Time to stop supporting slavery

Trade Aid has begun a campaign to ban the import of goods produced with slave labour. While slavery has been banned in most countries, and slave trading made illegal under international law, it still exists [PDF]; an estimated 27 million people still suffer in conditions of chattel slavery, debt slavery, or serfdom.

Like all civilised countries, New Zealand has banned slavery and slave trading. But it is still legal to import goods made with slave labour. As a result, slave owners can still profit from their violation of human rights. This has to stop. In 1983 the US banned the import of goods made with slave labour, and its time we did too.

Trade Aid has a petition calling on the government to legislate to ban the import of products made with slave labour. They're aiming to follow in the footsteps of the great abolitionist William Wilberforce's great anti-slavery petition and get 3.6% of the population to sign - meaning about 144,000 signatures. So, please give them a hand, either by signing online here, or downloading a PDF to share with your offline friends here.

Natural habitat

BBC reports that a group of Pygmies performing at a music festival in COngo were put up by the organisers in the city zoo. Their explanation? That it was closer to their "natural habitat".

They do actually realise they're people, don't they?

New Fisk

TE Lawrence had it right about Iraq

Failure in Iraq

So it's official: the Iraq war is a failure. A US government report [PDF] shows that the Iraqi government has met only 8 of the 18 benchmarks set by Congress to gague the success of the "surge" - and that most of the failures are military. Despite this, Bush has declared that the US can still succeed, and again threatened dire consequences if the US withdraws. But it seems that the US people - and the Iraqi people, for that matter - are tiring of that line. But their respective governments are overruling them in the name of "democracy". The Onion couldn't make that one up.

Meanwhile, the killing just keeps going on and on, and has now just become background noise. Last week's massive bombing - the death toll of which has now risen to over 150 - was buried in the news, while the NZ media joke that Paris Hlton got so much coverage because it was a slow news day where TVNZ would lead with "bomb in Baghdad kills 30". The war is a disaster, and its time Congress pulled the plug.

Fortunately, they seem to be moving in the right direction...

Conflicts of interest and the Waitangi Tribunal

Last month, Parliament passed the Treaty of Waitangi (Removal of Conflict of Interest) Amendment Bill through its first reading and sent it to select committee. The bill would amend the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975 to remove the ability for a serving High Court judge or the Chief Judge of the Maori Land Court to serve as chair of the Waitangi Tribunal. It would also remove the ability of the chair of the Tribunal to temporarily appoint judges of the Maori Land Court to chair inquiries. The justification is that there is an inherant conflict of interest - that a serving judge may have already presided over a case related to a claim, or may be called upon to do so in future. The bill's sponsor, Pita Parone, does not suggest this has ever happened. But he's sufficiently concerned about it that he wants restrict those roles to retired judges.

But is this actually necessary? I wouldn't think so. The judiciary already has established rules about such conflicts (which can be boiled down to a single word: "don't"), and I'd expect them to come into play regarding the Waitangi Tribunal. If a judge ends up potentially having to rule on a matter they have dealt with as part of a Waitangi Tribunal inquiry, I'd expect them to recuse themselves. And likewise if the chair of the Tribunal ends up having to investigate a recent Treaty breach which they have ruled on in court (the ability to appoint temporary chairs helps significantly in this case). Against this is the expertise brought to the Tribunal by Maori Land Court judges - expertise which is vital to the Tribunal's work. While retired judges would bring similar expertise, it would be less current, and their judicial philosophy and understanding of the law would be forged in a bygone, and more institutionally racist, era.

So, not a good idea, then. Instead, it seems like just another effort by the dying generation represented by NZ First to roll back the enormous changes in our understanding of the Treaty and the law, by cuckooing their own representatives into the Waitangi Tribunal in the place of the (much younger) present ones. And yet, there was one point raised in the debate which may make some change desirable: National's Chris Finlayson pointed out that Tribunal sittings are often determined by when a Maori Land Court judge is available to chair them, and that this both slows the work of the Tribunal and imposes a punishing burden on participants when sittings occur. Changes to the Tribunal's composition may allow it to sit more regularly, or even full-time, and thus speed its work. And hopefully the select committee wil look at the issue.

