Minister holding on to HUD homelessness report, saying he wants further advice; Rotorua Council tries to charge charity for consents for pods for homeless; Bishop blocking new Council plans
That's a good list, and I think we could add to that. Unfortunately, withholding reports isn't confined to this government. But they do seem to have raised it to tge next level... I'm sure there is a soundbite with Luxon saying this will be the most transparent government ever and will government for all New Zealanders.
The often delayed Disability Support and Services review as per Dr Bex's Substack is another to add to the list of Ministers and Ministries holding of on reports being made public.
Also see my comments I made on here on the Aged Care and Services Funding Model Review. As of 2022/2023 there were 32,000 people in Aged Residential Care ( Note, this is not retirement living situatios) and a further 80,000 receiving
On top of that the aged care review includes those under 65 years old with dementia and their families or about 5,500 or more people with Young-onset Dementia and a conservative 21,000 if you include their direct family members. Only a relatively small percentage of people with Dementia live in residential care - the majority live in their home and community. But currently less than half have access to in home and community support and services. So the sector is absolutely waiting for this report to see what is proposed.
Been getting a few OIA (non)-responses from the Minister of Health, Ministry of Health and Te Whatu Ora so have some more "no numbers" to add
- refusal to release list of private hospitals contracted to conduct 'overflow' operations, coupled with a refusal to provide of list of the type and number of operations performed, or the cost - all apparently commercially sensitive
- refusal to provide any details or reports on the size and design of the modular transportable inpatient wards to be used during the Nelson Hospital because giving any details of these units (or copies of briefing reports to senior management or the Minister) would prejudice or disadvantage negotiations or commercial activities - when the use of these modular transportable units was announced by Minister Brown none had been designed or built and no contract to supply had been called for - another vapour ware announcement.
- the reasoning and evidence behind the Minister Brown's 2025-2026 expectations for Te Whatu Ora is not being provided because it going to be released sometime in the future.
Give Potaka a break! What people don’t understand is the effort and difficulty in excluding all the homeless prisoners who were denied emergency housing but given tents instead. /s
Add to the list of Ministers sitting on reports that contain perhaps inconvenient truths, and likely don’t align with the Coalition’s preferred narrative, the Aged Care and Services Funding Model Review Part 2. Minister Casey Costello admitted during the Health Committee’s Scrutiny Week last month that she had seen the report in late 2024.
In follow-up written questions from Labour’s Ingrid Leary, Costello said the report is now with Health NZ, and that it’s up to Health NZ when they choose to release it. So, it seems Minister Costello is now passing the buck to nameless officials (see below for what one of those officials said back in November 2024). Meanwhile, nothing has been done to help the under-resourced aged care sector, or to improve in-home and community support services.
We were told (via a written response to my RNZ interview back in November 2024) by Andy Inders, then Director of Ageing Well at Health NZ, that the report was due and would lead to funding model proposals “in the next few months.” Andy Inders is no longer in that role as of April 2025, and an Acting Director is currently in place.
And still we wait.
N.B. All of the above is drawn from publicly available sources. Though I’ve had to stitch it together from multiple points of information, I’ve used hedging words like 'perhaps' and 'seems' because these are possible conclusions. That said, I believe they’re reasonable, based on what I do know. Although, I’m cautious about presenting them as hard facts - hence the hedging words. But when Ministers and officials remain silent, just as with the homelessness situation and Minister Pōtaka, drawing reasonable conclusions is sometimes all we’re left with.
What liability does the council bear for the safety of the sleeping pod? Fees for consents only cover the cost of processing the consent so it seems a bit off to imply the council are chasing consent fees because they want the fee itself rather than to do the work they are legally obligated to do.
Its a PR own goal for the council. Good on the charity to press on with the support - it's got a catch me if you can feel to it. Given what Rotorua has gone through in the emergency housing, you'd think they'd be funding the things.
Yeah, the council could find a way to "waive" the fee (which means funding it from rates, in a cost recovery system, they can't just delete the costs) because it's in the interests of their community to provide a safe place for people to sleep. There's usually a process (sometimes an obscure one) for doing that in certain circumstances.
This government is running my drinks cabinet low. I’m going to start invoicing them.
Here’s how I look at all this - for what it’s worth - it’s about values, which can be articulated as deeply held beliefs that guide how we think and how we act. It’s not rocket science. They help frame our understanding of what is important to us in our lives. It’s about integrity, which is about being honest and having strong moral principles that you refuse to change. It’s the hill you’re prepared to die on. It’s about morals, society’s accepted principles of right and wrong. It’s about ethics, which is really the guidance system in all of us that connects us to all these codes of values, integrity, and morals. Ok, I know, that’s quite a paragraph, apologies. Please, stay with me.
