After allegations of abuse

Quote:https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/destiny-church-youth-group-leader-stood-down-police-investigation-under-way-into-allegations-of-sexual-abuse/TC46HOWEIJEE3PQXLQ5TOCSL2Y/

Destiny Church youth group leader stood down, police investigation under way into allegations of sexual abuse.
A Destiny Church youth leader has been stood down and a police investigation launched into allegations the man sexually abused youths in his care. The Herald understands there are multiple alleged victims, with the alleged abuse spanning several years.
The man was a longstanding Destiny disciple. His Facebook page is littered with photos of church events, many involving teenagers from the Boys2Men youth group.
There are also several images of the man with Destiny leader Brian Tamaki, including of him being anointed by the self-proclaimed apostle.
A mother whose son attended the youth group claims the youth was abused by the accused man, who often had teens staying at his house.
She alerted police in November last year after her son revealed he had been sexually abused. ItÔÇÖs understood police then contacted Destiny Church, which immediately stood the man down from his volunteer leadership role and banned him from the church.
The┬áHerald┬áalso understands church leadership went to the manÔÇÖs house to remove any teenagers who were staying there.
Police interviewed the motherÔÇÖs son late last year and told her they were gathering evidence for a potential prosecution, she said.
But more than six months on, the mother said she has not had any updates on the investigation.
The solo mum said apart from an initial meeting with church leadership, she had received no communications from Destiny and no support since the abuse allegations came to light.
She told the┬áHerald┬áshe sensed something was wrong with her son a year ago due to anger issues and growing disrespect for women. She felt he was being ÔÇ£controlledÔÇØ and ÔÇ£usedÔÇØ by the youth group leader.
ÔÇ£Other mothers also felt something was wrong but there was no evidence. We felt that we had beautiful, respectful kids and all of them became very disrespectful of us as women.
ÔÇ£We had our own youth turning on us like they were gang members.ÔÇØ
The mother said she contacted Destiny Church about her concerns last year but received no response.
Since the abuse allegations emerged, the mother understands Destiny held a meeting with the manÔÇÖs alleged victims, including her son, without contacting parents or seeking their permission. She felt this was highly inappropriate given the boysÔÇÖ ages and during a police investigation.
The mother said she quit Destiny Church several years ago after becoming disillusioned with the culture and cult-like following.
ÔÇ£It seemed all hype and emotion. I just felt like the allegiance was to the leaders and the leader instead of God."

The machine...

https://www.facebook.com/thejuicemedia/v...040010480/

I'd not realised there were so many of us.

Quote:"One Auckland financial mentor said people who had been on low incomes through their lives were sometimes shocked to discover their superannuation was being docked to repay a student loan.
ÔÇ£They wouldnÔÇÖt be repaying it on a benefit ... I donÔÇÖt think people realise when they go on to a pension they have to start repaying their student loan from a pension.
ÔÇ£When IÔÇÖve said, ÔÇÿlook, they just donÔÇÖt have any moneyÔÇÖ you get told, ÔÇÿthey have to pay it back sometimeÔÇÖ. I think lots of people who havenÔÇÖt earnt a lot of money after studying will be quite surprised about that.ÔÇØ
She said half to three-quarters of the pensioners she dealt with had a student loan.
Fincap senior policy adviser Jake Lilley said there should be a mechanism for people collecting debt to look at the wider picture of what was being achieved.
ÔÇ£To take a step back and say, ÔÇÿhang on a minute what are we trying to achieve here overall?ÔÇÖ We want this person to be able to live a comfortable life and not having flow-on problems from poverty that arises when you canÔÇÖt afford things and you end up with a bad outcome that has a cost attachment with that, [like] hospitalisation ... if Studylink debt leads to someone not turning on the heater if they need it.ÔÇØ
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/tens-of-th...QGPCOYAJU/

Quite a decent video from Linus tech tips for a change.

Part one in the series.

This guy has no idea how to act as a politician nor how to interact with journalists. In one breath he defends avoiding pre-publicising his meetings with mining bosses and in the next he's saying "the best way to hide is in the open." You can't have it both ways Mr Jones. 

The idea that this guy is one of three politicians that will have unquestionable power to give major developments (including mining) the go ahead is extremely concerning.

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/517...publicised

Norton seems to be messing up it's SSL certificate for Xtra email, had a couple of clients this week with Thunderbird no longer collecting email from Xtra servers, citing errors with the certificate, signed by Norton...

Uninstall and reinstall Norton seems to sort it out...

HTH

They really are among the most despicable MP's.


The Greens called for rent controls & as a result the chief idiot in ACT says they're "economically illiterate"...which makes it crystal clear they'd prefer people to continut patying exorbitant rents & struggling to keep a roof over the heads of their families. These people clearly want this country to become a mini America. They are nothing short of evil.



https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/...mount.html

Quote:The Greens have again called for rent controls after data out on Tuesday showed median rents across Aotearoa hit an all-time high of $650 a week in the year to March.
But ACT has hit back, calling the party "economically illiterate" and instead advocating for removing regulations.
Trade Me's latest data showed national median weekly rents rose about $50 in the past 12 months (or 8.3 percent), which is "unusual", according to property sales director Gavin Lloyd.
Apartments also reached a record high of $525 a week across New Zealand.
Green Party housing spokesperson Tamatha Paul said on Tuesday that landlords are the only people being "well-served" by the Coalition Government's policies.
"People who rent are already struggling with sky-high rents ÔÇô and can see very clearly the lie that tax cuts for landlords will trickle down to help," Paul said.
She said the Government gave landlords a "$2.9 billion tax break" while others struggle and rents have never been higher.
"Landlords are laughing their way to the bank," she added.
If renting is to be attractive and affordable, Paul said New Zealand needs controls on rent increases, a rental warrant of fitness, and to rapidly build new housing.
"Housing is a human right. We can and must ensure it is afforded to all," she said.
Paul also said the Government has the power to regulate the rental market to put people before profits, rather than treating housing like a business.
"The main driver for the increase in rents is the ability of property speculators to drive up house prices and landlords to lift their rents at will, to suggest it is anything else is merely a distraction from the core issue."

