NZ ECONOMICS 101

Nobody does it better than Rob Hoskings at the NBR. He does a down to earth, laced with humour, easy to read step by step guide to debt mountains and double dip inflation.

Brilliant. It is behind the paywall ( Yip we happily pay for the NBR paywall content).

Sorry about that - market forces and all

BEST OF 2009

2009 has been a mixed bag.

We have new mates and we lost some good mates

We stopped blogging for a while then we started back up again .

We have a new job.

The son and heir is passing his helicopter exams and Ma and Pa have been hitched for 50 years.

So who is the best of the best for 2009.

Okay we think that the speaker deserved the best slot for his transformation of the running of the House. No argument there.

Best Minister? Probably Gerry Brownlie. He has made some ballsy calls on the energy front. His decisions have the potential to change the economic face of NZ. We are not sure that ordinary NZers have yet grasped the potential.

Judith Collins has to come a close second. She has police in her steely grip and we are the better for it.

Best Journalist? We reckon there are a few who for different reasons have done a bloody good job this year. Fran O'Sullivan, Ian Templeton, Rob Hosking are all up there .

Then who is the best columnists? Well its Hooton for starters. His columns are must reads and incite the mandarins and spinners alike. And he just gets it right.

Best blogger? Cactus on business is hard to beat. Bernard Hickey is pretty good and Kiwiblog on policy and oogling.. No- one does online girly oogling like D P Farrar.

Whale has to be noted for his fearlessness. He has a touch of the crazies but he is the Rottweiler of the right wing blogs and Gotcha is starting to do some good work ...

We have to pay tribute to Brent Wheeler who had made us think so hard about some economic issues that it makes our brain hurt.

Best paper? NZ Herald is our first read of the day. NBR is next and we dip into it quite a lot and Stuff is good but it seems to have lost the race against the Herald. And we always read TransTasman.

Best Labour politician? Well that's gotta be - we actually no one has really stood out. Grant Robertson is probably the exception. Most of the female Labour politicians are old school, social manipulators not empowerers.

Best Maori politician? Tariana Turia. First and last. However we think that Ururoa Flavell is starting to get some cred.

ACT- Well the jury is out on that for us.

To more urbane issues.

The Best coffee in Wellington is served at Mixed business on the Terrace.

The best wine bar is still Beaujolais and it still serves some of the finest lunch food around.

Best Restaurant is Zicos, followed by Arbitrageur who are happy to accommodate our rolling lunches with a continuously changing cast.

Best venue is Dockside but the food aint what it used to be.

Best new place - Ortegas fish shack and bar.

Best urban bar - D4.

Best wine list - Wine Loft.

Best Beer - Montieths Pilsener.

SOUTHERN HONOUR

We concurred yesterday with Rob Hosking that Bill English is an honest bugger. Today we saw just how honourable he is. He is paying back half of the $24k accommodation allowance he claimed.

Now we are aghast that Whale Oil called for Bill to step down - there would be no need for him to do that unless he has misled his boss.

And we there is no way an honourable Southland bred bugger like Bill would mislead his boss.

ROB HOSKING

Remains one of our snappier incisive commentators and his piece today on the MP allowance issue is a gud ' un.

We cant copy what he said but we can say we agree with the premise that English is an honourable and honest bugger. After all he is a Southlander.

Its the system that needs sorting - not him.

With quality writing like this we can see why NBR's helmsman Barry Coleman has put a value on it. And we are happy to pay.

PAYING FOR THE NEWS -YIP BUT MAKE IT QUALITY BARRY

We are more than happy to pay for good stuff, good shoes, good make up , and good wine, lunches and dinners for good info. So we have no hesitation paying for NBR's online subscription. It makes good sense as long as NBR continues to deliver the very high quality articles that have dripped from the pens of the likes of Rob Hosking, Chris Keall, David Cohen Matthew Hooton and David Farrar in the past few months. If, after six months we dont get value for money - we will kick it for touch.

It has worked for the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Review. You pay for the premium content. It will be driven by demand and we think there is a demand. The continued popularity of Transtasman already attests to the popularity of "insider" premium analysis, news and dare we point to the elephant in the room - gossip....

So Barry , yet again you have shown that you happily put your well earned money where your mouth is.

We will sign up. Its simply the smart thing to do. Newspapers may die, ( makes you wonder what we will wrap our fish in chips in and cover the bottom of the budgie cage with) but online news is where its at and where it will end up.

And for all the believers that news will be forever free- yip the crap stuff maybe but the reality is the overshiny stuff wont last. In the end the demand will be for the best, the fastest and the most accurate and incisive and undoubtedly the most interesting - News and info that gives individuals and companies a turbo boost down the information highway will be a must have. And we will gladly pay for it.

LAST ONE OUT TURN OUT THE LIGHTS

We are not sure whats happening over at the NBR but a number of their journos have just left or are leaving very soon. Thats sad. It is a good read but good reads only come from hiring good journos. We know they are as scarce than happy and content Labour MP's these days. and that that the talent pool is not deep. Thank god they still have the superb Rob Hosking on the payroll. And Chris Keall and Hazel and David Farrar and Hooton - but they need some daily grunts on the books who understand business as well.

