Manufacturing consent for attacks on Māori
We have previously reported on the digital campaign side-project of Taxpayers' Union's Jordan Williams - The Campaign Company. It has a client list that reads like an Atlas Network membership…
The Campaign Company: Astroturfing for fun and profit
Jordan Williams is the co-Founder, Executive Director and high-profile spokesperson of the Taxpayers' Union. Incorporated in 2013, the organisation purports to target government waste, but it has been alternately described…
A grim atlas guides NZ’s right-wing politics
This is an excellent overview of the Atlas Network's influence on our democracy by Lucy Hamilton. As she says "New Zealand is being driven into difficult times by the same…
Atlas Network-connected Minister lent her voice to Australia’s No campaign
As embattled NZ First Minister Casey Costello faces increasing scrutiny over her ties to the tobacco industry via her association with the Atlas Network and tobacco industry-funded Taxpayers' Union prior…
Water Users’ Group: An army of one?
In December of 2021 news broke that a "group of water users is taking action against claims made by the Minister of Local Government to justify giving some Māori the…
Backdowns on smokefree rules suggest tobacco lobbyists are in the House
While we will never know exactly what or who influenced David Seymour and Winston Peters, we do know that two former high-ranking NZ First officials, David Broome and Apirana Dawson, now…
Why the Atlas Network will win the Anti-Treaty referendum
Defeat is not a foregone conclusion but this piece provides good perspective on who the enemies are. Editor's note: While Hobson's Pledge has history of connection to other groups that…
Dame Anne Salmond: How to split a society
In forming the new Government, the National Party forged alliances with smaller, more extreme parties intent on amplifying their power, entering dangerous territory. With its immoderate attacks on the media, te…
Chiding in plain sight – Inside the Taxpayers’ Union’s in-your-face push for change
Imagine if an organisation that raised millions of dollars from unknown donors and employed almost as many people as the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment tried to influence the election.Not only that,…
Groundswell protest group supported by TPU
In November 2021, the Taxpayers’ Union was unmasked as the company that registered the www.motherofallprotests.nz domain name, showing its direct link to fringe agricultural group Groundswell. (That was changed, soon after,…