Victor Billot

Tag: Politics

  • Broke, Anxious or Seriously flush

    The following article appeared in the Otago Daily Times, on Wednesday 3 February 2010, in response to an article by Dr Mathew Zacharias entitled Patients’ rights trampled in drive for equality and ongoing talk about user pays models at the Dunedin Public Hospital.

  • Drinking liberally

    An appearance this Tuesday 23 April 7pm at Velvet Underground, Dunedin for the Drinking Liberally series. Facebook version here.

  • That’s very generous of you . . . sir

    A small mention here at Tumeke for my comments today about our Prime Minister who craves to see the warm and friendly hand of charity extended to the dispossessed. John Key is a confused man. He wants a British “honours” system, an American “generosity” system and presumably a Burmese employment system to pay for it…

  • Paths are made by walking

    New Zealand’s leading public intellectual of the Left, Chris Trotter, seems to have been genuinely unsettled by the defeat of Labour in 2008. Toys have been thrown, and targets targeted. In an initial attack of post-election spleen Chris railed against those voters who brought in National as ” . . . the men who just…

  • Stop the Stadium March, Dunedin

  • Campaign trail “08”

    I have been selected to stand for the Alliance Party in the 2008 general election for the Dunedin North electorate. More information as it comes to hand.  I haven’t decided yet to blog on my campaign on my old election blog or just keep it all here. I’m pleased to represent the democratic socialist viewpoint.

  • A couple of observations on the state of the world

    On the theme of things “eco”, George Monbiot sums up recent thoughts rather nicely here. He also manages to pin down the blindingly obvious with this post on Unions and the Labour Party in the UK. Some parallels to be drawn with our free trade pushin’  Government?

  • Jack Yan on the downsides and upsides of globalization

    My friend Jack Yan just posted a thought provoking article about globalization and the relationship between economy, business and society on his blog. Jack is speaking at an open to the public session later this year at the Alliance Party conference in Dunedin on these very topics – and based on his above article, it…

  • New film by Alister Barry

    Went to the new documentary from Alister Barry at the Film Festival last night. Alister was there to give a talk and was selling copies of his movies including a new DVD trilogy “The New Right is Wrong” featuring Someone Else’s Country, In a land of plenty and the new one A Civilized Society. All…

  • Support the locked out Spotless workers!

    Thanks to BinaryHeart for this.

  • Rod Donald

    Sad to hear about the death of Rod Donald in the weekend. Earlier in the year, during the election campaign, I spoke at a couple of meetings for the Alliance Party where he was speaking for the Greens. He tried to sign me up at one event, which I declined. Although I agree with many…

  • Redirection to Election Blog

    I have a new blog that is going to feature all the election stuff. This one will stay on for everything else.

  • Street Scene Dunedin

    I attended an interesting protest action today on behalf of the Alliance Party with a couple of other local activists. A local disability group called Gutted is asking for better treatment for those with disabilities and their caregivers. It was a small but very spirited demo and made the TV3 news. Earlier on I had…

  • Fear and loathing on the campaign trail

    That was the name of the late Hunter S. Thompson’s book on the Nixon/McGovern fight for the US Presidency back in the early seventies. Of course the wrong candidate won then, as is so often the case.But Thompson’s title has suddenly come to have a new meaning for me.This blog may have a change of…

  • Lucky country :: wild book :: mammon’s people

    After recovering from a dose of the midwinter flu and blues I’m looking forward to going on holiday. Heading across the ditch and doing a slightly unusual trip on the Indian Pacific from Sydney to Perth. I’m fascinated by Australia especially the natural environment, and I realized I hadn’t been there for over twenty years.…