New Fisk

Trudeau won’t stop $12bn of arms sales to Saudi after Khashoggi’s death because money always wins over murder

Climate Change: The opposite conclusion

Another day, and another article full of special pleading from farmers (or their mouthpieces) about how the rest of us should continue to subsidise them on climate change. This one is from National MP Stuart Smith, and takes the usual farmer line that cars, not cows, are the real threat to climate. The "justification" is that methane, produced by cows, is a short-lived greenhouse gas, whereas carbon dioxide, produced by cars, is long-lived, and hangs around forever. Utterly ignored: methane decays into carbon dioxide, so its effectively a long-lived gas anyway, while its warming effect - the thing that does the damage - is significantly higher than that of CO₂. Our normal greenhouse maths averages this out over 100 years, during which a ton of methane has 34 times the warming effect of a ton of CO₂ (the ETS uses the older estimate of 25 times - another hidden subsidy). If we look at a shorter timescale, the warming effect of 20 years is 86 times that of carbon dioxide (or 72 times in subsidy-maths). If we look at a longer one, its still seven times as bad over 500 years.


In other words, no matter how you look at it, methane is worse for warming than carbon dioxide. But worse, the climate crisis is now, so we no longer have a long-term to average over. We need to reduce warming as quickly as possible, to stop it from shifting the climate and driving destructive storms. And the most effective way of doing that is to target high-GWP gases. The bonus with methane is that because it is short-lived, the short-term effects of reducing it will be so-much greater, and the temperature will be that much faster to return to normal. Meanwhile, a rapid reduction of warming due to methane will give us time for longer-term solutions to deal with long-lived gases.

So, we should draw the opposite conclusion from farmers' special pleading on methane: rather than ignoring it, we should target it. We should target cars too, of course, but if we really want to do something effective, we need to target cows.

Climate Change: How to kill coal in NZ

If we are to avoid catastrophic climate change, then we need to end the mining and use of fossil fuels. This means not just ending oil, which the government is taking its first feeble steps towards today, but also coal. There are currently 15 operating coal mines in New Zealand, and every single one of them needs to be shut down. So how do we do it? The first step is to prohibit exploration and mining under the Crown Minerals Act. This would require a number of amendments:

• A new section stating that despite anything to the contrary in the Act, no permit of any type may be issued for coal.
  
• An amendment to section 32 (which allows exploration and prospecting permits to be converted to mining permits) to make it clear that nothing in that section shall apply to any permit for coal.
  
• An amendment to section 36 (which allows permits to be varied) stating that no permit for coal may be changed to extend its duration, the land to which it relates, or change its conditions so as to remove or extend any condition under which the permit or any land to which it applies would otherwise be required to be surrendered.
  

That cuts off the pipeline. But we would also need to kill existing permits. A clause simply cancelling them entirely after a specified date (say, 1 January 2030) would do that.

But effectively forbidding mining under the Crown Minerals Act regime doesn't solve the problem, because the Act applies only to mining crown-owned minerals. Coal is not necessarily government owned, and mining coal on private land is not regulated by the Act. So, we'd also need to change the resource management regime to shut those down. The way to do that within the RMA scheme would be to issue a National Environmental Standard to prohibit mining coal, so one way of doing it would be to add mining to the list of things NES's can be issued for, and statutorily require the Minister to issue one prohibiting the mining of coal. Alternatively, we could follow the scheme used for banning the dumping of radioactive waste, and just have a clear statutory ban. The complicating factor is that there are resource consents in place which will need to be phased out (by prohibiting the granting of new ones and issuing a statutory cutoff on existing ones), so that will require transition clauses.

But won't people just import? That's the easiest problem to solve: the government can simply, at an appropriate time, declare coal to be a prohibited import under the Customs and Excise Act (we can also use this to prohibit exports, to kill the coal industry earlier if we want). Such a prohibition must be "necessary in the public interest", but in the wake of the latest IPCC report and if things keep going the way they are going, that's not going to be difficult to prove.

So, is there any MP who wants to start the process?

Labour entrenches bad faith

The Crown Minerals (Petroleum) Amendment Bill, which is supposedly about banning offshore oil exploration, is back before the House for its second reading this afternoon. I say "supposedly", because the government has left loopholes in the bill the oil industry can drive a supertanker through, in the form of rights to vary and convert permits. Many submitters (including myself) warned the government about these loopholes, and urged that they be closed. But rather than close them, the government has instead chosen to entrench them in law, with a specific clause saying that existing permits will be treated as if the law had never been passed. This incidentally means that the prohibition on drilling on Taranaki conservation land will not apply, and that those permits could be extended onto DoC land, but I guess the government doesn't care about that, any more than it care about climate change.

