No sales this term

The government’s response to the Capital market Task Force report has prompted questions about the possible sale of State Owned Enterprises.

One of National’s election promises was that is wouldn’t sell any state assets in its first term.

That doesn’t preclude discussion on possible sales, possibly only partial, in a future term.

Landcorp would be a good place to start. I can’t think of any good reasons for the government to be involved in farming and some of the SOE’s farms were sold under the previous administration.

Listing would shine a bit of daylight on the operation of SOEs and there could be benefits from the financial rigor required of publicly listed companies.

Divesting even part of the shareholding from the government to individuals would free up public money for other things and provide much-needed opportunities for investment in something other than property.

Is NZ cream double anyway?

Medusa left a comment yesterday asking why we can’t get double cream.

I’ve seen it in recipes and overseas supermarkets but have never come across it here.

So what makes cream double?

Wikipedia says it’s all to do with fat content. Double cream in the UK has a minimum of 48% milk fat; in the USA it’s 38 – 40% and in Australia 48 – 60%.

New Zealand cows are bred to produce milk with a high fat content because most of our milk goes for export butter, cheese and milk powder rather than fresh milk for local consumption.

Dairy farmers are paid per kilo of milk solids (which used to be called milk fat) rather than per litre of milk as happens in most other countries.

I’m wondering if that means all the cream in our supermarkets has at least a 48% milk fat unless it says it’s light.

Consent delays could cost councils

The government is following through it’s promise to streamline the RMA with a proposal for efficiency incentives on the processing of consent applications.

In announcing the plan, Environment Minister Nick Smith said:

“Last year’s report on resource consent processing identified that 31% of resource consents were processed late and another 28% involved an extension of time,” Dr Smith said. “The report also identified that this problem had got progressively worse over the last decade.

“This new policy of a financial penalty on councils for late consent processing is designed to reverse this trend and get councils focused on providing a timely service.”

The discount regulations suggested approach is that councils must provide a discount of 25% for a consent one week late, with an additional 5% per week up to a maximum of 80%. The regulations also set out procedures for determining fault, and definitions to ensure the incentives are workable.

“It has long been councils’ policy that a penalty is loaded on ratepayers for failing to pay rates on time. If it’s good enough for the goose; it’s good enough for the gander. This new policy applies the same principle where the council fails to meet statutory timeframes.

“These regulations will set the minimum discount for lateness but councils will have the option of developing their own tougher regime if they wish. For instance, some councils already offer a free consent if late (i.e. a 100% discount) and will be able to continue to do so.

“This new policy is about recognising that time is money. New Zealand’s economic recovery cannot be held back by inefficient and costly red tape.

It would be difficult to quantify the cost of prolonging the resource consent process. But most applicants complain about the time taken to process applications and comment that a private business wouldn’t survive if they worked so slowly. One of the reasons for that is that private businesses are very aware of the cost of delays.

Incentivising efficiency, or disincentivising delay, will ensure that councils and their staff also understand the dollar value of delay.

It’s a policy that could well be applied to some central government agencies and their processes too.

More information on the proposal is available at the Environment Ministry.

February 19 in history

On February 19:

197 Roman Emperor Septimius Severus defeated usurper Clodius Albinus in the Battle of Lugdunum, the bloodiest battle between Roman armies.

1473 Nicolaus Copernicus, mathematician and astronomer, was born.

1594 Having already inherited the throne of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth through his mother Catherine Jagellonica of Poland, Sigismund III of the House of Vasa was crowned King of Sweden, succeeding his father John III of Sweden.

1600 – The Peruvian stratovolcano Huaynaputina explodeed in the most violent eruption in the recorded history of South America.

1674 – England and the Netherlands signed the Peace of Westminster, ending the Third Anglo-Dutch War. A provision of the agreement transfered the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam to England, and it was renamed New York.

1743 Luigi Boccherini, Italian composer, was born.

 

1807 Former Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr was arrested for treason and confined to Fort Stoddert.

1819 British explorer William Smith discovered the South Shetland Islands, and claimed them in the name of King George III. 

 Williams Point

1847 – The first group of rescuers reached the Donner Party who had been snowbound. Some of the party resorted to cannabilism to survive.