Here is the values statement directly from the National Party website and I quote, “The foundation of our Party is built on the values of ambition and success; with lower taxes, reward for hard work, and equal opportunity for all at its core.” See anything wrong with this? How about the priorities? How does inequality, homelessness, caring for one another or anything even vaguely human emanate from that reductionist, managerialist, neoliberal, drivel? Let’s look at ACT. They value freedom, personal responsibility, and opportunity for all New Zealanders. Yeah, that’s just complete bullshit. The word ‘all’ should be deleted and replaced by the word ‘donors’. New Zealand First. God this is tiring. Here we go. Apparently they’re here to ensure that government never loses focus on middle New Zealand or the hard working kiwi battlers. Yep, that’s bullshit too. Name one thing they’ve done for Kiwi battlers? Smoking? Gun laws? Environmental protection? Anything?
And the absence of these very human qualities is at the heart of the problem in my opinion. It’s a government without ‘human’ values staffed with politicians without ‘human’ values. Integrity, morals, and ethics are missing-in-action. Willis, austerity. Seymour, divisiveness. Luxon, nothing but spin. Van Velden, erosion of workers rights. Peters, self-interest. The list of ‘values’ transgressions by this government is infinite. It begs the question: what does back-on-track actually mean to this government? I challenge them to define ‘back-on-track’ in everyday Kiwi language, I double dare them. No Nicola, talking about stuff doesn’t bring down the price of groceries or reduce banking dominance or spirit up ferries or revive the economy. And sorry, but growth-growth-growth…FFS.
Frankly, they’ve got nowhere to go. This government is dealing with the consequences of conflating three, non-aligned, ideological positions with an ability to solve New Zealand’s significant economic and societal challenges. It isn’t working, it will never work. Their thinking is fragmented, Industrial Age, trickle down, neoliberalism, libertarian, bullshit. It has no chance whatsoever of improving the lives of everyday New Zealanders in 2025 and beyond. Unfortunately, the leadership of this coalition government are in politics for themselves, not New Zealanders. Christopher Luxon and the government he pretends to lead are dead in the water. Let’s hope there is a real alternative waiting in the wings.
Thanks for your observations James; I can't disagree that the Coalition's three set of Values as printed in their party manifestos etc are not aligned. Even if they were followed by their respective politicians in the current government (Where the individual morals and ethics are on display, with dissenters whipped back into line).
I'd add, when donars are donating to more than one party of the right, I don't think it is the Party's value they support, rather the influence they can gain to bend those values to what they want. You've alluded to that influence.
A bit of a thought dump, and questions that I would value your and other's opinions and answers on:
At the risk of getting an invoice for restocking your drink cabinet; what would a similar exercise as you've down for National, Act, and NZ First look like for our three opposition parties ? Could they also have values in their manifestos etc that don't align with their current politicians morals and ethics? I.e. would a coalition of the left also result in ideologically differences and chaos between their written values and principles and how they are likely to act when next in power?
What needs to change in our political system to ensure things like Lange's Labour Government don't renege on their treasured values and principles, let alone how we currently see, and expect from our opposition parties in 2026 or next time in power? What consenus can they really bring? Or will it just be an ideologically driven mess like we have now?
Good question Paul. I definitely think the ideologies on the left do not fully align either. They swing from neoliberalist to activism, which is tricky, however armed with anecdotal experience I would assert that the ‘left’ in general is people centric as opposed to being commercially centric. Hipkins, Swarbrick, and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer / Rawiri Waititi versus Luxon, Seymour, and Peters are really quite different genres in this regard. That said, in my view, it is the MMP system that is even more flawed and that needs a serious overhaul to avoid the tail wagging the dog like it is now.
This list should be enough to bring a government down. But it won't.
Labour and the Greens need to be in lock step, sounding like they are the next government in waiting. A tricky balance between attacking this CoC vs providing a vision for the country.
P.S. I just noted Judith Collins got treated at Wgtn ED, no doubt pushed to the front of the queue. What wrong with her medical insurance - does it exclude vertigo ? Or she could have saved being a burden on the health system by using the Eply maneuver
Well let's just hope Judith Collins finds a moment to tell Simeon Brown about her experience there. My radiographer daughter in Chch ED reported 472 patients on Monday, with 109 still waiting to be assessed at midnight.
