Here's our summary of key economic events over the long holiday weekend that affect New Zealand with news the first-world expansion seems to be gathering momentum.
Wall Street is trading today, little-changed from yesterday, but yesterday the S&P500 hit a record high. Overnight, most European markets did trade and were up +0.5%, but Frankfurt gained +0.8%. Paris and Frankfurt also closed at all-time record highs. London was the exception because it was closed. Yesterday, Tokyo was the day's enthusiast, rising +1.4% yesterday. Hong Kong ended up +0.2% yesterday, and Shanghai was up +0.4%. Both the ASX and the NZX were closed yesterday and will undoubtedly trade with very thin volumes today.
The rise on Wall Street was driven by very strong retail sales reports, with pre-Christmas sales gains as strong as those for Black Friday.
That was backed up by an improving report from the Richmond Fed's factory survey. However, the Dallas Fed's similar survey eased off a little even if it still at a very high level.
Median yields on the US Treasury 2yr bond auction rose to 0.73% (0.58% last time) with strong demand. For the UST 5yr bond auction, median yields were down a fraction to 1.21% compared to 1.25% a month ago.
In Japan, they had their own set of impressive results, especially for industrial production. That was up more than +7% in November from October, up more than +5% from the same month a year ago. For Japan, these are impressive outcomes. Their retail sales also grew at more than expected levels in November. The Tokyo stock market likes what it saw.
In the neighbourhood, South Korean consumer confidence is holding at levels above its pre-pandemic standards.
Over our holiday break, China reported its industrial profits data to November. This data is +9% higher than year-ago levels, and a tailing off from the +38% rise on the eleven month comparative they usually report. Over two years, to remove the pandemic base effects, the November 2021 result is comparable.
Defaulting property developer China Evergrande said construction work has resumed at more than 90% of its stalled residential projects, adding that it has picked up the pace of delivering apartments promised to home buyers across the country. They also claimed more than 80% of its suppliers have resumed cooperating and that it has signed thousands of new contracts with various suppliers. All this is happening despite the company's bond default, as Beijing works behind the scenes to protect it and the customers who bought dwellings off the plans and who stand to lose greatly if they are not completed. Completing existing projects is one thing - starting new ones will be something to watch. The company's share price rose with a minor gain, so investors are still very wary. And more bond payments are due.
We should note the rise and rise of the lithium price. It is high both because of rising demand, but also it is environmentally 'difficult' to produce requiring vast amounts of water in water-depleted regions. The search is on for more sustainable sources.
In Australia, hospitals are facing looming staff shortages as the Omicron surge forces the NSW state government to reintroduce compulsory masks and density limits. There were 6062 new community cases reported yesterday in NSW, and another huge jump, now with 52,459 active locally-acquired cases, but only 1 more death. And 1999 pandemic cases in Victoria were reported yesterday. There are now 16,467 active cases in the state - and there were another 3 deaths there. Queensland is reporting 784 new cases and 7 deaths. The ACT has 85 new cases. Overall in Australia, 90.1% of eligible Aussies are fully vaccinated, plus 3.2% have now had one shot so far.
The UST 10yr yield opens today at 1.48% and marginally lower. The UST 2-10 rate curve starts today very much flatter at +73 bps. Their 1-5 curve is little-changed +95 bps, while their 3m-10 year curve is flatter at +145 bps. The Australian Govt ten year benchmark rate is lower at 1.59%. The China Govt ten year bond is down at 2.82%. The New Zealand Govt ten year is going the other way, firmer at 2.29%.
The price of gold will start today at US$1810/oz and unchanged from its pre-Christmas level.
And oil prices start today higher at just under US$76/bbl in the US and +US$2.50/bbl above where we left them pre-Christmas, while the international Brent price is now just over US$78.50/bbl.
The Kiwi dollar opens today in a general move lower and is now at just over 67.9 USc. Against the Australian dollar we are even softer at just on 94 AUc and a six month low. Against the euro we are soft at 60.1 euro cents. That means our TWI-5 starts the today up at 72.5 and giving up all of the pre-Christmas gains.
The bitcoin price is down at US$47,886 and -5.5% below this time yesterday. Volatility over the past 24 hours has been very high at +/- 4.3%.
The easiest place to stay up with event risk today is by following our Economic Calendar here ».
