Labour is about to try something new. A new way of developing policy. Out in the open, and involving you.
Labour wants to start by developing a policy on open and transparent government. We want to do that in an open and transparent way.
Over the next couple of weeks there will be a series of posts on Red Alert on this.
- The first post will outline the process and how you can participate.
- The second will present some initial principles and ideas to generate discussion.
This is exciting and new and because it’s our first time, we might make some mistakes. We hope you’ll show goodwill and tolerance and above all, that you’ll have things to say.
Open and transparent government is about how politicians, the governing party and the public sector constructively interacts with citizens to be more democratic and effective.
Will you be writing Labour policy?
We want to be upfront with you from the beginning
Your input will contribute to Labour’s policy. The #openlabournz document will be taken as a key input for Labour to consider in developing its policy, noting the other drivers and that there will be changes possibly made between it and the final policy. However, please be assured that the final output will be of high quality, and that high quality suggestions are always taken very seriously in Labour Party policy development.
Labour is of course a political party and politics will dictate what the final policy looks like and how it is arrived at. Once the #openlabournz document is completed, we will keep you posted about where the policy is at, and where it ends up. Labour’s policy finalisation process is for Labour members and you’re welcome to participate in that next step through the usual route of joining the party.
Why are we doing this?
Red Alert was established as a tool using new technology to build a voice for Labour and to demonstrate that we are doing things differently and prepared to truly “engage” with the public in ways we haven’t before.
The debates on Red Alert are good. There is a definite need however for another mechanism which takes the discussion further on particular issues. A way of providing an open forum for discussion that can provide input into Labour policy. That’s authentic. That shows we are who we say we are.
#OpenLabourNZ is a way to do that. If the process works, we’ll do it again on other issues. You might have suggestions. So remember the hash tag #OpenLabourNZ. And watch this space for the next post.
At (or @) those talking about “stealing ideas” – ideas are hard to kill. They exist whether you want them there or not. What’s important is not where the idea came from, but rather, is it a good idea?
So let’s take the time to applaud Labour for recognising this and recognising that the ideas presented are not only going to be from Labour supporters, but also Green supporters, National supporters, Act Supporters etc. While this may lead to a lot of values interjected that may not be in line with yours, lets recognise the fact that Labour do have a set of core values and hopefully, those core values have a leaning towards sanity. Thus, the ideas presented are going to pass through this leaning.
I did have an idea for a party a couple of years back. The basis is this: We now have the technology to correspond with most parts of society (and a new party would attempt to address the issue of those without Internet by putting up Internet cafes) fairly easily and those voices are important. So the party wouldn’t rely on your own personal opinion but would instead attempt to vote on new legistration based upon a voting system.
So well done Labour – you’re progressing. Your reinvention is doing exactly what it should be doing. Clare – you really do rock – despite my criticism at times (I really do think that Labour need more people like you), you really do seem to be doing a great job and you truly are a great face to Labour. While I don’t use twitter and it’s ilk (or facebook – I do feel like a little bit like a dinosaur for not using facebook or twitter even though I’m only 30) I do think these technologies are vital to the way things are done in a democratic society (though I do think that a new technology needs to be developed for this scenario rather than relying on “social” networking – don’t get me started on “social” networking)
Regards,
Nevyn.
I have said for sometime now that I think it would be a good idea for the more serious blogs re social and economic issue/policy debate should have an address verified section that provides an area for debate where you know exactly with whom you are debating.
As for worrying about someone stealing your ideas, that would come down to whether you are in it for party machinery or the national interest.
The National Party executive are trying to get all their ducks in a row for further privitisation for the banking/corporate complex at pace faster than the checks and balances of democracy can keep up with, the same treasury advisors that mentored Roger Douglas and Ruth Richardson are going to be even more lethal now that they have a fully participating Prime Minister in the drivers seat. Thus if the basically decent majority of this nation are to be saved from impending conditions of absolute tribute paying economic domination Labours campaign must be to win their next election before the next official election and mobilise the people to fight any further transfer of our necesities of life into private hands every step of the way. If in doing that you create enough populist backlash that National have to adopt your ideas of be fully exposed for what they really are you will have won in the wider national interest and that I suggest is after all what should be what every MP enters parliament for.
cheers
Iain
Have a nice day, sadly I won’t be able to post any further until this evening, I am off back out on the hamster wheel.
I also suggest that the process will be a stuttering bumbling mess if mundane posts as mine above of reasonable lenght without any links get caught in moderation, what gives with that? cant the settings can be set better?
Kudos for the idea and trial. One thing this blog highlights, to me anyway, is just how many isues and how many balls in the air our MP’s have to have. Out here we can cherry pick issues and focus our energy on knowing everything about one, or two, you guys have to have answers for everything. New respect.
“those talking about “stealing ideas” – ideas are hard to kill. They exist whether you want them there or not. What’s important is not where the idea came from, but rather, is it a good idea?” – I think it is important to be careful with information given that there is an election next year.
@Nevyn – agreed about the benefits and pitfalls of social networking.
