Question Time 29.01.2025

Watched it live. - 1:10-1:25 pm Greens took a photo on the steps while chanting 'No sand mining!' Summer shower. A very mild one. Still brooding about the identity theft, though I think it's over. - 1:30pm-2pm Familiar vibes inside. Lots of time to think. Gary's travelling to Waitangi with Dakta. Lawrence from the Greens was styling some traditional Chinese robes. - 1. Brewer to Nicola CB 5, NW 4 'Increased economic growth in the year ahead' - Nicola 'Asset sales' - Gary Same old, same old: government attacking the opposition. 'She growth'd all over our economy' - Gary, making a barfing noise. 'New Zealand is open for business' - Nicola. 2. Chippy to Omelette CH 7, PO 4 'We are saying yes to economic growth ... we said yes to tourism' - Omelette. 'Asset sales are out for this term' - Omelette. The Press Gallery was quite full. TPM were all on their phones. Another Winston supplementary. Has anyone worked out the average of how much time he wastes per session? For those that are wondering why my scores for Luxon are low, it's because he's mugging for the TV cameras rather than the room. 3. Butterick to Bishop MB 5, CB 5 Bishop's now Minister of Transport. More points of order: Brownlee struggled, but I was pretty rusty today as well. 'The speaker is useless and the Prime Minister's senseless' - Gary. Speed limits chatter. Drug Driving Bill passed a second reading, despite the ineffectiveness of roadside testing. 4. Chloe to Omelette C 6, PO 4 'A culture of no and a culture of slow' - Omelette on NZ. 'We are going to use gas' - Omelette, who hasn't ruled out subsidising fossil fuels. 'Weasel words' - Chloe. 5. Edmonds to Willis BE 6, NW 4 Is Nicola fiscally responsible? Well, there wasn't really much of an answer to this question. Nicola saw it as another chance to attack the opposition. 'The Prime Minister's always right' - Nicola. 6. Debbie to Omelette D 7, PO 4 'We're going to do whatever it takes to power growth' - Omelette. What role will Te Tiriti play in this? 'We will honour the Treaty' - Omelette. Yeah right! 'Dick being a dick' - Gary on the new Police Commissioner cutting the top iwi liaison role. Rawiri asked the supplementaries. 7. Peeni to Slimeon PH 7, SB 3 Slimeon's the new Health Minister, and trotted out 'based on need' very quickly. The question was whether the coalition was committed to equitable healthcare, and that certainly didn't seem like the general thrust of the answers. 'dark and conspiratorial' - Slimeon on opposition thinking. Chloe looked dumbfounded. 8. Bates to Erica CB 5, ES 6 New curriculum. Erica said that it had been 'very well-received by the sector' $5000 for schools to buy additional structured literacy material. New maths books have been distributed as well. 'A world-leading education sector is key to economic growth' - Erica. 9. Kieran to Tama KM 6, TP 4 Housing question. Has the need for emergency housing been reduced? Potaka answered evasively, pointing to favourable statistics. This one is a bit of a war of the numbers, and those are always slippery. 'They're not concerns; they're homeless kids' - Chloe. 10. Lu to McClay NL 5, TM 4 Invest New Zealand, a new way of 'making us attractive' for foreign investment. McClay said that we're not getting our fair share of international dollars, to which Gary replied that we weren't entitled to any foreign help. 'Selling us off' - Labour. 11. Cushla to Upston CTM 5, LU 4 Digital nomads. Tourism is NZ's second-largest export earner, but is still languishing at a mere 86% of pre-Covid numbers. What a tragedy... Cushla accused the government of using this to prop up their dodgy finances. Random idea: to add a fill light, why not put an LED strip or lamp on the desks? 12. Ricardo to Upston RM 6, LU 4 Child poverty: removed food insecurity from the list of indicators. Louise disagreed, saying that they were still being counted in a different child poverty metric. 'We have a target' - 17,000 fewer poor kids in 2026. 'They go together' - Louise on eradicating child poverty and economic growth. 'Didn't ask about the targets. Asked about the projections' - Gary, pointing out that Ricardo wasn't asking her about their goals. Battle of the numbers. It's very important, but I didn't even take Year 13 maths. All I've got is common sense.