I am hoping that the Greens will put up some amendments at the committee stage to fix the bill, but I doubt they will pass. Which will simply mean we will need further legislation in future to close those loopholes. Because if we are to avoid catastrophic climate change, the oil industry must be destroyed - and that means not just ending exploration, but stopping all future drilling, and (eventually) closing existing wells. The earlier we do that, the safer we will be.

Banning "conversion therapy"

"Conversion therapy" is an unpleasant form of bigot quackery which claims to "cure" or at least suppress people's sexual orientation or gender identity. Now, Labour MP Marja Lubeck has put up a bill to ban it:

Lubeck's bill, the Prohibition of Conversion Therapy Bill, prohibits any person from advertising, offering, or performing a treatment that seeks to change a person's sexual orientation or gender identity in New Zealand.

"Conversion therapy is unproven, widely condemned and does not reflect the values of a modern and compassionate New Zealand."

She said the bill is about supporting young people to be proud of who they are.

Firstly, there's an obvious prima facie Bill of Rights violation with the advertising ban and the right to freedom of expression. But I'm confident that that will be found to be a justified limitation in a free and democratic society. We already prohibit quack medical advertisements, and this seems no different. As for the actual practice, the article notes that the NZ Association of Psychotherapists and the NZ Association of Counsellors note that it violates basic ethical standards for their practice. In other words, they prohibit it already. Insofar as its performed by non-professionals, it seems to be practising (purported) medicine without a licence - again, something we protect the public from. Add in the important duty of the government to protect people from discrimination, and I have no trouble at all with this bill.

Naturally, of course, leader of the opposition Simon Bridges is uncertain. Which I think tells you everything you need to know about the man. He's a snivelling little worm, too immoral to do what is right, but lacking the courage of his convictions to be open about his bigotry. Which seems to be a long tradition in the National Party...

Good news from Australia

The Australian government appears to have bowed to public pressure and is plans to have all child refugees off Nauru by the end of the year:

Former attorney-general George Brandis says he expects there will be no children of refugees and asylum seekers on Nauru by the end of the year.

More children have been transferred for treatment, with Government sources confirming there are now 40 on the Pacific Island — down from 52 last week.

[...]

The Australian newspaper is reporting that all the children will be transferred off the island by the end of the year.

The Federal Government is refusing to confirm that timeline but Mr Brandis, who is now High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, says it is a reasonable expectation.

I guess there's nothing like being thrashed in a by-election to focus a government's mind. But while this is good news, its only part of the battle: the Australian government needs to free its adult detainees as well as the children. And until they do that, and close down their concentration camps, you should not buy Australian.

NZ Police sexually assault prisoner

Part of my city was turned into a police state today, with streets closed off and walls of police quizzing residents in order to defend a pack of out-of-town blood merchants at their weapons expo. People protesting against it were arrested and assaulted, and one was left with concussion. Worse, one was sexually assaulted:

I was searched by a male cop, who put his hands in my back pockets and waistband. No badge on his uniform, and all the. cops arresting me refused to give me his number when asked.

— ☭ emmy ☭ (@cannibality) October 31, 2018

This is just wrong - both the assault and the pointed silence and complicity of other officers. And it shows that the New Zealand Police have learned nothing from the police rape affair, and utterly failed to stamp out the culture of silence and cops defending their own which allowed Rickards, Shipton and Schollum to rape so many women for so long.

Queensland's Human Rights Bill

One of the odd things about Australia is that it is almost alone in western democracies in not having formal protection for human rights. But Australia is a federation, and where the federal government sits on its hands - perhaps so it can continue its abhorrent treatment of refugees - the states will act. Victoria and the Australian capital Territory have already enshrined human rights in law, and now the state of Queensland will join them:

Queenslanders will have protections for 23 human rights enshrined in law, such as freedom of expression, religion and privacy, and a right to education and health services.

[...]

Attorney-General Yvette D'Ath on Wednesday introduced the long-awaited human rights bill into the Parliament.

Ms D'Ath said it was about changing the culture of the public sector.

"The primary aim of this bill is to ensure that respect for human rights is embedded in the culture of the Queensland public sector, and that public functions are exercised in a principled way that is compatible with human rights," she said.

"The bill will require departments, agencies and public entities to make decisions and act in a way that is consistent with human rights."