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127 Comments
And in the crazy , crazy world we live
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-26/bitcoin-mining-entry…
And Lego sets can be a more valuable investment than gold. Even though it's essentially just plastic.
https://www.news.com.au/finance/money/investing/lego-sets-better-invest…
People who say Bitcoin is worthless don't really understand what value is based on inherent properties.
I am one of those who struggle with the idea of Bitcoin having 'inherent' properties.
That's cool. I do see BTC as having properties, but unlike the ultra-orthodox, I'm not going to challenge the non-believers. Why? Because it's too complex and my conviction is not strong enough (I accept that it can fail). Also, I think it takes a lot of time (100+ hours) to understand the crypto space. I've put in that kind of time so it's difficult for me to debate with those who haven't. I'm not accept that my view is right and I accept that I am quite possibly wrong.
BTW, research from CNBC shows "millennials are investing as high as 50% of their wealth in crypto, while on the other side, only 4% of the older generation have invested in digital assets and only one-fourth of the GenX owns crypto."
https://cointelegraph.com/news/new-survey-reveals-83-of-millennial-mill…
What a refreshing response. I've been similarly conflicted - being quite taken by the idea of having 'smart currency' that could appreciate or depreciate overtime, or only be used for a given purpose, whilst, at the same time, being dismayed by the mad max notions of anarchic currency blah blah
The news about the US CDC halving Omicron self isolation time to five days was interesting. One more step towards normalisation as the variant becomes endemic. Governments are realising there is no silver bullet.
That said the isolation requirement will need to be dropped across countries countries or they'll be completely shut down within weeks just due to a lack of workers.
The CDC cannot mandate anything, they are not elected officials. The CDC is controlled by Big Pharma interests, not peoples health. The lack of airline pilots in the US is not due to omicron but vaccination requirements. Normalization is impossible until people overcome their fear, then it becomes endemic. Perhaps it always was!
There is no contradiction in a disease which is harmless to many and very harmful to some - perhaps a significant enough portion to mandate vaccines. Not the first time we've been here - here's some Polio stats:
"The majority of cases (approximately 95%) have no symptoms. However, while infected these people shed the poliovirus in their faeces and oral secretions and can spread the disease."
"Up to 2 in 100 cases see a rapid onset of acute flaccid (floppy) paralysis. Paralysis is either of a single limb or the respiratory system."
Do you have a problem with the Polio vaccine too?
Yes. Wild polio and a vaccine derived polio strain still exist today, it is only a matter of time before it shows up again. I have a problem with mandating anything especially when natural immunity rules. I prefer survival of the fittest and if you chose to take any vaccine, by all means do it. If I contact polio and my immunity overcomes it, am I not better protected against the new polio vaccine derived strain, thus improving herd immunity? The western world has deviated to far from how we evolved. Especially the medical industrial complex.
Diet is hereditary. Disease is a product of our toxic environment. My empathy is for the bewildered herd that believe doctors keep them 'healthy' and now experts want to keep us 'safe'. I cannot stop your illness or your injury, but you can. People should be responsible for their own 'health', but nobody wants that. Blame the doctor, blame the MIQ, blame the government, blame the unvaccinated, blame Bloomfield, blame me because I have no empathy, at least we are all 'safe'.
Have you never met someone that's had a congenital issue that's been cured or mitigated by medical science? Heck, even an asthmatic?
Most people know the benefits of eating right and exercising. And yes, commercial interests influence medicine. But to think medicine doesn't cure things that diet and exercise never could is naive.
But you're for thinning the herd from the sounds of it so this is brick wall stuff.
I'm confused. You seem to value the immune protection against polio, but are happy to catch polio to gain it. The whole point in the immune response is to stop yourself from catching and suffering from the disease.
Vaccination is how we break this circular argument. Natural immunity is not protection from disease, it is the result of suffering from the disease.
You chose an artificial protection, I chose my natural immunity, which 'is' protecting me. It is the bacteria in my body the first line of defense against a pathogen, it is the mucus in my nose, the wax in my ears, my skin, my whole body is my immunity. Suffering from the disease just makes my immunity stronger and having a healthy immunity (young or old), will lesson my chance of severity.
