NZDF are murderers

That's the only conclusion that can be drawn from the NZDF's latest admission to the Operation Burnham inquiry:

An SAS sniper killed an Afghan target without identifying if the person was armed during a controversial night-time raid.

The New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) made the admission in a memo to the Operation Burnham inquiry published this month, after asserting the person was an insurgent carrying a weapon.

"It is not possible to determine conclusively whether or not the insurgent observed by the [remotely piloted aircraft] was armed at the moment he was engaged."

The Government inquiry, at a third public hearing on Monday, heard the killing of civilians is prohibited under international humanitarian law, and suspected combatants should be treated as civilians if there is doubt.

NZDF clearly did not do that, and appears not to have even tried. The latter turns this from (most charitably) a horrible accident in the heat of battle to depraved indifference. As for the shooter, they should be prosecuted for murder and/or war crimes.

Will National stay the party of climate change denial?

The National party has a long history of climate change denial. When they were the opposition to the Clark government, they opposed the carbon tax, opposed biofuels, and infamously drove a tractor up Parliament's steps to symbolise their opposition to farmers contributing to the cost of researching solutions to agricultural emissions. When in government, the first thing they did was gut the ETS and remove restrictions on fossil-fuel electricity generation. And back in opposition, they have opposed every measure the government has offered to reduce emissions. Why? Reporting from the weekend's party conference makes this clear: because their rural core vote are climate change deniers:

Addressing the party faithful, [climate change spokesperson Todd] Muller caused some to grumble as he spoke about the need for an agricultural response to climate change, pointing to “market signals” from consumers and businesses that could not be ignored.

[...]

The first question from the audience did little to suggest that message had got through.

“Methane is 0.000082 percent of the atmosphere, it comes from a cow, emanates from a cow at either end...could you please explain to me how it actually contributes to global warming?”

[...]

“The previous National government was quite comfortable that the science expressed by the global scientists in the IPCC reports were valid.”

“Rubbish,” interjected one audience member. “Are you saying the science is settled?,” shouted another.

A less extreme critique came from someone noting New Zealand’s minimal contribution to greenhouse gases compared to larger nations.

“Given that we’re 0.17 percent, even if we achieve and aspire...to get to zero percent, what the hell are we going to achieve on a global basis from a global perspective and why do we need to lead the world?”

...and so on. They're not all like that, but these are National's core voters, the people it is there to represent. And with them, it seems like its denial all the way down.

Its a problem for National, because they are going to have to deal seriously with this issue next time they are in government. The climate crisis is not going to go away just because a bunch of backwards rural hicks don't believe in it, and urban voters (who are facing entire suburbs being drowned) are going to demand action. National will need to respond with effective measures, or risk losing the votes of the 80% of us who live in cities. It's that simple.

The Zero Carbon Bill is the real test of this. If they support it and strong methane targets, they're a credible party. If they oppose it, then they're a climate denial party and should be treated with all the seriousness such loonies deserve.

Something is rotten on the West Coast

That's the only conclusion that can be drawn from Development West Coast contractor Kevin Stratful's demand that West Coast local authorities ignore the LGOIMA for his benefit:

A Development West Coast contractor has urged West Coast councils to "avoid" responding to requests for official information.

[...]

In an email chain to Coast mayors and council chief executives, obtained by Stuff, Stratful said all councils and the DWC should have a joint policy on how Official Information Act (OIA) requests were handled "and what process or policies are put into place to avoid them".

He said the leaders should agree on a "West Coast Way" of handling OIA requests. He also said he had previously been given "the chance to edit" responses before they were sent to the media.

"If current OIA request continue and the ED [economic development] unit is subject to OIA it will become a joke resorting to back street meetings and coffee shops to get anything done," he wrote.

Stratful has a lot to fear from LGOIMA. Quite apart from the usual oversight it entails, he's involved in a dodgy "waste to energy" incinerator scheme which has seen a mayor censured for purportedly signing contracts without the approval of his council. He has a direct conflict of interest over this with his employer. So he has reason to be particularly fearful of transparency. The good news is that the councils seem to have ignored his demands - and now they are public, its prima facie grounds for an Ombudsman's complaint for any withholds related to him or Development West Coast. By seeking to avoid transparency, he's simply told people where to point the spotlight.

