed. This study would review existing reports and, where necessary, revise them in the light of the latest information, and using modern technology in civil works and mechanical and electrical generating plant. It also needs to carry out more detailed studies of schemes that have been proposed but not investigated in sufficient detail to provide reliable cost estimates.

The report released last week appears to be the first stage in this process - a review of existing reports. As such, Fish and Game's criticism that it "uses very old information" and "reads likes a once over lightly review of hydro potential where they have cobbled together some old material" is perfectly accurate. It's a list of ideas that people have had over the years, not a serious plan for energy development.

Some of those ideas are simply crazy - Project Aqua, for example - and others have been overtaken by events (the Ruapehu diversion schemes would likely fall foul of the same court judgement that limited the Tongariro schemes water rights). Others are saner. But their mere inclusion in the report doesn't indicate that they're going to happen. As the government says, the report simply identifies potential - and in a broad sense at that, judging that "where there is flow and 'head' there is an opportunity". While it identifies some sites in National Parks and the Conservation Estate or which are subject to water conservation orders, these are generally listed as "prohibited", meaning that they're almost certainly not going to happen without legislative change. The notable exception to this is the Dobson scheme; either the report's authors are betting on a change of government, or they've simply uncritically bought Trustpower's bullshit that there is no problem whatsoever with wantonly destroying part of the Conservation Estate for commercial gain.

In any case, the fact there is potential, or that a project is technologically feasible does not mean that it will be pursued - the fact that so many of these plans have sat on the shelf for twenty years or more shows that. The Greens are very definitely overreacting. But worse, they're adopting a fundamentalist anti-development position that runs counter to their core principles. A green energy policy must be centred around environmental sustainability; energy conservation is a key part of this, but it also requires shifting to an environmentally sustainable mix of generation technologies. Hydro is a key part of this mix. So is wind, but while it has enormous potential, it won't get us the whole way. If we want to get a green mix of energy technologies and substantially reduce burning fossil fuels for electricity, we need to build more dams.

This does not mean that we should pursue hydro without thought. Canal diversion schemes which run a river dry are destructive. Schemes which do not include storage capacity are missing the point. And we absolutely should not be pursuing ecologically damaging development in our National Parks or other areas of our Conservation Estate. Outside of those redlines, there's a wide range of hydro projects which should be possible. If we really want to be "clean and green", we should be pursuing and promoting those options, not rejecting them outright.

New Fisk

Protection, not oppression: How the new mobile police patrols have discovered job satisfaction

Irving denied entry

On the basis of his prior deportation from Canada (which was for hate speech). I think this is both wrong and stupid. You don't defeat lies by hiding from them and pretending they don't exist.

New Fisk

Iraqi recruits bombed as 100 die in day of bloodshed
Unreported war: US document reveals scale of conflict

New Fisk

Baghdad is a city that reeks with the stench of the dead

The "New Iraq"

The American invasion of Iraq was supposed to transform it from an oppressive dictatorship into a free and democratic society. Which is obviously why the Iraqi government is engaging in aggressive censorship of the media, including banning "unwarranted criticism" of the Prime Minister.

Who decides what constitutes "unwarranted criticism"? Why, the Prime Minister's flunkies, of course.

The "New Iraq" seems to be quickly turning into just another Arab despotism. Was this really worth 13,000 dead civilians?

David Slack responds to his critics...

Strategies

A discussion on Just Left on "what's the left for?" seems to be turning into a debate about political strategies for keeping a government on the right (or rather, left) tack, and whether "wing parties" (like the Alliance, and the Greens to some extent) are useful or not. IMHO wing parties are great for applying leftward pressure on a government, but the important thing is getting a left-wing grouping over the 50% mark in the first place. Doing this requires either cutting a deal with one of the floating parties, or gobbling (or rather shifting) the center. In 1999 the center shifted (though arguably it was in the same place its been since 1993; people just figured out where Winston Peters really stood). In 2002 it was looking like that shift would stay, until Helen opened her mouth and started talking about an absolute majority - when it shifted again to United Future. After the policy blitzkreigs of Rogernomics and Ruthaniasia, we just don't have much of a tolerance for majority government anymore.