Cactus also laments the late copy.

Come on Bazza - - find some good scribes. Keep us entertained and informed. Please.

TALKING TREES

It seems the NBR has let the very witty and very observant Rob Hosking loose on the Brash Email police cock inquiry cock up scandal. Or whitewash and cover-up as Guyon Espiner elegantly puts it.

Take a look at Mr Hoskings lovely read.

STUDENT JOURNO WRITES WELL.

This is a great piece on blogging by student journo Sandra Dickson who is part of Jim Tuckers Whitireia school for budding scribes . It is an easy read, lots of quotes from interesting people, balanced and informative. We hope to see this fine woman in print or broadcasting one day. She is waaaay too good for the one eyed brain sucker.

DID RIGHT-wing bloggers cost Helen Clark the last election? “Traditional” commentators ridicule the idea, but some in the blogosphere see signs that it is an influential participant in politics.

FOR LONG-SERVING political journalist Colin James, blog content is “trite” and “trivial”.

James – until recently a columnist for the NZ Herald, now writing for the opposition Dominion-Post – believes blogs in New Zealand currently have little, if any, impact on voter behaviour.

But others are taking a different view as the 2008 election is picked over.

Canterbury University mass communications lecturer Donald Matheson says the internet and blogging in particular have challenged the “authoritative voice” of journalism by “watching the watchdog”.

“The relationship between journalism and the big news organisations and the people reading those has changed. Good journalism should welcome that, a bit of critique, a bit of needling. It’s a healthy thing.”

Political bloggers in New Zealand do see themselves as watching the watchdog on issues such as electoral finance reform, copyright law and, last year, the monitoring of Winston Peters (below right) and New Zealand First.

One of the country’s leading political columnists Matthew Hooton – who entered the blogosphere himself last election – argues this watchdog role may have influenced the outcome of the 2008 election.

Read more here

And isn't Colin James a tosser, his column gets dropped from the Herald and he is now writing for the Dom Post but its bloody boring. We are lovers of Fran O'Sullivan and Rob Hosking both have offerings that are tasty and satisfying - like Lambshanks at Boulcott. James on the other hand is toast made out of cheap supermarket white bread.

OUR JOHN AND NZ INC

We have been pondering the speech John Key gave to the Wellington Chamber of Commerce this morning. We have been thinking about John Key the man and John Key, the Prime Minister. Thing is there is no difference – what you see is what you get. Perhaps we noticed it first when the Chamber's CEO Charles Finny said “So now John it’s your turn” after Finny had warmed up the audience.

Yip that’s right, no “Prime Minister” just John. Our John.

You see more than anything we think that Key’s style means that we may actually achieve what is often talked about but never delivered - NZ Inc.

New Zealand Inc. means we all work together for a common purpose. So despite being told by our John that we should be well positioned to weather storm ahead he also said it was going to be tough. There was no need for a call to arms, it was implicit.

You knew that he meant we were all in it together, part of a big team.

Now we often listened to Clark speak and we never felt that inclusiveness - that we were working with the government. Instead we felt like someone was making the decisions for us and woe be tide if we didn’t do as we were told. There was a pecking order and look out if respect wasn’t paid. It was Them and Us.

Sure we know that John's government wont get everything right but we are confident that we will be told the truth, that there will be more transparency, that they will listen and they think we are all grown up enough to make decisions – witness Tony Ryall's decision to let nurses decide who will lead their national body today rather than leaving it up to him to impose his views on the lynch pins of the health sector.

It is a new age and while there maybe financial rocks in the sea of commerce in the months to come we reckon we picked the right leader to chart our course.

Rob Hosking has also been pondering some similar issues – at NBR.

TODAY'S MUST READ

Rob Hosking of NBR has written an article that we think should be reprinted everywhere. He has done a Question and Answer of why ACC is a cluster fuck, who is to blame and what needs to be done.

Give that man a beer.

We would just add that we think New Zealanders need to harden up and stop being sooks and running off to the Doctors for every twinge and niggle and getting ACC to pay for it. And as for physios - don't start us.
They are Snake Oil merchants at worst Feel Goods at best.

Also what has been the cost of ACC's social marketing campaigns and what measurable difference have they made to the cost of the scheme?
Things like the falls campaign - did it reduce incidence and did it reduce cost?


UPDATE:
The ever wise and well placed MACDOCTOR has another great ACC post which echoes our sentiments - he has the figures.

Read it here

HOSKING CALLS FOR FINESSE

And rightly so. Rob Hosking of the NBR , one of the smarter financial and economic journalists around the traps always offers a wise and considered opinion on the meaty issues. His article today on the Stimulus package is on the button. We dont need flashy - or we will get lots of inflation and that will put us into the death spiral we think that the US is headed for. We need smart thinking. Now girls know all about stimulus - its something that needs to be done with finesse and something that should not be done in a hurry.