Meanwhile, there's a bigger question here: Development West Coast is a charitable trust administering $124 million of public money given to the West Coast as "compensation" for the end of native forestry there. Its board is mostly elected by West Coast voters, with a few government and local body appointees. It deals with public money for public purposes. Shouldn't it therefore be directly subject to the LGOIMA oversight regime, like licensing trusts or various other trust boards are?

Tax the rich to save the climate

The Greens often say that social justice is a necessary part of environmental justice. How? There's a good example in an article from Le Monde by economist Thomas Piketty. It turns out that the rich are some of the biggest climate criminals on the planet, so solving the climate crisis means solving inequality:

However, it is increasingly clear that the resolution of the climate challenge will not be possible without a strong movement in the direction of the compression of social inequalities at all levels. With the present magnitude of inequality, the advance towards austerity of energy will be wishful thinking. In the first instance because carbon emissions are strongly concentrated amongst the rich. At world level, the richest 10% are responsible for almost half the emissions and the top 1% alone emit more carbon than the poorest half of the planet. A drastic reduction in purchasing power of the richest would therefore in itself have a substantial impact on the reduction of emissions at global level.

How? Private jets, multiple houses, big cars, and leisure air travel are some obvious answers. Higher taxation would help limit this environmentally destructive overconsumption, as well as providing the usual benefits of lower inequality (lower crime, better life expectancies, lower health costs and everything else). So if we want to save the planet, we really do need to tax the rich.

New Zealand's dirtiest emitters

A couple of years ago we learned the shocking statistic that just 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global greenhouse gas emissions. So what about New Zealand? If anything, its worse: a study by Stuff has found 68% of our emissions - 54.5 million tons - are caused by just ten companies:


Its largely what you'd expect: Fonterra with all its cows, petrol companies, the two electricity companies still clinging to fossil generation, Air New Zealand, and a few large industrial emitters. Not included, because they fell just outside the top ten: the Tiwai Point aluminium smelter, which demanded a fat emissions subsidy from the government, then halved its emissions, and Bluescope (formerly New Zealand) Steel, which runs a dirtier-than-average steel factory in Glenbrook.

Stuff had to dig this information out of companies' annual reports, because currently it is all legally secret. The good news is that that is going to change: the government has decided to publish firm-level ETS data, allowing the public to scrutinise high-emitting companies and vote with their wallets where they can. Which suggests that there's absolutely no need for the secrecy clause anymore, and that it should be repealed entirely.

New Fisk

Genocides begin in the wilderness, far from prying eyes – in Ottoman Turkey as well as Nazi Germany

Spain fails to get a government

Back in April, Spanish voters went to the polls to elect a new parliament. The Socialists emerged as the largest party, with 28.7% of the vote. But despite being the only party with the possibility of forming a government, they have failed to do so:

Spain’s Socialist caretaker prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has failed at a second attempt to form a government after he could not reach agreement with his only potential coalition partner, the anti-austerity party Unidas Podemos.

Sánchez only needed a simple majority in parliament to get a deal across the line but after 48 hours of hectic negotiating the Podemos leader, Pablo Iglesias, announced his party would abstain during the second round of voting and the result was 124 in Sánchez’s favour, 155 against and 67 abstentions.

The Socialists blame Podemos, for not accepting whatever crumbs they were offered (or better, offering them support for free). But it seems the Socialists weren't that keen on a deal in the first place, rejecting every reduced offer from Podemos. Which really doesn't seem like the basis for a successful coalition. Meanwhile, the Socialists also arrogantly demanded the support of the Catalan parties, while refusing to even discuss independence or the end of repression. Oddly, they didn't get that either.

As for what happens next, they have two more months to try and form a government, otherwise its back to the polls in November.

Another climate emergency

Whangārei has become the latest city to declare a climate emergency:

Whangārei District Council is the latest local body to formally sound the alarm over greenhouse gas emissions, by declaring a climate change emergency.

It's been warned that without urgent action, Whangārei coastal communities will be under water in the decades to come, and rising sea levels could also threaten the city's new $26 million Hundertwasser centre.

The council chambers were packed yesterday with members of the public, and more people waiting outside, in support of a move to declare that climate change is a threat to the Whangārei community, its biodiversity, its economy - and the life-supporting capacity of the planet.

So again: where's Parliament? What happened to "my generation's nuclear free moment"? Is the government actually serious about this, or is it just spewing more hot air?