National's series of policy speeches are an attempt to define and thereby shift the center ground. It's doing this by picking negative topics - crime, welfare, the Treaty - and trying to force the government into defending a position that some people (let's call them "rednecks") will disagree violently with. Labour's response has been to pull their head in and hide, and try not to present a target. This is a losing strategy.

What Labour should be doing is defining that center ground for itself. Don Brash wants to talk about spending half a billion dollars a year on prisons? Fuck that! We should be spending half a billion dollars a year extra on health. There's a powerful narrative about National running down public services last time they were in government, using the "razor gang" and the "sinking lid" to cut services like health to the point where they were barely viable (the plan then being to say "it doesn't work" and privatise it). A similar story can be told about infrastructure. National has indicated that it wants to return to those policies in an effort to further shrink government expenditure as a proportion of GDP (and further lower taxes on the rich). This will mean further damage and cutbacks to our public services. Despite the rhetoric of the right, you can't get more for less.

Public services are widely seen as being a central part of what this country is all about. Significant majorities support higher taxation for better health and education. So why the hell isn't Labour enunciating this core part of the "New Zealand dream", and presenting people with a clear choice on the matter?

Good on her

An Israeli newspaper is reporting that Helen Clark insisted that the Israeli spies be prosecuted and refused to allow the affair to be "swept under the table". If so, good on her. These people broke the law, and therefore they ought to have been prosecuted, just like any other criminals.

While international power politics sometimes intervenes to force us to deviate from that ideal (just think of the French in 1986), it didn't this time. Israel had no leverage over us, and so we could for once afford to do the proper thing.

Things I want to write about

• "Has Labour reduced inequality?" - an analysis of data on income distribution to see whether early policy decisions (raising the top tax rate, increasing the minimum wage) have had the desired effect.
• An analysis of the New Zealand Institute's paper "The Wealth of a Nation". Home ownership is part of the "Kiwi dream", and information on whether that dream is becoming less achievable is both interesting and relevant. Unfortunately, I have a certain amount of suspicion about this think-tank. Is it just co-incidence that a group backed by banks and finance houses expesses concerns about our investing too much in houses and not enough in shares or retirement packages?
• Some of the interesting issues raised by reading Brian Easton's The Whimpering of the State.

Unfortunately, I actually have to write about "the present political economy of New Zealand", by friday. So I won't be doing any of the above (or at least not this week). Fortunately, it's a relatively interesting topic, and one that I can almost certainly adapt to blog-posts (yeah, yeah, I know, I've said that before...)

Procrastination blogging will continue - I need something to do while I drink my morning coffee - but I'm unlikely to be posting anything big for the rest of the week.

New Fisk

Terror by video: How Iraq’s kidnappers drew their inspiration from horrors of Chechnya

Repeal?

In keeping with their position as being the strongest promoter of a tolerant, secular and liberal society, the Greens are calling for the anti-flag-burning law to be repealed.

Realistically it's a non-issue. After that judgement, I can't imagine the police ever bothering to bring charges ever again.

Vaccinating virtue

The British government is thinking of vaccinating children against drug addiction. Except that when you read it, it's not addiction per se they're vaccinating against, but the ability to have fun with drugs. And their list of drugs to vaccinate against includes at least one which is currently perfectly legal: nicotine.

This is something I'm deeply uncomfortable with. Not because I think addiction is a Good Thing, but because this way of dealing with it simply too gross an invasion of personal autonomy - it's literally denying the ability to choose, by artificial means.

Now, any conception of autonomy has to allow for future choices to be limited; such limitation can itself be a deep expression of who you are. But in order to be autonomous, those limitations have to be voluntary, your choice, not the government's. It's OK for individuals to choose to limit their future ability to get high (as part of a rehab program, or a better way of giving up smoking), but it's not OK for the government to permanantly and irreversibly take that choice away from people.

Flag-burning, and legislative interpretation

Over at NZPundit, Ackbar lambasts the High Court for continuing "that dangerous trend of using the NZ Bill of Rights Act 1990 to essentially strike down other legislation". All I can say is that section 6 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 - the one that requires that, whereever possible, other legislation be interpreted so as to be consistent with the rights and freedoms guaranteed by that Act - wasn't made up by judges, or put there for no reason. Parliament wanted other laws to be subjected to such review and interpretation, while at the same time explicitly denying the courts the power to invalidate laws. The result is a balance between Parliamentary sovereignty and judicial interpretation; the courts have a lot of power to gut an act by "reading down" its provisions ("a time-honoured technique of construction for upholding individual rights or freedoms"), but Parliament has the final say.

