Timothy Gassin

I'm so old that I can remember when this guy had a mystique that excited the pundit class - not yet even in Parliament, but already spoken of as a potential future PM, who is now destined to be remembered as little more than the David Brent of #nzpol

Labor has so many reasons to get Australia out of AUKUS.

Canada sees it’s a dud deal and doesn’t want to join any more.

There’s another illegal Trump & Netanyahu war in the Middle East that Australia should not be supporting.

Feels about right.

Three Australians were onboard US submarine that sank Iranian warship, PM says Anthony Albanese confirms ADF members were on vessel but says ‘no Australian personnel’ took part in attacks on Iran

He actually said Australians being on the sub is "one of the big pluses behind the Aukus arrangements". What the fuck are we doing

Mr Luxon and Ms Willis will not make it to the election, but it hardly matters when the doctrine of “do nothing, ever” is bipartisan.

October 7 was a clarifying and radicalising moment for all decent, thinking people. And in New Zealand none of its warnings were heeded: there were no moral corrections and geopolitical realignments; no urgent action to secure energy independence and a measure of supply chain resilience; nil

Wellington council budget cuts = big climate cuts and a lower rate rise This year’s rates increase will be 7.4% as opposed to the forecast 9.4%, which was itself down on earlier predictions - if all cost-cutting recommendations are adopted.

Our Climate Change programmes are working! Last year Wellington city reduced emissions by 5%. Now is not the time for Climate cuts! We’ll only have to pay more later!

Needless to say, we ended up in a situation were many staff did not have proper access to Ministry IT systems for months. 🤦‍♂️

I and a colleague who tried to assess our teams' readiness to switch to WFH at short notice and see whether old laptops could be put back into service etc. were told to stop. Apparently, all Covid-related matters were to be handled at a senior leadership level.

I remember, when it was clear to anyone with half a brain that the country would likely be in lockdown within days, being told to keep making plans that relied on travelling to other parts of the country as if everything was normal.

Absolutely. My own fear as Covid was rapidly spreading around the world was that the NZ public service would seriously drop the ball - such was the level of complacency and unpreparedness.

The Covid pandemic was extraordinary because it was Jacinda Ardern’s personal authority and charisma, not State capacity, that underpinned the successful response. When State capacity was required - vaccine procurement, roll out, enforcing sovereignty on Parliament’s own damn lawn - it was wanting

The Canadian PM calls for middle powers to work together to counter the rise of hard power and the great power rivalry, in order to build a more cooperative, resilient world.

You can tell how much Labor and the Coalition care about the poor Iranians by the way they hastily built a series of offshore concentration camps to imprison Iranian refugees *forever* when they tried to escape the regime.

Live: PM confirms three Australians on board US submarine that sank Iranian frigate Prime Minister Anthony Albanese confirms three Australian defence personnel were on a US submarine that sank an Iranian frigate near Sri Lanka. Follow live.

AUKUS already dragging Australian service personnel into a reckless US war.

The government is now rewarding MSD for its illegal actions, allowing it to keep the money it wrongfully took from these people and to continue this practice into the future.

Absolutely shameful.

It would be more accurate to say that it creates more than $63 million of debts.

MSD chased vulnerable people to repay money they did now owe. The claimed 'debts' had no legal basis.

This is embarrassing and disgraceful. And for Labor to claim the moral high ground is rich given federal Labor’s role in creating the atmosphere that’s led to this. How does this in any way stop antisemitism?! It just gives the Israel lobby another opportunity to bully its critics. #auspol

My submission on the bill the government has just rammed through Parliament.

It is a shameful piece of legislation that shreds constitutional norms, rewards illegal behaviour, breeds a culture of bureaucratic impunity, and imposes made-up debts on some of society's most vulnerable. #nzpol

Another disgraceful action from the government. Again, the government has undermined the role of the courts, changed the law retrospectively, and ignored submissions against it.

Shame on the select committee members who were well aware of the harm the bill would cause and still voted for it. #nzpol

'From the river to the sea' and 'globalise the intifada' banned in Queensland Sweeping new hate speech laws banning certain expressions in a way that makes a member of the public feel menaced, harassed or offended have passed in Queensland Parliament.

The McCarthyist madness continues in Australia.

Whenever conservative parties win, they typically try to see just how far to the right they can go before everyone turns on them. Whenever center-left parties win, they end up backing away from progressive policies and "moderating" in hopes of trying to appeal to people who didn't vote for them.

All it does is give the more right-wing parties an excuse to get *even more extreme.* You end up turning off your own voters while ushering in fascism.

Labour is what happens when the nominally "center-left" party stands for absolutely nothing and just shifts more and more to the right in a foolish attempt to woo voters to their right: a massively unpopular party that's going to get absolutely crushed... and right-wing policies.

Liberal senator breaks with party to urge ‘mercy for the children’ of IS-linked Australian women in Syria Backbencher Andrew McLachlan describes the 23 children as ‘innocents’ victimised by their parents’ ‘tragic attraction to a horrible ideology’

And the latest sighting of a spine in an unexpected place...
www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

We are all going to die at the hands of some of the dumbest people alive

Well of course they were going to go after VPNs too: the whole point is to end your privacy online, not to take action that would actually protect people and democracy.

Claiming asylum is a right; getting a UK student visa is also both expensive and quite hard in the first place. This is punishing folks from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan for daring to dream of studying here, and daring to wish to be safe. This is, once again, so needlessly cruel.

Adelaide University cancels literary festival event with UN Gaza investigator Francesca Albanese Festival organisers criticise the university for last-minute booking cancellation of event headlined by special rapporteur for Palestinian territories

Fucking. Ridiculous.