Climate Change: Farmers plan to fail

The Environment Committee has begun hearing submissions on the Zero Carbon Bill, and farmers are first out of the gate, claiming that the targets are "unattainable":

Politicians have been told an "unachievable" 47 per cent methane reduction target would be setting farmers up to fail and investment in technology needs to be made first.

[...]

DairyNZ chief executive Dr Tim Mackle said he aimed to "send a clear message" that targets were "unattainable" for farmers and to convey their opinion that the books have been significantly "undercooked".

To point out the obvious, the targets are only "unattainable" if you assume that farmers can do nothing to meet them. But there's an obvious way to reduce biogenic methane by 47%: reduce cow numbers by 47%. And this can be done quite quickly within the farm business cycle, simply by not replacing cows as they are killed.

Obviously, farmers don't want to do that, because their imagination extends only as a far as a high-volume, low-value production model. But if they don't want to do that, then the onus is on them to find another way. And if they think there's a technological solution, then they need to step up, fund it, and adopt it.

But as usual, this isn't really a good faith argument. The fundamental problem here is that farmers don't want to change. And so they whine about the need for "research" (which they refuse to fund) and "technology" (which they refuse to adopt) as a delaying tactic, in an effort to keep on getting a free ride from the rest of us. But after nearly two decades of such whining and inaction, its become a little obvious. And we should not tolerate it any longer. Instead, we should make farmers pay their way for once in their lives, rather than leeching off the rest of us.

Climate Change: No doubt left

Since climate change first emerged as a global problem, the fossil fuel industry has worked hard to undermine and deny it, by trying to pretend its all natural variation. But science says there's no doubt left:

The scientific consensus that humans are causing global warming is likely to have passed 99%, according to the lead author of the most authoritative study on the subject, and could rise further after separate research that clears up some of the remaining doubts.

Three studies published in Nature and Nature Geoscience use extensive historical data to show there has never been a period in the last 2,000 years when temperature changes have been as fast and extensive as in recent decades.

It had previously been thought that similarly dramatic peaks and troughs might have occurred in the past, including in periods dubbed the Little Ice Age and the Medieval Climate Anomaly. But the three studies use reconstructions based on 700 proxy records of temperature change, such as trees, ice and sediment, from all continents that indicate none of these shifts took place in more than half the globe at any one time.

Previous shifts can be attributed to volcanic cooling. But the signal of industrial warming is now so strong and so widespread as to completely overwhelm it.

The authors naively hope that this will end climate denial. It should among actual scientists. But deniers are no longer operating in good faith, and have surrendered that title. Instead, they're just public relations mercenaries, advertisers, not scientists.

New Fisk

Trump is powering the UK’s preparations for war – it is he who needs to be deterred, not Iran

Bastion Point 2.0

In 1863, in the lead up to its illegal invasion of the Waikato, the New Zealand government illegally confiscated the land of Māori living south of Auckland. One of the areas confiscated was Ihumātao, once one of the biggest farming areas in the country. Over the years, the stolen land was pillaged, quarried, and destroyed, but some of its archaeological heritage still survives. Now, its all going to be bulldozed by a foreign-owned developer to make homes for the rich.

The injustice of this ought to be apparent to all. This is stolen land, and rather than being returned, it is going to be split up and alienated forever. Local Māori have been occupying the site, but yesterday the police moved in to evict them - just as they had evicted Māori from Bastion Point 41 years ago. But the protestors have not given up, and are blockading the site in an effort to stop the bulldozers. They need your help, and your support. We should not be letting this happen in modern New Zealand.

More RMA reform

The Resource Management Act is one of the most important pieces of legislation in the country, both in terms of its impact and its influence. If you want to build a house, run a farm, or dig a mine, or if you have opinions on whether someone else should be allowed to, then you interact with this legislation, and the way it is written literally shapes the environment around us. So, every government since 1991 has engaged in "RMA reform", typically to enable rich people to do those things more easily while restricting the ability of the rest of us to have any say on it. And the current government is no exception. They've just announced plans to "reform" the RMA, tasking an Expert Advisory Group to look at various questions, including how it will work with the Zero Carbon Bill. The good news is that they seem to want to reverse many of National's "reforms", which involved making the RMA less democratic and allowing landowners to chainsaw any tree they wanted. The bad news is that taking a proper look at things takes time, so they don't expect to have a bill before May next year, which given usual slippage and the need for an election, probably means mid-2021. by which time the political landscape will have changed, and the desire for RMA reform (or rather, which RMA reform) with it.