If Parliament doesn't like the decision, it should legislate to clarify its intent with regard to flag-burning. If it means to override freedom of expression, then it can bloody well go on the record and say so.

Ending coverups

The British government has shown how much faith it has in its army's internal system for prosecuting human rights abuses by soldiers by stripping commanders in Iraq of their ability to veto investigations:

The move follows the refusal of a commanding officer to let Army prosecutors charge a soldier for the alleged killing of an Iraqi called Hassan Abbad Said. Ministers were forced to ask the Crown Prosecution Service and Metropolitan Police to take over the investigation.

It seems the art of the cover-up was alive and well among British forces in Iraq.

I would have thought that refusal to allow prosecution was tantamount to approval and invited the commander's prosecution under the principle of command responsibility.

Dirty pool

Yet more evidence that the government has been playing dirty pool over the Zaoui case. Papers released under the Official Information Act show that Foreign Affairs secretly orchestrated a campaign to generate international criticism of the Refugee Status Appeals Authority's support for Ahmed Zaoui, with the primary aim of providing the government with PR-cover. This sort of interference - the deliberate soliciting of adverse comments on an ongoing court case - is unprecedented in New Zealand. We have a strong convention that the government does not comment on cases before the courts, for fear of being seen to influence the judiciary; here it has deliberately attempted to do an end-run around that tradition by stealth.

If this country can be said to have a core value, it's "fairness". Here Labour has shown its contempt for that value in spades.

Exits

Running Blog Capitalist is giving up the blog, NZPundit is on holiday, and KiwiPundit is taking a break. I imagine DPF is going to be feeling quite lonely for the next few weeks...

Yet another nail in the coffin of right-wing dogma

Last week I mentioned that New Zealand had placed third on the Economic Freedom of the World Index. An important part of this index - and an important part of the right-wing definition of "economic freedom" - is "small government". The idea is that states where government expenditure as a percentage of GDP is low are free-er (in an economic sense) than states where it is high. Unfortunately, it's not true.

I particularly like the way the right-wing idealogues have been hoist by their own petard here. It's their index, they're the ones handing out the scores, and yet it says the exact opposite of what they want it to say: larger government (on average) equals greater economic freedom.

Needless to say, this rather undermines the National/ACT/BRT dogma of reducing government expenditure as a percentage of GDP. If the goal is to increase economic freedom (rather than simply redistribute income from the poor to the rich via tax cuts), then reapplying the "sinking lid" and starving government services isn't the way to do it.

Inconvenient, inadvertant retention

Having tried to prevent further investigation of Bush's desertion from the Texas Air National Guard in 1972 by claiming that his pay records had been conveniently but "inadvertantly" destroyed, the Pentagon has now managed to "find" a copy. I guess they were inconveniently and inadvertantly retained. Unfortunately, they don't show any record of Bush being paid during the period in question - and there's no record of his ever complaining about his missing paychecks. One explanation for this is that, being rich, Dubya just didn't notice or care. Another is that he wasn't paid (and didn't complain) because he didn't show up. Which do you think is more likely?

A victory for freedom

The High Court has thrown out schoolteacher Paul Hopkinson's conviction for "dishonouring the New Zeland flag", finding that flag-burning is protected by the freedom of expression clause in the Bill of Rights Act. It was a lot of trouble to go to over a $600 fine, but it was worth it; we now have a clear and unequivocal precedent recognising and guarding freedom of expression in the strongest sense.

The law hasn't been overturned (we don't do that in New Zealand), but it has been effectively gutted, its language redefined upwards into oblivion. Those who disagree with the decision will no doubt cry "judicial activism", but it was more or less demanded by the Bill of Rights Act, which says that the only limits on the freedoms it recognises are those that can be "demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society" and requires that, whereever possible, all other legislation be interpreted in a manner consistent with that Act.

I've been following this story since the beginning, and I'm pleased to see it end in a victory for freedom. Suck that, Stephen Franks!

