... and the loser on the day is Whanganui

Sorry, Wanganui! You’ve contributed about $100 million in rates over the last three years (not to mention your contributions to John Maslin’s salary) funding Michael Laws’s re-election campaign.

Many of you have, however, fought the good fight and you’ve helped emasculate the party platform that has allowed the Mad Mayor to trample democracy and decency into the Vision mud.

His loyal lieutenant Murray (‘dishwasher’) Hughes has been consigned to the scrapheap and we now wait to see how long it takes for Rangi (‘I forgot to put my hand up’) Wills and the very strange Rana (mad-dog) Waitai to bed down with Vision. With luck Mr Waitai’s tenuous provisional margin will disappear and the independence of this council will be strengthened by substitution of that courageous campaigner Allan Anderson.

With even more luck, the pathetic Randhir Dahya will put the shenanigans of the past three months behind him and realise he’s got as much chance of getting the mayoralty when Mickey runs off to give birth to Vision First next year as Marty Lindsay has of being minister of broadcasting (actually, Mickey, why not take the whole lot of them with you to national ignomy – ed). To the Warburtons, Rewitis, Harknesses, Roses et al, may you drown in the toxic swamp you have personally created at Guyton St.

Congratulations to all those brave non-Vision souls (especially very high pollers Stevens and McGregor) who put their heads above the parapet and were rewarded with a very respectable number of votes from those who believe Wanganui has a future. Kia Kaha to all those who find themselves now in a position to pull back a smidgeon of respect for the democratic spirit.

10454 LAWS, Michael Brian

7044 MARTIN, John Bruce
1082 DAHYA, Randhir
270 FLEMING, Russell William

249 OSBORNE, Chandra Michelle

Blank 238

Informal 43

McKINNON, Dorothy Margaret (Dot) 10400

STEVENS, Raymond Mark (Ray) 10375

McGREGOR, James Roland (Don) 10269

DAHYA, Randhir 9359

BULLOCK, Barbara Lynn 9290

BAKER-HOGAN, Philippa 8911

LINDSAY, Martin Graeme (Marty) 8262

HIGGIE, Nicole Andree (Nicki) 8205

WESTWOOD, Susan Moya 8106

JONAS, Danny Ronald 7484

WILLS, Rangi Marehua 7445

WAITAI, Rana 6984

ANDERSON, Allan Royce 6978

HUGHES, Murray John 5976

EDMONDS, Matthew Lyle (Matt) 5960

MITCHELL-ANYON, Ross 5760

MOORE, Robert Joseph (Rob) 5475

SIMPSON, Kirsty Nicole 5423

BROWN, Ian Grant 4923

FLEMING, Russell William 4319

KEELTY, Gordon James 4064

SMITH, Rory James 3925

FORLONG, Shaun Graham 3922

MILNES, John Ingham 3898

OSBORNE, Chandra Michelle 3405

McNABB, Andrew 3102

SEARS, Victor Frederick 2686

HUDSON, Phillip Edward 1950

STEVENS, Gary John 1875

JANGO 1676

LITTLE, Ian Paul 829

Blank 215

Informal 78

AND IT’S THE MICKEY n CLIVE SHOW AT THE DHB:

SOLOMON, Clive 6717 1

LAWS, Michael Brian 3941

BAKER-HOGAN, Philippa June 2870.75

FAUMUI, Penaia Albert (PJ) 2848.24

ANDERSON, Allan Royce 2689.08

STEWART, Ailsa Crawford 2627.91

WAITAI, Rana 2494.04

DOUGLAS, William John 2340.34

The Walking Dead

Those of you who have followed LawsWatch through 367 posts over two years will know that we Watchers are seldom lost for words. We sometimes think we’ve seen it all, like the world weary forensic pathologists on our favourite television gore-fests. We’ve often felt in danger of becoming inured to the unspeakable horrors revealed by our weekly dissections of the rotting remains of the walking dead around His Worship the Mayor of Wanganui Michael Laws.

We’ve gasped and we’ve raged at the ghastly crimes against truth, justice, democracy (and most recently the sanctity of the Prince Edward Auditorium at Wanganui Collegiate) committed daily by the Beast of Taupo Quay, aka John Philip Maslin! We’ve cracked our cynical medical jokes at the ineptness of the Foolish Felons operating under the Sign of Vision! We’ve even developed a grudging respect for the ability of the Devilish Doctor Warbottom and his Guyton St Gang to evade the Bungling Cops in Wellington!

But we have to confess, Dear Readers, that events of the past three months have left us wondering just what deadly pathogen has infected the Wanganui body politic and its parasitic media. Since this vile disease called Election Fever was unleashed three months ago we’ve seen sights that have turned the stomach of even the most seasoned Watchers.

But nothing to match the appalling sight on page ten of the October 4 issue of the tacky and thoroughly corrupt little rag called River City Press. There, Dear Watchers, you will be shocked to see the grinning skulls of Dr Warburstein and his very own creation Julian Harkless proclaiming they ‘have their fingers on our council’s financial pulse’ and that everything – believe them – is hunky dory!

