As good news continues to emerge about the government’s fiscal position leading into the budget, it is worthwhile reminding ourselves of recent reforms that put New Zealand into an internationally enviable position. Primarily, the government’s response to the global financial crisis was to make it easier to employ people, keep them employed, and keep more of their own money. Read more
How do the world’s best performing education systems attract and develop great teachers? To find out, I am about to embark on a journey overseas. Read more
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Research Fellow Rose Patterson reports from parliament in Wellington about her international research trip on teacher quality. Ms Patterson will be visiting Singapore, Germany, England, Finland, and Canada, and former Head Master John Morris will be undergoing research in Australia. Read more
Public policy think tank, The New Zealand Initiative, launches its first report on New Zealand’s international debt position and foreign direct investment regimes. The report, New Zealand's Global Links: Foreign Ownership and the Status of New Zealand's Net International Investment, provides a one-stop-shop for statistics on New Zealand’s investment patterns. Read more
Last Saturday, the primary teachers’ union NZEI rallied more than 10,000 supporters all over the country to ‘fight the GERM’ and inoculate against a disease taking the world by storm. GERM stands for the Global Education Reform Movement, a term coined by Pasi Sahlberg, the renowned Finnish expert in international education reform. Read more
Last week, the government proposed changing the way food manufacturers label their products. Manufacturers will no longer be able to make health claims unless backed with scientific evidence. Read more
This week, the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) released its dramatically titled annual democracy index: ‘Democracy at a standstill.’ New Zealand scored well, as should be expected. According to the EIU, we are the fifth most democratic nation on the planet, being only marginally less democratic than the obligatory Scandinavians: Norway, Sweden, Iceland, and Denmark. Read more
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As a great Monty Python fan, one of my favourite scenes is from their movie Life of Brian. As a group of Judean conspirators against the Roman occupation gather, the rhetorical question is asked what those awful Romans had ever done for them. Read more
Governments, worldwide, control the issuance of domestic money. That monopoly position creates the problem of determining how much money to print. Read more
On 6 May, it will be three years since the United Kingdom elected its first coalition government since World War II. The Cameron government has made rescuing public finances its most important goal – with the Coalition Agreement giving deficit reduction precedence over all other measures. Read more
As readers of Insights will no doubt be aware Baroness Margaret Thatcher, prime minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990, died this week at 87. Amid generous tributes, and rotten and distasteful rallies celebrating her passing, it is worth remembering her achievements and failings as prime minister. Read more