Could this be what our PM is referring to when he says "growth, growth, growth"?
There aren't many Maori in the national government, and Potaka is a typical National politician. A National Cabinet minister first and a Maori just when he wants to be one.
We should call out this government for what it is: a concierge service for economic charlatans, pretending to govern. A manager of a system designed to serve the profit extractors - the rentiers, who are economic parasites.
We’re seeing this with the RSB, the attempt to diminish Treaty obligations, and the deliberate underfunding of core public services, especially those that provide critical data. This is a government that does not care. It is actively dismantling the systems that make accountability possible.
We are being governed by “wealthy and sorted” ghouls.
🤔 In the absence of actual housing, emergency pods seem like the very LEAST that can be done ie sleeping out of the elements during winter. It shouldn't be THE solution, but minimum surely⁉️ IF the Council needs "consent fees" by law, there is a way around that surely - first they complain that people are in motels, throw them out then complain they are sleeping in doorways, then block a low-key interim solution 🤷 In my cosy home last night it would have been FREEZING without access to electric blankets, log fire, almost limitless warm blankets etc 🥹
This Government is becoming more & more opaque by the day.
Considering their funding cuts to research & scrapping of the 5yearly census, I would expect to see websites which have publicly available data, to also be scrapped.
NZStats & even the RBNZ(Which is where Musical Chairs gets their data from to generate those charts) will most likely become unavailable.
Medicine ads "out of step with other countries" - my understanding is that only USA and NZ permit pharmaceutical ads - has that changed or is Seymour exagerating!
Potaka not revealing homelessness data because he "needs further advice" - shares similarity with the bill regarding retirement village payouts when someone dies/moves. In that case, Potaka has said it is necessary to take time to ensure good regulation. I do wonder at the contrast with the many other bills rushed through under urgency. Is the speed with which these reviews progress linked with whom they will most financially benefit?
Apparently it's a lifestyle choice, according to the irresponsible Minister
It's a period of "no numbers":
* HLPI (Household Living-cost Price Index) - delayed until October or later
* HUD - no numbers on homelessness
* Charter schools - no numbers on enrolment
* Bootcamps - no numbers on re-offending
That's a good list, and I think we could add to that. Unfortunately, withholding reports isn't confined to this government. But they do seem to have raised it to tge next level... I'm sure there is a soundbite with Luxon saying this will be the most transparent government ever and will government for all New Zealanders.
The often delayed Disability Support and Services review as per Dr Bex's Substack is another to add to the list of Ministers and Ministries holding of on reports being made public.
Also see my comments I made on here on the Aged Care and Services Funding Model Review. As of 2022/2023 there were 32,000 people in Aged Residential Care ( Note, this is not retirement living situatios) and a further 80,000 receiving
On top of that the aged care review includes those under 65 years old with dementia and their families or about 5,500 or more people with Young-onset Dementia and a conservative 21,000 if you include their direct family members. Only a relatively small percentage of people with Dementia live in residential care - the majority live in their home and community. But currently less than half have access to in home and community support and services. So the sector is absolutely waiting for this report to see what is proposed.
Been getting a few OIA (non)-responses from the Minister of Health, Ministry of Health and Te Whatu Ora so have some more "no numbers" to add
- refusal to release list of private hospitals contracted to conduct 'overflow' operations, coupled with a refusal to provide of list of the type and number of operations performed, or the cost - all apparently commercially sensitive
- refusal to provide any details or reports on the size and design of the modular transportable inpatient wards to be used during the Nelson Hospital because giving any details of these units (or copies of briefing reports to senior management or the Minister) would prejudice or disadvantage negotiations or commercial activities - when the use of these modular transportable units was announced by Minister Brown none had been designed or built and no contract to supply had been called for - another vapour ware announcement.
- the reasoning and evidence behind the Minister Brown's 2025-2026 expectations for Te Whatu Ora is not being provided because it going to be released sometime in the future.
Potaka is looking for more advice on how to spin this govt's disastrous policies.
Just ask Simeon.
Give Potaka a break! What people don’t understand is the effort and difficulty in excluding all the homeless prisoners who were denied emergency housing but given tents instead. /s
Add to the list of Ministers sitting on reports that contain perhaps inconvenient truths, and likely don’t align with the Coalition’s preferred narrative, the Aged Care and Services Funding Model Review Part 2. Minister Casey Costello admitted during the Health Committee’s Scrutiny Week last month that she had seen the report in late 2024.
