Today’s blog is not about the usual things I discuss, like pop culture, children, science or history. Oh no, today we are covering two other passions of mine: my country and politics. Yes, yes, I can hear the collective groan, but wait, you’ll like it.

Spring is in the air; well for us it is, Autumn for our Northern Hemisphere friends. The birds are chirping, lambs are being born, houses are being cleaned, seeds are being planted, and the conservative coalition government of Aotearoa New Zealand are doing what they do best: incompetency.

When we last shone a microscope on those duly elected smooth-brained politicians, they had hit the milestone of 100 days in power on 8th March. So what have they been up to since then? That is an outstanding question along with, “Would Jedi be good at poker?”

So, I’m not going to be covering everything The Three-Headed Taniwha have done since March, just the crappy things. Granted, they have done some good, but when balanced on the scales of morality, kindness, and decency, their shitty shenanigans outweigh them. Sweet as, let’s do it!

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• 19/3/24: Disabilities Minister Penny Simmonds explained that the Government would be terminating respite care funding for families with disabled children, because of budgeting concerns. After Simmonds had added some extra controversial statements, the disabled community of Aotearoa amassed 10,000 signatures in 24 hours as a protest against the statements and new policy. Simmonds was later stripped of her Disability Issues portfolio position.
• 27/3/24: This was a busy day for the conservatives. They passed legislation restoring interest deductibility for residential investment property; reducing the bright-line test for residential property to two years; eliminating depreciation deductions for commercial and industrial buildings; requiring electric cars and plug-in hybrids to pay road user charges; and halting work on creating a 620,000sqkm ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands.
• 2/4/24: Prime Minister Christopher Luxon proclaimed new policies concerning reducing wasteful spending, keeping agriculture out of the Emissions Trading Scheme, reversing the ban on offshore gas and oil exploration, restoring three strikes legislation, reviewing the firearms registry, establishing a Youth Serious Offender Category, and taking steps to replace mega polytechnic Te Pūkenga. You know, normal helpful things.
• 4/4/24: Local Government Minister Simeon Brown explained that local and regional councils that introduced Māori wards and constituencies without polling residents would have to hold referendums to hold or eliminate the wards they had just established.
• 14/4/24: Landlord-friendly policies were going to be introduced. These included re-introducing 90-day “no-cause” terminations for periodic tenancies. This means landlords can terminate a periodic tenancy without giving any reason. The tenant will only need to be given 42 days’ notice to end a tenancy. Landlords will also be able to terminate fixed-term tenancies, without giving a specific reason.
• 16/4/24: The Ministry of Education is going to ease the entry qualification requirements for ECE teachers, as well as the government will get to choose the locations for new ECE centres.
• 23/4/24: The Government revealed it would scrap or amend farming, mining and other industrial regulations as part of its planned overhaul of the Resource Management Act 1991.
• 2/5/24: Education Minister Erica Stanford announced the Government would install a structured literacy reading approach in all state-run schools, from Term 1 of next year. This means the Reading Recovery programme, which is an early literacy intervention system, will be terminated across public schools because the programme uses a whole language approach, instead of structured literacy.
• 21/5/24: The Government would be scrapping Kāinga Ora’s NZ$60 million first-home grant programme and redirecting the money towards social housing as part of the 2024 Budget.
• 7/6/24: The Government discontinued funding for the controversial drug rehabilitation Mongrel Mob programme, Kahukura.
• 9/6/24: Minister for Resources Shane Jones confirmed that the Government would introduce legislation to reverse the previous Government’s ban on oil and gas exploration in the second half of 2024.
• 11/6/24: Agricultural Minister Todd McClay explained that the NZ emissions trading scheme (ETS) would exclude agriculture.
• 14/6/24: Associate Justice Minister Nicole McKee confirmed that the Government would introduce new firearms legislation to replace the Arms Act 1983, by 2026.
• 17/6/24: The Government proclaimed it would begin policy changes to ensure certain housing buildings could be built without resource consent.
• 23/6/24: The 2024 Government of New Zealand explained they would introduce boot camps for youth offenders aged 14–17.
• 3/7/24: The Government announced it would introduce standardised testing for primary school students from 2026.
• 12/7/24: The Government extended the NZ Defence Force’s deployment to US-led efforts to combat Houthi forces in the Red Sea from 31st July 2024 to 31st January 2025.
• 18/7/24: Associate Health Minister Casey Costello cut the excise rate on Heated tobacco products (HTPs) by 50%, to make them a more attractive option to smoking. The Ministry of Health has disagreed with her assessment. She has been fighting accusations of having ties to the tobacco industry, like claiming, “Nicotine is as harmful as caffeine.”
• 26/7/24: The Ministry of Education revealed they have stopped 100 school building projects to save NZ$2 billion, as a cost-cutting scheme.
• 30/7/24: The Government has earmarked NZ$216 million to pay for tax cuts it needs to fund tax cuts for heated tobacco products.
• 2/8/24: The Attorney-General Judith Collins explained that the Government would not progress eight of the 44 recommendations of the “Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Terrorist Attack on Christchurch Mosques”, including creating a new national intelligence and security agency, establishing an advisory group on counter-terrorism, instituting mandatory reporting of firearms injuries and amending the Crimes Act 1961 to criminalise inciting religious or racial disharmony.
• 4/8/24: The Ministry of Education revealed the Maths Action Plan, which includes a new mathematics curriculum from 2025, twice-annual maths assessments, funding for teaching professional development, and raising maths entry requirements for new teachers.
• 8/8/24: The Ministry of Social Development announced that emergency housing eligibility criteria would be tightened.
• 15/8/24: The Ministry of Social Development also announced that Whaikaha – Ministry of Disabled People would be restructured as a policy and advisory department and that its support service delivery functions would be assumed by the Ministry of Social Development.

This list is not a Project 2025 initiative, an episode of The Handmaid’s Tale, or a chapter of 1984. I would be laughing at the insanity of it all if it wasn’t so painfully tragic and real.

After reading this list, I have a question for the 52.8% of the population that voted for the Coalition of Chaos: Do you have buyer’s remorse yet?

The Coalition of Chaos has upset this geek for several reasons:

• 52.8% of voters elected a Government that doesn’t care about all New Zealanders, only the ones that fit the bill and criteria.
• 52.8% of voters thought they wanted a change after six years with Labour, so they believed a National-led coalition would be the opposite of a Labour-led coalition; but all of them were deceived.
• The people making these cruel policies against New Zealanders are not foreigners living in faraway lands. They’re us. New Zealanders hurting New Zealanders. New Zealanders prosecuting New Zealand’s most poor and vulnerable. New Zealand’s most powerful and wealthy politician-landlords are telling the rest of the country, that we are overpaid and must cut back. New Zealanders spreading disorder with racism, conspiracy theories, culture wars, and division against other New Zealanders.

I love my quirky little country, I really do. But this elite club of village idiots couldn’t roll a tyre down a hill, let alone run this country. They’re dragging us back to the 1950s, smashing the progress we have made, and the bastards don’t care or don’t realise. I’m not sure which is worse.

The silver lining in this dumpster fire is that the Coalition of Chaos will be a one-term government because they have to be.

And with that, I’m done. We will check in with the Coalition of Chaos near the end of the year, to see if they have pulled their socks up, or just pulled their pants down to moon us.

Thanks for reading, following, and subscribing to Some Geek Told Me. Please remember to walk your dog, read a banned book, keep watching the Paralympics Games and I’ll see you next week when we talk about The Final Experiment.

3 weeks to go until we hit 200 posts!!!

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