The summer has been a good one and, in Wellington at least, the best weather is yet to come.
The wind drops in February and through into March it can still be pretty pleasant.
The Black Caps actually beat the Aussies , and better still we got to accuse them of being bad sports, combining two of our favourite national pastimes.
Indeed our national day approaches and this time it actually promises to live up to its name.
If the so called "terror raids" set race relations back 100 years, as Pita Sharples claimed at the time, then his party's partnership with National has catapulted them forward again. The tino rangatiratanga flag could even fly over Premier House one day soon, let alone over the Auckland Harbour Bridge .
This constant barrage of negative news about the world economy is largely a media beat up then, surely? She'll be right, won't it mate?
Yeah right.
You only have to spend an hour or so watching international news broadcasts for a cool shiver to slice the warm summer air.
The list of economic ills is so long it's difficult to know where to start. South Korea's exports are down 32%. Don't care that the Koreans aren't earning? Well, they are New Zealand's sixth largest export market.
In the past few days more than a million people took to the streets of Paris , revolting over President Nicolas Sarkozy's handling of the economy. OK so the French love a good revolution, but the highly controlled Russians are also demonstrating in their thousands against the Kremlin's economic policies.
Closer to home came some very disturbing news, which has largely gone unremarked on here.
Kevin Rudd revealed a $A115 billion hole in the Australian government accounts.
OK, so the Aussies cheat at cricket so it probably serves them right. But the domino effect is disturbing. Australia's economy had been ticking along through the recession because it was able to export its mineral wealth to China, whose economy seemed to expand inexorably. Now China's growth has collapsed, Australia takes the hit and guess who is at the bottom of the food chain?
Bill English travels to Australia this week to meet his counterpart Wayne Swan and you can bet the New Zealand finance minister will be wearing a furrowed brow soon after the jokes about trans-Tasman cricket rivalry have died away.
Worrying, too, for New Zealand is that China had been seen as an alternative growth engine to the faltering US and European economies and our Free Trade Agreement with the Asian giant was a source of optimism.
After meeting Hu Jintao at Apec in Lima last year John Key confided to journalists that the Chinese Premier had told him that for every one percentage point drop in China's economic growth a million people lost their jobs. Not good news for Kiwi exporters.
John Key and Bill English are attempting to navigate New Zealand through this sea of global economic turmoil but they're rowing a dinghy into a tsunami.
Sure, they are trying. Streamlining the Resource Management Act. Tax breaks for small and medium sized businesses. By mid-month there'll be a list of infrastructure projects to be fast tracked and at the end of February a "jobs summit".
By then the Prime Minister will have shed the cast from his broken right arm - at considerable benefit to charity by the latest look of the Trade Me auction - and a good thing too.
He'll need both hands on the tiller as autumn looms and behind it lurks a winter of discontent.
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Post new commentGeoff Keey said on 2009-08-14 @ 01:47 NZDT: Report abusive post
Guyon, I was surprised to see you citing the Government's climate change cost estimates so uncritically given the extent to which they have been discredited.
stephen6565 said on 2009-08-13 @ 22:15 NZDT: Report abusive post
Another very poor article. You are part of the fourth estate and should be asking the hard questions of the govt. Making the govt accountable is not just the oppositions job. This whole article is just rubbish 'feelings' centred around your personal political views. Stick to policy and 'news' items.
geekypolitics said on 2009-08-11 @ 19:34 NZDT: Report abusive post
Mr. Espiner has some good advice for Labour especially on the environment, but the idea that Goff should "cuddle" up to Key is appalling. It is always difficult for the opposition to take a stance on matters that are of an international nature, as the reputation of the country as a united entity is at stake. Democrats in the U.S. had the same problem with regards to the Iraq War. I'd hate to see Labour make the same mistake in the name of "solidarity behind the troops."
Andrew Nichols said on 2009-08-11 @ 14:17 NZDT: Report abusive post
"Polls in Britain showed, counter-intuitively, that support for their troop deployment increased even as casualties mounted. " You're flat wrong! Current polling in the UKs major dailies actually shows majority and growing option to Britains involvement in Obams purposeless war. Not that that's ever bothered the govt there, who in time honoured fashion enjoy perpetuating "Britains post WW2 role as the Greeks to the US Empire" (Harold McMillan 1943)
Kereama said on 2009-08-11 @ 13:39 NZDT: Report abusive post
Of course Labour need to find their direction! They lost the election and they lost touch with grassroots NZ - National did too once, and it took them years to get back on track - but they did. The point is, the "road to nowhere" isn't permanent (unless you're Winston Peters... let's hope anyway). While it may be the opposition's role to critique the Government, the media has an obligation to do so also. Let the opposition "find" themselves and focus instead on the ones that count.