Russell Brown
@publicaddress
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Journalist, rider of bikes, cooker of food, dad-DJ, seeker of joy. @publicaddress.bsky.social https://t.co/vvQNGvH9eX
Auckland
Joined December 2008
Quality of government and trust in systems are about to become very, very important. Governments conjured by merchants of chaos, lately ascendant in the world, are going to be a real problem.
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There are times when disobedience is an important political gesture.
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A Trump supporter in Pennsylvania is being charged with voter fraud and forgery for allegedly requesting an absentee ballot for his dead mother. via @HuffPostPol.
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Apart from wartime, no New Zealand Prime Minister has faced the challenges Jacinda Ardern has handled. And certainly none has had to govern through the kind of deranged abuse and threat to which she has been subject in the past two years.
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Espiner reads a list of disgraced National MPs and candidates to Luxon: "It looks like you're selecting arrogant and entitled men with no sense of public duty.". Oof.
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Ardern to Soper: no, we are not going to indulge the protesters with a meeting on the same day they threw human waste at police.
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Mum drew her last breath at a minute past midnight, and about an hour after she made it clear she didn't want the oxygen any more (it was much more peaceful without it). We got her back to her room in the rest home today and I was holding her hand throughout her departure.
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Hilariously, the protestors and their cheerleaders claiming victory over the ending of isolation for inbound travellers don't seem to have grasped that those travellers are subject to . a vaccine mandate. 😂.
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Te Pati Māori's ability to quickly, quietly mobilise a nationwide protest with modest resources is remarkable. Quite a contrast to the astroturf events of recent years. And quite a flex.
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Intrigued by this new centre-right framing that riding a bike makes you part of the grasping, entitled middle-class elite, but if you own multiple investment properties you're a hard-working Kiwi battler trying to provide for your family.
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I guess we can all be glad the family in South Auckland didn't listen to the broadcasters who told people to say no to tests.
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Dear fellow Aucklanders. I don't mean to be rude, but storming the supermarkets on a Friday night to panic-buy canned food and water because one, well-managed, case of Covid-19 has been reported is not rational on any level.
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We need to talk about this, the only communication to Aucklanders about yesterday's catastrophic weather event from Auckland Council's social media account, posted at least six hours after the heaviest rain began. It's not an update or bulletin, it's a PR defence of the mayor.
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Every job I need to finish by Christmas has had some sort of problem happen with it. But today was a brilliant day, because my ASD son who was pulled out of school aged 12, completed his Media Design School course, with two A+ marks (game design and 3D animation) to his name.
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If you're lighting and stoking fires under precious native trees that have given people shade and shelter for generations, then, in the strongest possible terms, fuck you.
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Shut up. Just SHUT UP. SailGP signed up to run a commercial event in a marine mammal sanctuary, agreed to the conditions and actively traded on their great wildlife care plan. But I supposed entitled rich guys gotta stick together.
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The actions of both National MP Hamish Walker and party powerbroker Michelle Boag in leaking the private details of people in managed isolation are utterly disgraceful. The party needs to have a fucking good look at itself, frankly.
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I confess, I didn't have Rob Schneider on my list of completely cooked celebrities.
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In 2024, Calgary, the city where Seymour was claiming in 2010 that public transport would never work, has a light rail network with the 2nd-highest ridership in North America (it runs on wind-generated electricity) and the most extensive walk-and-cycle network on the continent.
Here's a Canadian-accented David Seymour arguing against funding public transport on behalf of Atlas Network partner & climate change denialists, Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
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When our younger neurodiverse son couldn't stay at school and we had nowhere else but home for him, we fretted about truancy enforcement. At least we didn't have this authoritarian little snot wading in.
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Heather du Plessis-Allan uses "we" a lot in her shitty, shallow, predictable column today about how Auckland is "angry" about lockdown. I can't emphasise strongly enough that she and her feeble hackery do not speak for me and mine.
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Rachel Smalley, 2023: the unvaccinated were just humans exercising free choice, Jacinda Ardern divided us all and reaped their anger, etc. Rachel Smalley, 2017:
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No big deal, just Kiwi musician Jason Kerrison telling me to "repent" and attaching a picture of a mass execution.
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The median salary at David Seymour's vanity ministry is is 82% higher than the public service median. It has more than three times more staff than the agency it replaced.
