On Saturday morning 18 September Kim Hill interviewed Baroness O’Neill about the Sense About Science Charity – an independent charitable trust promoting good science and evidence in public debates. It does this:

“… by promoting respect for evidence and by urging scientists to engage actively with a wide range of groups, particularly when debates are controversial or difficult.”

Like the SPCS it seeks to promote public debate in controversial or difficult areas relating to standards.

The Baroness will deliver the inaugural Royal Society Aronui Lecture Series in Auckland (15 & 17 September), Hamilton (16 September), Palmerston North (20 September), Wellington (21 September), Christchurch (22 September), and Dunedin (23 September).

The Sense About Science Charity of which she is on the Board of Trustees, works with scientists to

• respond to inaccuracies in public claims about science, medicine, and technology
• promote the benefits of scientific research to the public
• help those who need expert help contact scientists about issues of importance
• brief non-specialists on scientific developments and practices

http://www.senseaboutscience.org.uk/index.php/site/about/6/

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NZ Herald 19/09/2010, By Celeste Gorrell Anstiss and Frances Morton

Television’s watchdog will tomorrow slam the broadcast of explicit content in a show watched by children, as it lays out a new hardline stance against sex on screen.

The Broadcasting Standards Authority is expected to rule against TV3 for screening steamy content on Home and Away, a usually innocuous Australian soap……

Family First [a well-respected registered charity] national director Bob McCoskrie has two complaints pending with the BSA, against a segment on porn that screened on TVNZ’s Close Up, and a report about naked rugby on TV3’s Nightline.

McCoskrie said there was a disturbing trend towards sexualising the news.

“You sit down and expect to get the facts of the day but instead we get full-frontal nudity and sex talk. It’s a joke,” he said.

Full report: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=10674514

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Institute of Directors welcomes law review by Hamish Rutherford. Dom Post. Business section C1. Sept. 16, 2010. C1

The Institute of Directors says it is not fazed by new powers being proposed for the new financial super regulator and welcomes a comprehensive review of financial market laws.

Commerce Minister Simon Power tabled legislation in Parliament on Tuesday which would give the Financial Markets Authority, set to come into being next year, wide-ranging powers never available to the Securities Commission.

These include the ability to take action against directors they believe to have acted illegally in the name of public interest, as well as the power to seek search warrants to raid offices and seize documents.

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Despite The Taranaki Daily News reporting this morning a victory for the New Plymouth RSA Club whose Strandon clubrooms sold at auction yesterday for $1.675 million leaving the NPRSA with a $400,000 surplus after debts are paid off, the club’s battle with the former owners – 435 Devon Ltd – appears far from over. Stephen (Steve) Peter Crow, a banned company director, speaking prior to the sale on behalf of 435 Devon Ltd that had defaulted on its mortgage interest payments – resulting in the property going to a mortgagee auction, is reported as saying that the RSA club owes him and his brother David Bruce Crow, who directs the company, $318,000. He added: “And we are not going to take a financial bath from this so they need to know there is a lawsuit if they don’t sort something out.” With this threat of more legal action by the former owners who tried to turn the iconic property into a boutique brothel and venue for their pornography business roadshow, the provincial heartland of New Zealand may have to put up with more ongoing disputes. Locals remain vehemently opposed to the iconic building ever being used as a brothel or as a venue to promote porn sleaze. The identity of the new owners and their intentions for the property have not been disclosed yet.  

In his story “V-Day for RSA Club”, Matt Rilkoff reports in The Taranaki Daily News (18/09), as follows:

After months of bitter battle the New Plymouth RSA has been delivered an improbable and dramatic victory. Its Strandon club rooms yesterday sold at auction for $1.675 million, significantly more than expected and enough to leave the club in the black after years in the red. Once expenses are paid and the $735,000 owed to its welfare fund is paid, the club should be left with about $400,000, some of which will be used to re-establish itself at Pukekura Raceway, spokesman Reg Trowern said yesterday. “We are very pleased with the result, it’s an excellent result,” he said.

For full story go to: http://www.stuff.co.nz/taranaki-daily-news/news/4133401/V-Day-for-RSA-club

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