Debt is good! Debt is great! says Dave. We’re doing a terrific job! says Julian. Watch their lips … VOTE VISION!! Their jobs depend on it, and the financial genii at the River City Press aren’t in the mood to argue. Like the rats down the drainpipe at Wanganui’s decaying morgue, they’re happy to feast on whatever comes their way.

MEANWHILE, BACK IN BLOGSVILLE …

We’ve been amused in the last few weeks by the emergence of a couple of Wanganui wannabe blogs which have fizzled and faded like soggy sparklers on a wet November 5. The first was the curious case of http://wanganuigossip.blogspot.com which set itself up as an alternative to LawsWatch, professed to be seeking the dirt on (night)mayor Mickey and attracted about five desultory comments before disappearing mysteriously into the blog fog with an announcement that:

This blog is open to invited readers only.

AND THEN

… there was the curious case of the newbie blogger at http://whanganui.org who lasted only a couple of posts after erupting with a hiss and a roar on September 17 with these promising gems …

Many feel that Michael has done God’s work but that it’s time for a rest from the politics of aggression and intimidation and for a bit of co-operation.

The Vision team bear an uncanny resemblance to Czarina Helen’s ministers: what the head prefect says goes. There’s one person making the decisions and we all know who it is. Supporters of Rob Muldoon and Maggie Thatcher will be suffering severe déjà vu.

I’m open to persuasion, but my feeling is that Wanganui folk are ready for some decorum and unity.

OF COURSE

The RIGHTeous Blogmeister turned pollster David Farrar boasts nothing if not longevity with his KiwiBlog. Mr Farrar, famous in his own lunchtime for the fact that ‘Michael got me arrested 13 years ago’ very kindly includes a link to LawsWatch on his very well-read site which recently discussed his polling pranks on behalf of the Wanganui Chron(ic).

Friday's poll results - see comments

CLICK ON IMAGE TO SEE LARGER PRINTABLE VERSION

See the Chron's inept coverage here

An orchestrated litany of lies

---------------------------------------------------------

STOP PRESS: READ HERE WHAT THE CHRON WON’T TELL YOU!

Police are investigating an alleged assault at a Wanganui mayoral election forum earlier this week after a candidate's mother claimed that a man had hit her several times.
----------------------------

Watchers reporting from the streets, supermarkets and cafes of the River City are seeing an overwhelming swing in voter opinion against Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws and his Vision Wanganui henchmen. Despite the outbreak of ratepayer-funded pork barrel politicking by Mickey (free ice-creams for kids, for heaven’s sake!), the electorate has had enough of three years of grandstanding, abuse and anti-democratic diVision party politics. Even previous non-voters can’t wait to cast Laws into talkback oblivion on October 13.

And Watchers are quick to remind their whanau and friends how lucky they are to have the right to vote for 12 non-Vision councillors after around 100 brave souls stood up for democracy, faced down the mini-dictator and succeeded when the Local Government Commission exposed MickeyMayor’s lies and propaganda and upheld the status quo. (Three years ago division ‘policy’ was to cut the number of elected councillors to eight with a claimed saving of $100,000 per annum). However, not even Cr Rangi Wills' duplicity and the Vision puppets' complicity could save this attempted further lurch to dictatorship after the people spoke – crucially they spoke to a statutory “outside” body where the customary Vision bullying carried absolutely no weight.

Meanwhile, as Capt Michael Laws steers Air Vision Wanganui on the flight path for its Electoral Erebus on October 13, our fair city finds itself engulfed in the white-out conditions of, in Justice Mahon’s immortal words, an orchestrated litany of lies. Only paid up mayoral groupies John Maslin (see Mas’s ecstatic editorial of May 2004) and Catherine Kennedy seem to have kept the faith.

And as the first hint of Wanganui’s equinocal nor-wester littered the Cave with a plethora of pamphlets from election hopefuls, Watchers weren’t surprised to find among the pictures of Mayor Michael Laws’ kids, parents, defacto etc (bet he’s wishing he had a dog or cat or two to complete the line-up – Ed) more dodgy claims of personal policy triumphs over the past three years than you could shake a mayoral stick at. In fact, we suspect that MickeyMayor has none other than his old PR queen Antoinette Beck running the Vision Wanganui propaganda machine!

When the Cave TV set is on the blink Watchers can sometimes be found playing a game of their own invention, called Where are they now? This involves crudely scrawling in charcoal on the Cave walls lists of Vision promises from 2004 that have never seen the light of day, or worse have turned out to be A-Grade, Money-wasting Flops. (You’ll note that we don’t include consequences like Politically Damaging, Ballot-Box suicide, Credibility Busting. These are the obvious kinds of collateral damage that Vision-style failures generally bring down on the heads of their promoters in more enlightened areas of democracy that are blessed with a free press, and journalists and opposition politicians worthy of the name. All entirely absent in Wanganui!

Scroll down for evidence of some 2007 campaign lies from Wanganui mayor Michael Laws and a small selection of broken promises and other lies from the 2004 Vision policy manifesto:

WALKING THE TALK

Regarding the new river walkway, Mickey said the following: "The total cost to the ratepayer will be just $800,000. The total budget may be $2.2 million, but $1.4 million of that sum has come from sources other than the Wanganui ratepayer."
The funding for the project includes $1.3 million from Development Contributions and approximately $800,000 loan funded. If you remove the spin, the Mayor has spent $2.1m ($1.3m + $800k) of Council money on the walkway. Council money. Our money.