Finally, I should point out that the Maori Party have made a number of claims about the purpose of the bill which suggest that they have never bothered to read it. Given that this is an area central to their party, that doesn't reflect too well on them.

Reminder

Submissions on the Crimes (Repeal of Seditious Offences) Amendment Bill are due on Tuesday. So, if you have something to say about the bill, it might be an idea to get writing.

Writing a submission isn't difficult - it can be as simple as a letter saying "I support this bill because...". Unless you're planning on doing a fifty-page report, it only takes an hour or two (depending on how hard you want to think about it). And if you're worried about missing the post, you can submit online. So, what are you waiting for?

Speaks for itself

This Saturday, Global Peace and Justice Auckland will be holding another protest outside Mount Eden Prison in support of the "Iranian Five" - four Iranian refugee claimants currently detained indefinitely without trial by the government in an effort to coerce them into signing travel documents so they can be deported back to persecution in Iran (the fifth, Thomas Yadegary, has been freed by the High Court). The legal basis for their detention is s60 (6) (b) of the Immigration Act, which requires judges to renew the detention of those who refuse to cooperate in their own deportation unless there are "exceptional circumstances". The idea here is that this will coerce people into cooperating and leaving. But does it actually work? It's a question worth asking, given that we've imprisoned six people for over a year (one for 40 months) without any of them giving in.

So, I sent off an OIA request to the Department of Immigration asking how many people they'd detained under s60 (6) (b) since the clause was introduced in 2003, how many of them were still in prison, and how many had actually been deported. They didn't want to answer, claiming that it would require substantial collation and research. I'm pursuing other avenues to get the data, but at the minimum it tells us that they have never assessed the effectiveness of the policy since it was introduced. And I think that speaks for itself.

The current policy of indefinite detention is morally wrong. From the data we do have - six people in prison for over a year, and none of them deported - it is also ineffective, a hugely expensive act of pointless sadism. Even if you don't care at all about human rights, that ought to give some pause for thought.

The uses of helmet cams

UK police are to adopt "helmet cam" technology - a small videocamera attached to their headgear, which records thier interactions with members of the public. The primary use is to gather evidence of "public order" offences (meaning: drunk people who swear at the police), and to supplement written records of witness statements. But there's another use as well: monitoring police behaviour. Unfortunately, it seems the officers themselves will have control over what is recorded, as well as full power to delete footage - so it won't be as useful as it could be. Still, there's always the hope they'll slip up.

(While some people might see this as raising the spectre of "big brother" and a surveillance society - which in the UK is already well and truly there - I don't think its that much of an issue when they're used to record statements and police are required to tell people they're being taped. It's when they start walking around with them on all the time, recording everything they see that there's a problem).

Meanwhile, it's been suggested that if such a system was introduced here, bloggers and the media could have a field day OIA'ing footage of any controversial incident. Which might help to make the police a little more careful about how they treat us.

Pointing the finger

Writing in the Independent (offline), political commentator Chris Trotter lays some groundwork for blaming the Greens if Labour loses the next election. Claiming that Bradford's advocacy for youth rights in the form of the anti-smacking law and proposal to lower the voting age has cost Labour support, he demands that they "shut the fuck up" and toe the line.

To call this arrogant is an understatement. To point out the obvious, the primary purpose of the Greens is not to deliver n% of the vote to keep Labour in power, but rather to represent the interests of their supporters. And contrary to Trotter's assertions, that is exactly what they have been doing. This may be inconvenient for Labour, but at the end of the day, that's their problem, not that of the Greens.

Campbell on Zaoui

Gordon Campbell has a pair of articles up on Scoop discussing the SIS's expected case against Ahmed Zaoui (part one, part two). The SIS have radically changed their case in the five years since the certificate was issued. When he first arrived in the country, they focused on the criminal association convictions in Europe (convictions regarded as unsafe by the RSAA, and certainly not justifying a return to torture and death) and claimed he was actively planning to commit acts of terrorism. Now, in light of the Supreme Court setting a higher bar for the certificate to be upheld, Campbell thinks they will instead try and paint Zaoui as an extremist who will inspire terrorism - despite all the evidence to the contrary.

