QUESTIONS FOR ORAL ANSWER

Tuesday, 12 June 2001

Questions to Ministers

1. Hon KEN SHIRLEY to the Minister of Corrections: What evidence does he have that the Government's rehabilitation programmes for prisoners are getting results?

2. MARK PECK to the Minister of Revenue: What recent reports has he received on changes to the tax scales and what implications would they have?

3. Hon BILL ENGLISH to the Minister of Finance: How does he intend funding the $7.6 billion cash shortfall required to fund the Government's investment activities out to 2005?

4. Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS to the Prime Minister: Has she ever suggested that the leak of the agreement with Mr Yelash came from him or his lawyers; if so, why?

5. GERRY BROWNLEE to the Associate Minister of Education (Tertiary Education): Will he be recommending to the Minister of Finance that funding for universities be increased beyond the 2.6% offer in the 2001/2002 Budget; if not, why not?

6. HELEN DUNCAN to the Minister of Education: What steps has he taken to encourage people into teaching as a career?

7. Hon ROGER SOWRY to the Minister of Health: Will she instruct or advise the Waikato District Health Board to reimburse a cancer patient who paid her own way to Brisbane for radiotherapy to avoid a wait of 8 to 10 weeks; if not, why not?

8. JUDY KEALL to the Minister of Health: Has she received a report which indicates that the level of elective surgery was to be cut by $84 million this coming year; if so, what action has she taken as a result?

9. Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU to the Minister of Maori Affairs: Has he seen comments from Mr Willie Jackson that "Maori issues seem to have been on a permanent back-burner with this Government" and that "You've got to wonder what those Ministers are doing in there, and that's what our people are saying."; if so, what steps does he plan to take to address those criticisms?

10. TAITO PHILLIP FIELD to the Minister of Social Services and Employment: What is the Government doing to promote "by community, for community" initiatives?

11. SUE BRADFORD to the Minister of Social Services and Employment: What does the Government hope to gain by introducing a bill which seeks to deny income support to the spouses of New Zealand citizens who are lawfully in New Zealand and are eligible for permanent residency?

12. Hon Dr NICK SMITH to the Minister of Conservation: How does she reconcile her decision to refer the Whitianga Waterways consent back for a rehearing, on the basis that she had no choice because the original hearing had not been able to consider the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park Act, with her decision on 28 June 2000 to grant consent to the Rodney District Council to discharge 8,000 cubic metres of sewage a day into the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park without a rehearing?

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>