Posts by Kevin Hague

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  Pink Shirt Day on April 14th - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  You know you have one. Time to get it out. Russel Norman says I have to iron mine. April 14th is Pink Shirt Day, a day when everyone around the country is encouraged to make a visual display of our abhorrence of bullying. read more
  April 7, 2011 11:29 am - 5 Comments
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  Back to the future with ACC experience rating - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  There are quite a number of nasty legislative and regulatory provisions coming into force today.  Among them are Nick Smith’s Experience Rating Regulations for ACC. Experience rating will result in an individual employer’s ACC levies being adjusted up or down on the basis of their work injury record.  The idea is supposedly that individual employers [...] read more
  April 1, 2011 2:01 pm - 4 Comments
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  Folding cycles to be encouraged on Wellington’s trains - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  Greater Wellington Regional Council are about to finalise their rules for allowing bicycles on trains. They’re proposing to continue to allow bikes to ride free (where space is available) on all trains except for the new Matangi trains during peak hours. Folding bicycles, however, will be allowed on all trains at all times. Folding bikes [...] read more
  March 18, 2011 8:02 am - 9 Comments
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  Thoughts from the Big Gay Out - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  I am the gayest man in Parliament. Everybody knows. So it was a bit galling to get essentially upstaged by John Key and Phil Goff. Perhaps I’m just a bit self-absorbed, but this strikes me as suggesting a weird prism through which at least some straight people see this queer event. Let’s review: I started [...] read more
  February 17, 2011 4:42 pm - 25 Comments
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  ACC digs a deeper hole - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  Financial Review of ACC today, so I subbed in for Gareth on the Transport and Industrial Relations Select Committee. Usual thing – we and Labour make the running and when things get too hot the Government members take a turn with patsy questions. ACC fronted with Chair, John Judge, by videoconference and CEO Jan White [...] read more
  February 10, 2011 4:03 pm - 35 Comments
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  Latest Pike River developments a further disaster for families - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  I think that until now the Government has got most things right in its response to the Pike River tragedy. While they made mistakes, like excluding the workers’ union from the official party at the Memorial Service, they mostly managed an appropriate balance of compassion and prudence. Now the cracks are starting to show. The Royal Commission [...] read more
  January 14, 2011 9:43 pm - 29 Comments
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  MPs combine across party lines for cycling safety - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  As the Green Party’s spokesperson on Cycling I have had the opportunity to carry forward my background in advocacy for cycling into new areas. For example, our work as a co-sponsor with John Key (he brings the dollars, we bring the cycling expertise) has seen Nga Haerenga (the NZ Cycle Trail Network) develop from a [...] read more
  January 12, 2011 12:14 pm - 2 Comments
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  Interesting answers to hard questions (for public servants!) - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  Sometimes it can be tricky being a senior public servant. The Department of Conservation senior management just fronted up to the Local Government and Environment Select Committee for the Department’s ‘financial review’. This is the Department’s accountability mechanism to Parliament for how it spent its public money in the 2009-10 year, but in practice the [...] read more
  December 9, 2010 4:41 pm - 1 Comment
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  ACC disentitlement saga a shameful exercise from start to finish - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  Four years ago the District Court decided that ACC claimants who were not earners at the time of their original injury, but who later became incapacitated from subsequent employment due to that injury, were not entitled to weekly compensation. Irrespective of the legal technicalities, it was an anomalous decision for a compensation scheme that is [...] read more
  December 9, 2010 11:04 am - 6 Comments
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  Rally brings hope for safer cycling - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  Yesterday, along with my colleagues Keith Locke and David Clendon (and Jacinda Ardern from Labour), I had the pleasure of attending the Bikes for Life rally in Auckland which you may have seen on the news last night. The rally was called in response to the recent spate of deaths we have seen on our roads. The husband [...] read more
  December 6, 2010 11:22 am - 8 Comments
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  Conservation concerns not to blame for tragedy - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  We have been supporting the Government’s decision to establish a Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate both the immediate causes of the Pike River disaster and wider systemic issues that may also have been contributors, and are particularly pleased that the terms of reference have been cast sufficiently broadly. The other suggestions we have made [...] read more
  November 29, 2010 5:21 pm - 49 Comments
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  Fears for Pike River miners and contractors - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  As many of you know, I live close to Greymouth and to the nearby Pike River coal mine. At the time of writing I am anxiously awaiting further news of the mine workers and contractors who are still underground following an explosion in the mine this afternoon. Mining disasters cast a long shadow on the [...] read more
  November 19, 2010 8:34 pm - 184 Comments
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  Time to stop importing pollen - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  I want to support Federated Farmers in their raising the possibility that imported pollen may be a vector for the introduction of PSA disease in kiwifruit. This imported pollen is used to artificially pollinate kiwifruit and includes pollen from countries with PSA disease. Beekeepers are already alarmed at the arrival in NZ of the potentially [...] read more
  November 19, 2010 11:22 am - 14 Comments
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  Cyclists’ deaths prompt greater action from Government - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  The death of three more cyclists on the roads this weekend in tragic circumstances highlights the need for concerted action on cycle safety. Two of the three cyclists died in one accident when a car crossed to the wrong side of the road around a corner into the path of a bunch of cyclists just [...] read more
  November 15, 2010 6:03 pm - 125 Comments
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  Sweet sweet Movember reign - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  It seems other MPs are running scared from my Movember challenge to them. One week in and I don’t detect any new facial hair from other MPs (caveat here: it’s possible that some efforts just aren’t visible yet). By my reckoning this makes me the unopposed champion in the House (though not necessarily amongst my [...] read more
  November 10, 2010 8:05 am - 4 Comments
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  More reasons emerge for independent inquiry on ACC reforms - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  I’m pleased Simon Collins at the NZ Herald has picked up on my blog post last month in which I released figures showing the number of people being moved off ACC weekly compensation onto welfare benefits increased to 1956 people in the latest June year from 764 two years earlier. Collins also highlights some other [...] read more
  November 8, 2010 12:22 pm - 4 Comments
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  Movember Challenge to other MPs: Bring it! - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  Movember 1st dawns. Well, actually approaching the crack of noon as I write, but it’s more or less my day off. I’ve had my last thoughtless shave of the month. From now on it’s a question of carefully trimming around the luxuriant moustaches I will be cultivating. Actually, having done this a couple of times [...] read more
  November 1, 2010 2:20 pm - 3 Comments
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  To queer youth: It gets better! (Now with video!) - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  We admired the American “It Gets Better” campaign so much that we decided to make our own: The point of these videos is to reach out to young people who may be feeling alone and scared to provide hope, let them know that there are people who understand what they’re going through and want to [...] read more
  October 29, 2010 11:33 am - No Comments
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  Nick Smith needs to open his ears to the deaf - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  As an MP I receive many lobbying letters.  Today one arrived that really caught my attention.  It was from the National Foundation for the Deaf, and it was about the cutbacks to ACC cover and entitlements for work-related hearing loss. Attached to the letter was a very detailed 82 page position paper.  The paper describes [...] read more
  October 22, 2010 4:45 pm - 2 Comments
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  Message to young queers: It gets better - by Kevin Hague

  
  
  
  Today is the day for “wearing purple to stand up against anti-gay bullying”, created in response to the recent wave of suicides by young gay people in the United States. Not to be confused with “wearing a pink shirt day, to take a stand against bullying”, which was on 28th April, as I recall. In [...] read more
  October 20, 2010 3:39 pm - 7 Comments