Will Trevor Mallard ever learn Social Media is bad for politicians?
Total Voters: 361
Loading ...We are well used to unionists telling us one thing and doing another. Robin Duff, head of the PPTA is no different. The PPTA and NZEI have fought the government to a stand still over National Standards.
Just yesterday they were calling for the data to be kept secret. Trevor Mallard even, bizarrely, tried to have National Standards data made more secret than SIS briefing papers.
Then Robin Duff in an opinion piece has this to say in opposition to Charter Schools:
Charter schools don’t have to follow the New Zealand curriculum or use the New Zealand qualification system and even though politicians mandate attendance at school for all children between the ages of 5 and 16, parliament will have no right or duty to scrutinise the activities of these schools.
The Official Information Act won’t apply, so it will be difficult for the media to enforce transparency. The other moderating influence on corrupt management practices in schools – unions – will be kept well clear.
The teachers union have opposed transparency every step of the way in education and now they are moaning that private training institutions should somehow be subject to the Official Information Act. They make out like this is a revelation and somehow evil ignoring the fact that every integrated and private school already enjoys freedom from busy bodies like him.
They don’t need the scrutiny of the OIA because their results speak for themselves.
To cap off his hypocrisy he then carps about an Act official being appointed to chair the committee to oversea implementation of Charter Schools.
Not mention the fact this educational experiment will be monitored by a committee led by a woman whose sole qualifications appear to be that she “loves education” and has served on a school board. The appointment of former ACT president Catherine Isaac is clearly politically motivated and shows that the implementation of charter schools is not evidence-based, but ideologically driven.
Of course it is politically motivated, it is Act policy, why wouldn’t they want someone in tune with the policy overseeing the implementation. If the situation was reveres you don;t think Labour would be appointing a neutral person to oversee their key policies do you? Mike Williams when president of Labour had 6 government appointed directorships after all.
After the tweet from Trevor Mallard:
Perhaps Stuart Nash is eyeing Hutt South?Â
 ” I’ve made it pretty clear to David that I have political ambitions and that I’m still keen to be an MP and he understands that.”  As for the next general election in 2014, Mr Nash said he was not sure what electorate he would represent. (Napier Mail Jan 31, 2012)
One thing is for sure the Labour MPs seem to be ignoring instructions about using Red Alert in a more circumspect manner.
Is it a coincidence that the Labour MP’s have SMOG’d all day on Red Alert, the first day of Stuart Nash’s employment?
Is this the MP’s way of saying you won’t touch our blog?
Is the following tweet as much about that than a post by Jake Quinn?
Why was Trevor Mallard spending the Christmas break beavering away writing LGOIMA requests to the local council about correspondence regarding Paul Quinn’s election signs?
Hasn’t he got better things to do?
Is this really focussing on the things that matter?
Raymond Huo has blogged about David Farrar:
Now that David Farrar is holidaying in South Africa and sending us pictures showing how big the turtles are there and how Hyenas are eating dead baby elephants. I wish to take his holiday spirit and send him this letter as my Christmas present.
His Kiwiblog is powerful and I hope this letter plays a small role in helping make his blog a bit fairer on some issues.
While on a roller-coaster over the past three weeks of being in and out of Parliament, I was told that Mr Farrar, rather indirectly, blogged on me by saying more than once that to the effect that: “It will hurt Labour. While not a huge contributor to Labour within Parliament, I understand he is a relatively large fundraiser for Labour”.
It is unfortunate that David Farrar made this sweeping comment without delving deeper into the subject.
Blah, blah, blah whatever….Scott Yorke at Imperator Fish sums it up nicely:
Labour Party MPs are said to be red-faced, after discovering that prominent blogger David Farrar is not the Prime Minister of New Zealand.
Mr Farrar has been the target of numerous attacks by Labour Party MPs over the last couple of years.
A source inside Labour has confirmed that party officials identified Farrar as the leader of the country shortly after the 2008 election, despite being given evidence to the contrary. Rumours that John Key was the actual leader of the National Party as well as the Prime Minister of New Zealand were dismissed at the time as mere speculation.
But this morning, in a shock announcement, Mr Key revealed that he is in fact the Prime Minister, and that David Farrar is merely an enthusiastic National Party member with a popular blog, a couple of newspaper columns, and only moderate political influence.
Commentators have observed that Labour’s obsession with David Farrar has been a distraction that has turned off many left-leaning voters.