 The Donner Party Memorial

1861 Serfdom as abolished in Russia.

1878 The phonograph was patented by Thomas Edison.

1883 Parihaka leaders Te Whiti and Tohu were released.

 1884 The Enigma tornado outbreak.

1895 Diego Mazquiarán, Spanish matador, was born.

1924 Lee Marvin, American actor, was born.

 

1936 Sam Myers, American musician and songwriter, was born.

1938 Twenty men and one woman were drowned when a sudden cloudburst sent a wall of water surging through a public works camp at Kopuawhara, near Mahia. This was New Zealand’s deadliest 20th-century flood.

1940 Smokey Robinson, American singer, was born.

 1942 Nearly 250 Japanese warplanes attacked Darwin killing 243 people.

1942 –President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the executive order 9066′, allowing the United States military to relocate Japanese-Americans to Japanese internment camps.

 

1943 Battle of the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia began.

1945 Battle of Iwo Jima – about 30,000 United States Marines landed on Iwo Jima.

1947 Tim Shadbolt, mayor of Invercargill, New Zealand, was born.

1949 – Ezra Pound was awarded the first Bollingen Prize in poetry by the Bollingen Foundation and Yale University.

1952 Amy Tan, American novelist, was born.

1953 Georgia approved the first literature censorship board in the United States.

1958 Helen Fielding, English writer, was born.

1959 – The United Kingdom granted Cyprus its independence.

1960  Andrew, Duke of York, was born.

1963 – The publication of Betty Friedan‘s The Feminine Mystique launched the reawakening of the Feminist Movement in the United States as women’s organisations and consciousness-raising groups spread.

 

1972 The Asama-Sansō hostage standoff begins in Japan.

1976 Executive Order 9066 was rescinded by President Gerald R. Ford’s Proclamation 4417

1978 Egyptian forces raid Larnaca International Airport, in an attempt to intervene in a hijacking situation, without authorisation from the Republic of Cyprus authorities. The Cypriot National Guard and Police forces kill 15 Egyptian commandos and destroy the Egyptian C-130 transport plane in open combat.

1985 William J. Schroeder became the first Artificial heart recipient to leave hospital.

1985 – Iberia Airlines Boeing 727 crashed into Mount Oiz in Spain, killing 148.

1986 Akkaraipattu massacre, massacre of 80 Tamil farm workers by the Sri Lankan Army in the eastern province of Sri Lanka.

1986 – The Soviet Union launched its Mir spacecraft.

1999 – President Bill Clinton issued a posthumous pardon for U.S. Army Lt. Henry Ossian Flipper.

2001 An Oklahoma City bombing museum was dedicated at the Oklahoma City National Memorial.

 

2002 – NASA’s Mars Odyssey space probe started to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system.

2001 Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal was awarded an honorary knighthood in recognition of a “lifetime of service to humanity”.

2007 – Three Salvadoran deputies to the Central American Parliament and their driver were murdered in Guatemala.

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia

You Aint Seen Nothin’ Yet

Happy birthday Robbie Bachman – 57 today.

Another song which brings back memories of student days in Dunedin.

Listen To The Music

Keith Knudsen would have been 62 today.

There was a pub in Princes Street, Dunedin (maybe where the Lone Star is now?) in 1975ish. Passing quickly over the fact that some of us weren’t 20 which we ought to have been to get in to licensed premises in those days, because we’d gone to dance not drink (which is irrelevant under the law).

This is one of the songs we danced to.

Nor any drop to drink

When I left home on Tuesday afternoon there’d been one full carton of milk in the fridge and another almost empty so it didn’t occur to buy any more on my way home last night.

But late this morning I went to make a roulade for lunch and found there was just one milk carton with a dribble in the bottom.

I whipped over to the office to borrow some and discovered why – they’d run out yesterday and borrowed some from the house.

The irony of returning to the kitchen to find milk powder wasn’t lost on me – 1,200 dairy cows ought to mean milk, milk everywhere but in spite of that there’s not enough to cook with nor any drop to drink.

Let it rain

We woke this morning to the very welcome sound of rain on the roof.

It’s still raining a steady, heavy drizzle.

It’s the first decent rain we’ve had this year and it’s long over due.

Summer didn’t turn up in North Otago until the end of January but the cool cloudy weather brought low temperatures without rain.

The benefits of irrigation are obvious at the best of times and even more so when we’ve had prolonged dry weather:

Is there a convenient time for a power cut?

No, and just after 6am is particularly inconvenient if you’re milking cows.

All the cups fall off.

February 18 in history

On February 18:

3102 BC Epoch of the Kali Yuga.

1229 The Sixth Crusade: Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor signed a ten-year truce with al-Kamil, regaining Jerusalem, Nazareth, and Bethlehem with neither military engagements nor support from the papacy.

