Drawn

A ballot for two Member's Bills was held today, and the following bills were drawn:

• Employment Relations (Termination of Employment by Agreement) Amendment Bill (Laura Trask)
• Copyright (Parody and Satire) Amendment Bill (Kahurangi Carter)

The first is ACT bullshit aimed at undermining basic employment rights. The second would correct a long-standing hole in our copyright laws, and hopefully it will be passed.

There were 73 bills in the ballot today - the most in quite some time. Naturally, Chris Hipkins doesn't have one - he doesn't care about anything / is too good for actual work. And naturally, his deputy Carmel Sepuloni is pushing for a four-year Parliamentary term, which tells us that what Labour really cares about is job security and unaccountability for themselves.

Member's Day

Today is a Member's Day. First up is the committee stage of Teanau Tuiono's Restoring Citizenship Removed By Citizenship (Western Samoa) Act 1982 Bill. This will be followed by the second reading of Rima Nakhle's Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill. And then, finally, the House will get on to some first readings: Tracey McLellan's Evidence (Giving Evidence of Family Violence) Amendment Bill, Camilla Belich's Employment Relations (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill, and (if the House moves quickly) Julie Anne Genter's Income Tax (Clean Transport FBT Exclusion) Amendment Bill. Which means there will finally be a ballot tomorrow, for two or three bills. Which I guess is why the page of proposed member's bills is filling up with new ones...

End the government, not te Tiriti

For the last few months the Waitangi Tribunal has been holding an urgent inquiry into National's "Treaty Principles Bill". They've already issued one interim report, declaring it to be a steaming pile of racist horseshit, but the inquiry is still going on to determine just how big and how steaming and how shitty that pile is. This is obviously embarrassing for the government, so they decided to put a stop to it, with a plan to rob the Tribunal of jurisdiction by introducing the bill to the House early.

Obviously, it didn't work. The government's lawyers immediately told the Tribunal (as they were obliged to do under their duty of candour to the court); the Tribunal immediately passed this on to claimant's lawyers (ditto); and then it produced an interim report (it being their job to do so), declaring the bill to be "worst, most comprehensive breach of the Treaty/te Tiriti in modern times" which, if passed and not immediately repealed, "could mean the end of the Treaty/te Tiriti" (which is, sadly, the point; this white supremacist government wants to end te Tiriti, and that needs to be said loud and clear so we all know what is at stake).

And now Rimmer has the gall to be upset at the Tribunal for doing its job when he tried to stop it. Because apparently he thought he could rob it of jurisdiction and so prevent criticism of his white supremacist, anti-constitutional policy in secret, without anyone noticing or being allowed to do anything. Which just shows how utterly contemptuous of democratic norms this racist fuckweasel is.

Democratic governments don't try and undermine the foundations of their constitution. And they especially don't try and do it in secret, with a blitzkreig to prevent and limit opposition. That's Trumpist shit, and stuff we should not tolerate in Aotearoa.

Neither should we tolerate Rimmer's bill. Te Tiriti is the foundation of our constitution. While it is not the source of the government's sovereignty (because sovereignty was never ceded), it is one of the key sources of its legitimacy. It meddles with it at its peril. If the government wants to end te Tiriti and the crown-Māori relationship, then I think that many kiwis would rather end them and their illegitimate regime instead.

26,000 unemployed under National

The latest labour market statistics have dropped, showing another rise in unemployment. There are now 148,000 unemployed - 26,000 more than when National took office.

...which is what happens when you sack thousands of public servants and have the Reserve Bank crash the economy. This is apparently the most severe per-capita recession in our history, and its completely self-inflicted for purely ideological reasons. What's scary is that this recession will have a body-count, measured both in direct suicides as well as ill-health. We need some way of holding the murderers who have inflicted it to account.

National's privatised child-abuse camps

National has a hard-on for "boot camps" as part of its desperate attempt to grub "tough on crime" votes from sadistic geriatric pedophobes. That's bad enough, but its gets worse: the camps will be privatised. And they will be allowed to use force against children:

A leaked ministerial document from the Children’s Minister shows an admission that giving military-style academy providers the power to use force against children may be seen as “increasing the potential risk of abuse in custody”.

[...]

Cabinet agreed that military-style academy providers – including “third-party providers” – will have the power to use force against young people outside of a residence, such as on overnight camps or rehabilitative programmes. Currently, powers only exist when a person is at a residence.