Vaccination is how you break this circular argument, your science appears to be settled. My science is still asking questions of this 'experimental' gene therapy.
i will be interested to see if the MOH releases all the facts, looks like they tested positive on day 9 of self isolation ( after 7 days in MIQ. supposed to be 3 home isolation)
how did they catch it ? supposed to be highly infectious so should have been picked up earlier?
did they catch it in MIQ?
looks like according to the reporting they may now have be home isolating? if so will that come out and if correct maybe we need some kind of tracking like they use in singapore as some people just can not be trusted to follow rules
and last will they roll out more RAT testing for different settings so we can get quicker testing results which is needed to keep pace with omicron and stop the spread ie i am catching the interislander to the south island in two days, i do not need any test as i am double jabbed but would be more than happy to take a RAT test to board an hour before hand
Why should it matter. Both Robertson & Little,of government, have repeatedly attested NZ’s hospital system etc has been coping and will continue to do so. Vaccination has now virtually reached the government’s avowed target nationwide, to protect that system. Therefore on the government’s own proclamations, NZ has no reason not to open up and live with covid and get on with life.
and do you trust this government not to lock down and deliver the final blow to many small businesses, i do not, even in NSW they are starting to reimpose restrictions ie number of people allow inside places.
also we know how slow they were to roll out vaccines so that in itself has delayed boosters which if we were doing now it could be full speed ahead open up and get on with it
Actually, in my opinion, our government has been lying all along in that the hospital system has never ever been going to be able to absorb and cope with covid. And curled up in that, by way of examination and explanation, where are the stats of what negative and dire impact covid has already caused to day by day patients by way of delays and cancellations of elective surgery & similar, nationwide. The problem had its roots long before this government for sure, but now, by denying that the health system is not up to the mark and simultaneously stalling, via any pretext, to open NZ up, the government is in complete contradiction of itself.
The hospital system can't cope with something like covid running unchecked, no healthcare system would.
It seems to fare ok with a robust suppression system.
There's two possible outcomes:
- suppression will fail and the hospital system won't cope, naysayers everywhere rejoice
- it won't, and you can move on to the next thing
Covid is running unchecked in Colorado. Nurses have been let go for unvaccination. Car parks are half full. 13,000 beds available in Colorado and never been more than 10% Covid patients. Like a flu season, only not as bad. Stop the fear it is not warranted. If you are lucky enough to be infected go to bed and sleep it off.
Unfortunately my YouTube feed has become populated with some of these doom and gloom pundits , while interesting (and sometimes they have something of value) most of what they have to say is just sensationalizing the financial news (with click bait titles), and reality is a bit more boring and mundane.
Over our holiday break, China reported its industrial profits data to November. This data is +9% higher than year-ago levels, and a tailing off from the +38% rise on the eleven month comparative they usually report. Over two years, to remove the pandemic base effects, the November 2021 result is comparable.
China 10-Year Yields Plunge To 18 Month Low On Surging Easing Expectations, Liquidity Injections
As you can probably already tell, all this to set up the latest data for, yes, Real Personal Income Excluding Transfer Receipts. Ugly:
Since July 2021, incomes have been falling in real terms because private economy income hasn’t been keeping up with price changes. In fact, income growth has been flat going all the way back to October 2020, an entirely too-long period for the system to be held back where it cannot afford it. As a result, the economic situation is, well, “growth scare” further into 2021 akin to the oil shock situation.
Americans, like their counterparts around the rest of the world, are falling further behind, here in the data represented by falling real incomes; the 2-year change for the data (above) is substantially less than at any time during any of the 2012, 2015, or 2019 near recessions.
And, obviously, this takes account of the various massive helicopters Uncle Sam had blithely disbursed last year and the first part of this year. While those may have created a true ripple of activity, and made the economy appear recovery-like – for a time – especially in terms of nominal incomes, it clearly did not lead to an actual recovery in a private economy more and more that seems instead particularly damaged if not deadened.
An eighteen month low - 52 week range 2.813 - 3.363
Nothing like nationalising debt, private, public, anything goes. Why worry about anything then.
Global trend: Fed’s $85 Billion Loan Rescues Insurer
WASHINGTON Fearing a financial crisis worldwide, the Federal Reserve reversed course on Tuesday and agreed to an $85 billion bailout that would give the government control of the troubled insurance giant American International Group.
The decision, only two weeks after the Treasury took over the federally chartered mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, is the most radical intervention in private business in the central bank’s history.
NZ$ drops as rest of the world finally wakes up to the fact that we are being run by marxist control freaks with no real world experience. Until ROTW are actually starving, NZ has nothing of any value to offer them & hence a huge lose of interest in investing or sending money down under. The wider market 2022 risk-off interpretations are a signal to stay away from small over-priced nations printing their own money.
