Eyebrows have been raised in the Auckland business community by the usually pro-private-sector Employers and Manufacturers Association, and its bid to start a campaign to use Vector, the lines company, to pay for Len Brown's proposed rail loop. On Tuesday, EMA comms czar Gilbert Peterson sent an email to various worthy bodies - the Auckland Regional Chamber of Commerce, Auckland Business Forum, Council for Infrastructure Development, Automobile Association, National Road Carriers Association, Committee for Auckland, Campaign for Better Transport, Property Council and the Contractors Federation - asking them to fund a campaign demanding the Auckland Electricity Consumers Trust be wound up and its assets handed over to Mayor Brown's council. Needless to say, some of those approached aren't too impressed with what they see as a "nationalisation" of shares in a publicly-listed company.
Puffed up and puffed out
Parliament can be a place of bizarre contrasts. At 6pm on Wednesday, in the Grand Hall there was an event to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Smoke-free Environments Act, which among other things banned smoking in bars. That was also start time for the Press Gallery Christmas party, an event which tends to bend to the needs of tobacco addicts. Last year, the aftermath of all the puffing was captured in the "day after fags" photos snapped by Jason Ede, and gleefully run by a blogger. The rather tame photos failed to capture the spirit of past gallery parties, though this year's event was a rather damp affair after Wellington's weather turned on the taps instead of playing fair.
Move over, Vlad ...
New Zealand isn't the only place attracting a growing amount of Chinese investment. In London, reports the Bloomberg news agency, the Chinese are the new Russians. As Vladimir Putin's problems grow and the Middle East faces falling oil prices, wealthy Chinese are taking up the slack, providing new customers for businesses as diverse as Bentley dealerships, luxury retailers, law firms and banks. Chinese investment in the British capital's real estate tripled from 2012 to 2013, to about US$2.8 billion, and that amount is likely to be matched this year, says broker Knight Frank. And Chinese shoppers accounted for a quarter of the retail purchases made by overseas visitors in London this year.
Actually, he's a bot
or those who dabble with - or are addicted to - Twitter, there is an app called BotOrNot, which can supposedly work out who is a real Tweeter and who is an automated account, or a "bot", by analysing the suspect sender's online behaviour. According to this analysis, Prime Minister John Key's Twitter account has a 60 per cent probability of being a robot - something many of his political adversaries would no doubt say about his real-life persona.
Taxing time for Netflix
There was excitement when American online TV operator Netflix announced it would be starting a service in New Zealand, even though Netflix NZ won't have the same content as the US version. The Insider can't help wondering if Netflix will have the problems it has faced in some countries it has moved into. In France, an agency of the Ministry of Culture extended the tax imposed on internet video providers to operators based abroad and President Franois Hollande took aim at "tax inequality", saying "digital companies based outside of Europe must be subject to the same tax treatment as traditional operators". In New Zealand, the IRD is looking at work being done by the OECD on the taxation arrangements of multi-national companies, and might take the same view that Netflix should pay its fair share of tax into our coffers.