AND

The financing of the walkway is perhaps the most cynical act perpetrated by M Laws and his Vision muppets since taking office. Development Contributions is a fund that is built up through a levy of $1800 per section paid by anybody who creates a new subdivision. It is set up by all councils to provide funding for future subdivision infrastructure. At 30th April 2007 Council minutes show that the fund had a balance of $1,120,627. I believe that Laws sought a legal opinion on whether he could divert the funds away from the purpose it was supposed to be used for- future subdivisions- and into his pet project. In the agenda preamble council officer Natalie Cowper said" Special Funds are Council's monies that can only be spent on expenditure for which the fund was originally set up. They are termed "restricted equity" according to the Local Government Act 2002. The redirection of these funds is a scandal, and would not happen in any other Council.

MUSEUM MOMENTS

Here's one, from a Chron article by Maslin on 12/6/07: “Mayor Michael Laws told Monday’s meeting that the museum board had cost ratepayers $60,000 because of its ‘intransigence’.”

RATES RORTS

This is a pretty good one about the rates. From the Chronicle 12/6/07 (Maslin, of course): Laws was adamant the rate increase and impact of the levies could not be considered in percentage terms. Cr. McGregor said it was "misleading" to keep the items separate. But Mr Laws said ....”You can’t, because it could then be argued we’ve delivered something like a minus 3% rate”. Mr. Laws said...for the third year in a row Wanganui was on target to effect the lowest annual rates increase in the country

AND …

I'm still trying to find somebody whose rates only went up by 1.7%. Most of the properties in my area had about a 10% increase even before the bullshit levies are added.

CAMPAIGN SLIME
Here’s a nice promise from Wednesday’s Chron. Virginia Lake will be algal bloom-free this summer. “in the short-term, and for a cost of around $20,000, we can ensure Virginia Lake is healthy and algae-free this summer”. That is the sort of promise you can make if you are willing to bypass democratic process completely. So much more efficient to just have a word with Leo and Dave. And why not. The timing’s perfect. Campaign in full swing. All those pesky meetings are over and YOU CAN GET AWAY WITH IT!

A SMALL SELECTION OF BROKEN PROMISES AND OTHER LIES FROM THE 2004 VISION POLICY MANIFESTO:

There will be no rates increase under a Vision Wanganui-led council in the 2005/06 financial year. #failed (oops – they forgot it was a revaluation year)

Create a ‘Residents’ Rights Charter’ that explicitly defines the service standards a ratepayer and/or resident may expect from Council #failed (mayor decided residents should have no rights)

Start discussions with our nearest territorial neighbours to see if some efficiencies cannot be gained from aggregating particular services. #failed (Mayor decided to insult and abuse them instead)

Institute quarterly suburban meetings to ensure that the Mayor and councillors go to their constituents rather than vice-versa #failed (no one turned up after liar-fatigue set in)

Hold a yearly Expo in the War Memorial Hall to canvas the options before Council before each yearly rates round and better inform citizens of the civic services available to them. #failed (Mayor replaced citizen consultation with citizen abuse)

Establish a Writer`s Residency that is regarded as one of the top literary prizes in New Zealand. #failed

Establish a mayoral office on Mainstreet. #failed (councillors & staff said ‘thanks but no thanks’ – too dangerous to actually meet residents.

Double the Debt = Half the Vote

Sadly, dear readers, the inconvenient scheduling of last night’s Mayoral Forum meant Watchers were gathered round Shortland Street on the gas-fired TV set at the LawsWatch Cave, where Sophie, Nate, Tess, Durville, Justine et al were going about their non-business, oblivious to the drama being played out at the Prince Edward Auditorium. Other Watchers, though avid Wanganui Chronicle readers one and all, missed the drama … the conflict … the applause … simply because the Chron managed to forget to tell anyone it was on!

So we are forced rely on reports from no less than the collective geniuses from the Chron, and to piece together comments to this blog (scroll down for the prize snippets) from Watchers who passed up Shortie Street for the night. To summarise:

Mas and Kirsty put together a macabre collection of questions for John and Michael and Russell and Randhir but not Chandra because she was staying home and sulking about something that happened ages ago and sent someone who looked like her Mum to make a nuisance of herself. It got so bad that Mas told her off and then Michael behaved badly and Kirsty made a fool of herself by letting him have his own way. Suddenly Kirsty was being booed and jeered for showing her organ’s Visionary bias in public and then Michael got even more angry and Kirsty was glad when it was all over and she could go home and watch the video of that night’s episode of Shortie Street which she’d had the foresight to tape …

The morning after hang-over must have been a shocker in the Maslin household when he saw what he’d written the night before and waited for the phone to ring with an early dose of mayoral abuse from his buddy Michael:

Martin tops mayoral forum poll

WE CALLED it "forum feedback" and if that decided the outcome of Wanganui's mayoral election race, then we’d have a new mayor! John Martin.

Of those who took part in our ballot, 64 said they'd vote for Mr Martin, 41 for incumbent mayor Mr Laws, one for Mr Fleming and none for Ms Osborne or Mr Dahya. And did the forum help in the voters' decision-making? Sixty-six said it did and 38 said it didn't.

