Weekly video commentary on New Zealand politics. Heavy on context, light on outrage, allergic to spin. We read the 400-page report so you can keep pretending you did.
This is what Counterspun is going to be: weekly video commentary on New Zealand politics, heavy on context, light on outrage. Watch the trailer, judge us accordingly, and subscribe so the first episode finds you.
Local Government Minister Simon Watts says amalgamation will deliver a more efficient system. The supporting figures are that about 44 councils have submitted Head Start proposals and fewer than 20 have not.
Asked on Morning Report what new taxes National would introduce, Christopher Luxon pointed to 'existing policy' such as the fuel excise tax. Neither the excise nor the accommodation levy is new. Both would cost you more.
A $30 million programme will put solar panels on 500 schools over three years. Large schools are expected to save around $8,000 a year. The release does not say what a small school saves.
Interest-free loans worth $642 million, not due until 2036, have been monetised for about $702 million. The gain over book value is more than $60 million, earned by lending at zero percent for fourteen years.
An upgraded Funding Explorer now brings 15 funding opportunities from seven agencies into one searchable place. The $400 million a year was already there. Finding it was the problem being solved.
Chris Bishop told the Law Association that policy belongs to elected legislators, not judges, partly because Parliament has the resources and machinery to consult properly. The argument rests on that machinery being used.
Written explainers and context pieces for when fourteen minutes of video wasn't enough rope.
Counterspun Media is an independent, one-desk operation covering New Zealand politics on video, from Aotearoa, on a weekly schedule the news cycle has so far declined to respect. There is no newsroom, no panel of six people talking over a host, and no mystery funders. There is a camera, a desk, and a reading pile that does not observe weekends.
The method is not complicated. We read the reports, the bills and the transcripts, then say what is actually in them, calmly, with sources cited on screen. Where we editorialise, we label it. Where we get something wrong, we say so in public and leave the correction up. In the current media environment this apparently qualifies as a radical publishing model.
We are not affiliated with any political party, and after this much Question Time, increasingly unaffiliated with the concept of political parties.