Providers would be able to use physical force, no greater than reasonably necessary, to restrain a young person attempting to abscond or harm themselves or others.

The problem of course is that Oranga Tamaraki already treats those in its care as sub-human, and physically abuses them; private providers will likely be worse, and certainly be far less accountable. While Karen Chhour is denying it, this is a recipe to repeat the abuses of the past, and Chhour and National need to be held accountable for that.

Meanwhile, Luxon is all over the place about this, first pretending he "wasn't briefed", then, when it was pointed out that that made him look like a stupid fool who had no idea what was happening around his own Cabinet table, admitting that he was. Which I guess shows us the dishonesty of his claims to be "unaware" of things, and how he uses them to try and kill questions and avoid accountability.

Stephen Rainbow is ACT's crony

Back in August, National sabotaged human rights by appointing terf and genocide supporter Stephen Rainbow as Chief Human Rights Commissioner. The Spinoff has been digging into this, and they've uncovered new information: Rainbow didn't actually get the job - until suddenly he did:

“I didn’t get the HRC role but still very keen to help out,” wrote Stephen Rainbow to Act Party chief of staff Andrew Ketels in a text message on May 22 this year. Rainbow had applied for the position of chief human rights commissioner, after being nominated by Act leader David Seymour, and been interviewed for the job in March. He did not receive a text back from Ketels.

But nearly three months later, Ketels did text. “Congratulations!” On that day, Rainbow had been announced by justice minister Paul Goldsmith as the new chief human rights commissioner. “Thanks Andrew,” Rainbow replied. “Appreciate the opportunity to serve my country.” He is due to start in his role at the commission next week.

So, Rainbow was ACT's choice, and the natural conclusion is that they pressured Goldsmith to overturn the transparent and independent appointments process to shoe-horn their saboteur into office. A saboteur BTW who commiserated with ACT about the "challenging time for your office and David as you head into Waitangi Day"... which sounds just a little bit racist, and adds to the evidence that he is a completely unsuitable appointee incapable of properly performing the functions of the office, who should be immediately sacked by the next government.

Sabotaging justice

One of the achievements of the Labour-led government was the establishment of the Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2019. After decades of high-profile miscarriages of justice, and judges looking the other way on state conspiracies of silence and each other's fuckups, we finally got an outside body to cast an independent eye over dodgy convictions, and refer them back for re-examination. But now, National seems to be trying to sabotage it, by their usual method of dubious appointments:

[L]ast week Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith told Hampton, CCRC head Colin Carruthers, KC, and fellow commissioner Virginia Hope their terms wouldn’t be renewed when they expired in December, despite them wishing to continue.

They have been replaced by two less experienced lawyers, with the chief commissioner’s job controversially going to retired judge Denis Clifford.

On Thursday afternoon, Hampton resigned from the commission with immediate effect, saying that allowed him to speak about his serious concerns with the appointments, and the the CCRC’s future.

Hampton said the changes at the commission effectively stripped it of anyone with experience in the commission’s core work of investigating individual miscarriages, which he and Carruthers had extensive involvement in, prior to the CCRC’s formation.

Moreover, it removed the only people who had significant backgrounds in criminal defence work, and added more commissioners who were previously Crown prosecutors, Hampton said.

So, rather than being an independent, outside view, it will be the system "re-examining" itself (in some cases, they may even be re-examining their own decisions). The foxes will be back in charge of the henhouse, able to go back to pretending there isn't a problem, just like they did before the CCRC was established.

Pretty obviously, this will undermine public confidence in the CCRC, and deter people from applying. And that's the point. Miscarriages of justice are expensive and embarrassing for the state. And so it has decided to limit its liability - just as it did with child torture. The rotten state doesn't want justice; it just wants its victims to shut up and go away.

As for how to fix this, as with the Human Rights Commission and Waitangi Tribunal, sacking National's saboteurs would be a start. But beyond that, the next government needs to amend the CCRC's legislation to ensure that New Zealand judges, prosecutors, and police officers cannot serve on the commission or taint its independence. If we want people to have confidence in the CCRC - and by extension, the entire justice system - we can accept no less.