In follow-up written questions from Labour’s Ingrid Leary, Costello said the report is now with Health NZ, and that it’s up to Health NZ when they choose to release it. So, it seems Minister Costello is now passing the buck to nameless officials (see below for what one of those officials said back in November 2024). Meanwhile, nothing has been done to help the under-resourced aged care sector, or to improve in-home and community support services.
We were told (via a written response to my RNZ interview back in November 2024) by Andy Inders, then Director of Ageing Well at Health NZ, that the report was due and would lead to funding model proposals “in the next few months.” Andy Inders is no longer in that role as of April 2025, and an Acting Director is currently in place.
And still we wait.
N.B. All of the above is drawn from publicly available sources. Though I’ve had to stitch it together from multiple points of information, I’ve used hedging words like 'perhaps' and 'seems' because these are possible conclusions. That said, I believe they’re reasonable, based on what I do know. Although, I’m cautious about presenting them as hard facts - hence the hedging words. But when Ministers and officials remain silent, just as with the homelessness situation and Minister Pōtaka, drawing reasonable conclusions is sometimes all we’re left with.
"Passing the Buck" might well be today's theme.
The question to Treasury about taxing charities - we took an extra 20 days before flicking it on to IRD.
Chris Bishop's speech - "it is clear to me that New Zealanders have serious questions about the performance of local government."
ComCom's chair on Uber - Hey, just use their competitors because they don't charge their drivers as much to use the app.
Incomming: changesto the way we collect data.
After all, isn't that what we do when we don't like the numbers?
What liability does the council bear for the safety of the sleeping pod? Fees for consents only cover the cost of processing the consent so it seems a bit off to imply the council are chasing consent fees because they want the fee itself rather than to do the work they are legally obligated to do.
Its a PR own goal for the council. Good on the charity to press on with the support - it's got a catch me if you can feel to it. Given what Rotorua has gone through in the emergency housing, you'd think they'd be funding the things.
Yeah, the council could find a way to "waive" the fee (which means funding it from rates, in a cost recovery system, they can't just delete the costs) because it's in the interests of their community to provide a safe place for people to sleep. There's usually a process (sometimes an obscure one) for doing that in certain circumstances.
This government is running my drinks cabinet low. I’m going to start invoicing them.
Here’s how I look at all this - for what it’s worth - it’s about values, which can be articulated as deeply held beliefs that guide how we think and how we act. It’s not rocket science. They help frame our understanding of what is important to us in our lives. It’s about integrity, which is about being honest and having strong moral principles that you refuse to change. It’s the hill you’re prepared to die on. It’s about morals, society’s accepted principles of right and wrong. It’s about ethics, which is really the guidance system in all of us that connects us to all these codes of values, integrity, and morals. Ok, I know, that’s quite a paragraph, apologies. Please, stay with me.
Here is the values statement directly from the National Party website and I quote, “The foundation of our Party is built on the values of ambition and success; with lower taxes, reward for hard work, and equal opportunity for all at its core.” See anything wrong with this? How about the priorities? How does inequality, homelessness, caring for one another or anything even vaguely human emanate from that reductionist, managerialist, neoliberal, drivel? Let’s look at ACT. They value freedom, personal responsibility, and opportunity for all New Zealanders. Yeah, that’s just complete bullshit. The word ‘all’ should be deleted and replaced by the word ‘donors’. New Zealand First. God this is tiring. Here we go. Apparently they’re here to ensure that government never loses focus on middle New Zealand or the hard working kiwi battlers. Yep, that’s bullshit too. Name one thing they’ve done for Kiwi battlers? Smoking? Gun laws? Environmental protection? Anything?
And the absence of these very human qualities is at the heart of the problem in my opinion. It’s a government without ‘human’ values staffed with politicians without ‘human’ values. Integrity, morals, and ethics are missing-in-action. Willis, austerity. Seymour, divisiveness. Luxon, nothing but spin. Van Velden, erosion of workers rights. Peters, self-interest. The list of ‘values’ transgressions by this government is infinite. It begs the question: what does back-on-track actually mean to this government? I challenge them to define ‘back-on-track’ in everyday Kiwi language, I double dare them. No Nicola, talking about stuff doesn’t bring down the price of groceries or reduce banking dominance or spirit up ferries or revive the economy. And sorry, but growth-growth-growth…FFS.
