POLITICS : How To Spend Political Capital
(March 2010)
John Key knows a thing or two about capital. Or does he? He seems to think political capital travels a one-way street – down. But didn’t his financial capital travel a one-way street – up – when he was in business? Key is not alone among his cabinet colleagues in this one-way-street thinking. Many ministers, if they are to be bold, would like to manage by stealth, preventing political capital from eroding too much too fast. The spectre older hands see is of polls plunging after Ruth Richardson’s 1991 mother-of-all-budgets. Bill English, then a new backbencher, was seared by the experience.
ECONOMICS: Taxation Reform Shouldn’t Be So Taxing
(March 2010)
It’s (probably) impossible to come up with a tax system that will please everybody. Not surprisingly, therefore, fault was quickly found with a raft of options and proposals contained in the Taxation Working Group’s report to the Government two months back. Property investors bridled at the prospect of being stung by property taxes; farmers baulked at proposals for a land tax; and, retailers predicted a customer backlash if GST was raised to 15 percent. Not surprisingly, most everyone welcomed proposals to cut personal and company tax rates.
HEALTHY WORKSTYLES : Walk Your Way … To A Healthier Workplace
(March 2010)
Last year an OECD report ranked New Zealand as the third-fattest nation in the developed world behind Mexico and the United States. That’s right – the country once touted for its active population and healthy, outdoor lifestyle is getting fatter.
Are our workplaces part of the problem? Sedentary occupations can contribute to a number of health problems including weight problems, chronic fatigue, increased stress and anxiety, and increased risk of heart disease. The statistics are scary.
THOUGHT LEADER : Greedy Organisations Will Suffer Most
(February 2010)
Over the past year, New Zealanders, along with the rest of the world, have had to seriously change the way they do business. From credit lines drying up, to mass employee redundancies, the shift from a prosperous economy to one in a state of so-called peril has left many organisations high and dry. The role that organisational culture and leadership has played in the global meltdown, both here and internationally, is intriguing. Take, for example, the fall of some of the world’s largest financial institutions.
ECONOMICS: Our Dipton Lad Dips Out
(February 2010)
You can rule out one source of influence on the decisions of our Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance: Bill English’s fondness for his home town of Dipton. This columnist once lived in Dipton and was taught at Dipton school – for just a year. I crassly hoped this might count for something when, just before Christmas and the season of giving, I tried to secure an interview on economic advice, decision-making and what have you. It didn’t. Trying to seek a favour on the strength of having lived in Dipton and walked down English Road may even have been counter-productive.
POLITICS : To Start Or Stop - That Is The Question
(February 2010)
How to start and how to stop. These two questions are perennial conundrums for governments bent on trying out new things. Both are important for taxpayers. By the time an idea materialises into a “pilot” so much may already have been invested in research, planning and persuading stakeholders, other officials and ministers that it is almost predestined to evolve into a full-blown operation. Rigorous evaluation could fix that. And departments do have evaluation programmes.
THOUGHT LEADER : Doing Nothing Is Not Okay
(December 2009)
The recently released 2009 survey of chief executive pay scales by national consulting firm Sheffield drew the usual headlines regarding executive remuneration and its relationship – or lack of it – to corporate results and the economic environment. But a bigger issue emerges beyond this single-minded focus on CEO pay. This year all employers face a set of remuneration decisions that are ultimately of much greater impact: what compensation strategy is best to adopt for everyone other than the CEO? Even in these most uncertain of times, doing nothing is not okay.
SUSTAINABILITY : ETS Still A Mystery – But NZ Public Wants Actionꂁ
(December 2009)
A measure of the size of the task to inform business and others on emissions trading has emerged. A recent survey has found that just three percent of New Zealanders feel “well informed” on the system which will send an emissions price signal through every electricity and fuel bill from July 1 next year. While 71 percent are aware New Zealand has an emissions trading scheme, 58 percent say they are not well informed about it. Only 12 percent feel informed and three percent well informed on emissions trading. Another 23 percent feel informed but want to know more.
ECONOMICS: Of Foolishness And Forecasts
(December 2009)
Give us some economic predictions for 2020, the editor instructed. If I was gifted with that sort of foresight, I replied, I would be a wealthy bloke and have no need to write columns. Anyway, there are too many uncertainties. The Government has announced a 2020 target range to take to the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December, for example. It will aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 10 to 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 (with all sorts of ramifications for energy-dependent industries and our export competitiveness) if there is a comprehensive global agreement.
POLITICS : Re-writing The Political Dictionary
(December 2009)
Almost exactly 20 years ago Ruth Richardson won a narrow vote in the National party caucus in favour of the Reserve Bank Bill. That sealed a broad National-Labour pro-market consensus based on “neoliberal” precepts and embedded the new political language. This year Rodney Hide, talking Richardson’s language, has been notching up de-regulatory wins in the National-led Government which will intensify strains in the pro-market consensus. Nick Smith has been talking a new language in an experiment which might change how complex and divisive issues are dealt with over the next 20 years.