The bill is here. Comparing it to our own Bill of Rights Act, it has a similar requirement for legislation to be interpreted through the lens of the affirmed rights, and a similar requirement for bills to be assessed on introduction to parliament (though this is done by the member introducing them, and is positive - a declaration of compatibility - rather than negative - a declaration of inconsistency. Which invites all sorts of bullshit from self-interested politicians). The rights themselves are more expansive, including rights to health and education, property and culture, but apply only to natural persons - corporations have no rights. The real difference is that where a law is found to be inconsistent with human rights - that is, no rights-compatible interpretation is possible - the courts can formally issue a declaration of inconsistency, and the government must respond, and that response must be scrutinised by Parliament. On the flip side, damages in human rights suits are forbidden, meaning there's no effective means of enforcement for low-level abuses. Another weird point is that the law doesn't apply to the judiciary and courts themselves - they're required to interpret the law in a rights-consistent fashion, but have no duties to respect human rights themselves in e.g. sentencing decisions or court procedures.

There's ideas here New Zealand might want to steal when updating the BORA, but also things that don't seem like such a good idea. Still, its a huge advance for Queensland, and hopefully the federal government will eventually be forced to follow suit.

Pumpkin time

Happy Halloween, everyone.

Member's Day

Today is a Member's Day, and its yet more later stages, as all the stuff put into the pipeline earlier in the year comes back. First up is the third reading of Jan Tinetti's Education (National Education and Learning Priorities) Amendment Bill. Following that there are the committee stages of Gareth Hughes' Consumers’ Right to Know (Country of Origin of Food) Bill and Simeon Brown's Psychoactive Substances (Increasing Penalty for Supply and Distribution) Amendment Bill. If there's any time left, then the House will make a start on the second reading on Andrew Bayly's Arbitration Amendment Bill, a nasty little move to US-style secret private "justice" which has been fortunately gutted by committee. It will be interesting to see whether National wants to proceed with it now.

There is unlikely to be a ballot tomorrow.

Ecocide

Bad news: humanity has killed 60% of animals in the last 50 years:

Humanity has wiped out 60% of mammals, birds, fish and reptiles since 1970, leading the world’s foremost experts to warn that the annihilation of wildlife is now an emergency that threatens civilisation.

The new estimate of the massacre of wildlife is made in a major report produced by WWF and involving 59 scientists from across the globe. It finds that the vast and growing consumption of food and resources by the global population is destroying the web of life, billions of years in the making, upon which human society ultimately depends for clean air, water and everything else.

“We are sleepwalking towards the edge of a cliff” said Mike Barrett, executive director of science and conservation at WWF. “If there was a 60% decline in the human population, that would be equivalent to emptying North America, South America, Africa, Europe, China and Oceania. That is the scale of what we have done.”

Habit destruction, hunting and fishing are the chief culprits. And its only going to get worse as climate change bites. We are committing ecocide, destroying the natural environment we rely on for our survival.

As for what we can do about it, in New Zealand at least we can try and protect what we have, by locking land away under DoC protection and imposing marine reserves and strengthening the quota system to limit fishing. But over 80% of our native animal species are endangered, so we need to be doing a lot more than we are at present to protect them.

No hope for Australia

Australia's policy of imprisoning refugees in offshore concentration camps has long had bipartisan support, but recently there's been some hope that that support was fading and the policy of cruelty might be able to be ended by electoral means. Sadly, that hope has been dashed, with the Australian Labor Party pledging to keep torturing refugees in camps forever, just as Tony Abbott did:

Australia's opposition Labor Party will maintain the offshore processing of asylum seekers if it forms government.

Leader Bill Shorten has told the Lowy Institute that Operation Sovereign Borders would be "fully resourced".

Under the programme, asylum seekers who have arrived in Australia by boat since 2013 have been sent to detention centres on Nauru and Papua New Guinea's Manus Island.

Mr Shorten says his government would look to appoint an Ambassador for Refugees and boost efforts to find resettlement countries.

"Stopping the boats was never meant to leave people languishing in indefinite detention," Mr Shorten said in his speech.

In other words, the ALP's big "solution" is to look for other countries to dump the problem on - a quest which ignores their moral and legal responsibilities to their victims. Meanwhile, the ALP's position combined with Australia's use of full preferential voting (an establishment rort requiring voters or parties to preference every candidate for their vote to be valid) means that voters and parties who oppose concentration camps cannot effectively threaten to withhold their electoral support from the parties who support this cruelty - meaning that there is no electoral pressure for change. The Greens might oppose concentration camps, but unless they win, their preferences will ultimately flow to Labor, who support them. The only hope of change is for a change in the leadership and direction of the ALP.