Frederick II (left) meets al-Kamil (right).

1268 The Livonian Brothers of the Sword were defeated by Dovmont of Pskov in the Battle of Rakvere.

1478 George, Duke of Clarence, who was convicted of treason against his older brother Edward IV of England, was executed.

1685 Fort St. Louis was established by a Frenchman at Matagorda Bay thus forming the basis for France’s claim to Texas.

1745 The city of Surakarta, Central Java was founded on the banks of Bengawan Solo river, and became the capital of the Kingdom of Surakarta.

1797 Trinidad was surrendered to a British fleet under the command of Sir Ralph Abercromby.

1814 The Battle of Montereau.

1841 The first ongoing filibuster in the United States Senate began and lasted until March 11.

1846 Beginning of the Galician peasant revolt.

1861 Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as the provisional President of the Confederate States of America.

1861 King Victor Emmanuel II of Piedmont, Savoy and Sardinia assumed the title of King of Italy.

1873 Bulgarian revolutionary leader Vasil Levski was executed in Sofia by the Ottoman authorities.

1878 John Tunstall was murdered by outlaw Jessie Evans, sparking the Lincoln County War in Lincoln County, New Mexico.

 Jessie Evans.

1884 Mark Twain‘s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was published for the first time.

1901 Winston Churchill made his maiden speech in the House of Commons.

 

1906 Hans Asperger, Austrian pediatrician.

1911 The first official flight with air mail took place in Allahabad, British India, when Henri Pequet, a 23-year-old pilot, delivers 6,500 letters to Naini, about 10 km away.

1913 Raymond Poincaré becomes President of France.

1922 Helen Gurley Brown, American editor, was born.

1929 The first Academy Awards  were announced.

1930 Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto.

1930 – Elm Farm Ollie becomes the first cow to fly in a fixed-wing aircraft and also the first cow to be milked in an aircraft.

 

1932 – The Empire of Japan declared Manzhouguo (the obsolete Chinese name for Manchuria) independent from the Republic of China.

1933  Yoko Ono, Japanese-born singer, was born.

1933  Mary Ure, Scottish actress, was born.

1936 Jean Auel, American writer, was born.

1943 – The Nazis arrested the members of the White Rose movement.

 Monument to the “Weiße Rose”

1943 – Joseph Goebbels delivered the Sportpalast speech.

 

1946 Jean-Claude Dreyfus, French actor, was born.

1948 – Eamon de Valera resignsed as Taoiseach of Ireland.

1948 Keith Knudsen, American drummer and songwriter (The Doobie Brothers), was born.

1950 Cybill Shepherd, American actress, was born.

1953 Robbie Bachman, Canadian drummer (Bachman-Turner Overdrive), was born.

1954 John Travolta, American actor, was born.

1954 The first Church of Scientology was established in Los Angeles, California.

1955 Operation Teapot: Teapot test shot “Wasp” was successfully detonated at the Nevada Test Site with a yield of 1.2 kilotons.

 

1957 Walter Bolton, a Wanganui farmer was the last man to be hanged in New Zealand.

1957  Kenyan rebel leader Dedan Kimathi was executed by the British colonial government.

 

1960  Greta Scacchi, Australian actress, was born.

 

1965 The Gambia becomes independent from the United Kingdom.

1969 The Hawthorne Nevada Airlines Flight 708 disaster occurred, killing all on board.

1972 The California Supreme Court in the case of People v. Anderson, 6 Cal.3d 628 invalidates the state’s death penalty and commutes the sentences of all death ro innmates to life in prison.

1977  The Space Shuttle Enterprise test vehicle was carried on its maiden “flight” sitting on top of a Boeing 747.

1979 Snow fell in the Sahara Desert in southern Algeria for the only time in recorded history.

1982 “Queen of Crime” Dame Ngaio Marsh died.

 1983 Thirteen people die and one is seriously injured in the Wah Mee Massacre in Seattle, Washington. It is said to be the largest robbery-motivated mass-murder in U.S. history.

1991 The IRA exploded bombs in the early morning at both Paddington station and Victoria station in London.

2001 FBI agent Robert Hanssen was arrested for spying for the Soviet Union.

2003 Nearly 200 people died in the Daegu subway fire in South Korea.

 

2003 Comet C/2002 V1 (NEAT) made perihelion, seen by SOHO.

2004 Up to 295 people, including nearly 200 rescue workers, died near Neyshabur in Iran when a run-away freight train carrying sulfur, petrol and fertilizer caught fire and exploded.

