Archives for September 2014

19 September 2014 by Jan Rivers

On the cusp of something very special (part two).

So Bill English thinks that welfare is like crack cocaine and the successful National Government has announced its intention to cut the welfare bill significantly. He revealed in June that if re-elected National will bring about the biggest changes to public services that NZ has seen in 50 years. How will it do this? Here is […]

17 September 2014 by Jan Rivers

On the cusp of something very special?

Is the National Party keeping some things out of sight in case they frighten the electorate? Here is some worrying evidence that this may be the case. On 20 June this year there was a Wikileaks release on the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA) and the media coverage internationally was mainly related to its potential […]

15 September 2014 by Jan Rivers

Conference report back

Democracy, ethics and the public good – The 2014 Geering Event Our conference took place on the weekend of 1/2 August and attracted a good crowd. Listed below is information about the presentations made and organisations represented at the conference. Panel presentations, workshops and time for networking helped us to refresh the language of democratic […]

10 September 2014 by Jan Rivers

Speech to the clean politics rally Parliament 10 September

Several people at the rally asked me to publish this speech. Here it is Tena koutou e hoa ma Ko Jan Rivers toku ingoa We held a conference at St Andrews on the Terrace on Aug 1 and 2. The topic was democracy, ethics and the public good. But the Public Good is really much […]

9 September 2014 by Jan Rivers

Clean politics rally Wednesday September 10 12.00 Parliament Steps

A ‘washing-line’ of placards with three key ideas for cleaning up politics in the wake of the Dirty Politics saga will be displayed by attenders of a Kiwis for Clean Politics gathering on Wednesday at 12pm. Melinda Gamlen, organiser of the event was so shocked and dismayed at the corrupt activities going on in the […]

2 September 2014 by Jan Rivers

Democracy issues for candidates using Askaway

Campaigning organisation Action Station is using the social media election site Askaway to pose questions about the quality of our democracy. Some of these questions were raised by participants at the recent conference Democracy, Ethics and the Public Good. There are many great questions but the following relate specifically to the quality of our democracy […]