Tagged: local politics

Landlord, local MP, regional czar, next-door-neighbour-to-my-doctor, guy-who-took-a-photo-of-me-once

Brownlee property ownership 31/1/2013 - http://www.parliament.nz/resource/0000262069

Inspired by comments on the Standard, I checked out the Register of Pecuniary and Other Specified Interests of Members of Parliament here. I was particularly interested in Gerry Brownlee’s* four** properties in his (and my) stomping ground of northwest Christchurch.

In ensuing Facebook discussion, a few questions quickly presented themselves:

  1. How much passive income does Brownlee get for his* properties, and how much has it gone up since 2010 and him subsequently “letting the market sort out” the housing crisis?
  2. How is someone whose decisions have such a massive impact on the Christchurch housing ‘market’ allowed to own potentially millions dollars’ worth* of properties here?
  3. Is it even ok to be both landlord and local MP for several houses’ worth of people?
  4. Is he a ‘good landlord?’ Are his properties part of the 44% of NZ’s rental housing assessed as in poor condition?
  5. Who’d like to become one of his tenants? (there are ways of finding out the addresses.)

* It’s possible that Brownlee only has a small pecuniary interest in the listed properties. The Register doesn’t declare other owners, if any.
** As at 31/01/2013. Apparently it’s become five since then.

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Miscreants

restartcartoon

The earth turns, the grass grows, the Press publishes articles with zero analysis or respect for human dignity.

Capitalist society marginalises young people, complains about marginalised young people interfering with the smooth running of capitalist consumption, and thinks the solution is to scapegoat them and hide them away.

Let’s drive away the intimidating, anti-social, miscreant capitalist system from our city centre/world.

140-character election reactions

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I’ve joined Twitter. I’m not proud of it, but I have.

I’m an even bigger noob to it than Lianne so I’m probably doing it wrong, but here are my tweets in response to the election results yesterday. 140 characters is good training in conciseness, but I can’t help but add a few more comments now that I’m back in my natural habitat.

“Great result on Chch council alround, comm boards mixed, really hoping special votes will swap round 7th/8th on CDHB. http://www.ccc.govt.nz/thecouncil/howthecouncilworks/councilelections/index.aspx”

“Looking at #Christchurch council results, I can see why #National aren’t giving back democracy for #ECan…”

ECan notwithstanding, there’s definitely been a leftward shift on the city council … People’s Choice have one councillor elected in each ward except Fendalton-Waimairi (the most they’ve had since councillor numbers halved in 2004) and several of the independents lean to the (relative) left too. It’s looking like a dream council for Dalziel and certainly a change from the Parker/Marryatt-era council.

Local government elections usually favour incumbents, but this time the mayor and nine of the 13 councillors are new faces. Eight councillors sought re-election – three People’s Choice, who all survived, and five I-Citz/City 1st, of whom Jamie Gough is the only survivor.

Four of these I-Citz/City 1st voted for Marryatt’s pay-rise … three are gone, and Gough has a lot to thank The Press for. Aaron Keown has managed to hold onto his community board and health board seats despite being booted off council – though he’s sitting at a precarious 7th on the health board preliminary results. Let’s hope special votes bump Heather Symes above him. (If they don’t, I’m blaming you non-voters).

Elected councillors by parties/groupings:
People’s Choice – 6
‘network of the likeminded’ – 3
I-Citz – 1
City 1st – 0
Other – 3 (Scandrett is former People’s Choice, Lonsdale might as well be National, I don’t know anything about David East)

Last minute voting

It’s not too late to vote in local body elections, even if you don’t have your voting papers. You just have to go to one of these places today, tonight or tomorrow morning and cast a special vote which seems pretty easy.

If you do have your voting papers, you can drop them at your local library.

You don’t have to fill everything out if you don’t want to… eg. you can just vote for mayor and a councillor or two and that’s fine.

Here are my votes and good resources for figuring out how to vote, and here is my guide to four important questions (which councillors voted for Marryatt’s pay-rise, what the [non-]parties mean, etc).

Wheat, chaff, sheep, goats (resources, votes)

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Though political scientist Bryce Edwards suggests maybe we shouldn’t vote in this year’s local body elections, I’ve never missed an opportunity to vote in any local or national election (anarchist sympathies notwithstanding).

This year’s elections in Chch are more important than most… we get to vote for a new mayor, mostly-new city councillors, community board representatives, district health board representatives and Environment Canterbury councillors.

Here’s how I’m voting this time, and – more likely to be useful for you – the resources I used to make my decisions.

I won’t fill out my form and post it until the last minute (Wednesday), so I’m open to changing my mind, and I’m keen to hear about any other useful resources you know about.
 

Resources

My votes

Mayor (pick one or none)
Lianne Dalziel

Councillors – Fendalton-Waimari ward (pick up to 2)
Raf Manji
Faimeh Burke

Community Board members – Fendalton-Waimari ward (pick up to 5)
Faimeh Burke
Sally Buck
Ahi Allen

Canterbury District Health Board members (rank as many/few as you like, up to 26) (Updated 9/10/2013)
7 are elected but your votes are almost guaranteed to be transferred further down your list, so it’s worth ranking at least 12 if you can bring yourself to do so. I’ve ranked 25 to give my votes the maximum chance of contributing to anyone but Keown (see below).

  1. Paul McMahon (preventive health, mentions health inequalities, highlights wider causes of (un)health, community development/youth health experience, supports living wage for all, supports free public dental care in theory, part of the Anabaptist network, People’s Choice)
  2. Heather Symes (health practitioner, focus on vulnerable people, sympathetic to public dental care, supports living wage for all health workers and lower CEO salaries, signed Nurses Organisation pledge, People’s Choice)
  3. Oscar Alpers (focus on vulnerable people, public health not health insurance, People’s Choice)
  4. Adrian Te Patu (health practitioner, community/public health experience)
  5. George Abraham (health scientist, campaigning on free public dental care, wants to look after ‘less privileged’)
  6. Jo Kane
  7. David Morrell
  8. Anna Crighton
  9. Chris Mene
  10. Sally Buck
  11. Steve Wakefield
  12. Alison Franklin
  13. Drucilla Kingi-Patterson
  14. Andrew McCombie
  15. Wendy Gilchrist
  16. Tim Howe
  17. John Noordanus
  18. Margaret McGowan
  19. Andrew Dickerson
  20. Beth Kempen
  21. Murray Clarke
  22. Keith Nelson
  23. David Rowland
  24. Robin Kilworth
  25. Tubby Hansen

Unranked: Aaron Keown (Only attended one two full Health Board meetings in 2012 but still picked up a cool $26,000 for his troubles. Tries to go where the populist wind blows, but occasionally reveals his true colours as an ACT member and Marryattophile who called quake victims whiners.)

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Disclaimer: Fine, I admit it. I linked to the Bryce Edwards post 78% for ego reasons. He mentions me!