So diVision apparently managed a turnout of roughly the same number of candidates and Bob Walker's fellow realtor Catherine Kennedys as they did at their damp squib launch a week earlier, while Randhir Dayha’s apparently undentable ego got the bash.

But the Cave’s discerning followers of the TV soaps were delighted to find the Chron(ic’s) new soap queen Lin Ferguson, editor Kirsty MacKnucklehead’s fellow Southland Times graduate, writing in the style to which they have become accustomed in a gushing review of Episode 981 of Vision Street in which Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws stars in yet another a crude election special down by the riverfront, specially funded by the Ratepayers of Wanganui …

"Michael Mayor's here! yaaay," a small group of children whispered as the opening of the Riverfront Walkway got under way on Saturday. The balmy, spring day attracted a crowd of more than 300 people to cheer on Wanganui’s latest community project.

Meanwhile, back to the Vision Street reviews provided courtesy LawsWatch’s anonymii:

ML goes Surreal on debt
Anyone who missed the forum this evening passed up the chance to listen to Mickey explain how the $31.5 million we owed in 2004 was actually less than the $67.5 we now owe and the $48 million peak we were predicting in 2004 for 2010 has now actually been reduced to $74.6 million. It was surreal

Jokers, pretenders & losers
Tonight’s mayoral forum illustrated clearly that we have a two man race. Russell Fleming is a joke and Randhir showed us all how badly he is out of his depth. Ms Osborn chose not to attend, but sent a heckler to represent her. Wonder how Randhir Dahya feels this morning? The world's biggest loser maybe?

Business as usual for Chronic
What the Chron didn't say this morning was that it didn't take long for the editor to abandon her presence of neutral chairpersonship and give ML a second crack at a question. Sure, he went through the motions of appearing to throw a wobbly at her but it was plain he was going to get his own way. Why should Monday night be any different to any other day of the week?

Vision lacks numbers
The numbers in the chron say it all - from where I was sitting down the front there appeared to be a formidable chunk of paid-up vision party candidates and their hangers on at the back plus the seriously weird Catherine Kennedy and her long-haired companion. They must have accounted for most of the 41 pro-mickey "votes" between them!

Cornered rat
Laws was really in cornered rat mode last night. The neering/shouting/snarling act probably made some of the Visionaries think wistfully about a change of mayor. I wonder if they are allowed secret votes or if they have to hand over their voting papers for mayoral inspection before putting them in the box.

Poor old Randhir While Russell Fleming turned out to be a worse buffoon than expected, one couldn't help but feel a pang of sympathy for Randhir. He was so clearly out of his depth and fumbling ... then with his quote about how "when he is mayor" he'll appoint the highest polling as his deputy he went and spilled the beans on his three bitter years and the deal that Mickey dangled before him to get him to make such a dick of himself by standing for mayor. If he wasn't so old, you'd want to tell him to grow up!

Promises and lies

Three long years ago, Wanganui mayor Michael Laws convinced himself that people’s memories were so short he could rise again from the ashes of his ignominious failure in national and local politics. He worked his Svengali magic on the likes of Nicki Higgie, Marty Lindsay and John Maslin then booked the 830-seat Opera House for the Vision Wanganui lunchtime launch. And from the clutter of zimmer-frames and wheelchairs on the St Hill St pavement, it seems the lure of an hour’s free operatic entertainment was sufficient to draw a good number of the aging Bob Walker’s friends from their rest-homes, though not to keep them from their midday naps (see picture above).

And what an appropriate venue our grande dame of opera was, as the castrato boy-who-would-be-mayor warbled his way through the lamentably overwrought libretto for the debut performance of diVisionii’s Promesse e bugie (that’s Promises and Lies to you, Bob! - Ed) which needless to say brought the house down among the Vision Wanganui fan club at the Chronicle editor’s office that night.

But oh how the Diva of the Ditch has fallen! After three long years of screaming abuse at Wanganui citizens and council staff, his once powerful castrato voice has lost its range and he’s reduced to performing diVisionii’s 2007 operetta Più Promette e si Trova (that’s More Promises and Lies to you, Bob! - Ed) in the 200-odd seat Davis Lecture Theatre. Or, Watchers are suggesting, is it really a case of mayoral cold feet?

The Diva has done enough polling by now to know that the citizens of Wanganui are weary of his promenading and performing, and they’ve certainly had more than enough of his Vision Wanganui promises and lies. So like a fading Dame Nellie Melba, the Diva of the Ditch has wisely chosen not to risk playing to an empty and cavernous Opera House for the last stop on his Vision Wanganui political farewell tour.

STOP PRESS: LAWSWATCH PROVED RIGHT ON THE MONEY AGAIN ... NOT EVEN MAS COULD HIDE THE FACT THAT WANGANUI MAYOR MICHAEL LAWS WAS REDUCED TO RANTING TO A PRACTICALLY-EMPTY VENUE AT THE VISION WANGANUI 2007 LAUNCH. FORCED TO ADMIT THAT 'A LITTLE LESS THAN 40" (It's time the boy reporter was sent back to school for a basic lesson in countable nouns and their appropriate adjectives - Ed) FRIENDS, RELATIVES AND BOB WALKER'S MOTHER IN LAW COULD BE LURED OUT OF THEIR RETIREMENT HOMES. IN FACT AS MAS FOUND OUT, MICKEY'S PROMISES AND LIES ACTUALLY OUTNUMBERED HIS AUDIENCE.