Meanwhile, if you're outside Australia, remember: don't buy Australian. Buying Australian goods means supplying the Australian government with tax revenue - tax revenue it spends on the torture and abuse of refugees. If you support refugees, you should boycott Australia until its policy changes.

Climate change: Wales ends coal

The Welsh regional government is banning all new coal mines:

Future coal mining applications are set to be rejected as a matter of policy for the first time in Wales.

New proposed planning rules, which are due to be finalised by the Welsh Government by the end of the year, would only allow permission under "wholly exceptional circumstances".

[...]

Haf Elgar, director of Friends of the Earth Cymru, said: "It is a historic moment. This is the end of coal in Wales after a long association and history."

She added: "We have to be aware of our global responsibility and the impact all of the coal has had over the years and to make sure that we really do play our part in Wales now to be globally responsible and to reduce our carbon emissions,"

This is something that needs to happen if we are to avoid catastrophic temperature change and the human consequences it entails. we can't afford to burn the coal we're already mining, let alone dig up more, so its go to stay in the ground. And if somewhere like Wales, which was once one of the biggest coal mining areas in the world, can do it, then so can we.

So, when is the government going to follow suit?

Climate Change: Spain ends coal

If we are to avoid catastrophic levels of climate change - meaning war, famine and death - humanity needs to end fossil fuel use by 2050. And Spain has just taken the first step, shutting down its coal industry:

Spain is to shut down most of its coalmines by the end of the year after government and unions struck a deal that will mean €250m (£221m) will be invested in mining regions over the next decade.

Pedro Sánchez’s new leftwing administration has moved quickly on environmental policy, abolishing a controversial “sunshine tax” on the solar industry, and announcing the launch of Spain’s long-delayed national climate plan next month.

Unions hailed the mining deal – which covers Spain’s privately owned pits – as a model agreement. It mixes early retirement schemes for miners over 48, with environmental restoration work in pit communities and re-skilling schemes for cutting-edge green industries.

Most of the mines being shut down were uneconomic, so this is simply doing what the market would have done anyway, while saving billions of Euro in subsidies. They've made a huge shift to renewable energy in the past decade, and practically eliminated coal from the electricity system, so its not going to cause problems for their electricity sector. But it will remove a dangerous source of pollution.

So, the obvious question is when are we going to follow Spain's lead? Most of the coal we mine is exported, and there seems to be little need to allow that to continue. Meanwhile, our major coal users have announced plans to exit the market: Huntly will close in 2022, and Fonterra is switching to electricity in the South Island. Announcing a phased shutdown will help drive that process, while pushing those industries still dependent on coal to look for alternatives. So, when will the government do it? Or is their talk of climate change being "my generation's nuclear-free moment" just hot air?

Ireland repeals blasphemy

While things seem to be going badly all over the world, with a murderous autocrat winning in Brazil, plus the ongoing retreat from democracy in the US, there is one place where things seem to be heading in the right direction: Ireland. In recent years, Irish voters have voted overwhelmingly for marriage equality and legal abortion. And now, the same liberal consensus has done it again, overturning the country's medieval blasphemy law:

Ireland has voted to remove blasphemy as an offence from the country’s constitution.

In a referendum, 64.8 per cent of voters were in favour of changing the law, with 35.1 per cent supporting the status quo.

The result was largely expected, as the article on blasphemy in the constitution is generally agreed to be outdated and obsolete.

The amendment finally needs to be brought into law and the outdated offences formally repealed, but its pretty much done.

If you're wondering, our government's bill to repeal blasphemy in New Zealand is currently waiting for its second reading.

Reforming abortion law

During the election campaign, Jacinda Ardern promised that if elected she would decriminalise abortion. Labour followed up on that by referring the issue to the Law Commission for consideration. Today, the Law Commission reported back, with three options for reform:

• Under Model A there would be no statutory test that must be satisfied before an abortion could be performed. The decision whether to have an abortion would be made by the woman concerned in consultation with her health practitioner.
  
• Under Model B there would be a statutory test. The health practitioner who intends to perform an abortion would need to be satisfied that the abortion is appropriate in the circumstances, having regard to the woman’s physical and mental health and wellbeing.
  
• Under Model C, there would be no statutory test until 22 weeks of a pregnancy. After 22 weeks, the health practitioner who intends to perform an abortion would need to be satisfied that the abortion is appropriate in the circumstances, having regard to the woman’s physical and mental health and wellbeing.