My punt for 2022 is that the Labour Govt will not end the year with the same PM as they started with. Everyone is slowly beginning to understand just how much damage she's done to the country already, & even worse, how much more damage she can do in the coming year. The lady is dangerous. She has got to go.
Lol. Interesting. This is going to make it more expensive for kiwis moving to Australia then.
Still, despite the PMs Marxist regime and nationalisation of everything: tertiary sector, health, local body assets, etc, nullifying energy sources - the global corporates are still successfully farming the passive nz consumers so the nzd must still be worth something.
Dead from the consequences of catching coronavirus.
It's super easy to be critical of what we didn't get to experience due to half competent governance. And it's not as if the rest of the world's economies just kept on trucking, they got to experience worse economic performance than NZ, plus heaps of deaths.
Sucks if you're in certain sectors of hospo and physical retail, but I count my stars every other day I spent the last 2 years in Godzone.
Still, you could’ve been one of the 68,000 kiwis who died in the last 2 years of cancer, heart disease, dementia etc. Many of whom did not receive normal medical treatment due to the COVID phenomenon.
The argument in this this thread is around economic stewardship not disease control. Although COVID has been a great opportunity for the government to expand the nationalisation of many NZ assets.
1500 workers in the NSW health service currently have covid. That's an awful lot of health service unavailable to people.
Maybe controlling a disease is part of good economic stewardship.
The fact you're able to downplay things because the government has managed to separate you from the realities of the pandemic is something to take pause over.
It’s pretty much all over now. The jury is still out whether the settings affecting disease control and economic damage/citizens rights were made at the right level.
https://i.stuff.co.nz/world/300487755/not-the-same-disease-oxford-scien…
I was wrong earlier, NSW has over 2000 health workers now with covid. They can't work in a hospital or health facility until they are all clear. How many surplus health workers would you need to maintain "optimum levels"?
We've shown the best approach is to keep a highly contagious virus away from the general population. That's probably the better course of action.
Not really - NZs approach just makes things worse and worse into the future with more flus, colds, viruses and COVID eventually running through the population after they have been in social isolation for 2 or 3 years and now we are in a more vulnerable state.
Immunity is maintained and is necessary for all humans with daily contacts.
As well as that the NZ population has been constantly bombarded with fear messaging from the media and govt which is unhealthy.
Countries that go through waves Eg Sweden, UK, NSW Etc actually get the benefit eventually.
Not many other places look to have done that successfully. Prompt restrictions and controls still look to be the best approach across the board, and plenty of others have assumed they were "near the end" at their own peril.
Worked good in 2020
Worked good again in 2021
2022, who knows? It looks like itll require a bit more patience.
Godzone of increased debt and government spending which hardly constitutes an economy. Heaps of deaths? Do not believe the fabricated numbers from the USA (CDC statistics), they died 'with' covid, not 'of' covid. Godzone still has to deal with the pain, like a cavity you keep putting off the dental visit. Just like the dentist there is nothing to fear, that is the first step.
Speak to most businesses that aren't hospo and they struggle to meet demand. Sounds like an economy to me.
Say there's a pack of wolves on the way. You can choose to build a fence or not, and choose not to. Fitter people manage to run away, unfit and infirmed people get eaten by wolves. Do you pretend their existing condition killed them, or the wolves?
The world is going through a pandemic. You can pretend that it's not a problem, silly men with even sillier haircuts did that and the results don't look flash. It's highlighted the fragility of what we previously took as a given. Dealing with it won't be free and you'd be kidding yourself if it wasn't.
Never going to vote Labour. That said the gang have done a reasonable job dealing with covid. Ardern's lecturing is still irritating to the extreme. Hipkin's is tolerable for the first few minutes tocatch up on the essentials.
But as a government dealing with thebig picture it's an absolute disaster. Robertson is an absolute menace, much more than the first two. Covid has been the excuse to unleash the spending. It's been spectacular. Our grandchildren will hate us.
On top of that the prick just talks down to us. Mr Superior, knows better than - ummh - everybody.
I had to buy more property under labour, had no choice, the inflation has been insane. I really feel I should be more grateful for given the manna from heaven they've bestowed. But then I'd feel dirty like I need a shower if I voted for them so instead I just feel guilty.
Or any of the 15 or so different people who've helmed the National party over the past few years.