The other good news is that they have identified some priority issues for immediate change. Unfortunately, there's no word on what these are, but I'm hoping they include s104E, which bans local authorities from explicitly considering climate change, as well as the parallel clause in the Exclusive Economic Zone Act. We're in the middle of a climate crisis, and it is utterly nonsensical to tie the hands of what could be an effective tool to prevent it.

Update: Environment Minister David parker has confirmed in Question Time that the government does not plan to urgently repeal s104E or similar clauses, or to restore tree protection (which National gutted). So there's nothing good here. As usual.

Still taking the piss

Last year, the Supreme Court ruled on the pillage of swamp kauri, stating clearly that export was forbidden unless it had been clearly turned into a finished product. But less than a month later, MPI was again approving minimally carved logs for export, pretending they were "finished products" so the pillagers could make a quick buck:

A Supreme Court judgment has placed Te Uru Rākau, the Ministry for Primary Industry forestry arm in the role of deciding what’s art and what’s a log.

Te Uru Rākau's call is a swamp kauri log with light carvings, similar to those found inadequate as to be considered a finished product, and a paua shell-dotted resin inlay is a genuine sculpture.

[...]

The decision to call an item exported in December, barely a month after the Supreme's Courts judgment, a sculpture has shocked the Northland Environmental Protection Society’s Fiona Furrell.

“I feel this Ministry is making a mockery of the Supreme Court ruling.”

And she's right. The "products" MPI is approving are no different from the raw logs the Supreme Court ruled were illegal. Which is not the sort of behaviour I'd expect from a government agency. But I guess that's what happens when you let yourself be completely captured by the industry you are supposed to be regulating.

"My generation's nuclear-free moment"?

When she was running for election, Jacinda Ardern called climate change "my generation's nuclear-free moment". It was meant to convey a sense of both the scale and moral imperitive of the challenge. So how is her government meeting that challenge? By subsidising oil drilling:

The Government has extended an income tax exemption for oil rigs for another five years until 2024, despite leading a worldwide push not to subsidise fossil fuel companies.

It says the tax break is necessary to stop the oil rigs and seismic vehicles "churning" in and out of New Zealand waters every 183 days to escape all tax liability, and means that they will still pay other taxes to the Government.

Revenue Minister Stuart Nash simply told Stuff the decision was "the right thing to do" when asked on his way into caucus.

The explicit justification for the policy is that without it, less oil exploration would take place. Which is exactly what we need to happen if we are to prevent the destruction of the global climate. But it seems that the government would rather have the climate destroyed than have oil companies angry at it. So much for the nuclear-free moment...

"The most transparent government ever"?

In its Open Government Partnership National Action Plan, the government promised to "Test the merits of undertaking a review of the Official Information Act 1982 and provide and publish advice to Government". Originally, they planned to do this in secret, but when that was exposed, moved to public consultation. So how's it going? Sadly, it doesn't seem to be a priority:

A decision on whether to review 40-year-old Official Information laws has been quietly pushed back.

In March, Justice Ministry officials asked the public for feedback on how freedom of information legislation is working, with a view to carrying out a review.

A decision was due to be made by Justice Minister Andrew Little in June.

But documents published by the Ministry and the State Services Commission show that has been delayed until September.

"The most transparent government ever"? Yeah, right. And remember, this is a review of whether to have a review.

Meanwhile, I have been working my way through the submissions - which you can read here - and a number of themes have emerged. There is a strong strand of public servants complaining about Ministers and "no surprises" management pressuring them to make unlawful withholding decisions. There is strong demand from requesters for criminal penalties for intentionally and unlawfully thwarting requests - something supported by those public servants, and by the Ombudsman, who see it as giving them something to point to to resist Ministerial demands. There is widespread dissatisfaction from both sides with the slowness of the Ombudsman's review process, and from requesters about its one-sided nature. Almost all of the experts given followup interviews supported a full review (though some from the Law Commission wanted the government to implement their previous one), and none of them supported impunity for proactive release (which Ministry of Justice has been using this process to push). Any honest reading of these submisisons would find that the OIA should be reviewed. The question is whether "the most transparent government ever" wants to do that, or whether they want to retain the status quo. Hmmm, I wonder...