Is becoming clelarer by the day. I've no idea why any govt allows someone who is childless to have any part in making decisions on education in govt. He appears to have no idea what's involved & worse, gives the impression that he's really not bothered.

Because he isn't the one who will have to eat sandwiches for lunch when its midwinter & freezing..


https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/...koI1OETyro

Quote:Foodbanks which rely on leftovers from school lunches to feed communities are worried a plan to pare the programme back will lead to more hungry children. 
They're calling on the Government to put some of the more than $100 million its cutting from the lunches scheme into food banks. 
At Nourished for Nil in Hastings, every week there's a queue for food packages of rescued kai and leftover school lunches. The not-for-profit is finding more Kiwis needing their help. 
One person collecting a parcel said they liked getting the spare lunches. 
Nourished for Nil founder Christina McBeth said the current free school lunches made a difference on families' budgets. 
"It does take the pressure off families having to provide an extra meal for their children and it might be the difference between a child not having any hot meals that day."
Associate Education Minister David Seymour - who is in charge of the school lunch programme - wants to make it cheaper. 
"We've got to be realistic, it's not the education system or the school's job to feed a child 24/7," he said. 
Seymour said the lunches, which are set to change next year, would be "very similar to what the other 75 percent of parents are putting into school lunch boxes". 
He's previously said the changes would mean less "quinoa, couscous and hummus, it will be more like sandwiches and fruit". 
McBeth and other foodbanks have told Newshub changes to school lunches will mean more hunger because they're expecting the meals to be less nourishing and that there won't be leftovers to feed others. 
They want to see some of the more than $100 million being cut from the lunches programme to go to food banks. 
Seymour said the savings would go back into the Government's general Budget.

The Reverend Paula Vennells finally appears in court over the disaster with Brit Post offices. Some people committed suicide, some were  sent to prison. She doesn't appear to understand either the harm done or  contrition.


https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...eo-victims

Quote:The former Post Office CEO Paula Vennells would like the victims of the most widespread miscarriage of justice in British legal history to know that she┬áhasnÔÇÖt actually done anything deliberately wrong, and that she honestly doesnÔÇÖt understand how all this has happened. I guess sheÔÇÖs asking all the jailed and wrongly convicted subpostmasters to try to imagine being swept up in a Kafkaesque nightmare of undue blame. So ÔǪ please add the murder of irony to her notional future charge sheet.
To┬áAldwych House in London, then, where Paula produced tears in time for the lunchtime bulletins and reprised them for the section in which her emails seemingly found her on a fishing expedition for other ÔÇ£contributory factorsÔÇØ that might have caused an appallingly persecuted subpostmaster to take his own life.┬á
For now, letÔÇÖs just say Paula Vennells now ÔÇ£canÔÇÖt recallÔÇØ more about the Post Office than youÔÇÖd expect a tenuously engaged CEO on 700 grand a year ever to have known.
Pressed early by the inquiryÔÇÖs Jason Beer KC how on earth she hadnÔÇÖt known what was going on, Paula explained: ÔÇ£I was too trusting.ÔÇØ Barely a quarter of an hour later this humblebrag had done a complete 180, as she said: ÔÇ£I was sometimes criticised at team development events for being too curious.ÔÇØ Was she? At one stage Vennells had even been unaware that her organisation employed a team of about 100 enforcers driving private prosecutions. IÔÇÖm reminded of those people who worked for Bernie Madoff on the 18th and 19th floors in his offices, and somehow didnÔÇÖt realise he and a crack unit were running the worldÔÇÖs biggest Ponzi scheme on the 17th.

Now they're going after Oranga Tamariki. While it was far from perfect, they're trying to load more work - which according to some, ought to be legal & therefore done by lawyers - onto social workers.

This govt very clearly doesn't mind who suffers, as long as they cut costs.
 

https://www.thepost.co.nz/politics/35028...m=referral

Quote:In April,┬áOranga Tamariki proposed 632 jobs could be disestablished┬áÔÇÆ a net loss of 447 roles.
Another section proposes reducing reliance on the legal team, in some parts through Oranga TamarikiÔÇÖs investment in ÔÇ£social worker professional capabilityÔÇØ.
It says as part of lifting performance and accountability, ÔÇ£functional leads would have sole responsibility for delivery in areas that they own and would not need the support of solicitors (e.g. policy advice and social workers Family Court-related work)ÔÇØ.
LabourÔÇÖs children spokesperson Willow-Jean Prime said claiming the legal services ÔÇ£don't provide frontline support services to children just doesn't make any sense ... and it is going to have an impact on childrenÔÇØ.
ÔÇ£This is crazy to expect social workers to take on more and to take on the role, the job and the responsibilities of professional lawyers who are legally trained to provide those services, to expect that of social workers in unfair to the social workers.ÔÇØ
Oranga Tamariki was facing a social worker shortage earlier this year, with a select committee report stating at the time of the hearing, ÔÇ£the ministry had 160 vacant social work roles, which it said puts a lot of pressure on frontline workers to provide servicesÔÇØ.
Prime said the proposal was ÔÇ£loading on to an already stressed and pressured workforce of social workersÔÇØ.