House building is expensive when lizards must be considered – but taniwha would make it even costlier

Duncan Garner is being coy about naming names.

He tells a  fascinating story nevertheless about the abuse of the Resource Management Act and local council planning rules. The council said this must include “subcontracting a lizard specialist to assess whether a lizard management plan would also be needed”.

A lizard management plan?

How do you manage lizards?

At great expense.

Garner’s story is about “a decent hard-working guy” who is merely trying to build a house bu is being gouged financially as part of the planning and consent process.

How to improve NZ’s political reportage: assign Soper and his mates for Teleban target practice

Alf’s spirits lifted enormously, when he spotted a headline at Scoop this morning: NZ journalists under fire in Afghanistan.

The story beneath did not quite meet Alf’s expectations – or (he confesses) deliver on his hopes.

All that happened was this:

A TVNZ journalist and cameraman were travelling with the NZ Army bomb disposal patrol that came under fire in Eastern Afghanistan late yesterday afternoon.