Sunday Newspaper Brunch Club

Top news stories from the Sunday Papers

SUNDAY STAR TIMES
One call away from losing your licence
THOUSANDS OF New Zealanders face losing their licences if they are caught just once using a hand-held cellphone while driving. The penalty for breaching the new law, which comes into effect on November 1, is 20 demerit points and an instant $80 fine. But figures obtained by the Sunday Star-Times show that 9009 Kiwi drivers already have between 80 and 99 demerit points. So if they are caught breaking the new law, they would reach or exceed the 100-point limit, and would automatically be banned from driving for three months.
Sunday Star Times

How come one phone call can get a licence lost yet drink drivers who kill can get their licence back within 28 days?

Is this another example of poorly planned thinking by National in their rush to ram legislation through? Did they click that the demerit points would impact like this? Why not just make it a cash penalty? Police making money from cell phone use by driving will be enough of an incentive to police it, I’m not sure stopping drivers from driving because they are caught using a phone while killer drunk driving grannies get their licence back within 28 days is the kind of ‘justice’ we’re looking for on the roads. Does it strike anyone else as amusing that this is from the Party that trumpeted so hard against the ‘Nanny State’ talkhate radio created mythology yet don’t get criticized for it?


Secret ACC plan to charge all victims $100
EVERY ACCIDENT victim would pay the first $100 of the cost of their ACC claim, and injured workers would lose thousands of dollars in income compensation under secret plans to cut costs at the state insurer. The Sunday Star-Times has obtained a shopping list of Accident Compensation Corporation proposals to pare back compensation entitlements as it deals with a $4.8 billion blowout. The list justifies the worst fears of compensation recipients, particularly those who have been on the scheme long-term. While ACC Minister Nick Smith insists that the government will never dismantle the no-fault public-owned insurance scheme, the proposals obtained by the Star-Times suggest otherwise.

The ACC's hidden agenda:

• Introduce a $100 excess on every claim.
• Reduce income compensation from 80% to 70% after one year and 60% after two.
• Impose a two-year limit on compensation for soft tissue injuries, such as back pain.
• Introduce wider surveillance powers for ACC investigators to stamp out fraud.
• Legislate to make it easier to get workers back to work.
Sunday Star Times

When Nick Smith isn’t getting caught out inflating ETS costs, or holding climate change greenwash ‘consultation’ meetings when the Government had already decided on a pitiful 10% that they won’t keep, he’s explaining that suicide victims are really killing themselves for ACC payouts. National claim ACC is in financial dire straights because Cullen hid the true cost till the books were opened at the end of last year, the reality is that National were simply looking for a reason to privatize ACC and that as early as July last year (before Cullen’s hole was discovered) Merrill Lynch were excitedly telling the Australian Insurance industry that National’s Privatization agenda would be a $200 million dollar bonanza for them. National need to pretend it’s Cullen’s fault for the changes they had already telegraphed to Merrill Lynch and need to hide their privatization agenda behind a smokescreen of manufactured crises, bullshit motorcycle non-issues and crass comments on suicide by Nick Smith.


Hide seeks answers on Sounds murders
ACT LEADER Rodney Hide wants authorities, including police, to answer allegations about their conduct in the Scott Watson case which saw the then 26-year-old convicted for the Marlborough Sounds murder of Ben Smart and Olivia Hope almost 12 years ago. Yesterday Hide attended an Act-arranged public meeting at a cafe in his Epsom, Auckland, electorate, where journalist and campaigner Keith Hunter spoke to a crowd of 40 people about the Watson case.
Sunday Star Times

The case against Watson has always been so circumstantial I’ve never understood the verdict. The beef for me is that boat people know boats, if they say they saw a certain type of boat, they did. The criticisms of the case are powerful and Keith Hunter has done an excellent job exposing them. It’s a smart move by Hide as well, he’s feeling the heat of laying down with the crazy climate skeptics (after taking $100 000 from skeptic Alan Gibbs) and the Sensible Sentencing Trust (do they take funding from GEO the private prison company or not?), and need to try and expand their vote minus the fringe crazies hence this case (makes ACT look softer than hard right law and order nutbars) and the dog freedom nonsense Rodney is championing (nothing is softer than a picture of Rodney having his face licked by a Labrador). ACT have a lot of nasty right wing policy to get through before 2011, being painted as fringe hard right might risk support, soft issues like this help redefine how they are perceived.


'Plague' of sex abuse in church alleged
THE EXCLUSIVE Brethren Church is being rocked by accusations that it has covered up a "plague" of sexual abuse in its ranks. Last week a former member of the church, 74-year-old Clive Allen Petrie, was found guilty in Nelson of nine counts of indecently assaulting girls under 12 and one of inducing a girl under 12 to do an indecent act on him. The case involved four girls, three in the 1950s and 60s, and the fourth in the 1980s. Former church member Neville McCallum, who last week sent a letter to all 1900 Brethren households in New Zealand about alleged crimes and cover-ups within the church, says the Nelson case "is only the tip of the iceberg".

Hmmm, Don Brash’s and John Key’s funding buddies the Exclusive Brethren have apparently been doing their best to go to hell. Never been sure about freakish cult groups that decide to cut themselves off to the rest of society, obviously in a free liberal democracy one can chose to interact or not, but surely there needs to be outreach programs openly accessible to people wanting to escape groups like this?


Minister flies gang bosses to secret meeting
THE GOVERNMENT stands accused of sending mixed messages in its war on P-producing criminals following revelations senior Mongrel Mob and Black Power members were flown to Auckland at taxpayers' expense for a secret hui with a minister.

YAWN – the bullshit war on P that John Key announced last week has little to do with reducing social harm as it does mass expansion of Police powers. P killes dozens, smoking and booze kill thousands, if this was really about reducing social harm we’d focus on our nations alcoholism rather than allow cops the right to break into your house, plant spy equipment and spy on you minus judicial oversight while reducing the evidential threshold to seize your assets. Instead of damning Sharples, Labour should be congratulating him on looking at alternative ways to connect with alienated communities rather than the SWAT team approach Key is favouring.

Finlay Macdonald writes a good opinion piece about punishing Aussie Banks for their despicable tax avoidance scam.


HERALD ON SUNDAY
Cat survives 19-hour ordeal in freezer
A pet cat has stunned an animal expert by surviving 19 hours in his owners' freezer.

Why do I buy this paper, how is it worth $2.80? Their lead bloody story is a cat that got stuck in a freezer for 19 hours. This is a brain dead as it gets, Jesus, just go the full hog and get a page 3 pin up girl, God it’s painful - the only reason to buy it is because of Matt’s column…

Matt McCarten: Sharples cops the blame for a National disgrace
After Maori Party co-leader Pita Sharples was smacked down by his National Party allies, it looked as if this weekend's Maori Party annual conference was going to be a very unhappy event. What got Government ministers upset last week was Sharples' support for Maori Television's deal with Te Puni Kokiri (Ministry of Maori Development) on sponsoring a bid for the free-to-air television rights for the Rugby World Cup. Government sources claimed it was not an appropriate use of taxpayers' money. Nor was it seen as practical for Maori Television to think they could do it, given they had only 90 per cent transmission coverage of the country. More ugly was the leaking by government spin doctors that Sharples had, through his inexperience, neglected to inform his National Party colleagues about the Maori Television bid. Fortunately it didn't take long for the real story to emerge. Te Puni Kokiri's business case was a strong one, given it could justify its sponsorship on the basis of the captive audience to which it could promote its services, as well as the participation of secondary sponsors.

…Matt points out that National knew about this all along and shows the utter disorganization within National, a point even Deborah Coddington picks up on.