Opinion: The 440-page report of the inquiry into the Pike
River mine disaster is an exemplary piece of work - thorough,
comprehensive, rigorous and surely one of the most
hard-hitting produced by a royal commission.
After nigh on three decades of constant and unflinching
devotion to free-market economic orthodoxy, the Treasury
seems to be opening the door to fresh thinking, albeit only
slightly.
The $500,000 carrot to keep Doug Heffernan at the helm of
Mighty River Power until the company's partial privatisation
is done and dusted is a reminder of how the Government's
asset sales programme just keeps on throwing up curly
questions for National.
Casting himself as some kind of self- anointed Harbinger of
Economic Gloom and Doom, Winston Peters this week warned it
was now only a question of time before New Zealand's currency
reached dollar-for- dollar parity with its American
equivalent.
A hands-off policy might avoid some problems, but it can
create others ... and it won't work if a spy agency goes
feral. It illustrated how keen John Key was to put plenty of
distance between him and the Government Communications
Security Bureau.
This was the week the emperor found himself with no clothes,
new or otherwise; this was the week John Key was revealed to
be human after all; this was the week his Government looked
distinctly ordinary.
Here is a blunt message for a couple of old-school Aro
Valley-style socialists: Get off our backs. Stop behaving
like a pair of tut-tutting old dowagers gossiping in the
salons.
Whether you think the water claim to the Waitangi Tribunal by
the New Zealand Maori Council is an audacious try-on or a
legitimate test of legitimate rights, it is an issue that
will make or break the reputations of many.