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia

10/10

Today’ I”m better at politics than history – 10/10 in the Domion Post’s politics quiz.

Perhaps the only time I can claim to be Kiwiblog’s equal

Return to Paradise

Ron Goodwin would have been 85 today.

Keeping Up Appearances

Happy birthday Patricia Routledge, 81 today.

Did you see the one about . . .

Lessons in healthcare from Edinburgh Zoo - Theodore Dalrymple at Pyjamas Media (hat tip: Skeptical Doctor).

Looking at Ohariu {5} Vote Splitting - one of a series of posts at BK Drinkwater which show why Peter Dunne should retire gracefully before the next election. Links to the previous posts in the series are at the bottom of the post.

Getting people off benefits - Big News asks: “”how many people come off benefits because they go to prison?”.

Youth rates and Youth Rates Revisited Offsetting Behaviour shows why youth rates cost young people jobs. Kiwiblog has related posts A 10 year high in unemployment  and  Youth rates and youth unemployment.

On Travelling With A Toddler - Bernard Darnton at Not PC serves as a warning to others.

Another Labour Party Bureaucracy and Be happy – that’s an order and Staff Morale - a selection from the series of visual humour at Something Should Go Here.

The Wage Gap - Gooner shows the sorry stas at No Minister.

The Courts must be hellish busy - Lindsay Mitchell has the sorry stats on recidivism.

An interesting course - Kiwblog on law studies at Auckland.

How Not To Run A country - Anti-Dismal on the internet in Iran.

Reflections on media, name suppression etc - Inquiring Mind asks why we should take it any more.

Lactose Intolerant - Macdoctor on homeopathy.

Technology dystopia or utopia - The Visible Hand on technology and labour.

8/10

Last week I missed just one question, this week I slipped and got two wrong in the NZ History Online quiz.

Changes to sheep industry up to farmers

Late last year an email circulated seeking signatures for a letter to the Minister of Agriculture, David Carter,  asking for his assistance in arranging a merger of the meat companies Alliance and Silver Fern Farms.

The email was confidential so I’m not going to copy or quote from it. But its contents have been discussed in the media as has the response of the Minister.

He correctly said any changes in the meat industry are up to farmers and a merger is up to the co-operative’s shareholders.

Now there are suggestions Landcorp should use its muscle as a catalyst for change in the industry.

A State Owned Enterprise should not interfere in this way and fortunately Landcorp’s influence on the meat companies is limited because shareholdings in both companies are capped. 

Recent attempts by the Meat Industry Taskforce and then Alliance to sort out the meat industry failed at least in part because Silver Fern Farms wasn’t interested. The reason for the company’s reluctance to co-operate became clear when the merger between PGG Wrightson and SFF was announced. Now that’s fallen through SFF may be more willing to look at other options but it’s too late.

A merger between Alliance and SFF by themselves wouldn’t solve the problems of low returns to farmers because the new entity wouldn’t be big enough to exert enough influence on international markets.

Besides, returns from meat are only part of the problem, low prices for wool and other by-products are also responsible for the gloomy outlook for the sheep industry.

The Wool Taskforce has completed its report  The taskforce was established by the Minister and he says:

“The report asks the right questions and identifies strategies to restore profitability to a sector that has been in decline for decades,” says Mr Carter.

“Everyone knows that the only way to raise price is to raise demand. Rather than generically marketing New Zealand wool, the report says the industry needs to work across the supply chain to boost demand for clothing, carpets and other wool products.

“The Taskforce makes it clear that this will only come about through unity and leadership, essentially having one voice for the sector.  I’m encouraged to hear this challenge from a group formed from within the industry.”

As a result of their recommendations he is to appoint an independent expert to work on forming a single body for the wool industry.

Improving returns for wool will play an important part in restoring confidence and profitability to the sheep industry. Whether anything happens in the meat industry as well is in farmers’ hands.

They choose who they supply their stock to and they hold the shares in the co-operatives. If there is to be any change in the industry it can only come from them.

Money doesn’t buy elections

The ink was hardly dry on the media release about electoral funding when the usual suspects started raving about rich people buying elections.

Some thoughts which have escaped them:

* The only buying of an election in recent times was Labour’s with the pledge card paid for by public money.

* Spending more doesn’t necessarily win elections. Kiwiblog analysed the four elections from 1996 to 2005 and found

The impact of money on elections is relatively insignificant compared to policies, party reputation, leadership and media treatment.

