David Carter

ᔥ Stuff.co.nz

Well done to Simon Bridges, who in the past two weeks has had a blinder. He has celebrated the birth of his heir and now he has been promoted to the ministry of the John Key led government. Good to see he is Associate Climate Change minister, his suggestion to Tim Groser should be to wind up that ministry altogether:

National’s MP for Tauranga Simon Bridges is to be appointed a minister outside Cabinet after the departure of shamed former minister Nick Smith forced a minor reshuffle.

Napier MP Chris Tremain, who is currently outside Cabinet, will move into Cabinet at number 20, Prime Minister John Key said.

Smith resigned his ministerial warrants two weeks ago after admitting he wrote letters for friend and ACC whistleblower Bronwyn Pullar while he was the minister of ACC.

He also admitted failing to declare a conflict of interest when he signed off a letter to Pullar on behalf of the Corporation.

Smith, who is also the MP for Nelson, held the local government, environment and climate change portfolios.

Primary Industries Minister David Carter will also take on the local government portfolio.

Local government reforms were an important part of the Government’s agenda, Key said.

“Mr Carter is an experienced Minister and I’m confident he will drive these reforms along.”

Internal Affairs Minister Amy Adams will become Environment Minister and hand over the Internal Affairs portfolio to Tremain.

Trade Minister Tim Groser will also become the new Minister for Climate Change Issues.

Bridges will take over consumer affairs and associate transport from Tremain.

He will also be Associate Minister for Climate Change Issues.

David Carter gets worked up and sledges Grant Robertson hard:

The Port Hills MP (from Christchurch) Ruth Dyson doesn’t think Auckland needs a convention centre. I don’t either but that is an other matter entirely that I have canvassed before. 

Today, she’s issued a rhetoric laden statement declaring Labour’s strong opposition to the convention centre.

“John Key’s government has become reliant on the glitz of commercial projects to boost the perception that it is performing.”

If Labour had a Leader, he or she would be reminding Dyson that Len Brown’s all in favour and they’re raining on his parade.  Brown was even at the announcement:

Auckland’s mayor is defending his support of SkyCity’s convention centre, despite backing a sinking lid policy when it come to pokie machines.

Both David Carter and Len Brown welcome the opportunity to boost the Auckland economy.

via the tipline

MSN had this as one of their headlines. I’m not Sure David Carter has left National and joined Labour, but hey, given the popularity of National maybe this is the “game-changer” Labour has been seeking all year.

Is David Carter the game-changer that Labour needs?

Some farming program on the radio asked “Brown Envelope” Carter about what the spending cuts meant to the farming industry. As minister of agriculture Carter gave some weasely excuse about not sacrificing government spending on farmers. This is just typical of the farming sector, New Zealand’s biggest bludgers, always with their hands out for more.

I really wonder about why a centre-right government doesn’t have a decent line about cutting government spending to grow the economy. This is a simple argument to make, and any spin weasel worth their salt would have followed the Tea Party and the United States mid-terms last year and had endless arguments about getting the government out of the economy to help the economy grow.

Instead we have ministers defending their departments, and not saying outright to business people, “if we cut government spending it means your business and New Zealand will grow faster than it would with the dead weight of massive government spending”.

John Key should ring DoC to see if they cant get him a few DoC 200’s so he can weed out his current spin weasels and replace them with some that can look more than 48 hours ahead and teach ministers how to sell spending cuts as a good thing.

Sue Kedgley is a classic “other person”. She tells people to catch the bus but doesn’t catch one herself. Now it turns out she isn’t too crash hot at maths either.

Green Party MP Sue Kedgley is calling for the Commerce Commission to investigate how retail dairy prices are set in New Zealand.

Kedgley says the Ministry of Agriculture’s review of the domestic milk market, ordered by Agriculture Minister David Carter last month in response to public anger over rising milk prices,  comes close to being a “complete whitewash”.

The ministry’s report said it could not comment on whether there was sufficient competition in the domestic market because it did not have the powers to investigate.

It said current law governing the dairy industry promoted competition, but did not ensure it.

Kedgley says the report failed to address the central issue of lack of competition in the domestic market.

“It doesn’t tell us how the price of milk is set. Farmers say they receive less than 30 per cent of the price of milk, but it fails to shed any light on what makes up the other 60 per cent,” she says.

“These are all valid questions and it’s time that we had some transparency into how domestic prices are set, and some asurance that supermarkets, or Fonterra, are not putting exhorbitant mark-ups on milk.”

Not only does she fail basic arithmetic, she also demonstrates a complete lack of knowledge of the mechanics of how a raw product gets into the plastic bottle and onto the supermarket shelves.

It looks like John Key is going to have to have a cabinet re-shuffle.

I have already blogged on this and note I have already called for David Carter’s useless carcass to be flayed.

It should now be booted out the back door after an appalling lack of judgement on his part in ignoring the religious beliefs of one people over the trade interests of another group, ironically with similar religious beliefs around the killing of animals. Not only that he was horribly conflicted in making the decision.

A farming company part-owned by a Cabinet minister was able to give him a briefing about how the Government could protect its lucrative trade with Muslim countries by banning Jewish slaughtering. (shechita)

Agriculture Minister David Carter supported the recommended law change but had to back down days before he was to be taken to court to justify it.

It is the second time this year Crown lawyers have had to leap to the defence of one of Parliament’s wealthiest MPs – and this time in a case in which he was forced to admit getting basic facts wrong.

Carter was being sued by the Auckland Hebrew Congregation for changing the law in May to make traditional Jewish slaughter of animals illegal. The case was set to begin in the High Court at Wellington tomorrow – until an embarrassing backdown by Carter who on Friday overturned the ban he asked Cabinet to support.

