Posts by Deborah
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Hard News: News from home ..., in reply to Moz,
One can only hope that this version of Labour is willing to accept that MMP is a thing and contemplate governing with the assistance of other parties.
You mean just as Labour did when Helen Clark was the leader of a minority government, with confidence and supply arrangements with New Zealand First and United Future?
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Hard News: News from home ..., in reply to Paul Williams,
However, it troubles me that so many people in Labour are still talking about Labour, and in ways that play directly against unification, and still not talking about matters that impact on the electorate.
Less than 24 hours after the result of our leadership election has been announced? I think it's okay to keep on talking it over for a few days. If people are still talking about it say, when the New Year rolls around, then I'd be deeply worried. I'm hoping that the internal focus will shift by 2015, and preferably sooner. It would be much better if our focus goes outwards by the time this parliamentary recess is over. (The House sits again next Tuesday.)
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Well... I think Andrew will be okay, and maybe even exactly what my party needs. He's relatively unencumbered by strong links to particular groups within caucus, so that might help with a bit of renewal, perhaps more so than might have been the case with any of the other potential leaders. I see that as a positive.
Having won the unions, he now has to do some work to get the party genuinely onside. I see that as a positive.
He can be a bit serious at times, but he also has quite a dry and self-deprecating wit. He's very straight, and I've never seen him try to wave off a question or fudge a difficult issue. I see that as a positive.
He has a good record with respect to helping a large organisation get its house in order and grow. I see that as a positive.
I don't know Andrew well, but I did grow up in New Plymouth at the same time as him, and we went to the same Friday evening drama classes. My recollection is of a decent and kind young man, who was prepared to work hard and didn't hog the limelight for the sake of it. In the last few years I've seen him at party events and at one or two non-party social events. He's been good company - witty, interesting - and he took the time to give me some very helpful advice when I was seeking a place on the party list.
FTR, I'm on the record as wanting someone else to win, but also of the view that each of the people running had real strengths to bring to the role, and being happy to work with and for any of them. I stand by that.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Dylan Reeve,
The police have to be able to investigate all manner of things.
They do indeed. That seems to have been the excuse they used when not investigating the Roastbusters, despite clear video evidence that crimes had been committed. It just didn't seem to be a priority.
I think it's completely reasonable to ask questions about police priorities when comparing the response to the Roastbusters case, and the response to the dirty politics issues.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Raymond A Francis,
Actually, it was the police who said Hager was a witness.
"Soon after the police arrived, the lead detective stated that I was not a suspect in their case, merely a witness."
Source: NZ Herald
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That's all there is on the Radio Live site right now - 4.08pm.
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Speaker: An Open Letter To David Cunliffe, in reply to mark taslov,
I am in no position to say what Labour will or won’t do with respect to the CGT. All I know is what is written in the policy, which is freely available on the Labour party website, and has been for months. I never said that Labour was exploring this position. All I said was that it was a possible option with respect to a CGT (any old CGT, anywhere in the world).
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Speaker: An Open Letter To David Cunliffe, in reply to mark taslov,
The Australian CGT was inflation indexed, but it proved to be absurdly complicated, so inflation indexing was abandoned, and instead, only half of any capital gain is subject to the CGT (NB: in Australia). Capital gains (in Australia) are taxed using ordinary old tax rates. This is one way of adjusting (in some fashion) for the effect of inflation ie. applying standard income tax rates, but taxing only half the gain.
The proposed CGT here goes the other way. All the gain is taxable, but at a low rate. Bear in mind that the great majority of people who will end up paying the CGT are wealthy, so they will be on higher tax rates. So the 15% rate on CGT is a concessionary rate in comparison to standard income tax rates.
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Speaker: An Open Letter To David Cunliffe, in reply to mark taslov,
You've misread what I wrote, Mark. It would be possible to put in some sort of exemption like that, but there are big technical difficulties with doing it. No such exemption is in the proposed CGT. Instead, there are exemptions for family homes, and long held small businesses (per my previous post) and and exemption for collectables.
The exemption for collectables and the like takes out most of the low level capital gains, so you're left with the big ones which are intended to be the major focus of the tax, namely, real estate and shares. Typically, low income people do not hold second properties and do not hold shares. In the great majority of cases, the only people who will end up paying CGT are wealthy people ie. those wealthy enough to own more than one house.
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Speaker: An Open Letter To David Cunliffe, in reply to mark taslov,
Collectables are exempt. Exactly what collectables are is yet to be defined, but there's plenty of precedent to follow from other tax jurisdictions. So that particular exemption is in place already.
Yes, it could be possible to put in some some of low level exemption. For example, one way of doing it is to say that everyone is entitled to say, $100,000 of capital gains tax free within their lifetime, and once you've used up your exemption, that's it. But there can be considerable technical difficulties with that sort of approach, such as how to take inflation into account (an exemption worth $100,000 in 2018 is probably much more valuable than an exemption worth $100,000 in 2048).