Unfortunately, because the review is happening in secret and the participants are gagged, this is all guesswork. At the end of the day, we'll never be allowed to know the SIS's case - which means we can never be sure whether it is strong or merely paranoia.

The problem of contracting out

Since the 90's cost-cutting drive, the New Zealand public sector has been contracting out services previously performed in house. But while this usually saves money (simply because the new staff are paid less than the old ones), it introduces new problems around accountability and control. So we've seen cases where contractors have screwed up royally without anyone seemingly being accountable. Or the situation at the moment, where hospitals around the country face strikes because a contractor - Spotless Services - wants to run a sweatshop rather than pay its workers properly. And it's not because the money isn't there - the DHBs have put up the funds, and negotiated successfully with both their own workforce and with other contractors to ensure that staff are paid and the work gets done. Spotless, however, wants to keep that money for itself, rather than passing it on to the intended recipients. As a result, our hospitals won't be cleaned, and patients won't be fed - something that the DHB should be held accountable for - but because of the contracting relationship, accountability and responsibility will slip through the cracks in a chain of downward's finger pointing.

This insanity has to end. Contractors clearly can not be trusted to perform vital services properly, and they simply get in the way of a successful relationship between health sector workers and the people they are ultimately working for. Bringing these functions back in house would have two benefits: firstly, it would ensure a clear chain of responsibility and accountability so that when the public service fucks up, they can't point the finger elsewhere. And secondly, it would allow the health system to actually function, rather than being shut down due to corporate greed. Finally, it's worth pointing out that the contractors cream off some portion of their charge as profit; bringing services back in-house would allow this money to be spent on paying their workers a decent wage, or on other health services. Which seems like a bit of a no-brainer to me.

Searching Hansard

Looking at the parliamentary website today, I see that Hansard is now searchable - and that they've extended coverage back to 2000.

Oh, the fun I'm going to have with this...

This is a joke, right?

When I saw this on Scoop today, I thought it was one of Lyndon's excellent satire pieces.

Apparently not...

A special pit of vileness

The internet can be a pretty vile place, particularly for women. But one of our local sewer blogs (no link as it is well beyond the cordon sanitaire) has managed to find its own special pit of vileness in suggesting that a female blogger it politically disagrees with should be "fixed" by being raped.

Clint Heine linked to my post about The Australian Labor Party. The post and comments are almost entirely made up of personal insults, which is unsurprising. But one commenter, James, said (about me):

Nothing a big black dildo won't fix......

Clint replied:

James.....!!! Nice suggestion, go over there and tell her that :)

Insults go with the territory, I have no problem with people calling me a thieving, parasite dog. But James wants to hold me down and stick an object in my vagina (or mouth, or anus), and Clint thinks this is a good idea.

As Maia points out, Heine blogs under his own name, and previously was the ACT party's youth president. And yet he thinks that threats of sexual violence are perfectly acceptable (and indeed, something to be encouraged rather than condemned). They're not - and we should all be ashamed to have a sorry little creep like this in our midst.

But no doubt he and the other sewer-dwellers will accuse Maia of being "oversensitive" and claim that he was "only joking"...

Climate Change: Another nail in the denier's coffin

Another nail in the climate change denier's coffin today, with an upcoming study in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A showing that recent climate change is not the result of changes in solar output. Neither has it been caused by cosmic rays. Instead, it seems that the deniers cherry picked their data to "prove" their case (which is why all their graphs stop suddenly in 1980). What a surprise!

I wonder what they'll try and hide behind next? "It will cost our funders money, so it can't possibly be true"?

Retraction: Jim Flynn and Eugenics

The Alliance blog has a long piece by Jim Flynn explaining his position on eugenics. It seems that he has been seriously misrepresented by the Sunday Star Times, which somehow managed to turn his opposition to eugenics into support for eugenic policies. Instead, Flynn argues that:

• The correlation between university education and IQ is mild;
• The downwards trend in IQ is both insignificant and counteracted by a much stronger upward trend;
• The upwards trend is not likely to disappear, and that there are many ways (such as social democratic social policies) to continue it;
• That better access to family planning will reduce the differential the eugenicists care so much about anyway.