Thoughts on Farenheit 911

Two obvious comments. Firstly, it doesn't pretend to be "balanced journalism" of any kind. It's a very one-sided movie, showing the side of things which has been mostly ignored by the US media for the past three years. And secondly, it's made very much for Americans, hence the pandering to lowbrow sterotypes about "funny little countries" like Palau, Costa Rica and the Netherlands.

Much of the material won't be new to media-junkies and blog-weenies, but we're not really who the movie is aimed at. As I said, it's aimed at ordinary Americans, not educated liberals who supplement their newsfeed with material from the BBC and the Independent. And to those people, it is new, a whole side of things they haven't seen before.

Some of it is also very unsettling. I did not expect to see a decapitation, closeups of exposed bones quivering in a child's ruined arm, or dead babies being thrown in the back of a truck after a US bombing raid. Neither did I expect to see US soldiers being blown up live on camera, or to hear the wounded screaming as they were carted away. These sorts of things are usually sanitised from our media experience, and I think that we lose sight of what war actually involves as a result. Hopefully Moore's movie will remind Americans of the consequences of their actions, and make them consider more carefully what they're really voting for.

Don't eat KFC

Just don't (warning: contains graphic descriptions of cruelty to animals).

Brash and foreign policy

Former Human Rights Commissioner Chris Lawrence has an article in the Herald in which he draws attention to Don Brash's disturbing views on foreign policy. Since 1945, New Zealand has been a consistent supporter and advocate of multilateral institutions and international law. An important part of this position has been support for international legal instruments governing human rights.

Brash has already indicated that he believes his poll-driven domestic political concerns trump this long-term policy when he said that he would be willing to opt out of UN conventions in order to make prisoners do hard labour. Now, he has pretty much repudiated the entire vision:

Mana magazine has featured an interview with Dr Brash. One subject was, unsurprisingly, the proposed foreshore and seabed legislation. The interviewer noted it had been suggested by some that the Government's proposal breached United Nations human right conventions.

"Does that concern you?" Dr Brash was asked.

"No, it doesn't," he replied. "I have a very low regard for some of the United Nations conventions in this area. I think they are driven by people with a particular political agenda, frequently from countries which have pretty lousy laws and provisions in their own countries for indigenous peoples."

Brash is, I suspect, simply mouthing off. His comments on forced labour showed total ignorance of our international legal obligations, and those above indicate a certain amount of confusion about history (UN human rights conventions have generally been driven by rich, western nations with decent human rights records). Despite this, the media should be following this up. Here we have the leader of a major political party threatening to overturn sixty years of foreign policy and a number of major international commitments. He should be being asked to explain and justify that position. In particular, he should be asked which UN conventions he wishes to withdraw from, and why, and how this will affect our mana and credibility on the international stage. And if he clams up, then he should be called on it. As a small nation which makes its way through trade, foreign policy is vitally important; if Brash doesn't understand this, or regards it as a political football to be manipulated for short-term political gain, then the public needs to know.

Back from the grave

The Sock Thief has returned from the dead, as has MediaCow.

Military intervention in Darfur?

I've been vaguely following the atrocities in Darfur for the past few months, watching the reports of ethnic cleansing, deliberate starvation and mass rapes trickle in, but haven't blogged about it, in part out of a sense of total helplessness. None of the major powers really gives a shit about what goes on in Africa (too much trouble for too little oil), and so the best that could be done was for the UN to nicely ask the Sudanese government to rein in its puppet militia and end the killing. Which, given the nature of the Sudanese government, is about as effective as pissing in the wind. Given the aforementioned disinterest by the international community, the usual means of arm-twisting a poorly behaving regime into line - trade sanctions - were simply not on the agenda, and so there was nothing that could really be done.

Fortunately, I was wrong about that. In the past month both the US and the EU have taken an interest, and Colin Powell has personally visited the area and applied pressure to the Sudanese government. The African Union has got involved, sending a small monitoring group and protection force. And today, the Guardian reports that Tony Blair has asked his advisors to draw up plans for military intervention.

Would such intervention be justified? Looking at the plans, the first two options - transporting aid and providing equipment and support to the African union force - are certainly justifiable. The third option - using military force to create safe zones and protect refugees - would require the consent and co-operation of the Sudanese government to be effective. But if there is consent from the relevant authorities, then there isn't really an issue - it's the question of what happens if that consent is not given which poses a moral quandary.