And from the August council minutes, two snippets follow on the Who pays the piper theme from last week’s post (see the sordid tale below of how Randhir Dahya learnt to blow for Vision):

Before members of the public were excluded from the meeting, Mayor Laws thanks John Maslin, Wanganui Chronicle Newspaper journalist, on behalf of the Council for his accuracy in reporting the Council’s meetings during this term of the Council. Mayor Laws said it had been a boon to the Council to have a veteran professional reporter. He hoped that Mr Maslin’s appointment as Council reporter would continue following the upcoming triennial election.

… and lest anybody lucky enough to win Mr Quigley’s Events Lotto should think there are no Vision strings attached, we came across this little gem in which Ray Stevens leads the way in suggesting a nifty little cost-cutting ruse for the election ‘celebrations’, much to MickeyMayor’s delight:

Cr Stevens suggested that as the Council had previously funded jazz festivals, the jazz band entertaining at the Riverfront Boardwalk and Upokongaro Jetty openings should provide its services free of charge. Mayor Laws agreed and asked Mr Quigley to follow this up.

Who pays the piper …

Fittingly, former Wanganui mayor Chas Poynter was piped on his final journey last weekend by his loyal lieutenant, friend and former deputy Randhir Dahya. Few Watchers in the Collegiate Chapel to celebrate the life – and mourn the death – of a true son of Wanganui can have been unaware of the irony surrounding Cr Dahya’s bizarre decision to ‘do a Chas’ and make a vote-splitting run for the mayoralty this year.

Wanganui mayor Michael Laws probably managed a sly smile at the thought that he may yet have the gullible Randhir to thank for finishing the job Chas started three years ago when unnamed dark forces were alleged to have persuaded him to make the mayoralty a three way race that went to bolter Laws. He may even have toyed with the idea of giving Randhir star billing on his own billboards in the sharing, caring Vision election spirit. (Yeah right! - Ed)

The punters who did their dough on Chas and found themselves living in a city struck with an epidemic of Vision flu have had plenty of time for regrets – none more so than Randhir Dahya and the other councillors who ran in independent colours in the 2004 WDC Cup. They’ve found themselves pulling up hobbled and lame through three miserable years of fixed race meetings, while the nags from the Vision stable were mercilessly whipped into shape by their cruel owner-trainer.

So what got into Randhir’s oats, you ask, to make him run against the odds for both mayor and councillor, and risk not even making it to the weigh in for either race?

The answer, from the horse’s mouth, is apparently a Faustian Bargain struck by Randhir with Wanganui’s very own Beezlebub.

As the Vision ring-ins have discovered over the past three long years, the old idiom is true: Who pays the piper calls the tune. And we are grateful to the anon who spilt the beans about Randhir’s bargain here on August 24:

Randhir had a long chat with Laws and they agreed that Randhir didn’t have a chance of winning but would be a serious vote-splitter. So Laws told Randhir that if he would run and fulfil this function, Laws would step down and hand the mayoralty over to Randhir after the election.

This came from the horse’s mouth and illustrates just how thick Randhir is in two ways. (a) He apparently believed Laws after seeing him in action for three years and (b) He told another person about the proposed ‘arrangement’. The indiscretion of (b) must have dawned on him because he has since denied the whole thing, but that is hardly surprising.

It has been said he wanted Maslin to write a story of his denial, which would have made the Chron even more mysterious reading than usual.

Thanks for that insight, anon. And wherever knowledgeable Wanganui punters gather to study form, the smart money all goes one way:

After a string of wins in previous races for council, Randhir has been saddled up by MickeyMayor for a one-way ride to the knacker’s yard as the punters punish him for trying to rig their city’s most important race.

Games people (& politicians) play

Local Body Elections: Nominees

Mayor
DAHYA, Randhir; FLEMING, Russell William; LAWS, Michael Brian; MARTIN, John Bruce; OSBORNE, Chandra Michelle.

WDC election at Large
ANDERSON, Allan Royce; BAKER-HOGAN, Philippa; BROWN, Ian Grant; BULLOCK, Barbara Lynn; DAHYA, Randhir; EDMONDS, Matthew Lyle (Matt); FLEMING, Russell William; FORLONG, Shaun Graham; HIGGIE, Nicole Andree (Nicki); HUDSON, Phillip Edward; HUGHES, Murray John; JANGO; JONAS, Danny Ronald; KEELTY, Gordon James; LINDSAY, Martin Graeme (Marty); LITTLE, Ian Paul; McGREGOR, James Roland (Don); McKINNON, Dorothy Margaret (Dot); McNABB, Andrew; MILNES, John Ingham; MITCHELL-ANYON, Ross; MOORE, Robert Joseph (Rob); OSBORNE, Chandra Michelle; SEARS, Victor Frederick; SIMPSON, Kirsty Nicole; SMITH, Rory James; STEVENS, Gary John; STEVENS, Raymond Mark (Ray); WAITAI, Rana; WESTWOOD, Susan Moya; WILLS, Rangi Marehua.

