Maharey offers Newman a tour of ‘state castle’

Housing Minister Steve Maharey is offering to take Muriel Newman to the state house she described this afternoon as a state castle.

Answers to parliamentary questions indicate the valuation and location of the five most valuable Housing New Zealand Corporation houses in Auckland.

Steve Maharey said the valuations indicated the land on which the houses stood had grown appreciated in value very rapidly.

“It really is quite silly to claim that state houses are castles. Housing New Zealand Corporation provides modest housing to low income tenants – but certainly not palatial housing.

“The value of the homes cited by Dr Newman range from a very modest $41,000 through to $121,000. It’s the land on which they stand which has escalated very rapidly in recent years.

“What would Dr Newman have the Corporation do? Move all its tenants out of inner Auckland – away from jobs, public transport and public services.

“I’m sure if Dr Newman actually visited these properties she would see they were a world away from her own seaside residence,” Steve Maharey said.

© Scoop Media

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>>