Earlier in the year, Human Rights Watch produced a report on the humanitarian argument for the war in Iraq, in which they concluded that said war was not justifiable on humanitarian grounds. The same ethical framework can be applied to Darfur. According to HRW, military intervention

...can be justified only in the face of ongoing or imminent genocide, or comparable mass slaughter or loss of life

This is a high threshold because of the inherently messy and uncertain nature of war, and its ability to completely disrupt society and make things far worse. And it may be questionable whether the Darfur crisis reaches it - while the atrocities are terrible, they may not actually be killing enough people. It is starvation and aid delivery which are the chief threats, and these may be able to be met by co-operating with Chad, where many of the camps are located.

But assuming Darfur does reach the threshold - if for example the Sudanese government or the militias continue to interfere with the delivery of food aid, and thereby endanger the lives of the million or so refugees currently in camps along the border - then there are other criteria which must be met. In order to be morally justifiable, any military intervention must:

• be a last resort;
• be "guided primarily by a humanitarian purpose" (this does not preclude other motives, but they must be subsidiary);
• comply with international human rights standards (the means must be concordant with the ends);
• be reasonably likely to actually make things better; and
• ideally should be endorsed by the UN or other appropriate multilateral institutions, except in extremis.

I don't think there's any problem with meeting these criteria. If the situation in Darfur deteriorates and the Sudanese government deliberately attempts to starve a million of its citizens to death, it would be entirely justifiable to use military force to prevent it.

It remains to be seen whether force will be necessary. I hope that it will not be, and that the Sudanese government will bow to international pressure, deal to the Janjaweed and allow the free flow of aid to those who need it. But if they do not, then the international community should act. We stood by and watched while a million died in Rwanda; we cannot let that happen again.

No respite for Blair

Both the Foreign Affairs Committee and the Intelligence and Security Committee are re-opening their investigations into the handling of intelligence used to justify the war on Iraq, focusing specifically on what Tony Blair knew and when he knew it. It seems that they don't quite believe that MI6 would withdraw intelligence that was central to the case for war without telling the Prime Minister.

Unlike the previous whitewashes, this time Blair may face real scrutiny. Labour MPs on the Foreign Affairs Committee have had enough, and refused to vote with their fellows to prevent further questions being asked. I guess those byelection results have reminded them who they really work for...

Be All You Can Be

With ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US military are facing a shortage of volunteers. However, recruiters have hit upon a perk to get people lining up to die for Haliburton: free breast enlargements.

Treaty time-limits

What do I think of the suggestion that the government is considering a cutoff for lodging historical Treaty claims? I think it's a bad idea. As I've said before, it's great to have a goal, such as settling everything in ten or fifteen years, but having a cutoff date after which no claims can be filed is likely to lead to injustice and allegations that the process is being manipulated to avoid righting past wrongs.

The process of historical investigation surrounding Treaty claims takes time, and while it can be sped up (by for example increasing resources and hiring more historians), it is something that has to be done properly. While I am keen to see historical claims settled as quickly as possible, I want the government to get it right. It should not be needlessly rushed to meet some arbitrary politically imposed date at the expense of justice.

As for National's claim that they would do it in five years, if it was properly resourced and they committed the funds required for just settlements, then it would of course be a Good Thing. But I think that we have very good reasons to doubt their sincerity on this, and I'd rather we took our time than rush things and (deliberately) make a hash of it.

RMA myths

Jeanette Fitzsimons has a good editorial about the RMA in today's Herald, in which she thoroughly trashes the right-wing mythology surrounding the Act. Almost all consents are granted (without notification, to boot), and only a tiny fraction go all the way to the Environment Court; growth has been high and unemployment low for the past four years, so what's the evidence that the RMA is "deterring investment and blocking growth"?

There are similar problems with the mythology around "national interest" projects. The RMA already allows central government to provide guidance to local government on such matters, and even allows them to "call in" projects of national significance - but these processes haven't been widely used. Why not? Some of it is bad memories of "Think Big", but a large part is almost certainly the desire to provide a "level playing field" and avoid criticism for "picking winners" - not to mention businesses lining up at the Minister's door for special treatment, and the resulting allegations of corrupt behaviour and favortism that would inevitably accompany such a process... Labour wants to avoid this, just as National did

In fact, the current bout of whinging over the RMA is just the latest incarnation of the business lobby's disatisfaction with having a Labour, rather than a National, government. First it was "business confidence", then it was the government's "failure" to gain an FTA with the US (one that never was, and never will be, on offer), and now it's the RMA; in all cases its pretty much independent of the underlying facts. These people will never be satisfied unless the government benches are full of compliant Dead White Males dancing to Treasury's tune, and so we might as well ignore them.

