Brian Rudman

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 5 days ago
Talk about sneaky. While the rest of us are trying to focus on the handouts being promised by our national politicians, the Auckland health boards have chosen this month to hold a secretive "consultation" process on the merits of,... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 3 days ago
Wave the key to a locked prison cell in front of a bunch of politicians and chances are they'll immediately start a competition to see who can throw it the farthest. No sooner had National leader John Key declared that under his compassionate... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 1 day ago
Can't say I've had to buy a gate recently, but the $30,000 Auckland City Council plans to shell out to block the One Tree Hill summit road to nocturnal hoons, seems a tad excessive in these economically troubled times. What's wrong... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 38 days ago
At least Winston Peters had the modesty - or well-tuned fear of ridicule - not to carve the initials of his hero on some public tree trunk. His nod to Winston Spencer Churchill was, until recently, discreetly hidden from view... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 40 days ago
In the next month or two, as election day looms, the dull drone from business lobby groups for more public spending on roads, electricity plants and the like will become deafening. It's a shame these lobbyists don't also campaign... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 33 days ago
Don't you love the strange bedfellows MMP throws together? Any day now, all going to plan, Parliament will pass a bill permitting the control of Auckland's highly subsidised public transport network to return to public hands. And... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 30 days ago
We humans can be a contrary lot. Give a kid a fancy toy and he prefers to play hide-and-seek in the box. Call a general election and all the political establishment can concentrate on is the sideshow - the Winston Peters' bear-baiting. Admittedly,... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 26 days ago
If I was the best symphony orchestra in the land and wanted everyone to know, I'd do it the way I knew best, up on the platform and blowing and bowing the competition away. But highly strung old Wellington-based granny the New... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 19 days ago
The cycle lobbyists seem driven by the same cargo-cult philosophy that makes business leaders believe their expensive new Big A logo is the aphrodisiac that will have customers flocking into our city. The cyclists have a similar... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 10 days ago
Despire the latest food contamination crisis in China, this one ensnaring our flagship food exporter, Fonterra, the Government continues to reject calls for country-of-origin food labelling. It will add to the cost, we're told, and... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 99 days ago
The truck drivers' protest today underlines the truism that no one likes a tax rise. So it's unlikely that Aucklanders will be out celebrating the power granted to regional councils by Parliament yesterday to introduce a fuel tax... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 73 days ago
In the United States, the scandals surrounding electoral financing are the stuff of Greek tragedy. Here all we get is bad French farce. Not for us, shady oil and armament moguls queuing to buy a politician's attention. Just lonely... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 87 days ago
All the Veitch saga needs now is for the disgraced news reader to do a Lord Lucan or a Keith Murdoch, sneak out of the country disguised as a pilgrim to Sydney, then scarper north and out of our lives. As yet more horrific details... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 80 days ago
At his pre-election rally on Sunday, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters tried to inspire his followers to cast off their walking sticks and "act today" by borrowing Brutus's famous call to arms. "There comes a tide in the affairs... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 93 days ago
If there's one thing the area that doesn't like to be known as South Auckland needs like a hole in the head, it's more gangs. They already have the Black Power and The Mongrels and the Killer Beez. Now vigilante crime fighter Peter... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 59 days ago
Another election and once more politicians on the right are dangling the carrot of public private partnerships (PPP) for building roads and other infrastructure before a drooling commercial audience. Last week the National leader... ...

Source: www.nzherald.co.nz --- 85 days ago
The volunteer battlers of the Auckland Volcanic Cones Society have won another famous victory in the Environment Court, defeating plans to build multi-storey apartment blocks on the northern face of Mt Wellington-Maungarei. Judge... ...

Source: planet.journals.co.nz --- 36 days ago
Sigh. Another right-wing local government buffoon who wants to "get the homeless of the streets" by allowing the police to arrest them . This is simply a criminalisation of poverty, aimed at shuffling social problems under the carpet (or into Mount Eden) rather than solving them, so that rich pricks don't have their consciences troubled by seeing the effects of their policies as they cruise along in their BMWs. We are a better society than this. What these people need is help, not persecution. Help with housing, help with addiction, help with mental health issues. This help may be expensive, but as Brian Rudman points out, it's cheaper than the alternative . It's also more decent and humane. But then, what would a CitRat (and a former Brash acolyte) know about that? ...