My Submission to the NZ Royal Commission Covid Inquiry: Phase 2

For the public record - my short submission is also published here

Dear Commissioners, Grant Illingworth KC, Anthony Hill, Judy Kavanagh,

In respect of your Terms of Reference, if your purpose is to “learn from Aotearoa New Zealand's experience of the pandemic to prepare for the future” then this is based on a false premise – covid was not as it appeared, and so the preparation for ‘another pandemic’ is meaningless.

In summary:

1. The topic of “Vaccines, including mandates, approvals, and safety.” Have been covered in other Submissions that I have supported, read or been involved with. I know that by now the evidence supplied will be overwhelming and heartbreaking. You now have ample evidence that the vaccines were UNSAFE and INEFFECTIVE: counter to the propaganda that was heavily funded by BigPharma and our Government chose to unethically amplify.

2. Lockdowns, especially the lockdowns of late 2021, were already known to be unnecessary, unethical and extremely harmful. This was especially the case in our country, where our population is sparse and individuals are already isolated.

3. Testing and tracing technologies (like RATs or the COVID-19 Tracer app), and public health materials (like masks) were the main part of what has been termed the Censorship Industrial Complex: the Behavioural Insights Team (Nudge Unit) used these strategies to deliberately escalate fear in the population which in turn, increased compliance.

You will be aware that there are various psychological experiments and strategies where individuals’ thoughts and therefore behaviours can be manipulated; changed. Effective examples of this behavioural science that everyone will be familiar with, are the blunt phrases and raw images on packets of cigarettes, reminding people of the dreadful harm that smoking can cause to our lungs, or the unborn child.

Over recent years, these kinds of behavioural science strategies have grown more complex and ambiguous: supermarkets using certain smells or playing certain music to encourage specific purchases, subliminal messaging on radio advertising etc.

Ethical researchers, especially in healthcare interventions, embarking on experiments in behaviour change, endeavour to seek feedback and approval from those who are impacted. This is through informed consent. This is because healthcare interventions should never become advertising for profiteering commercial companies, but instead aim at outcomes that are for the public good. But who decides what is ‘public good’? This is an ongoing debate with (for example) the Charities Act NZ.

Commissioners may not be fully aware of the UK-based Behavioural Insights Team (The ‘Nudge’ Unit)? But the Commissioners WILL be aware of the global growing practice of Public Private Philanthropic Partnerships (PPPPs). It makes perfect sense for commerce to leverage behavioural science to increase profits for shareholders, why else would these corporate entities, and their tax-exempt foundations, partner with Government? So it should be of no surprise at all, to learn that when the Nudge Unit expanded globally, to more than 200 (known) entities and contracts worldwide, that included New Zealand’s various Government depts like MBIE and MoH and private companies too, like The Warehouse Group or Fonterra, which themselves were partnered closely with Government.

My strong recommendations to the Commissioners are as follows:

• Read the Nudge Unit’s MINDSPACE report (freely available online).

• Interview those involved with the NZ agreements with Government, unions, and private companies. For instance, Lee McCauley now of Tick Consulting (previously of the UK’s Nudge Unit) would be a valuable source of initial insights on this topic. Jane Kelley of NZ Health Group and others involved with the PPPPs and vaccine mandate exemptions would also throw some light on covert agreements made.

New Zealand was already vulnerable to exploitation by unethical pharmaceutical companies. Companies which have been found numerous times, globally, over decades in courts of law for falsifying data, fraudulent advertising and causing widespread death and harm as result of unethical business practices. During the covid era social media platforms and search engines like Google’s Alphabet, YouTube, Meta and Twitter (X) all acted in lockstep with Governments worldwide to censor and manipulate the “Safe and Effective’ message. And of course, NZ is one of only two countries worldwide which allow BigPharma to advertise, which in turn leads to heavy reliance upon that income from entities like ‘news’ outlets that ignore their moral and civil duty to be independent rather than captured.

The questions for the Commissioners are these:

1. Where is the line between advertising and clinical interventions that have bypassed informed consent?

2. What should the consequences be, when those lines have been crossed, not once, but multiple times, by multiple individuals and entities that ironically were formed to prevent that line being crossed?

3. How can we address the harms from these crimes, and prevent these crimes from being repeated?

Today there are still many citizens, including those on the covid inquiry team, who are unaware that their behaviours have been manipulated during and since the covid era. When they realise the extent of the emotional exploitation, will these people be angry? What will the repercussions be? And to those who have recognised (but are perhaps unaware how) their behaviours were changed, and through the powerful emotions of shame and guilt would prefer to ‘forget it ever happened’, what of them?

How will the Government address this extremely divisive, unethical impact on Human Rights and bodily sovereignty? Will the Commissioners be brave enough to begin our collective healing journey?

Thank you for reading these Submissions and good luck with the difficult work ahead.

[ENDS]

I will share more submissions this week. Thank you for all those who Buy Me a Coffee! Much appreciated indeed!