Clearly Carter hasn’t passed around the blank envelope, his usual method of hushing up people, because people are squawking.

He has had far too many close shaves and this must surely be the final straw.

Questions surely must be being asked too about the ongoing management inside the Key ministry. These types of woeful decisions-making were nipped in the bud by the over-arching control of chief of staff heather Simpson in the Clark ministry. There appears no such controls from the 9th floor under National.

It would seem that ministers under Key are operating in silos, with little or no co-operation with each other. This may well be fine in the corporate sector where talent is spectacularly rewarded and incompetence punished swiftly. It isn’t the same in politics, where the talent pool is car park puddle shallow and getting rid of the idiots and fools not as simple as handing them a rubbish bag and showing them the door.

With Wong, and Simon Power and now Carter seemingly operating willy-nilly with no controls it would point out clearly that something isn’t right in the Beehive. Hell, Simon Power even went and did a deal with Labour to rob us of our freedoms and didn’t even put it to caucus first, at least Labour’s caucus got a say in the deal.

National needs to seriously start looking at its leadership and finding some strength otherwise its jelly like spine may well collapse under the strain. Maybe John Key needs to perform his own shechita on some of his more inept and foolish ministers. I’d cut Simon Power‘s throat sooner rather than later before he costs National the election.

I am on Campbell Live tonight, no it isn’t about the video release it is about The Mosquito.

I have been mentoring, along with a good friend of mine, a group of kids from Auckland Seventh Day Adventist High School in the Young Enterprise Scheme. Their team is called DICE and their business is making and selling ringtones that only teens can hear.

They have been doing really, really well. In the first stage they came third in the presentations behind St Kentigern College and McLeans College. Both of those schools are Decile 10; ASDAH is Decile 2 and is located in Mangere.

At the recent show day our team won Best Stand and Overall prize for their product, presentation and business plans. They are really rocking.

Watch Campbell Live and check out how they have been doing.

Well, my site has taken a hammering since posting the infamous secret scampi video. Now by way of a backrounder here is some filler information that tells you why this video is so explosive. It is from Hansard and the debate on Scampi. When you read this you can see why Winston Raymond peters, 63, List MP of no fixed abode is going to be squirmingthat the video has now seen the light of day. You would also do well to read Question 5 from the other day as well.

Hon KEN SHIRLEY (ACT): On 16 October 2001 Winston Peters, the leader of the New Zealand First Party, issued a press release. It was titled: “Gross incompetence in fisheries. Heads need to roll.” He was calling for a dismissal of the chief executive of the Ministry of Fisheries, and he claimed that the ministry was guilty of gross incompetence, faulty allocation of scampi quota, wanton disregard for due process, and unlawful treatment of fishers. He called on the Minister of Fisheries to invoke an immediate inquiry. He said that the allocation of scampi was to be taken away from the ministry, as it could not be trusted. Those were very serious allegations, and some even called them reckless. It was classic Winston Peters innuendo.

Six months later, on 24 April 2002, in the general debate-this very debate we are having now-Winston Peters lambasted the Minister of Fisheries for not taking action. He accused the Ministry of Fisheries of condoning corruption, aiding and abetting corruption, and involving itself in that corruption. Winston Peters said: “I will produce evidence that the ministry knowingly condoned that corruption.” He went on further to say: “In the next few weeks I intend to demonstrate with voluminous evidence and affidavits why this ministry should be removed from its job and the Serious Fraud Office asked, belatedly, to do its job.”

Eventually, a parliamentary inquiry into the scampi allegations was instigated by the Primary Production Committee, following a very high-profile Assignment programme that screened on television. One would have expected Winston Peters, having made those allegations, to rejoice at having got that inquiry but, oh no, he gave not a whisper, not a murmur. He quickly replaced Doug Woolerton, the permanent New Zealand First member on that select committee, and then spent his time focusing on narrowing and closing the terms of reference for the committee. It was all, one would say, rather curious.

The Primary Production Committee sat for several months, consumed an enormous amount of Parliament’s time, and reported on 2 December 2003. Winston Peters produced no evidence to support the reckless allegations he had made, and he certainly did not table the “voluminous evidence” he had promised. He was as quiet as a lamb, with barely a whisper.

Last night on television further allegations were made, and reference was made to a sworn affidavit. The functioning of this Parliament and its processes was raised, and the programme focused on a former member of this House-perhaps one of the most unsavoury members who has passed through this House-a Mr Ross Meurant.

It seems that a former member of Parliament, Ross Meurant, was engaged by Simunovich Fisheries as an adviser and lobbyist. Concurrent with that, of course-and a lot of people do not realise this-Mr Meurant was also hired by the New Zealand First Party and was on its payroll; actually, on the taxpayers’ payroll through the Parliamentary Service.

We were told that Mr Meurant attended several meetings, together with principals of Simunovich Fisheries. Mr Meurant’s former partner of some 9 years, Yvonne Theresa Dossetter, swears that Ross Meurant met at the Simunovich’s olive farm following the infamous Kermadec restaurant meal, and the proposal was put that the payment of $300,000 to Meurant would be a good investment for the Simunovich business. It is alleged that the deed was done, and that the money would be available from an Australian bank account. Subsequently, it is alleged that Mr Meurant boasted to Yvonne Dosseter, who has sworn an affidavit, that the money was paid, and that Meurant indeed had it in a brown paper bag.
This is an extremely serious allegation, and it brings into question in the public’s mind the functioning of our representative democracy. What we have to realise is that Winston Peters was in there with him.