The High Court says "Land Back"

Way back in 1839, the New Zealand Company bought the area that is now Nelson from local iwi and hapu. As part of the deal, they promised that Māori would retain their homes, fields, and burial grounds, and that in addition, 10% of the land in the planned township and surroundings would be set aside for them. A few years later, the New Zealand government, as part of its investigations into pre-Treaty land deals, effectively took over the arrangement. They then proceeded to break it: land which was meant to be set aside was stolen; promised land was never delivered; and what was given was stolen again for "government purposes". The local iwi have been fighting this ever since, and in 2017 won a major victory in the Supreme Court with a ruling that the government owed them a fiduciary duty and must honour the deal. They kicked it back down to the High Court to decide exactly what was owed, and after seven years of foot-dragging the court has finally ruled, deciding that the government must give them their land back:

Māori customary landowners in New Zealand’s oldest property claim, the Nelson Tenths, suffered a loss of land and are entitled to millions of dollars in compensation, the High Court has found.

In a decision released on Thursday, the plaintiffs, led by kaumātua Rore Stafford on behalf of the descendants of customary landowners, were found to be entitled to relief, which was likely to be “substantially less than $1 billion” but still a “significant sum”, the court found.

The sum could not be settled until the final acreage of land to be returned and other issues are determined, a press summary on the decision said.

...which the government will no doubt try and drag out for another seven years, as part of the same immoral legal strategy it used on the children it tortured. But the principle isn't in doubt: the High Court said "Land Back". And if they've already given it away, then they have to pay compensation. In addition, there's 180 years of back-rent, plus 180 years of interest. Its simple interest, not compounding, but: this is going to be hugely expensive for the government.

(Note that "given it away" apparently includes to SOEs and Crown Entities, which are part of the government. The government here is behaving exactly like a rich bankrupt who hides their assets in a trust: sure, they can use them, control them, even get money from them, but they're not "theirs", so can't be used to pay off their suckerscreditors. Whether this position meets the standard of ethical behaviour we expect from our government, or is consistent with its longstanding position that privatisation would not undermine Treaty redress, is left as an exercise for the reader...)

So, given the current government's anti-Māori agenda, the question naturally arises: will National once again abuse its Parliamentary power to over-rule the courts and prevent justice, as they are doing over the foreshore and seabed? Sadly, I don't think it can be ruled out. But if they try and go that way, it would be another ongoing Treaty breach, and basically blow up the crown-Māori relationship completely. National might not care about that: Māori don't vote for them. But the rest of us should. And we should not let it happen.

A collapse in police legitimacy

Last week, the government had a big wank about police raids in Ōpōtiki, crowing about "gangs" and "drugs" and "law and order". Unfortunately the police did exactly the same shit they did in the Urewera terror raids 17 years ago, dragging people off in front of their kids and terrorising the community (so much for their "apology"; sincerity requires change, and the police are just incapable of that). And it seems that the local iwi have had enough of that:

Māori community leaders Te Aho and Tame Iti attended a meeting in Ōpōtiki, the Eastern Bay of Plenty town, where locals outlined issues caused by the police raids where mokopuna were forced to watch as whānau were arrested by armed police.

“No more will we tolerate this.”

[...]

“If the NZ Police Head office or any other government agency like Oranga Tamariki think that they can do what they have done again in our district again then they have another thing coming.

“The other thing coming is that we will establish our own intelligence and surveillance of them. When an emergency is triggered we will blockade them at the houses that they raid and not relent until the rights of our people have been validated and our tamariki mokopuna.”

Its hard to see this as anything other than a collapse in police legitimacy. Police need the support of the community to do their jobs effectively, but in Ōpōtiki, the community is saying "nope". National likes to complain about "Labour's" policy of policing by consent (you know, the foundation of our entire model of policing); the above is a glimpse of what policing without consent looks like. While the police can (maybe) use force to carry out their raids and arrests, the cost of that is to further alienate the community they are ostensibly there to protect - which means a further reduction in cooperation, and possibly even more active opposition. And the police simply cannot function as police in the face of that. At least not in any way that we would recognise or accept.

Taking the piss again

Remember Casey Costello? The government's most ignorant Minister? First she was referred to the Chief Archivist after claiming that key advice on her cancer promotion policy had simply magically appeared on her desk one day, and that she had no idea where it came from. Then, when the Ministry of Health said her plan to give Philip Morris a $216 million tax cut for its heated cancer products was a bad idea, she told Cabinet she had received "independent advice" to the contrary; when the media quite rightly asked to see that advice, she released a collection of random papers which did not support the case, and appeared to have been googled up at three a.m. by an emotional junior staffer in response to media queries. And now, she's claiming to have no idea where they came from either. In response to an OIA request for the origins of the material, she claimed:

I note that the advice consists of academic articles and health research that forms part of a wider body of scientific literature that focuses on harm reduction, rather than a moralistic, abstinence-only perspective on tobacco and nicotine products. This research is available online and my office has spent a considerable amount of time reviewing a wide range of evidence and information. As such, it is not possible to provide a definitive response to the date and time the articles and health research were first accessed by my office. Therefore, this part of your request is refused under section 18(g) of the Act, as the information is not held.