Whanganui District Health Board
ADAMS, Graham Patrick; ANDERSON, Allan Royce; BAKER, Kevin Owen; BAKER-HOGAN, Philippa June; BROOKHAMMER, Leonie; CURRY, David Andrew; DOUGLAS, William John; FAUMUI, Penaia Albert (PJ); LAWS, Michael Brian; MORRIS, Nygllhuw James (Nigel) ; RAAYMAKERS, Karen Ann; READING, Elinor Ann; SMITH, Heather Marion; SOLOMON, Clive; STEWART, Ailsa Crawford; STRONG, Trevor Alan; STUBBS, Timothy; TURNER, Michael Fisher; TUTHILL, Patricia Elizabeth (Trish) ; VALENTINE, Diana Mary (Di) ; VAUGHAN, Brian Patrick; WAITAI, Rana; WILLS, Rangi Marehua.

More tomfoolery in Visionland

`Begin at the beginning,' the King said gravely, `and go on till you come to the end: then stop.'

We beseech you, dear Watchers, to join us for another chapter in the tale of Antoinette in Visionland, where our heroine finds herself in the midst of a strange menagerie of Vision candidates wearing funny hats as she defends herself on charges of forging a document.

Even stranger, the King of the Vision court is wearing eye makeup and the Queen is wearing a funny Horizons hat, even though she hardly ever goes to Horizons meetings. (For the evidence of that, dear Watchers, please click here or see the post below). OFF WITH HER HEAD! we hear you shout.

Can this be the sort of ‘tomfoolery’ that caused an outbreak of tutting and tongue clicking in an editorial cutely titled Wrong Choices in today’s Chron(ic)? Of course, we at LawsWatch are reluctant to add to the distress of the House of Laws already caused by the public airing of the oh-so-delicate topic of Leonie Brookhammer’s ratepayer rip-off … distress so acute, in fact, that Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws was forced to breach his own policy of only talking about personal family matters in colour spreads in the Wimin’s Daze or the Sunday Crimes. There he is, on page 3 today, confiding in his buddy Mas that his children’s health may have had something to do with the fact that “Leonie had been unable to attend all those meetings”.

We would love to be able to report that Mas then had an acute attack of journalistic instinct and pointed out to readers that Brookhammer’s maternal obligations didn’t prevent her applying for and getting a Wellington-based job … but of course Mas was inoculated against all variants of Journalism Syndrome the day Mickey rode into town and infected him with a bad dose of Mayoral Love Disease. And that also presumably explains why he politely didn’t ask the Object of his Affection just why he and the mother of his oh-so-sick children still feel comfortable banking close to $90,000 worth of Horizons ratepayers’ dosh, under the circumstances.

We’re inclined to label the whole sorry tale the most immoral and corrupt facist act that we’ve witnessed in the last three years with Michael Laws as mayor .. but that line has already been taken by none other than our bold and fearless defender of democracy himself on today’s front page.

Neither did Mas probe just what sort of shock and horror prompted this comment in the ghost-written press release in the Brookhammer name that carried his byline the day before:

"I also believe that I have the experience and ability to make a greater contribution to Wanganui, closer to home," Cr Brookhammer said.

We are of course awash with empathy for her situation. It must be just awful to have to travel to Palmerston North to put in an appearance at every fourth meeting, in order to avoid being kicked off Horizons and losing the $1200 per meeting she’s been pulling in. So whatever new close to home ratepayer rort Mayor Michael has in mind, we’re sure she’ll not only stand by her man but ensure the House of Laws continues to receive it’s share of ratepayer or taxpayer funding.

Meanwhile, Watchers, we were somewhat amused by the antics of that venerable old rag Women’s Weekly which kicked up its heels, lifted its skirt, poured a nice sherry and engaged in a bit of risqué humour to celebrate its 75th birthday. Running photos of the eye-linered one and “courageous cancer battler” Jools Topp of Topp Twins fame, WW pointed out the uncanny resemblance.

Which prompted the Stuff gossip columnist to opine:

I'd say we blame Michael Laws for this fashion crossover and suggest he stop wearing so much eyeliner.

Here at LawsWatch we think it’s hardly fair on either Topp Twin to be compared with what TV One’s Monday satire show FaceLift more accurately referred to as “Wanganui’s poofter mayor”.

Nice work if you can get it

RECORD OF ATTENDANCE OF CR LEONIE BROOKHAMMER PROVIDED BY HORIZONS REGIONAL COUNCIL UNDER THE OFFICIAL INFORMATION ACT

NB: CR BROOKHAMMER IS APPOINTED TO THE ENVIRONMENT COMMITTEE AND THE PASSENGER TRANSPORT SUB COMMITTEE. ALL COUNCILLORS ARE INVOLVED IN COUNCIL MEETINGS ,STRATEGY & POLICY CTTEE MEETINGS , AND WORKSHOPS.