Remember when John "good guy to have a beer with" Key reckoned we were overdoing it a few months back, and that the rest of the world had gone back to normal? Turned out the virus didn't get that memo.
The virus also appears to not follow the rules. Living in a hermit kingdom, with a suppressed media, gives you little chance of knowing what is truly going on in the rest of the world. Florida pandemic declared over. Wyoming, Oklahoma, rural Colorado, western Kansas, northern Texas, did not even know there was one. US is back to normal for the rural community, Rednecks, cowboys, Indians and Hillbillies but the city slickers that are scared of there own shadows have slowly taken off their muzzles and are starting to breathe.
One of the best reads of 2021 for me related to the problem encapsulating the Anglosphere and how one Fed Reserve insider Thomas Hoenig has been fighting the good fight.
Do yourself a favor and read. The following excerpt reminds me of NZ.
But the logic of asset bubbles has the opposite effect. Rising land prices actually enticed more people to borrow money and buy yet more land because the borrowers expected the land value to only increase, producing a handsome payoff down the road. Higher prices led to more borrowing, which led to higher prices and more borrowing still. The wheel continued to spin as long as debt was cheap compared to the expected payoff of rising asset prices.
The bankers’ logic followed a similar path. The bankers saw farmland as collateral on the loans, and they believed the collateral would only rise in value. This gave bankers the confidence to keep extending loans because they believed the farmers would be able to repay them as land prices increased. This is how asset bubbles escalate in a loop that intensifies with each rotation, with the reality of today’s higher asset prices driving the value of tomorrow’s asset prices ever higher, increasing the momentum even further.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/12/28/inflation-interest-ra…
What happens when average wage earners can’t afford property or land and smaller amount of people can buy and only top 10% can afford land or large businesses and governments this is about the time the 90% of people raise up and take it back. If people cannot put a roof over there heads and feed family society breaks down.
A total breakdown doesn't occur with housing, it takes the lack of essentials like food, water or even petrol or electricity to cause a pretty sudden meltdown in society. We live in a very narrow band of control, really its just a veneer, so paper thin it wouldn't take much to turn into a fight for survival.
About 60% of the population are home owners and if you add to that the number of people that are happy renting or somehow think that renting is better than you have the vast majority of the population that has no problem with the roof over their heads.90% are not going to "Rise up" because 90% are happy its the 10% that are not happy.
I guess I'm what you call a long term thinker, I don't have any kids. Fact is some people will never be happy no matter how much they have, its human nature. You don't need to own a house to be happy either, its all in your head, plenty of people are happy living with next to nothing.
Yes here is something I agree with you JC instead of the usual hype. Something I have said before here (and words to the effect) is that both central and local govts have allowed the snowball to take hold, through 1. overbearing regulation. Their hearts were in the right place but they have effed up. And 2. the massive financial contributions imposed by local govt which by association get added to the cost of existing housing. They know this yet do nothing to change the system. When housing values slow or even fall, they never come close to returning to the original price. Hence the saying, as safe as houses... love it!
Ah yeah sure not. All countries worldwide had cheap/falling interest rates. NZs housing cost exploded more than anywhere else. We is different. Readily accessible credit is a common factor in house prices rising across the globe but does not explain why nz is now the most unaffordable RE market worldwide. It did not use to be
Much of the rest of the world has had low interest rates for a long time. Until 2 years NZ's rates were very high by international standards.
Throughout much of Europe and Asia mortgage rates have been typically lower than 2.5% for a long time. I have looked at family in Japan and Sweden with envy, in laws in both countries who have had sub 2.5% (and often sub 2%) mortgage rates for many years.
It was NZ's big lurch lower that fuelled the current boom.
Construction costs are the other big factor, and that's largely the product of our small size and isolation. Our costs are about 40-50% higher than Aus, and about 100% higher than the USA.
Then throw in world leading rates of immigration and you have the main 3 reasons for the mess we are in.
It is not coincidental that govts over 15 years have proposed simplifying the RMA and the housing market going hyperbolic since 1993. The rma was introduced in 1991, DCs aka reserve contributions introduced sometime in the 90s, the restrictive auckland council district plan since the 90s or earlier. All adds up to lower supply at higher cost.
PS: if property owners can do 3 homes without RC, in theory that should circumvent Dev Contributions. Though councils will find a way to collect the revenue
No, DCs are payable on building consent if resource consent approval is not required.
