Open Journal Systems at the Victoria University of Wellington Library
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Konka Board: a cement-pumice-tow sheathing board
Get PDFKonka board was a New Zealand invention which combined cement, pumice and flax fibre ("tow") into a fibre-cement board, replacing the imported asbestos-cement sheet. Sold soon after manufacture, Konka, it could be nailed or screwed, and over time it hardened. A waterproof plain or stucco plaster finish provided a resilient, borer proof, fireproof, low maintenance house. Three patents created the Konka system – 34,845 for the fibre-reinforced board, 37,354 for the stud and support system into which a concrete grout was poured to lock the panels in place, and finally 52,50 for metal strips to ensure a smooth final plaster surface. A waterproofing additive in the plaster provided the final part of the system.The company quickly setup a national series of agents, with manufacturing ultimately occurring in Wanganui, Gisborne, Christchurch and Timaru. Patent 34,845 was challenged in 1927, with the Privy Council finding in 1930 that it was invalid, opening the way for similar products to be made. The development in the 1930s of NZSS 95 Model Building By-law allowed Konka to be used nationally, without further evidence as to its performance. However, competitor other products were also included e.g. Excell, Rotorua, Thermax, Duro, Wangan, Walasco and the asbestos based Fibrolite.Konka survived until the 1960s, when flax production was in decline, the high labour costs and manufacturing time meant it was no longer competitive. Even so, in a twist of fate it was a Konka style approach which led to cellulose fibre replacing asbestos in fibre-cement sheeting. In the twenty-first century, Konka could even be considered a desirable product – a natural fibre reinforced, composite sheet
Forensics and ship logs solve a 200-year mystery about where the first kiwi specimen was collected
Get PDFThe following article is republished from The Conversation, dated 14 April 2021 (https://theconversation.com/forensics-and-ship-logs-solve-a-200-year-mystery-about-where-the-first-kiwi-specimen-was-collected-158410).
As required in this journal’s republishing guidelines, the article has not been edited, but we have attributed the authors and their institute
"Property Purgatory"
Get PDFClimate change will place increasing numbers of homeowners in ‘property purgatory’, a state of financial insecurity arising from the foreseeability of eventual damage and uncertainty about means to recover their losses. The impacts of climate change-induced sea level rise and storm events are now certain, and exposed properties will likely incur insurance, mortgage and value loss. These effects could occur prior to physical damage, and existing inequities will be magnified. Current legal and institutional arrangements offer no clear pathway for those affected to recover funds in order to relocate themselves. We position property purgatory as an immediate practical challenge for those affected seeking to recover their losses, and as a legal question regarding undefined responsibilities of central and local government
Transition Inequity: gendered employment trends in New Zealand’s energy industries
Get PDFEnergy industries are experiencing a period of rapid and sustained change as nations seek to meet climate policy targets. In Aotearoa New Zealand a gap in both information about and attention to the gendered dimensions of the proposed low-emissions transition has emerged. This silence has implications for the distributive impacts of any transition. We present data illustrating the sub-sector variation in women’s employment, pay, tenure and executive representation in both the electricity and fossil fuel industries. Recommendations are presented for more sustained policy attention to how an energy transition, given current gendered employment trends, is unlikely to be inclusive or just
Informing Anti-Racism Health Policy in Aotearoa New Zealand
Get PDFRacism is firmly established as a determinant of health and an underlying cause of ethnic health inequities. As an organised system, racism operates at multiple levels (including structurally and interpersonally). Racism and its many manifestations are breaches of international human rights obligations and, in the Aotearoa New Zealand context, te Tiriti o Waitangi. This article considers approaches to anti-racism in health and disability policy in the 30 years following the foundational publication Pūao-te-Ata-Tū (Ministerial Advisory Committee on a Māori Perspective for the Department of Social Welfare, 1988), which was one of the first government publications to name and call out the harmful impacts of institutional racism. The article then examines the ways in which government health and disability sector organisations have talked about and responded to racism at a national level since 1980. The results of this research urge a stronger organisational-level approach to antiracism in the health and disability system for more tangible results, requiring multi-level solutions, and transforming what is considered ‘business as usual’ in health and disability sector institutions
Disability: the Living Standards Framework and Wellbeing in New Zealand
Get PDFDisabled people and their whänau have poorer outcomes across a wide range of wellbeing and living standards measures.1 Yet disability analysis does not appear to be well integrated into government decision making on wellbeing. This article builds a framework for understanding disability in a wellbeing context by using the Treasury’s Living Standards Framework and Sophie Mitra’s human development model for disability and health. One of the most important aspects of Mitra’s model is the interaction between resources and structural factors. Structural factors, such as an inaccessible built environment, force disabled people to spend more resources to get the same outcomes as nondisabled people. Publicly funded disability support is essential to counteract these structural factors. We also need to improve the usability of the four capitals for disabled people and their whänau to reduce these structural barriers
Funding New Zealand’s Election Campaigns: recent stress points and potential responses
Get PDFThe nexus between money and politics creates particular problems for liberal democracies like New Zealand. Events during the last parliamentary term put our present system of regulating this issue under some stress. With two cases relating to political fundraising now before the courts and other matters still under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office, this is the right time to consider whether reform of the law is needed and what such reform ought to look like
Hobbit Laws: Human Rights and the Making of a Bad Sequel
Get PDFIn 2010 the National Party-led government did a deal to keep the filming of The Hobbit in New Zealand. The deal involved amending the Employment Relations Act 2000 to exclude film workers from the definition of ‘employee’, and thus also from the protections of employment law. The amendment was rushed through under urgency, and protests and international criticism ensued. Ten years later, the Labour government is considering the Screen Industry Workers Bill. Rather than restoring employment rights to the workers in the film industry, it introduces a dangerous new precedent and continues to trade off human rights against commercial convenience
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