The core principle of the RMA is that local communities should have a say over development which affects them. Propertarian absolutists will never be satisfied with this, but it's a good basis to start from, and any changes which move away from this idea - for example by reducing the need for notification, or limiting the ability of people to make a submission or access the Environment Court - would be a grave mistake.

Whingers and moaners

It looks like the Auckalnd Chamber of Commerce agrees with Jim Anderton that business critics of government are "whingers and moaners":

For years, we’ve expressed an attitude that New Zealand is programmed for failure, and facing years of tough economic and social difficulties.

However, there is a major problem with this view of ourselves and our nation - the "here and now" of the economy is telling a different story. There is a mismatch between what we believe and what is actually happening at the coalface of the economy. It seems that our attitudes about how well we are doing as a nation are not connecting with the very real successes the nation is achieving.

Unfortunately, I suspect that the majority of the business community, egged on by National and ACT, would rather continue to pout and stamp their feet than accept the facts.

Vladimir Putin speeding to the Kremlin?

From Stuff:

National leader Don Brash was rushed to Saturday's Bledisloe Cup in a police motorcade that swept through Wellington running red lights and at times driving on the wrong side of the road.

But it's OK if you've got a comb-over, right?

Actually, I suspect the problem isn't so much with the politicians as with their police protectors taking a rather paranoid view of what constitutes a security threat. According to the Diplomatic Protection Squad, "you can't stop because then you get recognised and next thing you know there are security issues." Throw in a monomaniacal focus on their "client" and an overly subserviant attitude to authority, and its easy to see how this happens.

Help with Civil Unions submissions

The Campaign for Civil Unions has released an information pack encouraging people to make submissions on the bills (downloadable PDF here). They're also running a series of regional workshops to help people with the process.

This is useful no matter how you feel about the bill, and I encourage everybody to download it and send something in.

Deniable assets

One of the Americans arrested in Kabul a couple of weeks ago for running their very own Abu Ghraib claims they were working for the Pentagon. No doubt the Secretary will disavow any knowledge of their actions...

New Fisk

’America is not a charitable organisation - they came to steal from Iraq’

David Irving and freedom of speech

The Waikato Jewish Association wants the government to prevent infamous Holocaust-denier David Irving from visiting New Zealand. This is both wrong and stupid. Irving should be treated the same as any other potential visitor; if the fact that he has previously been convicted in Germany and deported from Canada would count against him, then so be it - but we should not be discriminating against him on the basis of his beliefs, no matter how ill-founded or poisonous they may be.

Partly this is based on straight-out liberal principles. We're a country that supposedly respects freedom of speech, and therefore we shouldn't be preventing people from speaking by preventing them from entering. While those who wish to ban Irving would argue that his ideas are wrong and harmful, he is nowhere near the traditional limit of yelling "fire" in a crowded theatre. Not even close. At worst he's guilty of spreading some rather poisonous lies intended to inflame hate against a particular group - but if that's a crime, then I can think of a few organised religions who are first into the fire.

The other half of my objection is that it is simply tactically stupid. You do not defeat Holocaust-deniers by suppressing them - that simply grants them legitimacy in their own eyes. It allows them to claim that they must be right, because they would not be being suppressed if their arguments were wrong and had no power to convince. It allows them to claim that we are afraid of them, and to draw strength from our supposed fear. And where attempts at suppression are driven by the Jewish community, it allows them to claim that there really is a Jewish conspiracy to hide the truth. This is somewhat self-defeating.

Instead, you defeat Holocaust-deniers either by ignoring them (in much the same way as we ignore the Flat Earthers, Tesla-loonies or Raelians), or by open memetic confrontation. Given the court finding against Irving, his vist is an opportunity for those who oppose him to put their case in the strongest possible terms. And if they are unwilling to do that, then their ideas are hardly worthy of being artificially propped up by the government.