Doctors overwhelmingly supported model A (which is used in Canada and the ACT), with a tiny fraction supporting model C. Nobody seems to have supported model B, and its pretty obviously there as salmonella. But what's worth noting is that any of these models is going to mean repealing the Crimes Act provisions and regulating abortion under the existing regulatory framework for health services, and ending the requirement for women to jump through hoops, declare themselves mentally ill, and endure the wagging finger of society. Abortion will be a health service, between a woman and her doctor.

And now its a question of which option the government will choose. Which is going to be a matter of ugly horse trading between Labour's young progressive women, and its old conservative / bigot rump and coalition partner. Because it will be a conscience vote, they'll also be looking across the House for liberal National MPs to secure a majority (assuming there are any: it seems any ambitious Nat feels obliged to grovel to the bigots and misogynists). It would be good if National's supposed liberals stepped up and made it clear which options they would support, but that would require them to display both principle and courage. And sadly, that seems to be too much to expect from politicians.

The full report can be read here.

New Fisk

Jamal Khashoggi: Did they bury him with his body facing Mecca?

Climate Change: Labour isn't serious

When Jacinda Ardern called climate change "my generation's nuclear-free moment", it suggested that she recognised that the problem was urgent and that her government would be doing everything it could to fight it. Since then we've seen a cowardly, deceitful backdown on the offshore oil ban, and now we find out that they didn't even bother investigating solar power for kiwibuild homes:

Housing Minister Phil Twyford didn't consider installing solar panels in Kiwibuild homes.

Documents released under the Official Information Act show Mr Twyford received no advice in relation to solar power and the 100,000 affordable homes the Government wants to build through the Kiwibuild programme.

Mr Twyford told Newshub it's too expensive at the moment. He says it could've added $15,000 in price to each home.

"Until the cost of domestic solar comes down, I don't think it's going to be practical financially to put them on Kiwibuild homes."

According to My Solar Quotes New Zealand, the average price to install solar power is $9000.

...and it pays itself back while you live there, and will be even cheaper with mass installations.

KiwiBuild is a massive opportunity to significantly upgrade our housing stock, and raise housing standards. But its also a massive opportunity to drive the shift to decentralised, renewable generation we desperately need to make to reduce electricity emissions and enable the shift to electric vehicles. Twyford's penny-pinching is squandering that opportunity. And its another sign that Labour isn't taking climate change seriously, and that all Ardern's fine words are just more hot air from uncaring, institutionally compromised politicians.

Climate Change: One state at a time

Earlier in the year, New Zealand ended offshore oil exploration. Now the US state of Oregon is set to follow:

Oregon Governor Kate Brown announced a plan to block offshore drilling off the state's coast on Monday.

"At a time when the states are doing more than the federal government to protect the environment, the Trump administration is trying to allow oil rigs to be built off of every single coast line in America except for Florida," Brown said in a Facebook Live event. "I'm tired of waiting for the federal government to come to their senses and realize this is a terrible mistake."

[...]

"Today I'm announcing that I will sign an executive order to permanently ban offshore drilling along the Oregon coast," Brown said, announcing she would work with state Senator Arnie Roblan, a Democrat who has spoken out against offshore drilling, to "make sure that no future governor can reverse this executive order with the stroke of a pen."

Hopefully other US states will follow suit. If we are to avoid catastrophic climate change, we need to end the oil industry, and the first step towards that is ending offshore exploration and drilling. Though this being the US, no doubt we'll see a series of court cases over the balance between state and federal rights to regulate, which will ultimately be resolved in favour of whichever lobbyists control the political party which has most recently stacked the Supreme Court...

Ignoring the obvious solution

NewsHub reports on the growing risk to the government of being taken to court by iwi over freshwater:

The Government could face a decade-long battle over Māori rights to freshwater, a conflict with potential to become as difficult as the controversial Foreshore and Seabed Act.

Some legal minds are saying Māori are entitled to ownership of water - including the right to restrict others' use, and to compensation for unpaid royalties.

Darrell Naden of Tamaki Legal told Newshub denying Māori ownership to water is akin to the confiscation of land by early Pākehā settlers.

[...]

Regional Development Minister Shane Jones said the Government could face a decade in court.

"I'm deeply fearful of another 10 to 15 years of litigation," he said on Tuesday.

Of course, there's a solution to that: settle. The government did it before, with fisheries, and it can do it again. And its pretty obvious what any settlement would look like: a share of any royalties or tradeable rights and a voice in environmental control. But the barrier to that doesn't seem to be iwi, but a government which is absolutely unwilling to address the issue. But if they refuse to even explore settlement, they have only themselves to blame when iwi seek to enforce their rights through the courts instead.