Labour MP Trevor Mallard admitted today that the party had made an “embarrassing but understandable error” over the identity of the Prime Minister.
However, he was unrepentant over Labour’s policy of giving free publicity to David Farrar by attacking everything the commentator writes or says.
Mr Mallard also vowed to keep piling the pressure onto Mr Farrar.
“He’s not fit to hold office. He’s certainly not fit to be in Cabinet,” said Mr Mallard.
“When Parliament reopens we’ll be piling the heat on David Farrar, and holding him to account. This Farrar-led government has been a disaster for New Zealand.”
For some reason I missed this but Jane Clifton has some good advice for politicians, and in particular labour politicians addicted to social media:
STEP AWAY FROM THE KEYBOARD: MPs’ command of the social media is a fine thing – up to a point. Alas, too many have made themselves look uncharacteristically boorish and petty through ill-considered cyber-blurts. Labour’s usually good-natured Darien Fenton slagged the much-loved Sir Peter Leitch for being too friendly with the evil Tories and even suggested a boycott of his butcher shops. It’s a tragically short hop from Twitter to twit, but the lure of instant gratification is dangerously over-stimulating for most MPs.
Another victim was Trevor Mallard, goaded into a bike race by right-wing blogger Cameron Slater. Mallard won comfortably, but as Slater cheerfully characterises such encounters, the trouble with wrestling with pigs is that you get dirty, while the pigs absolutely love it. Repeat to self before posting: These golden words will be public and permanent. Do I really want history to record that I called someone a weasily little scrote?
This pig had fun last year.
An old quote, but still relevant:
“Why do people take such an instant dislike to me?” asked a perplexed Gingrich, to whom Dole bluntly explained: “Because it saves them time.”
Applies the same to Sue Moroney and Trevor Mallard.
It looks like Trevor Mallard, Labour’s election strategist, has been dabbling in the commercial advertising world:
A “tongue-in-cheek” advertising stunt telling people they were being evicted from their homes has backfired, forcing a public apology from the company responsible.
The orange flyer, left, has “Home Eviction Notice” written on the front, but inside explains the benefits of Generation Homes’ home and land packages.
It was sent to 15,000 Hamilton properties last week and while it generated some interest from potential buyers, it also upset a few. Generation Homes’ Hamilton director, Alana Savage, yesterday apologised for any offence caused after receiving a barrage of complaints from Hamilton residents.
“They were really quite upset by it.
“We’ve had people leaving messages on our phone really swearing.
“People are very, very upset,” she said.
One resident told the Times he was surprised to receive such a flyer.
While at second glance he realised it was a marketing ploy, it was obvious it would cause distress for some. “It was an ill-conceived promotion that will probably cost more sales than it achieves,” he said.
Either Trevor Mallard is moonlighting, fitting commercial advertising advice into his busy schedule as a professional cyclist, part time politician, or Labour is focus grouping the next election campaign very early.
When David Shearer stood at the gate of one of the clapped out Crafar Farms did he consider for even a minute that the farms were already owned by an overseas company and were ever since Alan Crafar defaulted on his loans to Westpac Bank, which correct me if I am mistaken, but I thought they were Australian.
But as long as they aren’t Chinee, Labour is fine with selling rural land:
During its nine years in power, Labour allowed 650,000ha to be sold; in 20 months National has approved the sale of 31,000ha.
Trevor Mallard thinks that Shearer gets a free pass though because he wasn’t an MP and so Labour’s past misdeeds don’t carry through.
Fran O’Sullivan schools Shearer and Mallard hard:
Labour’s Trevor Mallard has joined the fray opposing the Chinese bid. But it’s notable that he has not challenged any of the successful “Anglo Saxon” bidders for NZ farm land such as German investors, US and Australian investors. No dairy farms have yet to be sold to Chinese buyers. Penqxin also has extensive agriculture investments in South America and elsewhere.
Something Mallard omits to say is the Crafar farms are diddley squat in size and value compared to the amount of farm land that was sold offshore during the Clark reign. The Real Estate Institute said yesterday that rural property sales had a strong finish in 2011, reflecting good growing conditions across the country.
The institute pointed to the emergence of offshore buyers, mainly from Europe, acquiring properties in both Canterbury and other regions, although “this comes after extensive due diligence and securing OIO approvals in the six to 12 months prior”.