“As for worrying about someone stealing your ideas, that would come down to whether you are in it for party machinery or the national interest.” – They could do more for the country if elected than the position they are in now of not being able to out vote anything they disagree with.
“If in doing that you create enough populist backlash that National have to adopt your ideas of be fully exposed for what they really are ” – So far when they have done this in the past 18 months this hasn’t happened.
Well, theres another one off for a stint in the spam. I hope the serious students of history, economics and transparent government enjoy.
Goodnight and goodluck to you and your families.
Remember what JFK had to say about the dangers of secrecy within society:
” The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it. Even today, there is little value in opposing the threat of a closed society by imitating its arbitrary restrictions. Even today, there is little value in insuring the survival of our nation if our traditions do not survive with it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. That I do not intend to permit to the extent that it is in my control. And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know.”
For the sake of reason I sincerely hope the Labour movement rediscover the ideals they were founded on at the turn of the century, as those ideals of Monetary, Banking and Credit System reform are even more needed today than they were back then for the very same reasons.
Go Clare, put the Labour back in Labour. Continue the efforts of great men such as JFK.
cheers
Iain
Labour for transparent government aye, what happened to the comment, I twice tried to post on this thread, that didn’t even come up as waiting for moderation, but for some reason, that I would suggest would have anyone that got to read it scratching their heads, it went straight to spam and has not been, like similar in past, pulled out of spam and put up?
Maybe? length was issue, will try in two parts?
Part 1
Another area where the seperation of power within government to prevent the tyranny of the few over the many has been turned on its head is the RBNZ. Reserve Bank governor is supposed to be able to stipulate the base cost of credit to influence the demand for credit, thus be able to slow or speed up the economy to stay within a set inflation band, a service for which he is paid more than the Prime Minister. However since 1989 the RBNZ has been nothing but a mouth peice for the NZDMO, an independent institution that sits within our government, who now controls our debt dealings with the outside world.
In 2007 RBNZ was officially dropped as even an agent of NZDMO and the commercial banking sector have all but ignored the Official Cash Rate(OCR) in setting their interest rates, stating they are more influenced by cost of credit on international wholesale markets.
At the core of these “Wholesale” markets are the teir 1 level private incorporated investment banks, refered to as Primary Bond Dealers, they are the only ones who have the power to monetise the debt bonds of governments coerced into using it as their monetary bases instead of issuing their own public credit. They decide if they do or don’t on-sell them on the secondary bond market.
In 2009 bond report the International Finance Services London (IFSL)
( http://www.ifsl.org.uk/output/ReportItem.aspx?NewsID=287 )
states there are $85 trillion dollars worth of Bonds in existance at a time when you only have to watch the news to observe the social cohesion of the world is once again, as it did in first half of 20th century, crumbling under the pressure of debt repayment. There is mounting evidence that the private designers and cross-owners of the international banking network have again abused the credit creation mechanism in a predatory manner by issuing created credit in excess of the ability for it ever to be repaid then foreclosing on borrowers to secure ownership of hard assets and resources.
Part2
There is mounting evidence that these financial predators have massive influence of what has become a mega concentrated cross-owned global media, thus it should be of great concern when the Reserve Bank Governor makes statements as the one below at RBNZ Press Conference Dec 10 2009 re Dec quarter monetary policy statement:
Question from Barry?
“are we to expect a properous and happy new year”?
Answer from Allan Bollard
“Thankyou Barry for that point, finally on a more personal note, since this is the last press conference of the year, I would like to thank you very much for your help and co-operation through the year, it has been one amazing year as you all know, at the beginning of this year we were seriously worried about the financial system and the state of the economy, both in New Zealand and internationally, its with some releive that we see much more secure conditions as we go into christmas time. I am aware that, um, at the beginning of the year when New Zealand was in such a vulnerable state, actually it would only have taken a, ah, one of the major media people looking for a fast headline, acting on rumour or passing on something irresponsibly to have sparked off some real problems in our system, that, we were concerned about that, that didn’t happen. You all, I felt, acted very responsibly through that and for that we would like to thank you. Finally its not a forecast but a wish, have a merry christmas, Barry and everyone else, thank you very much.”
————–
The above speech alarmingly resembles that of this one in 1991:
“We are grateful to the Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promise of discretion for almost forty years… It would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subject to the bright lights of publicity during those years. But, the world is now more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto determination practiced in past centuries.”
– David Rockefeller, in an address given to Catherine Graham, publisher of The Washington Post and other media luminaries in attendance in Baden Baden, Germany at the June 1991 annual meeting of the world elite Bilderberg Group.
—————
We need to bring RBNZ, Treasury, NZDMO relationships out from the shadows and into the cleansing light of day.
We need to ask why the mainstream media of this nation under the unwritten conventions of the Fourth Estate in a, so-called, transparant democracy, to provide the electorate with balanced information, have not reported indepth the increased questioning of the current monetary, banking and credit systems around the world and just why would the RBNZ Governor be thanking them for it?