2004
Meetings held 6 Attended 5 Apology 1

2005
Meetings held 38 Attended 22 Apology 8 , Leave of absence 2 , No apology 6

2006 to August
Meetings held 27 Attended 16 Apology 8 Leave of absence 2 No Apology 1

Since Sept 06 to end June 07
Council/ Special Council ( 10 meetings )
26/09/06 Present 4hours Meeting duration 5 hours 23min.

24/1006 Present 50 mins Meeting duration 5 hours 49 mins

28/11/06 Present 1hour 35mins Meeting Duration 5 hours 12mins

19/12/06 Apology

27/02/07 Apology

13/03/07 Did not attend/ No apology

27/03/07 Did not attend/ No apology

24/04/07 Present 1hour 45 min Meeting duration 5 hours 55min

22/05/07 Apology

26/06/07 Present 1 hour 55min Meeting duration 6 hours 2 mins

Strategy & Policy ( 9 meetings )
12/09/06 Leave of absence

10/10/06 Present 4 hours 45min Meeting duration 5hours 56mins

14/11/06 Present 2hours 36min Meeting duration 3hours 55min

13/02/07, 13/03/07, 21/05/07, Did not attend/ No apology

23/05/07 Apology

6/06/07 Present 1hour 40mins Meeting duration 4hours 5min

Environment Committee ( 5 meetings )
13/09/06 Leave of absence

15/11/06 Present 2hours 2mins Meeting duration 3hours 52min

30/01/07 Did not attend/ No apology

14/03/07 Apology

9/05/07 Did not attend /No apology

Passenger Transport Subcommittee ( 3 meetings )
21/11/06 Present

20/02/07 Present

15/05/07 Present

21/06/07 Did not attend/ No apology

WORKSHOPS Records for attendance began Sept 05
2005 from Sept 2005 Held 11 Attended 4 Apologies 4 No apology 3

2006 to 16^th August06 Held 12 Attended 1 Apologies 3 No apology 8

from Sept o6 to 30^th June 07 Held 15 Attended NIL Leave of absence 1

Apology 2 No Apology 12

Summary

Meetings held during term 139 Attended 54 39%

Meetings held prior to parental leave 81 Attended 46 56% No Apology 7

Meetings held since parental leave 27 Attended 9 33% No Apology 9

Workshops Held prior to parental leave 23 Attended 5 21% No Apology 11

Workshops held since parental leave 15 Attended Nil Nil No Apology 12

Remuneration
TERM Oct 04 to June 07 $ 86,153.55
LAST TWELVE MONTHS 1^st July 06 to 30^th June 07 $ 32,429
Since returning from parental leave $24640
Hourly rate for actual attendance at meetings since returning from parental leave
( 20.5 hours) $1200
Per meeting ( 9 ) $2738

The stupidest tea-party

`At any rate I'll never go there again!' said Alice as she picked her way through the wood. `It's the stupidest tea-party I ever was at in all my life!'

It must be hell being a Vision CEO right now. On the one hand you’ve got the Auditor-General waving his pre-election guidelines and ruling out the use of council resources for electioneering purposes … on the other hand you’ve got your mad mayor demanding you flout those guidelines with one last mad tea-party … and on yet another hand you’ve got the same mad mayor publicly grandstanding over the cost of you providing him with the very same guideline-busting electioneering photo-ops that he’s demanding from you.

Watchers’ hearts go out to poor Dr Warburton after his very public smacking last week by Wanganui mayor Michael Laws. There he was, busy cleaning the red carpet and dusting off the best wedgewood china for the series of Mad Mayor’s Tea Parties he was told to arrange for voters in the run up to the October 13 elections, when ‘them upstairs’ told him to mind his budget.

All very amusing, no doubt, for the Auditor-General’s lot who seem to labour under the delusion that CEOs are generally a decent, independent bunch of chappies who will happily blow the whistle on blatant electioneering with ratepayers’ money – not merely quibble over the amount to be spent buying votes for the incumbent political party.

Meanwhile, not even the Auditor-General would be naïve enough to expect the Vision dwarves to resile from the chance to push their vote-collecting barrow at the ratepayers’ expense in the Council’s weekly newspaper spin sheet. Since the onset of the three-month pre-election period on July 13 the ‘Councillor comment’ Roll of Shame has featured Vision look-alike Rangi Wills, the incredibly thick Marty Lindsay, bob-each-way Don McGregor, and mayoral wannabe Philippa Baker-Hogan.

However, credit where it’s due and LawsWatch is pleased to toss a bouquet in the direction of perpetual bridesmaid Dot McKinnon who, despite being jilted at the altar by Michael Laws, is gamely sticking around for a slice of the wedding cake. Her last appearance in the tacky little River City Press was on July 11th and she has since spared RCP’s masochistic readers her froth and drivel. Well done, Dotty!

Watchers wondered whether Rana Reckoned he’d also been torpedoed by the RCP after last week’s McKinnon & Waitai-free issue, but it turns out he was just off having an epiphany. No doubt inspired by his fellow ex-cop Chester Borrows’ recent stomach stapling, our Rana has had a bile duct reassignment and he won't be coming to Mad Mickey's tea party after all! After a suitable period of bed rest he was back in print warning the voters against having any truck with his ex-pal Mickey, while beating the drum for challenger John Martin.

