Here’s how our economy actually works.

"Every Starbucks in Korea is now empty." Good. I didn't understand why they were in Korea anyway when you could get excellent coffee from local vendors and Starbucks are crap, but celebrating May 18th like this? Hope the whole franchise dies forever.

Nats are acting like state housing is emergency housing, which tracks because they basically made emergency housing not exist. Michael Joseph Savage on the other hand established state housing as permanent, secure rental homes. Can we spot the difference whānau? #NZPol

Perhaps someone should tell Nicola Willis.

This is cruelty for its own sake. It isn't a "saving" and I wish journalists would stop describing cuts to the supports of our poorest people as such. These cuts will cause suffering, they will affect health and well-being. They will save nothing #nzpol

I think I mighta just got inaugurated as President Business.

first thing i thought of too, that NZEI Wellington poster (circa 1981) was just everywhere i went ✊ seems it was based on a 1979 poster produced by the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom in Philadelphia.

If you're working fulltime on minimum wage, you'll take home less money per week than the Minister for Social Development gets paid for LIVING IN HER OWN HOUSE. On top of a $320k salary, earned by making housing less affordable for low income households. The absolute state of it.

Yesterday I got to catch up with my sister's new puppy again and he really is the most adorable bundle of fluff

Trump: “A lot of people don’t know “dumb” actually has a B in it.”

Costa-Gavras' brilliant 1969 move "Z" was based on this story. Highly recommended if you ever get the chance to see it

Tautoko. None of the trans people I have met over many decades as a cis woman have ever made me feel unsafe but countless cis hetero men certainly have

Seems positive until you read the article and it's a merger because there's not enough staff or capacity to keep MPs safe. A week after powerful testimony from wāhine Māori about online threats, harassment and feeling unsafe as a politician. #nzpol www.rnz.co.nz/news/politic...

The Road to Wigan Keir

Mindless word salad

Brilliant title

Aotearoa BSky, if sharing news articles on the blatant racism of Pharmac's changes to Diabetes medicines - PLEASE ADD the simple 5min action people can take to DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. We only have 6 days. Too impt for this to get lost in Pre-Budget/Budget carnage 'flooding the zone' over same 6 days.

Congratulations to @domesticanimal.bsky.social for winning 2026 Cartoonist of the year (used to be the Voyager Award). Bloody brilliant news and well deserved. Look forward for to seeing more wonderful creations this year ❤️❤️❤️

Maiki Sherman won Political Reporter of the Year #OneTermGovernment #nzpol

Sunrise, Saturday, 23 May, from Wainui Beach, Aotearoa / New Zealand. Ata mārie / Good Morning ☀️

Bernard Hickey "This is a clear income transfer from state tenants to private landlords of ~$500 million and this is on top of the $12.5b tax breaks that have been handed to landlords in the last 2 years, and that was taken from the Climate Emergency Response Fund" www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5u0...

The same billionaire who bankrolled lawfare against me, and TVNZ for reporting Julian Batchelor's anti-Māori racism, now directs advertising to far-right accounts, & platforms trafficking in the same register to amplify his own media. In the lead up to November's poll, this completely tracks. #nzpol

Things are grim but doing something helps with feelings of helplessness. Donate to a charity. Write to your MP. Sign a petition. But also look for joy, whimsy, beauty. They are vitamins that you will need to strengthen yourself so you have the energy and stamina to keep on keeping on.

Long term state housing provides people with stability, you absolute ghoul. It means people can become part of a community, children don't have to keep changing schools, they have enough left over from rent to afford food ... to frame this as "dependency" is as bad as Willis's lotto reference #nzpol

Why is it important to criticise MPs for accepting an accommodation allowance for living in a property they own? Because accepting that allowance betrays a lack of sense of shame, which in turn betrays a lack of empathy, which should disqualify you from holding power of any kind.

