Thursday, September 15, 2005
The future government of New Zealand could be decided by a handful of voters in Epsom. And it looks seriously like National could win the battle but lose the war. I fear that the following is the likely scenario for Saturday:
On current polling, National looks on target to gain the greatest number of party votes (perhaps in the vicinity of 40%), which will give them around 50 seats in Parliament. United Future could gain 3-4 seats, and New Zealand First 7-8 seats. But Winston Peters has said NZ First will not go into coalition with either party. So a National-United Future coalition could be up to 5 seats short of a working majority.
The cold, hard fact is that National needs ACT to gain 4-5 seats. But ACT has almost no hope of doing that unless leader Rodney Hide wins the electorate seat of Epsom.
This is where the situation becomes bizarre. National has not only refused to give Rodney Hide an easy ride to a polling victory, it is actively campaigning against him. And Labour is so desperate to keep ACT out of Parliament, it has suggested that Labour supporters should also vote for the National candidate, Richard Worth. Without National's covert support, it is virtually impossible for Hide to win, which means National cannot muster the numbers to form a government. Why National is shooting itself in the foot, for the life of me I cannot imagine. The party is obviously banking on gaining an absolute majority of seats, which on all current indications looks a forlorn hope.
So Labour could be left to cobble together a coalition with the Greens, Progressive's one seat, United Future, and maybe the Maori Party.
A new book highlights a growing trend among New Zealanders in mid-life to change jobs rather than endure workplace misery, burn-out and boredom. You Don't Make A Big Leap Without A Gulp offers practical advice and tips about how to go about a major mid-life career change, and features the stories of a range of New Zealanders who've summoned the courage to make the transition. Authors Mike Fitzsimons and Nigel Beckford say they were inspired to write the book after hearing horror stories from fellow mid-lifers trapped in jobs they couldn't wait to leave. Fitzsimons says too many Kiwis endure work they don't like or they've done for too long: "According to recent workplace surveys, only 17% of Kiwi workers feel any sense of connection to where they work. Sixty-eight percent of us don't rate our boss or the management and only 25% of us are actually happy in our jobs. After a Christmas break, up to 1 in 14 of Kiwi workers visited an internet recruitment site to look at alternatives..." The case studies featured in the book include a corporate executive turned social worker, a publican turned university lecturer, a builder turned fly-fishing guide and a teacher turned lawyer.
A little-known law that prevents people marrying their sons-in-law or daughters-in-law is likely to be scrapped after a European Court ruling yesterday that it breaches human rights. The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg said that to deny in-laws the right to wed was a breach of their human right to marry and found a family.
A Chinese cosmetics company is using skin harvested from the corpses of executed convicts to develop beauty products for sale in Europe, an investigation by the Guardian has discovered. Agents for the firm have told would-be customers it is developing collagen for lip and wrinkle treatments from skin taken from prisoners after they have been shot. The agents say some of the company's products have been exported to the UK, and that the use of skin from condemned convicts is "traditional" and nothing to "make such a big fuss about".
"In a world of religious wars, genocide, and terrorism, no one is naive enough to think that all moral beliefs are universal. But beneath such diversity, can we discern a common core — a distinct, universal, maybe even innate “moral sense” in our human nature?"
On current polling, National looks on target to gain the greatest number of party votes (perhaps in the vicinity of 40%), which will give them around 50 seats in Parliament. United Future could gain 3-4 seats, and New Zealand First 7-8 seats. But Winston Peters has said NZ First will not go into coalition with either party. So a National-United Future coalition could be up to 5 seats short of a working majority.
The cold, hard fact is that National needs ACT to gain 4-5 seats. But ACT has almost no hope of doing that unless leader Rodney Hide wins the electorate seat of Epsom.
This is where the situation becomes bizarre. National has not only refused to give Rodney Hide an easy ride to a polling victory, it is actively campaigning against him. And Labour is so desperate to keep ACT out of Parliament, it has suggested that Labour supporters should also vote for the National candidate, Richard Worth. Without National's covert support, it is virtually impossible for Hide to win, which means National cannot muster the numbers to form a government. Why National is shooting itself in the foot, for the life of me I cannot imagine. The party is obviously banking on gaining an absolute majority of seats, which on all current indications looks a forlorn hope.
So Labour could be left to cobble together a coalition with the Greens, Progressive's one seat, United Future, and maybe the Maori Party.
A new book highlights a growing trend among New Zealanders in mid-life to change jobs rather than endure workplace misery, burn-out and boredom. You Don't Make A Big Leap Without A Gulp offers practical advice and tips about how to go about a major mid-life career change, and features the stories of a range of New Zealanders who've summoned the courage to make the transition. Authors Mike Fitzsimons and Nigel Beckford say they were inspired to write the book after hearing horror stories from fellow mid-lifers trapped in jobs they couldn't wait to leave. Fitzsimons says too many Kiwis endure work they don't like or they've done for too long: "According to recent workplace surveys, only 17% of Kiwi workers feel any sense of connection to where they work. Sixty-eight percent of us don't rate our boss or the management and only 25% of us are actually happy in our jobs. After a Christmas break, up to 1 in 14 of Kiwi workers visited an internet recruitment site to look at alternatives..." The case studies featured in the book include a corporate executive turned social worker, a publican turned university lecturer, a builder turned fly-fishing guide and a teacher turned lawyer.
A little-known law that prevents people marrying their sons-in-law or daughters-in-law is likely to be scrapped after a European Court ruling yesterday that it breaches human rights. The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg said that to deny in-laws the right to wed was a breach of their human right to marry and found a family.
A Chinese cosmetics company is using skin harvested from the corpses of executed convicts to develop beauty products for sale in Europe, an investigation by the Guardian has discovered. Agents for the firm have told would-be customers it is developing collagen for lip and wrinkle treatments from skin taken from prisoners after they have been shot. The agents say some of the company's products have been exported to the UK, and that the use of skin from condemned convicts is "traditional" and nothing to "make such a big fuss about".
"In a world of religious wars, genocide, and terrorism, no one is naive enough to think that all moral beliefs are universal. But beneath such diversity, can we discern a common core — a distinct, universal, maybe even innate “moral sense” in our human nature?"