Yeah right. And if you believe that, I have a Minister to sell you.

Obviously, this is going to the Ombudsman. They have already made clear in their previous ruling that Ministers are required to take reasonable steps to find if information is held. Obvious steps in this case could include searching emails, checking document management systems, examining file metadata, or just asking staff. Its not clear whether the Minister did any of those things - but in the wake of the previous ruling and referral to the Chief Archivist, it smacks of a further attempt to mislead the public and cover up the truth. Hopefully the Ombudsman will get to the bottom of it.

More Sabotage

The Waitangi Tribunal has been one of the most effective critics of the National government and its racist, anti-Māori agenda. So naturally, they're sabotaging it with a crony appointment:

Former ACT Party leader Richard Prebble has been appointed to the Waitangi Tribunal.

Prebble, a Commander of the British Empire, is one of two new members to be appointed, Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka said in a statement on Thursday.

Prebble is a former Cabinet minister who was originally a member of the Labour Party. He joined the newly formed ACT party in 1996, later becoming its leader until 2004.

Prebble is a racist. He opposed even limited recognition of Māori rights through the (now repealed, and disastrous in other ways) Foreshore and Seabed Act. He opposed recognition of Māori interests in water through Three Waters. He hangs around with racist people like Don Brash, Michael Bassett, and Rodney Hide. He has nothing positive to offer the Tribunal, and his appointment can only be seen as an attempt at sabotage, similar to Paul Goldsmith's sabotage of the Human Rights Commission by appointing racists and terfs. And to add insult to injury, we'll be paying for him to undermine them from within.

Our institutions deserve better from our government than this. We deserve better from our government. Their contempt for democratic and constitutional norms is another reason why they need to urgently be voted out on their arses.

As for Prebble, like Goldsmith's Human Rights Commission appointments, he appears incapable of actually performing the functions of the office to which he has been appointed. And like those other racists, the next government can and should simply sack him.

National's fast-track fucks our future

A few years ago, we looked to be on-track to a decarbonised future, with an international consortium led by BlueFloat Energy announcing plans for huge offshore windfarms off Taranaki and Waikato. But National's corrupt fast-track law just fucked all that:

Spanish offshore wind developer BlueFloat Energy is cancelling plans for wind farms off the coast of Taranaki and Waikato, citing “key uncertainties” about the route to market and the competition for allocation of the seabed.

The move comes after a controversial seabed mining plan was revealed to be among the 149 projects listed in the Government’s Fast-Track Approvals Bill.

Developers, including BlueFloat, have previously said the seabed mining project could shrink or completely eliminate the area available for offshore wind in South Taranaki, which is considered to have the country’s best wind resource.

This is an absolute disaster. In addition to GW of renewable generation, these offshore wind developments were expected to result in 10,000 jobs during construction and 2,000 ongoing ones for maintenance. It would have been a lifeline for the Taranaki economy, a replacement for its current fossil industry which would have allowed many fossil employees to move directly into new work. But National prefers to rip, shit, and bust for a tiny number of mining jobs with no wider benefits, to help a company which lies to the stock exchange.

Heckuva job, National. Hope you're proud of yourselves.

Member's morning

Today the House is in an extended sitting, devoted to Member's Business as a catch-up for time stolen by the government in urgency. First up was the second reading of the Restoring Citizenship Removed By Citizenship (Western Samoa) Act 1982 Bill, soon to be known as the Citizenship (Western Samoa) (Restoration) Amendment Bill. Second is the first reading of a local bill, the Auckland Harbour Board and Takapuna Borough Council Empowering Act Amendment Bill. After that the House will move on to the third reading of Katie Nimon's Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) (Improving Mental Health Outcomes) Amendment Bill. If that goes quickly the House might be able to spend a bit more time on the second reading of Rima Nakhle's Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill, but I doubt it'll get there. So again, no ballot - but with the postponement of several second readings, we might finally get one soon.