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Can't help but feel like the most broken thing about New Zealand right now is the people who can't stop complaining about how broken they think New Zealand is. A sense of perspective might be handy.
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"No" 50.7%, "Yes" 48.4% in the cannabis referendum. This is *not* a mandate to shut up shop on any and all drug law reform. It just is not.
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"Boot camps" (MACs) were operated from 2010 until they basically ran out of steam in the final years of the Key government. A 2016 MSD analysis found the 12-month recidivism rate was 86% and acknowledged that they did not prevent reoffending any better than other interventions.
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This is devastating and I'm so sad for Efeso's family. He was a remarkable man and more than that, a deeply good man. He had so much more to give.
#BREAKING: Green MP Efeso Collins, 49, has died after collapsing at a charity event this morning.
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I'm philosophical about the end (or pause) of vaccine passes and some mandates, on the basis that their real utility had become limited. But the implacable belief of some gallery journalists that they were horrifically unpopular – despite no poll ever showing that – is weird.
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This is vile. One of the people who died was an old friend of mine. He was working, and police made it clear there were no suspicious circumstances and no indication that drugs were involved. Someone in his party needs to intervene with Bridges and stop this.
With two tragic deaths at Rhythm & Vines, its in the public interest that there are full coronial investigations. Quoting sources about what is understood to have happened is not good enough.
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ASD son that we had to withdraw from school aged 12 just scored another A+ in his Media Design School course. Last time, it was a digitally-animated short film, this time a game prototype. Things can get better.
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Yeah, you're really not convincing me that we're all in this austerity thing together when it turns out you demanded and got an extra $30 million for your pet ministry, while disability services were being slashed. My thoughts about that are very impolite.
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@dbseymour Tell it to my disabled son who regularly applies and interviews for jobs and doesn't get them. You want to whip up some hate against him, you nasty little snot?.
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I am delighted to be wrong about Chloe Swarbrick’s electorate prospects. What a remarkable night.
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Spoiler: because it was *dark when they arrived*.
Why new arrivals are being bussed to Rotorua 'under the cover of darkness'
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I feel that messing with the employment conditions of 30,000 people in order to hopefully benefit a localised subset of unrelated businesses is an idea that requires some proper scrutiny.
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In today’s blather, Mike Hosking insists that no-one uses public transport in Auckland, a city where there are 100 million passenger journeys a year. He’s genuinely incapable of conceiving of an experience that isn’t his own.
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I haven't been very engaged with last night's debate, but this mean-girls schtick seems weird and embarrassing. Honestly, come back with your snark when you've led a country through what Ardern has.
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This is ludicrous. I honestly don't get this editorial obsession with treating one percenter fringe obsessions as if they were half the nation. Frankly, leave out "love " too and just report the bloody story.
"Love him or loathe him". That is not the way to open the 6 pm news on Dr Bloomfield's resignation. @TVNZ.
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So the estimated cost of the proposed monster tunnel to Wellington airport would pay for new inter-island ferries and terminals three times over, with change. It just feels like satire.
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Mike Hosking's latest reckon is that the Prime Minister is being too visible in a crisis. This isn't commentary, it's pathology.
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I went to the shop for tomato puree and accidentally came back with tomato paste. I'm not sure how much longer I can live like this. #NZHellhole.
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Kia ora koutou. Just a note to say I got knocked off my bike yesterday. The impact was low-speed, side-on, I hit the road hard. No broken bones, but I have shoulder and hip sprains and I’m very sore.
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Just went to pick up my various ageing-dude prescriptions. $30. Add in the $25 repeat fee from the GP and it's not hard to see why stretched households might give medicine a miss. What a stupid false economy reimposing those charges was.
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Bishop going out strongly with a made-up fact, but Jack Tame has done his reading as usual. Shocker.
One tobacco outlet in Northland, or 35? The back and forth with minister Chris Bishop on the smokefree changes being scrapped - full interview here:
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I actually didn't think I could have a lower opinion of David Seymour, but there you go.
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It's hard to think of a sadder act than painting over a rainbow.
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It has struck me that Ashley Bloomfield could have really thrown the Karens under the bus today, but he didn't. I like that.
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There is no situation Judith Collins can't make worse with her absolute screaming lack of judgement.
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The correct answer to Luxon's te reo Māori hypocrisy is NOT for him to repay the cost of his lessons. The solution is to stop mouthing populist race-baiting bullshit you're going to get caught out on.