Listening to Chris Bishop, it's obvious their new policies are about a transfer of wealth from public hands to private landlords. Bishop was key driver in giving $3b of tax cuts to landlords but this is bigger - it's about privatisation as Bishop stops & sells state land/houses

We are incredibly lucky that George came to live in Aotearoa. Don't fuck this up Aotearoa. Donate, volunteer and vote to make sure this terrible government loses the election #nzpol

🔥 Tamatha Paul @greens.org.nz 21 May #nzpol

new zealander everlee wihongi - kidnapped by ICE 41 days ago - was meant to take the stand today in front of a wisconsin judge. but ICE had other plans. webworm has the latest on this story - please RT, and share: www.webworm.co/everleemay21/

This grift has been going on forever: Nat MP owns BUT DOES NOT LIVE IN Wellington apartment. Nat MP RENTS their apartment to ACT MP (who ALSO owns but does not live in a Wellington apartment) Nat MP rents NZF MP's Wellington apartment. All claim $1000/wk allowance while bashing beneficiaries.

My parents and older sisters look happy because they would soon be able to live in a state house instead of a garage. The state house gave us security but it wasn't like winning lotto.That's my grandparents' car - I was 17 by the time Dad could afford to buy one of his own

Bishops claim to fairer social housing is false . Its not fairer. Its rationing. Let him call it what it is, rationing. Services being rationed for the poor, while landlords are paid more in subsidies and tax breaks.

Lots of bs happening in NZ politics this week. Want to be clear, these aren't "distractions" but I think a bit of shock doctrine instead. Announce a bunch of unpopular shit at once to overwhelm us.

This is, of course, genocidal and horrible. The UK is now as bad as Florida and Texas for trans people. Beyond that the guidance as written is impossible to implement and, moreover, in no way actually extends from the supreme court ruling. Absolute shitshow, heartbroken for so many of my friends.

Relieved to see a decent response from the NZ Human Rights Commission to the NZF terf bill, with comments from the Commissioners who *aren't* terfs themselves. Doubly relieved since the UK's EHRC has been a travesty for so long, & now only exists to campaign against trans people having a wee.

I find it both chilling and obscene that David Seymour is the person fronting media to explain Pharmac’s decision to stop priority access to Type 2 diabetes treatment for Māori.

Good metaphors mirror arguments through some lens or other. Did Willis' metaphor which somehow was found by her when reaching, not reflect the argument she was making? Or did it reflect it too well and make people get a bit sick?

Louise Upston pushing down hard on state housing while claiming $1000/week to stay in her own apartment: #nzpol www.stuff.co.nz/politics/360...

It’s bad to be in social housing cause you are poor but completely fine to charge the taxpayer $52,000 to rent the house you already own. National party MPs are disgusting people and people who vote for them are disgusting too.

Again. They're doing this again. The accommodation supplement is a subsidy to landlords that already costs us $2 billion annually. There's a sorry history here ...

social housing tenants would probably feel more like they had won the Lotto if they could claim a $36,400 accommodation supplement to live in their own property

Everybody deserves a secure, comfortable, affordable place to live and the best way to achieve this is for the government to build lots more state housing and also regulate private landlords with rent controls and enforceable standards

This makes me so angry. Maybe come to my neighbourhood where people who have “won the lotto” living in very old state housing stock and are now being given 90 day notices to be moved away from our community while new homes built (where there were state houses) nearby are sold to market for $$$.

Excellent point. Replacing public servants with AI is like importing your public service from the US. You spend less money into the domestic economy and shovel more NZ financial assets into offshore ownership.

I liked our country better when we weren't treating everyone except rich, cis white people like absolute shit. And to be clear, we weren't exactly perfect before, but my heart hurts every day seeing the path we're currently on

I didn't think I could hate Nicola Willis any more than I already did but I was wrong. She is totally despicable #nzpol

REDUCING SUPPORT FOR SOCIAL HOUSING TENANTS AND INCREASING THE SUBSIDY FOR PRIVATE TENANTS IS GIVING MORE MONEY TO PRIVATE LANDLORDS www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/...

I've never seen anything like this. The Coalition's attacks on disabled people and the people who care for them are just relentless. We need to get rid of this vicious government, and we must put all our energy into doing it. www.emilywrites.co.nz/breaking-the... #nzpol

The hypocrisy of all these people is so beyond shameful.