The cooker government

We know that the current National government is basically a government of and for antivaxxers and cookers, the people who rioted at Parliament and burned the grounds. But so far they've generally avoided explicitly identifying themselves as such. Until today, when Workplace Relations Minister dropped (or rather refused to wear) the mask, by claiming that the previous government was "anti-worker" because it supported vaccine mandates:

I don't agree with that statement because I believe, in fact, the most anti-worker Government we've seen in decades is the previous Government. It was the previous Government that ordered vaccine mandates for workers; never before had we seen the rights of workers across the country be eroded so swiftly. Not only did this erode workers' freedom of choice and bodily autonomy, so many people were forced out of their jobs because the Government refused to look at other options like rapid antigen tests. Rather than listen to those affected workers, the previous Government pushed them to the margins of society. The previous Government's legislative overreach led to ostracism and division that have hugely impacted our civil society and had a negative impact on the employment and earnings of Kiwi individuals.

ACT has form on hosting cookers, but previously they've tried to downplay it. Van Velden's stance suggests they're now nakedly trying to appeal to them. Meanwhile, we now have a Minister for Workplace safety who seems to be opposed to the whole idea. If she's unwilling to do the job properly, and commit to protecting workers from all workplace hazards (including disease as well as bad employers), she should resign.

Stomping on democracy

That's the only way to describe National's actions in appointing a crown observer to the Wellington City Council. Wellington didn't vote for National. They elected a council which supports public transport, housing intensification, and making Wellington a nicer place for people to live (rather than landlords and house hoarders to bank capital gains). So they've started the process to overthrow that council, using the disruption created by National's own proxies on the council as a justification. Which sounds an awful lot like Putin's tactics of using "instability" caused by local proxies to justify invasion...

But its not just Wellington. The Otago Regional Council is trying to pass a land and water plan which will protect its rivers. The government has just decided to legislate to stop them from doing so - and of course it will have retrospective effect (a favourite tactic of this government). In Auckland, they're trying to over-rule the Auckland Council's commitment to safe speed limits, so they can hoon to the airport in their government limos. In Canterbury they seem to be gearing up to overthrow local democracy to steal the water again. And then there's all those councils who want to keep their Māori wards...

it seems that rather than being committed to localism, National wants to micromanage our councils from Wellington. And if voters disagree, well, they'll just stop us from voting. Which probably sounds fine to them - except (so far) we can still vote in 2026, and we should take the opportunity to vote these anti-democratic authoritarian tyrants out on their arses.

A violation of law, justice, and decency

This morning, in a desperate effort to distract attention from the suppurating sore of contempt that is Andrew Bayly, National announced that it would be bringing back its "three strikes" regime. The policy never worked and had no significant quantifiable benefits; but National doesn't care, despite a commitment in both coalition agreements that policy would be "evidence-based". Instead, they seem to think the reason it didn't work was because they simply weren't vicious enough. So this time round, they'll not only be lowering the threshold for a 'strike" - they'll also be imposing them retrospectively:

The regime would also be retrospective, capturing all the strike convictions in the old regime that would count in the new one.

This is despite officials warning this would “contravene a fundamental justice right only to be subject to penalties that were in place at the time of the relevant offending (Bora section 26)”.

Murder Minister Nicole McKee disagrees, which I think shows her complete lack of understanding of not just the BORA, but of justice. The right to the lesser penalty has been black-letter law in this country since at least 1980, thanks to s22 of the Criminal Justice Amendment Act 1980, and I suspect it goes back much further in caselaw (the law codifying practice rather than creating a new principle). We're committed to it under Article 11 of the UDHR and Article 15 of the ICCPR, so National's tyranny will put us in breach of our international obligations. And as we are subject to universal periodic review as well as an individual complaints mechanism, they will be called on it.

But National doesn't care about any of that. All they care about is the sugar hit of "tough on crime" headlines. And as with their prisoner voting law or their climate change policies, complying with our international obligations will be a problem for the next government (which National will of course criticise them for).

What National thinks of us

A "what the fuck" moment for National: Andrew Bayly went round calling a worker a "loser" on an official visit:

The worker explained their interaction with Bayly, and said once the pair were introduced, Bayly asked them why they were still at work.

“Take a bottle of wine and go home, go on, go home ... take some wine and f*** off,” the complainant wrote that Bayly said.

“What followed next was both shocking and humiliating. He called me a ”loser“ repeatedly, saying the reason I was still was work was because I am a ”loser“.

“He turned to the group of people with him at the time, including my boss, the minister’s assistant and marketing staff, and ... employees and formed an ‘L’ with his fingers on his forehead.