Those commenters who have concluded, on the basis of Rana Waitai’s weekly ‘columns’, that he was a prime contender for microchipping or worse, especially those when he’s been barking in support of Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws, may like to take a peep at page 7 of the current River City Press. There he is, pointing the bone fairly and squarely at Mickey for playing the vote-splitting game and treating Whanganui with contempt.

My, how things have changed since the Xmas fairy tarted up her eye-liner and prepared to drop down the Buy-election chimney on December 23, 2005, when our Rana was only too happy to leap in and split the vote for Mickey’s crew. Back then, our favourite anonymickey (the one with 20:20 Vision into the mayoral brain, not to mention his running shorts – but let’s not go there!) made a heartwarming declaration of academic and filial love for “independent” Candidate Waitai:

You've got Rana Waitai wrong - he and the Diva are good mates and saw them together last month. They were in the same Vic law classes and it was actually Laws who encouraged Waitai to stand. They have a mutual relative too I've heard – anonymickey, 5:36 PM, December 23, 2005

Now, Watchers, doesn’t that sound an awful lot like the kind of vote-splitting bile that same anonymickey is now spreading all over the blog, and every other available outlet, as he strokes the Ego from Double SS, aka Candidate Stevens?

Whistling up the dogs

Well done, Wanganui! Your mayor (the one who dragged you into the national sewer when the King of Tonga and Kahui twins died) is at it again.

Just when it seemed he had no better topics than his battle with the Employment Relations Authority or the Museum or the Arts Trust or the iwi … for his Sordid Sunday Sermon, an abused Rotorua toddler was unfortunate enough to end up in Star Ship Hospital. She promptly became collateral damage in Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws’ desperate dog-whistle politicking for the recognition (and votes) of the same rednecks whose racist insecurities lead them the slimy downside of the radio dial. (See Nicky Hagar’s The Hollow Men for an introduction to this sordid form of politicking as cynically employed by Barmy Brash during his brief reign, and across the Tasman by his ideological twin Horrible Howard – or for that matter, any study of Hitler’s enlistment of the anti-Semite cause. Closer to home, refer to Laws’ ignominious days of Asian and Somali refugee bashing as Winston Peters’ chief string-puller with New Zealand First).

So here he is last Sunday:

Maori culture is simply a motif to pick up when the cops come calling … What is it about Maori and child abuse? .. and then back to the familiar refrain: The time has arrived: remove these children at birth from this sub-culture.

And little more than a year ago when the Kahui twins tragedy was unfolding, he was there too – our very own racist Forrest Gump, putting the boot in and tickling the talkback tongues:

But why Maori? What dark skein twists itself within that culture to produce rogue whanau like the Kahui? … And are the Kahui rogue? Or are they symptomatic of an underclass within Maori who are resistant to both mainstream and Maori assistance?

As a LawsWatch anonymii with a penchant for numbers reminded us on July 30:

Last Sunday when yet another battered toddler made the front page of the paper he leapt in and hurled abuse at the perpetrators. How profound. In a column that used the words Maori or Maoridom eighteen times, sixteen of the references were extremely negative. He excused himself of racism on the grounds that he was throwing off the bonds of political correctness. This will give racists a righteous rallying point.

I wonder if the grand plan is for the child beaters to go to war with the racists, or if there is no grand plan and he just can’t pass up a chance to set one part of society against another.

Thanks, Watcher. And predictably, within days Mickey had his Mouthpiece John Maslin whipping up a bit of front-page and editorial page racism in our nasty little excuse for a local rag.

Meanwhile, on the home-front, he’s also stepping up the war with local iwi over that perennial whipping boy – the H! Seems those uppity iwi thought they had been commissioned to come up with a carved entranceway to the council chambers that, as Mickey proclaimed in November 2005, would:

"… recognise the invitation our local iwi gave to settlers to share this region" … “At last,” he said, in the full flush of a little bicultural tic, “we have a Council Chambers that belongs to all of Wanganui, that celebrates our heritage and of which we can all be proud."

But then he saw ‘H’ and then he saw ‘Red’ and a predictable mayoral ‘H’issy Fit ensued .. and you read it here first, Watchers.

So what, we hear you ask yet again, maketh the man(iac) who rides the troughs of gutter politics? Is it that Michael Laws is simply a father and family man beyond moral reproach (you’ll have to ask his extended whanau what they think about that proposition as paraded in the wimins’ mags) or is it something deeper, darker … altogether dafter in fact.

Turn a couple of pages in last week’s Sunday Star-Times from his breakfast bilge and we find Victoria University psychologist Dr Marc Wilson neatly assessing Michael Laws’ political personality as being “remarkably similar to the psychopath”. Says Wilson:

It’s pretty common for people standing for political office to talk about devotion to the public, their commitment to the nation’s interest, their strong sense of responsibility. It’s unusual for politicians to say ‘I’m interested in getting paid and I’m a megalomaniac.”

(And before the sad, single anonymickey of Porritt St rushes to proclaim our First Citizen’s selfless devotion to the public good that leads him to give away his salary, we would point out that the unique ‘salary cycle’ he rides simply positions the mayoralty of our unfortunate city as a means to an (inflated salary) end via the media mouthpieces and dancing spectacles that are sufficiently desperate to be wagged by his 2% redneck tail).