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No one expected this highly unusual handout, not even the landlords. Yet everyone else is expected to accept that money's too tight to mention. WTF.
Landlords are set to receive backdated tax breaks in an accelerated decision by National — and the policy is tipped to cost $3 billion.
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Spoiler: Luxon has not in fact "overtaken" Ardern, or anything approaching that, as the story in fact spends most of its length having to explain.
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This was the correct decision and I hope she'll be left alone to get herself right as a private citizen.
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Watching these briefings and the subsequent press conference, it’s clear that the government wanted to have as much lined up as possible before announcing the most dramatic public action in our national history. Ardern has been able to answer every question.
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I have two kids with disability and they're both better people than you'll ever be, you grifting shit.
Not our Deputy Prime Minister describing something said in Parliament today as "a retard comment"
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In case you were wondering, the first post-election 'Mike's Minute' doesn't mention the National Party at all, but argues that Labour has some soul-searching to do over Waiariki and Auckland Central. Bless.
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Aucklanders looking at a 25%+ rise in water bills owing to EXACTLY THE PROBLEM THREE WATERS WAS DESIGNED TO FIX. Cynical populism turns out to be quite pricey in the end.
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This is a vile surrender to ideological contagion. Just wiping out years of work on sexual health and consent.
From the Nats & NZ First agreement:."Refocus the curriculum on academic achievement and not ideology, including the removal and replacement of the gender, sexuality, and relationship-based education guidelines.".
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@PiersonOlivia You have no idea of the significance of moko kauae, you're so wrapped up in your dumbass "western civilisation" narrative that you can't see how positively it will be received, and you just need to go have your stupid sulk in private.
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"Unmarked police vehicles had reportedly been parked up on the street outside the house since the early morning and officers had stopped two people who tried to approach the house.". So maybe showing her house on TV news wasn't a good idea. Let that sink in.
No charges laid amid investigation into Ghahraman shoplifting allegations
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Good lord. I gather Simeon Brown told the House today that raised pedestrian crossings in Auckland cost $500,000 each. The ones in the news today are actually costing $19k and $31k. I think it's reasonable to expect better from the Minister of Transport.
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My autistic son had a bit of an incident today: accidentally broke a commercial van's tail light in the course of doing his job. He aced it: talked with the driver, the driver's manager (on the phone) and his own manager (he's insured). Time was, he'd have frozen with stress.
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I'm being silenced, says HDPA in her 1000th column for the month.
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Brutal.
Newshub pulled no punches in their coverage of Luxon's "entitlement" to paying himself thousands in taxpayer money to live in his mortgage-free apartment:
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Fortunately, we live in a world where significant public health decisions are not made by Kate Hawkesby.
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Uh, New Zealand's voting age a century ago was 21. It was reduced to 20 in 1969 and 18 in 1974. Dude who wants to be the next Justice minister should probably read a book.
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It's fine for Bryce Edwards to talk about the people he met onsite – he has been there and I'm sure he's talking to decent, if misguided, folk. But dismissing any far-right link to the protest as a "conspiracy theory" is ridiculous. We're seeing their comms, for goodness sake.
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Well, Chloe Swarbrick made Garner look like the empty vessel he is. The point where she asks for a citation on one of his sweeping claims and he admits he’s just reading some bullet points his producer wrote for him is special. Knife to a gunfight, etc.
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While the Newstalk ZB talkers have their collective freakout about the gang tangi, it seems worth noting what the actual mayor of Ōpōtiki has to say.
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RNZ posted an arts story about a $600k charitable fundraising campaign for a waterfront statue in Wellington yesterday. Newstalk ZB's editors picked it up, wrote a headline that turned 5.5 metres into $5.5 million – and the story into ratepayer ragebait – and just left it there.
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Sigh. After having symptoms while isolating as a household contact, but repeatedly RAT-testing negative, I thought I was good to go. Woke up today with a sore throat and a headache – and a strong and immediate positive RAT result. Bugger.
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My disabled son will likely never drive, but takes buses everywhere. That mobility is a big part of his life. This is a horrible decision and the pretext – that Community Connect has been too difficult to implement – is flat-out false.
National will double the price of public transport for people on low incomes/or with a disability to help pay for tax cuts that benefit high income people.
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This, I shit you not, is Kate Hawkesby's argument against lowering the voting age.