About time

In the wake of the March 15 mass-murder, the government moved swiftly to ban semi-automatic firearms, weapons for which there is really no case for being allowed to own in New Zealand. and now, it has announced phase two of its gun control plans: a national firearms register, and tighter licensing restrictions:

The government is to establish a firearms register and make major changes to the licensing regime, in the second phase of gun law reforms.

[...]

A second piece of legislation will now set up a national register, which is expected to take about five years to capture the estimated 250,000 licence holders in New Zealand.

Gun owners will be required to sign up to the register when they get a licence, get one renewed, or when they buy or sell firearms.

If a licence holder is not on the register after five years, they will have to proactively sign up.

Licenses will need to be renewed every five years, and there will be much tighter character requirements. Dealers will face tougher restrictions too. The changes should make kiwis a lot safer, with a minimal impact on legitimate gun owners. As for the gun industry, they'll no doubt scream bloody murder about it. And by doing so, they'll make the case for even tighter regulation in future.

Petty fools with fragile egos

Local body politicians are concerned that the hostile online environment might deter people from running, and want British-style laws to prevent "online attacks". So what sorts of attacks are they concerned about? Death threats (illegal under the Crimes Act)? Sustained online harassment campaigns(illegal under the Harmful Digital Communications Act)? Defamation (a simple tort)? None of the above:

Mr Cull said criticism was part and parcel of public life, but there should be limits.

"If you didn't allow it you wouldn't have a functioning democracy, but I think that too often it's playing the man and not the ball.

"We need to stick to issues."

Marlborough District councillor Cynthia Brooks, who was stepping down this year after two terms, said a lot of criticism stemmed from a lack of awareness.

It was especially noticeable every time there was a story on councillor attendances at meetings.

"Criticism". "Playing the man and not the ball". "A lack of awareness". And they call us "snowflakes". The first are simply a basic part of public life. The other has a very obvious recourse of more transparency about the job and what it entails. Neither seems to remotely reach the threshold required to justify any regulation of speech.

(RNZ also quotes a younger candidate, one used to social media, about curation. Which seems to be a much more mature attitude than that of the older, experienced politicians. Its the internet, you don't have to see anything you don't want to, and you'll almost certainly be much happier if you don't.)

There are real problems online with hate speech, threats, and serious online bullying. That's why we have the (flawed) HDCA. That's why we're having a conversation about hate speech. These petty fools and their fragile little egos aren't helping that. And no doubt, they'd use this post as an example of the "abuse" they face online.

Accountability?

When allegations emerged that civilians had been killed during an SAS raid in Afghanistan, NZDF was absolutely unequivocal in its denials, both the Ministers and the public. Since then, we've learned that they were well aware that there were reports that people had been killed. Whether they knowingly lied to us to protect their reputation is one of the central questions the inquiry is supposed to answer. And the inquiry is sufficiently uncomfortable about the evidence it has that rather than doing it all behind closed doors, it is going to force NZDF to face public cross-examination about its honesty:

The Inquiry into Operation Burnham issued an order for NZ Defence Force to appear during five days of public hearings and explain discrepancies which have emerged in its evidence.

[...]

The discrepancy was such the Inquiry said evidence about what NZDF knew, and what it then relayed to the Beehive, should be examined in public hearings.

The Inquiry said NZDF "made firm statements publicly that no civilian casualties occurred" and went on to support ministers making similar statements.

"These actions were taken despite the repeated allegations of civilian casualties in the media and elsewhere from immediately after the Operation until the present.

"Given that the statements of NZDF and ministers were made publicly, the Inquiry considers that they should be explained publicly."

Good. Though it will be interesting to see whether it is just the current NZDF leadership, or those who were in charge at the time (including former Governor-General Lt General Jerry Mateparae) who will face questioning. And it will also be interesting to see whether they answer, or try to hide behind another wall of bullshit.

Meanwhile, if you read the briefing to the Prime Minister in that article, their description of Operation Burnham claims that NZ troops were actively opposed by "a large number of armed insurgents, operating in small groups" who "attempted to outflank the force and fire on it from high ground". Which doesn't seem to fit with any description of what happened at all. Were NZDF talking up their raid to make themselves seem more heroic as well? And if they do such things, how can any of us trust them about anything?

New Fisk

At Cologne’s Gestapo museum, visitors are drawing modern parallels – can we really say they’re being simplistic?