Again, what the actual fuck?

There's a suggestion that Bayly was drunk; alternatively, it may just illustrate the attitude of Ministers on $304,300 salaries towards people who actually have to work for a living: they're all just "losers" who should have become Cabinet Ministers. Whether either is the sort of behaviour acceptable for a Minister is left as an exercise for the reader.

Unexpected support

When the Education and Workforce Committee reported back on Camilla Belich's Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill and recommended that it not be passed, I'd assumed it was doomed. The right-wing coalition government supports employer exploitation of workers, and certainly doesn't see why intentionally and systematically conspiring to not pay them or demand free labour - an actual business model for some employers - should be a crime, or why the current law which views employers as "persons in special relationship" towards their employers, but not vice-versa - could be considered unfair and asymmetrical. So I was quite surprised when, last night, NZ First voted for the bill, getting it over the line to its second reading.

During the debate in Parliament, NZ First MP Mark Patterson said his party hadn't been part of the select committee that investigated the bill, but had listened carefully to both sides.

"It is the view of the New Zealand First caucus that this bill is not without some merit," he said.

But he wasn't guaranteeing support all the way through.

"New Zealand First will be supporting this bill through to the committee of the whole House stage.

"We, however, have listened carefully to the concerns on this side of the House. So there are some things that we want to see examined further through that committee stage."

...Which suggests that this isn't actual support, but just a weapon in some internal coalition power-play. Still, maybe they're pissed enough at ACT or National to support it all the way, if they get a token amendment to let them claim a victory. Which would be well worth doing if it doesn't further gut an (already pathetically weak) bill.

But if it passes, this bill will establish a principle: that wage theft is theft. And it means that a future government can then amend it to actually treat it as such, with an identical penalty.

We need more judicial power, not less

The Herald is reporting on yet another reporting from the ATLAS-network-linked "New Zealand" Initiative, this one complaining of a creep towards judicial supremacy, and calling for the powers of judges to interpret the law to be reined in. It seems that the billionaires who fund ATLAS and its local collaborators want to be sure they get what they pay for when they buy politicians, and don't want judges souring the deal or interfering with corporate power, even when the law requires that they do so. Hence the short-sighted enthusiasm for arbitrary executive despotism. Meanwhile, for people who aren't billionaires or shilling from them, and who actually live in Aotearoa and pay attention to our democracy, its clear that we need more judicial power, not less.

The most obvious reason for that is the current government, whose naked corruption is exactly the sort of thing judges were invented to prosecute. But beyond that, there are also long-term reasons. Parliament has been a terrible guardian of our human rights. It does not even pretend to do the job properly. Remember Hilary Calvert's absurd third-reading speech on the prisoner disenfranchisement law? That's the standard of "care" our politicians bring to our laws. That abdication of responsibility produced a constitutional backlash: the first ever declaration of inconsistency, and a law requiring Parliament to formally take notice of them. But that law did not fix the problem: the current government is ignoring formal declarations of inconsistency, and Parliament is still routinely passing laws which violate human rights. And now the present lot are taking that attitude and applying it to te Tiriti as well, on the weird belief that their private coalition agreement amongst themselves trumps the foundation of our constitution and state legitimacy. Which is in turn inviting a constitutional backlash in that area as well...

Again and again our parliament has shown that they cannot be trusted to make laws responsibly. Our judges, OTOH, seem to be responsible custodians. They take their duties seriously, provide real reasons for their decisions (which are in turn tested and scrutinised by others), and unlike politicians, have not institutionalised bribery as part of their culture. The balance of power between legislature and judiciary is a slider we can move. And the sheer irresponsibility and corruption of the former is inviting voters to shift it further towards the "judicial" end. And when we do, the present advocates of "parliamentary supremacy" will have no-one to blame for it but themselves.

Member's Day

Today is a Member's Day. First up is the third reading of Deborah Russell's Family Proceedings (Dissolution for Family Violence) Amendment Bill, which looks like it will pass unanimously. This will be followed by the committee stage of Katie Nimon's Pae Ora (Healthy Futures) (Improving Mental Health Outcomes) Amendment Bill and the second readings of Camilla Belich's Crimes (Theft by Employer) Amendment Bill and Rima Nakhle's Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill. If the House moves very quickly it will make a start on Tracey McLellan's Evidence (Giving Evidence of Family Violence) Amendment Bill, which would mean a ballot tomorrow, but that seems unlikely.