Complaints aren’t just about election spending but spending on referenda with lots of derogatory references to Peter Shirtcliff and the money he spent campaigning against MMP.

A thought which has escaped them:

* He lost the campaign.

Money doesn’t buy elections or referenda.

February 17 in history

On February 17:

1500 The Battle of Hemmingstedt.

1600 The philosopher Giordano Bruno was burned alive at Campo de’ Fiori in Rome for heresy.

1801 An electoral tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr was resolved when Jefferson was elected President of the United States and Burr Vice President by the United States House of Representatives.

 

1809 Miami University was chartered by the State of Ohio.

1814 The Battle of Mormans.

 1819 The United States House of Representatives passed the Missouri Compromise.

 The Missouri Compromise prohibited slavery in the Unorganized territory of the Great Plains (dark green) and permitted it in Missouri (yellow) and the Arkansas Territory (lower blue area).

1848 Louisa Lawson, Australian suffragist and writer, was born.

 

1854 The United Kingdom recognised the independence of the Orange Free State.

1864  Banjo Paterson, Australian poet, was born.

1864 The H. L. Hunley became the first submarine to engage and sink a warship, the USS Housatonic.

1867 The first ship passed through the Suez Canal.

1873 The editor of the Daily Southern Cross, David Luckie, published a hoax report of a Russian invasion of Auckland by the cruiser Kaskowiski (cask of whisky).

1877  Isabelle Eberhardt, Swiss explorer and writer, was born.

 

1904 Madama Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini received its premiere at La Scala in Milan.

1913 The Armory Show opened in New York City, displaying works of artists who are to become some of the most influential painters of the early 20th century.

 

1917 Guillermo González Camarena, Mexican inventor (colour television), was born.

 

1924  Johnny Weissmuller set a new world record in the 100-yard freestyle swimming competition with a time of 52-2/5 seconds.

1924 Margaret Truman, American novelist (, was born.

1925 Harold Ross and Jane Grant founded The New Yorker magazine.

 2004 cover with dandy Eustace Tilley, created by Rea Irvin. Eustace Tilley debuted on the first cover and reappears on anniversary issues

1925 Ron Goodwin, English composer and conductor, was born.

 

1929 Patricia Routledge, English actress, was born.

1930 Ruth Rendell, English writer, was born.

1933 Newsweek magazine was published for the first time.

 

1933 – The Blaine Act ended Prohibition in the United States.

1934 Barry Humphries, Australian actor and comedian, was born.

1940  Gene Pitney, American singer, was born.

1945 Brenda Fricker, Irish actress, was born.

1947 The Voice of America began to transmit radio broadcasts to the Soviet Union.

1958 Pope Pius XII declared Saint Clare of Assisi (1193~1253) the patron saint of television.

 

1959 Vanguard 2 – The first weather satellite was launched to measure cloud-cover distribution.

1962 A storm killed more than 300 people in Hamburg.

1963 Michael Jordan, American basketball player, was born.

1964 Gabonese president Leon M’ba was toppled by a coup and his archrival, Jean-Hilaire Aubame, was installed in his place.

 

1965  The Ranger 8 probe launched on its mission to photograph the Mare Tranquillitatis region of the Moon in preparation for the manned Apollo missions.

1972 Sales of the Volkswagen Beetle model exceeded those of Ford Model-T.

1978 A Provisional IRA incendiary bomb was detonated at the La Mon restaurant, near Belfast, killing 12 and seriously injuring 30.

1979 The Sino-Vietnamese War started.

1995 – The Cenepa War between Peru and Ecuador ends on a cease-fire brokered by the UN.

1996 World champion Garry Kasparov beat the Deep Blue supercomputer in a chess match.

1996 – NASA’s Discovery Programme started as the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft lifted off on the first mission ever to orbit and land upon an asteroid, 433 Eros.

2003 The London Congestion Charge scheme began.

 

2006 A massive mudslide occurred in Southern Leyte, Philippines; the official death toll was 1,126.

 

2008 Kosovo declared independence.

Sourced from NZ History Online and Wikipedia

$10,000 doodle

The flag doodle John Key did on Breakfast  sold for $10,150 on TradeMe.

The money will go to Cure Kids and the winning bidder will also get morning tea with the Prime Minister.

And what does a $10,000 doodle look like?

This:

What Dreams May Come

Happy birthday Vincent Ward – 54 today.