DCs are charged under the LGA not the RMA.
Also, correlation does not equal causation. The early 90s saw lots of things changing not just the RMA. Liberalisation of finance sector, plus immigration opening up. I remember W Peters getting big gains in support for his anti Asian immigration stance of the mid 90s.
Sure, ultra restrictive planning under the RMA played a part too.
It's around a hundred grand to subdivide a section - and that's a flat section with virtually no encumbrances. That's adding a line to a map.
$2500 or so per square metre to build a physical dwelling is cheap.
There were some fairly serious government efforts to boost home ownership in the 50s/60s, with home ownership being desired by the government for various reasons. So the natural rate of home ownership is likely less than what it is even now, and home ownership as a "right" somewhat of an illusion.
100k, where?
In Auckland, a typical one lot subdivision will set you back maybe 30-40k in council fees. HW2 was talking about council costs.
Maybe 100k if you include design and engineering costs, but they aren't council costs.
And $2500 per square meter for a house, yeah nah. Starts from 3k mInimum these days, and often at least 3500.
The last schedule I had for a subdivision came to 96 grand, about 50 in direct council fee and the remainder for services, engineering etc but all to satisfy council requirements for subdivision.
A single level spec home shouldn't set you back more than 2200 a square currently, obviously if you're doing anything bespoke or more involved is going to coat you more. I went for 2500 because that's about what a spec home with a bunch of upgrades will cost you.
Maybe if you're in central Otago it'd be 3k.
2200 for a spec home? I would have thought these days you'd be upwards of 2500-2700.
What's your location? Most of urban Auckland shouldn't set you back more than 30-40k max in council fees and contributions. That's small change when house and land packages are $1.3 million plus.
Land costs, build costs, profit margin and GST typically make up the vast bulk of the sales price.
Council fees and costs are not where people's focus needs to be.
Didn't you just say it started at 3 grand?
From Auckland Councils own website:
Generally, the average two-lot subdivision can cost around $120,000 – $150,000 for an approved consent, a new Record of Title, professional fees and other requirements.
If you're in the industry, you'll know how much it costs to produce a new unit of housing. The part most people are getting their knickers in a twist about (the rising cost of land) isn't insignificant, but is only a portion of increased costs right across the board. This has a flow on impact on existing houses, because the replacement cost is now pretty high.
Christchurch is a good example of what can be done, you can get a new 3 bedroom house there for 550k, and part of that is because the council liberalised everything due to the quakes.
Yes, starting at at least 3k for non spec builds. And that is the cheap end, larger house and single storey.
That quote from the council's website will include a raft of things such as laying services, driveways, building platforms.
HW2 had raised the matter of council fees. That's a totally different thing to the total cost of getting a subdivided site to market.
You can be cute and say all those things are council requirements, sure, but they are basic things any urban section requires, right?
Well, if you want more precision and 'science' read the Council's Housing and Business Capacity assessment produced a couple of months ago.
Something like a million homes could be built now that are commercially feasible.
If that's not huge then I don't know what is.
What do they mean by "commercially feasible" gobbledygook. How many would actually already have infrastructure provided, I would hazard 10 to 15 percent but who knows.
One of my points above is that council knows that adding DCs upfront to developers is ultimately added to the end cost of the new home. They have paid expensive consultants to write them reports to inform them about it. That also told council that by association the cost of all existing homes increases due to the relative nature of housing. Council can come up with a new system to spread the cost such as a targetted rate, but they do not bother. One million existing homes in Auckland get revalued for the DC cost of 30 to 100k per dwelling/section. Is that plus gst, probably. Add to that 20k or more for a water meter. These charges are new, they never used to exist. Council could just build in the cost and spread it over time, but oh no they are not doing that.
It sounds like we are now punishing kiwis trying to come home even more. Sadistic government. Not only are we stopping people coming home to see their dying relatives because a rule breaking Ozzie DJ wants to fill the MIQ spot without having to go in the inhumane raffle but now it seems the MIQ hotels are rife with the virus so we are making them stay in a COVID soup. Be Kind. Aroha.
Our Hotels....Err I mean MIQ facilities were always going to fail. They failed with Delta so its a no brainer they would fail with Omicron. We would have had to build dedicated MIQ facilities at a huge cost to keep this out. Probably would have been worth it until Omicron came along and then it was pointless really, simply to infectious.
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