I'll leave the final word to John Stuart Mill:

the particular evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth; if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.

Those wanting to suppress Irving would rob us of the latter, and we would be poorer for it. Instead, Irving should be as free as any other to visit and to talk - and others should be free to ignore him or argue with him as they see fit.

Clueless

When browsing a recent copy of Adbusters, I came across this:

On June 12, 1812, the US declared war on the United Kingdom, beginning a battle that nobody really won, except perhaps the Russian composer Tchaikovsky. [...] Inspired by the war's brutality, Tchaikovsky created the "1812 Overture", his best known piece.

Which is of course why the 1812 is marked by a musical duel between "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "God Save the Queen", rather than one between "La Marseillaise" and "God Save the Tsar"...

New Fisk

’A better and safer place’

Beating the war drum again

George Bush is beating the war drum again, this time by claiming that Iran was involved in the 9/11 plot. His evidence? Eight of the 9/11 hijackers travelled through Iran on their way to the US.

If I recall correctly, several of the hijackers had actually lived in Germany, and one even got his pilot's license there. That seems a lot more serious than simply passing through. If Bush wants a pre-election bombing campaign, maybe he should be setting his sights on Berlin...

Unforgivable

With various people mulling over the 1984 revolution , I thought I might as well weigh in. To my mind, there were two absolutely unforgivable aspects of the "reforms": they undeniably made those at the bottom of our society worse off in real terms, and they were grossly undemocratic.

I've blogged about the effects of the "reforms" on the poor before (most notably here), but to summarise: the rich got richer and everybody else got poorer. And not just in relative terms, but absolute ones. Most of the blame for this can be sheeted home to Labour's 1988 tax cuts, which transferred wealth from the bottom 80% of our society to the top 20%. This is unforgivable behaviour from any government, but was especially unforgivable from Labour, a party which had traditionally stood for the interests of the poor and downtrodden - and made all the worse by the fact that it didn't actually work. The "payoff" for the "economic stimulus" provided by cutting the top tax rate was five years of low or negative economic growth and an enormous structural budget deficit, which was temporarily papered over with asset sales. Which is yet another reason to be highly sceptical of right-wing claims that tax cuts increase government revenue and produce higher growth: we've done the experiment, and it was a complete failure.

On the democratic front, successive governments gained power by being economical with the truth, and once in office, lied blatantly about their intentions. Labour's 1984 manifesto was hardly indicative of what it would do in government; their 1987 campaign was built on promises that they would rebuild social services and not sell state assets - promises which were simply ignored once re-election was secured. They abused Parliamentary procedure to ram legislation through without the usual checks and balances, frequently passing bills in parts or under urgency to prevent public scrutiny. On several occasions, they even passed legislation through its first reading with entire sections marked "[to come]", making a mockery of the entire legislative process. This was partly due to the autocratic Parliamentary culture of the time, but largely due to the "reformers" inherent distrust of democracy - they knew that the electorate would never accept their policies (the economic theories on which those policies were based said as much), and so we had to be forced to "take our medicine" - for our own good, of course.

This experience - and National's 1990 betrayal (they campaigned on a platform of ending the "reforms" and returning us to a "decent society", but once elected adopted Labour's policies and pursued them with even greater enthusiasm) - is the chief reason why we have MMP: so that future governments will be hamstrung by having to work in coalition, and will never be able to do that to us again.

In hindsight, many of the reforms are uncontentious - the abolition of farm subsidies and trade barriers, the adoption of the SOE model for some government enterprises, the requirement for government departments to keep open and honest books - but the speed with which things were done and the utter disregard for the human consequences or public opinion poisoned the entire program. Change was necessary - but not that much, not that fast, and not that way.

New Fisk

Four missiles, 14 deaths and the crisis of information in Baghdad

The sound of silence

For the first day in a while, I couldn't really think of anything to say.

Ah well, I had reading to do anyway. Currently I'm swapping between various economic histories of the 80's and 90's to get an overview for an assignment. This is likely to increase my urge to procrastinate, so it shouldn't interfere with bloggage much - assuming I can find something worth writing about.

New Fisk

Six die in blast targeted at Iraqi minister

New Fisk

Democracy Now: Robert Fisk On Sovereignty, Martial Law, and Continuing Violence in the New Iraq