So, it would seem I owe Professor Flynn an apology for this post. And it would seem that the Sunday Star Times owes him rather more than that.

On the plus side, I now know how to respond to those who do believe that IQ decline is a problem: grant them every one of their assumptions, and then point out that their "problem" is so miniscule that it doesn't justify any policy whatsoever.

It's the jobs, stupid

The Press today carries one of the periodic complaints that not enough people are studying science, and that this endangers our future as a "knowledge economy". Unfortunately, while it dutifully quotes scientists and educators about how this is a Bad Thing, little effort is made to analyse the underlying problem. Which is a shame, because the underlying problem is very simple: it's the jobs, stupid. There aren't any, or at least not enough to make it worth the risk of studying to get one.

Science is not like other careers. If you want to go into business, you go to university and get a BCom. If you want to work in McDonald's, you get a BA. But if you want to work in the sciences, a Bachelor's degree is not enough - you need to get a PhD to even get a foot in the door. This means spending seven to ten years of your life learning everything about nothing to have any hope of getting a job. If you stop early, your career prospects are limited - if you did biology, you can work as a lab technician, and get paid slightly more than the minimum wage to do mindlessly repetitive and intellectually unrewarding work that is beneath even robots. Anything else, and you're limited to teaching (which some people would say is much the same).

Unfortunately, if you study for those seven to ten years to churn out five copies (hardbound) of your thoughts on "sexual behaviour in the lesser spotted weka: an integrated computer model", you are likely to find that there is no position for you at the end of it. There's a limited number of places in our universities, and they're all full. Our CRIs (who used to be so short of PhDs that they'd send people overseas to get them) have been shedding staff for over a decade. And the private sector simply isn't interested in R&D - that would be investment, anathema to the short-term, strip the assets, screw the shareholders, and relocate to Singapore thinking so beloved of our managerial class. As a result, twenty to thirty percent of our science graduates are leaving the country. Which sends a very clear message to those at the start of their university careers considering a career in science: that there isn't one. Better to do computer science instead; you'll probably make more money that way anyway.

Before anyone gets the wrong idea, this doesn't mean that there isn't a problem. There's no jobs now, but there will probably be plenty in a decade, when universities and CRIs face block retirements among the few staff who survived the perpetual restructuring of the 90's. But students respond to the signals the market is sending now, and they're all pointing in the wrong direction.

As for solving it, politicians and business leaders need to move past the rhetoric of "science is vital for our future", and actually put their money where their mouth is and ensure that there are jobs at the end of the process (or, in simpler terms, hire more fucking scientists). Otherwise, when they can't find an expert in quantum analysis of sheep intestinal parasites in a decade's time, they'll have no-one to blame but themselves.

Focusing the mind

John Banks has decided to run again for Mayor of Auckland.

Well, that should focus Aucklanders' minds on their local body elections.

Remember, if you don't vote, you might get John Banks.

Tonga: shooting the messenger

Here in New Zealand, we're currently fighting an attempt by self-interested and overly precious politicians to prevent people from using parliamentary coverage to satirise, ridicule or denigrate them. But it could be worse: in Tonga, the Parliament has banned all television coverage by the Tongan Broadcasting Corporation to prevent the media from "inflaming the situation". In other words, letting the people see what goes on in Parliament and what the legislature is planning might cause another riot.

I'd suggest that if that is the concern, then Tongan politicians - the majority of whom are unelected or nobles - should look at what they are saying, rather than simply shooting the messenger.

Hiding behind secrecy

The Prime Minister is defending the secrecy of the review of Ahmed Zaoui's Security Risk Certificate, claiming in her press conferance today that it was necessary to protect classified information:

"It's not a court it's a review of a security risk certificate. Obviously it involves the use of classified information and that is properly done outside what would be the procedures of a court," said the PM.

There's just one problem: it's not true. The current "open" hearings do not involve any classified information at all. If they did, Zaoui and his lawyers would not be allowed to attend. Instead, the SIS and the government are hiding behind secrecy, and using it to prevent any independent assessment of the evidence or the fairness of the process. And in a society which supposedly respects human rights, that is simply unacceptable.