Frankly, they’ve got nowhere to go. This government is dealing with the consequences of conflating three, non-aligned, ideological positions with an ability to solve New Zealand’s significant economic and societal challenges. It isn’t working, it will never work. Their thinking is fragmented, Industrial Age, trickle down, neoliberalism, libertarian, bullshit. It has no chance whatsoever of improving the lives of everyday New Zealanders in 2025 and beyond. Unfortunately, the leadership of this coalition government are in politics for themselves, not New Zealanders. Christopher Luxon and the government he pretends to lead are dead in the water. Let’s hope there is a real alternative waiting in the wings.
Thanks for your observations James; I can't disagree that the Coalition's three set of Values as printed in their party manifestos etc are not aligned. Even if they were followed by their respective politicians in the current government (Where the individual morals and ethics are on display, with dissenters whipped back into line).
I'd add, when donars are donating to more than one party of the right, I don't think it is the Party's value they support, rather the influence they can gain to bend those values to what they want. You've alluded to that influence.
A bit of a thought dump, and questions that I would value your and other's opinions and answers on:
At the risk of getting an invoice for restocking your drink cabinet; what would a similar exercise as you've down for National, Act, and NZ First look like for our three opposition parties ? Could they also have values in their manifestos etc that don't align with their current politicians morals and ethics? I.e. would a coalition of the left also result in ideologically differences and chaos between their written values and principles and how they are likely to act when next in power?
What needs to change in our political system to ensure things like Lange's Labour Government don't renege on their treasured values and principles, let alone how we currently see, and expect from our opposition parties in 2026 or next time in power? What consenus can they really bring? Or will it just be an ideologically driven mess like we have now?
Good question Paul. I definitely think the ideologies on the left do not fully align either. They swing from neoliberalist to activism, which is tricky, however armed with anecdotal experience I would assert that the ‘left’ in general is people centric as opposed to being commercially centric. Hipkins, Swarbrick, and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer / Rawiri Waititi versus Luxon, Seymour, and Peters are really quite different genres in this regard. That said, in my view, it is the MMP system that is even more flawed and that needs a serious overhaul to avoid the tail wagging the dog like it is now.
This list should be enough to bring a government down. But it won't.
Labour and the Greens need to be in lock step, sounding like they are the next government in waiting. A tricky balance between attacking this CoC vs providing a vision for the country.
P.S. I just noted Judith Collins got treated at Wgtn ED, no doubt pushed to the front of the queue. What wrong with her medical insurance - does it exclude vertigo ? Or she could have saved being a burden on the health system by using the Eply maneuver
https://alignwc.com/4-best-vertigo-maneuvers-instant-relief/
Well let's just hope Judith Collins finds a moment to tell Simeon Brown about her experience there. My radiographer daughter in Chch ED reported 472 patients on Monday, with 109 still waiting to be assessed at midnight.
Could this be what our PM is referring to when he says "growth, growth, growth"?
There aren't many Maori in the national government, and Potaka is a typical National politician. A National Cabinet minister first and a Maori just when he wants to be one.
🤔 Like Shane Reti & "I'm-Indigenous" Seymour et al 🤢
We should call out this government for what it is: a concierge service for economic charlatans, pretending to govern. A manager of a system designed to serve the profit extractors - the rentiers, who are economic parasites.
We’re seeing this with the RSB, the attempt to diminish Treaty obligations, and the deliberate underfunding of core public services, especially those that provide critical data. This is a government that does not care. It is actively dismantling the systems that make accountability possible.
We are being governed by “wealthy and sorted” ghouls.
🤔 In the absence of actual housing, emergency pods seem like the very LEAST that can be done ie sleeping out of the elements during winter. It shouldn't be THE solution, but minimum surely⁉️ IF the Council needs "consent fees" by law, there is a way around that surely - first they complain that people are in motels, throw them out then complain they are sleeping in doorways, then block a low-key interim solution 🤷 In my cosy home last night it would have been FREEZING without access to electric blankets, log fire, almost limitless warm blankets etc 🥹
This Government is becoming more & more opaque by the day.
Considering their funding cuts to research & scrapping of the 5yearly census, I would expect to see websites which have publicly available data, to also be scrapped.
NZStats & even the RBNZ(Which is where Musical Chairs gets their data from to generate those charts) will most likely become unavailable.
Very concerning.
Medicine ads "out of step with other countries" - my understanding is that only USA and NZ permit pharmaceutical ads - has that changed or is Seymour exagerating!
Potaka not revealing homelessness data because he "needs further advice" - shares similarity with the bill regarding retirement village payouts when someone dies/moves. In that case, Potaka has said it is necessary to take time to ensure good regulation. I do wonder at the contrast with the many other bills rushed through under urgency. Is the speed with which these reviews progress linked with whom they will most financially benefit?