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The three likely parties of government are now all competing on how punitive they can be towards beneficiaries and it just feels like bleak, profound political failure.
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Okay.🧵 Antivaxxer types here keep referring to the "Lancet study" that apparently calls for the abolition of vaccine mandates. Firstly, it's not a study, it's a letter to the editor. Its author, Carlos Franco-Paredes, is certainly qualified to offer comment. But . .
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Luxon says National would put prescription charges back on contraception, which he says isn't something people need. They're really showing us who they are, huh.
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New rule: if the National Party is going to campaign on a Hawke's Bay law and order crisis the Commissioner of Police says isn't happening, Christopher Luxon has to hold a press conference, call the Commissioner a liar, and stake his political career on it.
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Got this from one of the RNZ Afternoons producers: “For the foreseeable future we won’t be having panellists and opinion based shows – we will be having specific experts on to answer listener questions.” So that’s a few less reckons!.
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Oof. And there's no comeback, because he actually knows what he's talking about.
And again, here’s @jamespeshaw absolutely shutting down National’s climate change spokesperson on @NewshubNationNZ 😃✅
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Dr Bloomfield can dance. Not in some way you have to learn, but in the simple, vital joy of moving your body to music with the people around you. I find this very cheering.
I don’t care, this is the greatest thing ever - Dr Ashley Bloomfield dancing to Roimata down in Cannons Creek🕺 #SuperSaturday. 🎥: @BarbEdmondsMana FB Live
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Two people on bikes have been killed in Auckland this week, but sure, let’s get all performatively outraged by a protected bike lane. Screw these stupid old men.
Top mayoral contender Wayne Brown visited Upper Harbour Drive, Greenhithe to view ill-fated cycle lanes. No impressed. @GenZeroNZ @AklTransport @simonbwilson @pv_reynolds @pippacoom @BikeAKL @NewstalkZB @HDPA
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Just an appalling person. As the decision notes, Hawkesby kept up this misleading race-baiting for an hour of radio.
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Call me crazy, but I think the guy who helped establish NZ needle exchange, which saved thousands of lives and hundreds of millions in healthcare costs, might be onto something here.
Baker calls for drug decriminalisation as part of effort to stamp out COVID-19
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Good news, everyone: I went back to the shop and the man there readily exchanged the paste for puree. We are sustained by these fragile flickers of hope in the darkness. Kia kaha. #NZHellhole.
I went to the shop for tomato puree and accidentally came back with tomato paste. I'm not sure how much longer I can live like this. #NZHellhole.
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Political party that says we "need the debate" immediately poses as a victim when actually debated.
Russel Norman and Greenpeace are now campaigning against our Treaty Principles Bill. That's because they like to use Treaty principles to justify their political agenda. By restoring the integrity of Te Tiriti, we can stop it from being exploited by political actors like these.
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@alaskantexanQCT She's more likely letting her loved ones know she's okay, as anyone would. Delete your account, you idiot.
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🧵Kia ora. I've been head-down writing all day, so it took me a minute to catch up with "prioritising Māori for surgery" story. I think it's really an illustration of what's wrong with our media and our politics.
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Damn. Three Covid cases at Mum's rest home. She's fine, but they're all confined to rooms. "I thought it was all over with," she said. That's because she unfortunately listens to misinforming clowns on Newstalk ZB.
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Idiotic culture war politics. The legal basis is questionable, councils are confused and Simeon Brown is exactly the Transport minister he looked like being.
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Mate who went down the antivax/ivermectin hole and ended up at Parliament is now back in AK and having a bad time with Covid. He's still resisting science, but sort of acknowledges it might have been better if he was vaccinated. Not going to argue now, just want to see him well.
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It’s good that New Zealanders can finally listen to Lorde’s Solar Power album in the weather conditions for which it was designed.
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At the risk – nay, certainty – of upsetting my Labour friends, I think tonight's poll says "vote Chloe in Auckland Central".
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Andrew Little just once again cited the 2020 referendum into cannabis LEGALISATION as evidence that New Zealanders aren't yet ready to get behind drug DECRIMINALISATION and frankly someone needs to intervene.
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Not a great day for Luxon. He's previously said, on TV, that he owns a Tesla. Then it was his wife who owned it. Now it appears that the family has upgraded to another Tesla – and claimed the clean car discount on both of them! Just hapless.
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Does anyone really need to hear what Don Brash thinks about a Māori Health Authority?.
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