Interesting? it was not length, something in content of part 2 is being vetted by spam filter, I assure you their is no swearing, no nasty words that would attract the human rights commissioner, only my usual evidence from the mouths of major economic influences, thus it leaves me wondering just which part is it that the moderators find so worrying?
Interesting? it was not length, something in content of part 2 is being vetted by spam filter, I assure you their is no swearing, no nasty words that would attract the human rights commissioner, only my usual evidence from the mouths of major economic influences, thus it leaves me wondering just which part is it that the moderators find so worrying?
—————–
There is mounting evidence that these financial predators have massive influence of what has become a mega concentrated cross-owned global media, thus it should be of great concern when the Reserve Bank Governor makes statements as the one below at RBNZ Press Conference Dec 10 2009 re Dec quarter monetary policy statement:
Question from Barry?
“are we to expect a properous and happy new year”?
Answer from Allan Bollard
“Thankyou Barry for that point, finally on a more personal note, since this is the last press conference of the year, I would like to thank you very much for your help and co-operation through the year, it has been one amazing year as you all know, at the beginning of this year we were seriously worried about the financial system and the state of the economy, both in New Zealand and internationally, its with some releive that we see much more secure conditions as we go into christmas time. I am aware that, um, at the beginning of the year when New Zealand was in such a vulnerable state, actually it would only have taken a, ah, one of the major media people looking for a fast headline, acting on rumour or passing on something irresponsibly to have sparked off some real problems in our system, that, we were concerned about that, that didn’t happen. You all, I felt, acted very responsibly through that and for that we would like to thank you. Finally its not a forecast but a wish, have a merry christmas, Barry and everyone else, thank you very much.”
————–
The above speech alarmingly resembles that of this one in 1991:
“We are grateful to the Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promise of discretion for almost forty years… It would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subject to the bright lights of publicity during those years. But, the world is now more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto determination practiced in past centuries.”
– David Rockefeller, in an address given to Catherine Graham, publisher of The Washington Post and other media luminaries in attendance in Baden Baden, Germany at the June 1991 annual meeting of the world elite Bilderberg Group.
—————
We need to bring RBNZ, Treasury, NZDMO relationships out from the shadows and into the cleansing light of day.
We need to ask why the mainstream media of this nation under the unwritten conventions of the Fourth Estate in a, so-called, transparant democracy, to provide the electorate with balanced information, have not reported indepth the increased questioning of the current monetary, banking and credit systems around the world and just why would the RBNZ Governor be thanking them for it?
Have a nice day all, would like to be able to stay and get right into it, but have to get back onto that hamster wheel and go get my 35 odd cents in the dollar after private bankers compound interest bearing debt factored into the system.
To me, labour has always been the opposite of national, there for the people that needs a hand.times have changed and labour needs to outhink national as these older style political lines have become blurred. Economics is at the heart of everything.My own personal thoughts are to scrap all taxes ecept GST, make kiwi s…aver compulsory,eventually ending the need for super,make it accesible when needed.add a capital gains tax for rental proerties, taking the heat out of the property market, making it affordable for first home buyers.purchase any homes at GV that landlords sell and make them state houses.bring company tax down to 10%add a transaction tax for trading of the dollar, this should make it easier for exporters as the dollar should settle at a more realistic level..also bring in govt. investment bonds for things like research and development…a safe investment for those that do not trust the share market.See More
8 consecutive posts Iain? Is that some kind of Red Alert record?
michael said:
What. Uh, not sure that’s what you meant to write.
Scrap personal taxes? Yes for the poor and raise the taxation take by taxing more from those who spend little of their income on GST linked purchases – the top 30%
Higher taxes on higher incomes works for the country long term in spite of all the bleating from the business round table.
Who drives them any way. The links are international. They are always the first to scream in indignation even when they are doing very well indeed.
Greed knows no bounds and those who get more often want more still. They will give you all sorts of contorted reasons that often are myths screamed loudly many times.
When you hear them scream you know something effective may be in the wind. The BRT is extremely proactive for their own regime and business plan to increase the take from society. They hardly need or deserve pity.
Progressive rates of taxation stabilises the economy and supports stronger infrastructure, providing the tax take from the upper earning group is substantial.
The gain should be for all and that is not what is happening now.
Property speculation, the sharks and parasites who have added nothing but taken billions, have been able to do that through lack of govt regulation.
Regulation is not a bad word. In this area lack of regulation has promoted the sorry state where housing has been turned into a buying and selling industry and a part of out GDP.
Housing is a facility for shelter and protection, firstly of families. Government should be “hands on” to house families and also protect housing from the rampant destructive market forces through speculation.
Past Govt intervention and control worked well,stabilised housing and supported families into housing.
Now housing is the playground of excess money and international speculation.
The Greens at least have some position on this albeit minimal.
Three ideas for consideration:
1. Compulsory saving through kiwisaver so that we have our own pool of capital. This will help us reduce reliance on foreign capital.
2. More funding of NZ-based R&D – once we have safeguarded whatever intellectual property arises from such R&D.
3. Investigate use of low-interest Reserve Bank credit for major infrastructure projects.