Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

I asked on Friday how anyone could vote for Labour given the latest Treasury report into their irresponsible spending of taxpayer money that came out last week. That irresponsible spending that contributed greatly to the recession, the high mortgage interest rates to unemployment - when so many of the same people, those people who made so many stupid decisions are still there, how could anyone, I asked, think that Labour should get another crack at government?   The answer is quite a few of you think they should. The latest Taxpayers Union Curia poll that came out yesterday shows that if an election were held on Sunday, the result would be a hung parliament with the centre right bloc gaining 61 seats and the centre left block getting exactly the same - 61 for National, for ACT, for NZ First, 61 for Labour, the Greens and Te Pati Maori.   Labour’s up two points, National’s down 2 points. It's only a poll - and we all know the Winston Peters dictum, the only poll that counts is the one that counts on election day. But it is a clear indication that when you campaign on fixing the economy, ‘hang on, help is on the way, we're here now, the grown-ups are in charge,’ then you have to actually fix it.  Things have to change. Cost of living remains voters’ most important issue. Closely followed by the economy, then health and employment. All of those hang around the economy, hang around pulling the right levers to get things cracking again. Your average hard-working Kiwi is exhausted and tired of being told that things are coming right, that the ship is slowly turning around and heading in the right direction.   So, this latest poll may be an expression of exhaustion and dissatisfaction. It may just be an indication that more people are starting to agree with Greens Co-leader Chloe Swarbrick that capitalism’s cooked. The Greens held their AGM over the weekend and Swarbrick urged the party faithful to build the parties fan base. She wants them to be talking to miners and factory workers and farmers to people who are fed up with politics and the two main parties and who are looking for alternatives, alternatives to the main parties and alternatives to capitalism. She also says she wants to have more say in the next government, she and Marama Davidson want to be the ones calling the shots, forming the government and deciding the policies.   Chloe's put herself up as finance minister in the next coalition government. And if you want to see what that looks like the Greens, unlike Labour, have put up their economic policies to be scrutinised. They have put up an alternate budget. What this latest poll says is that Green supporters should take heart.   People are tired, they are fed up, they can't see the status quo helping them. National, Labour, whatever, they're interchangeable. They're hard workers, they're good citizens, and they're still not getting ahead. The only way they can see a future for themselves and their families is by leaving the country. Does that mean they're ready to put the Greens in the driver's seat? Well, according to this latest poll, they're willing to put Labour there, so surely it's not such a great stretch of the imagination to see the Greens getting the votes they need to call the shots in 2026.   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A hit for the Taranaki region, with dwindling gas supply forcing a potential short-term shutdown of a local fertiliser plant.   Ballance Agri-Nutrients may have to cease operations at Kapuni for up to four months if it can't secure more gas before its contract expires next month.   The company manufactures about a third of the country's urea fertiliser each year.  Federated Farmers Arable Chairperson David Birkett told Kerre Woodham it’s been an ongoing issue that has just been getting worse and worse.  He says that plants like that in Kapuni was built around the gas supplies nearby, and to convert it to another fuel source would be a huge and expensive process.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I get texts on the daily from people saying “you're so negative about Labour”.  “You never have anything good to say about the last government. You're so critical of Labour.” And I say to them, how can anyone with a brain not be critical of Labour?! The gut feeling I had at the time that the previous administration was out of their depth and hopelessly incompetent has been proved with hard data, time and time and time again. The failure to deliver any kind of transformational reform, the failure to deliver on the absolute basics, the arrogance around co-governance, the breathtaking and utterly tragic waste of taxpayer money, more on that later, Treasury's report that came out yesterday slamming the governments spending during the pandemic just confirms everything we knew – but now this.   Labour's absolute refusal to even acknowledge changes taking place within NCEA. The Herald has the story and its a good one. The Government offered Labour multiple opportunities to be briefed on the NCEA change process, but the party’s education spokeswoman Willow-Jean Prime initially didn’t respond to these invitations and then flat-out declined them. This after Hipkins said to the Herald last month that the Labour Government consulted with the then-Opposition to ensure changes were “going to be enduring” and expressed a desire for the current Government to do the same. A text message appears to show Stanford reached out to Prime about NCEA after the Labour MP took over the education portfolio from Jan Tinetti in March.  “Hey Willow-Jean, congrats on the new role! Will need to get you up to speed with the NCEA change process. Jan and I had started working cross-party on this given the importance of our national qualification,” Stanford wrote, according to a screenshot provided.  “Would be good if we could meet first and I can run you through where we are at and what the process is. There is a policy advisory group of principals who are working on the details and you can have access to them when they meet as well as my officials and also NZQA.”  The Minister said her office would get in touch with Prime’s “if that’s ok?”. Nothing.  Tumbleweeds. Now I get that she doesn't have to like the changes. She doesn't have to agree with the change. But a letter along the lines of 'Thanks Minister, but I am philosophically and intellectually opposed to the changes you intend to make and I will be rolling them back once I am Minister. Nga mihi, Willow Jean' would have let everybody know where they stood. Nothing? No response at all?!   Stanford's office reached out again in May. Again, nothing. In mid June, Stanford reached out personally and then when again, there was no response, Stanford emailed Chris Hipkins office on July 1. “I’ve sought on multiple occasions to get input from your education spokesperson on NCEA curriculum reform, with no response,” Stanford wrote to Hipkins on July 1.  “It is important to have cross-party collaboration regarding a national qualification, and the offer remains open to arrange a briefing from officials or from the Professional Advisory Group.”  The next day, an adviser for Prime emailed Stanford: “I acknowledge your email regarding NCEA curriculum reform." “Willow-Jean has considered your email and declines the invitation."  That is Labour's education spokesperson. Some one who is so rude, so out of touch, so out of her depth she refused to be part of transformational change. But no, this is not just Labour's education spokesperson, this is Labour. Out of touch, out of their depth, and while Chris Hipkins remains as leader, they should never be allowed anywhere near the levers of power ever again. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On the face of it, the announcement from Transport Minister Chris Bishop yesterday makes good sense. It's been signalled; it was National Party election policy to move away from a fuel excise duty to road user charges (RUC). Simeon Brown, who was the transport spokesman at the time, said it would be a fairer way to charge for the distance people drive rather than the amount of fuel they use, given the different nature of the way we drive these days and the vehicles we drive.   So the current fuel excise duty is expected to be abolished in the coming years, all vehicles moving to road user charges. These are currently paid by owners of diesel, electric, and heavy vehicles. Last year the Government said the transition away from the so-called petrol tax could happen as soon as 2027. Yesterday, Chris Bishop said no date had been set, in order to make sure the changes aren't rushed. Which put this rather in the category of an announcement of an announcement.    What was announced yesterday is:    Removing the requirement to carry or display RUC licences, allowing for digital records instead.   Enable the use of a broader range of electronic RUC devices, including those already built into many modern vehicles.   Supporting flexible payment models, such as post-pay and monthly billing.   Separating NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi’s (NZTA) roles as both RUC regulator and retailer to foster fairer competition.   Allowing bundling of other road charges such as tolls and time-of-use-based pricing into a single, easy payment. Currently, the system is mostly paper-based and drivers have to monitor their odometers to check what distance they have driven. It also requires owners to buy RUCs in 1000km chunks.   The Automobile Association is broadly supportive of the changes. AA Transport policy director Martin Glynn spoke to the Mike Hosking Breakfast and believes moving to an electronic system is a good idea.   MG: “I think absolutely long term, as vehicles become more fuel efficient and people start, you know, there's different ways of powering vehicles, as we all know it's just not sustainable. So yeah we actually do need to make the shift.  MH: "The electronics behind it, is the transfer easy? If you get an app or you get a sensor in your car or whatever that turns out to be, is that easy?   MG: "The announcements been a little bit vague. Certainly for new cars the Minister’s been clear that a lot of that data and the systems are already available in the car itself, so that should be fairly straightforward. But I think that what he seems to be signalling is that we're moving to electronic devices to measure distance, and base, and weight. So that would be actually something in vehicles like we have the heavy vehicles now.    And the National Road Carrier Association CEO Justin Tighe-Umbers spoke to Early Edition this morning, and they also think it's a good move.  “It’s a once in 50 year change. Every country around the world is actually facing this problem where you've got EVs and far more efficient petrol engines just reducing how roading’s paid for. New Zealand's actually in, we're in quite a good position because we're world pioneers in road user charges. We were the first to bring it out in the late 70s and we're still a world leader on it with electronic RUCs for how trucks pay for it, so we're actually in quite a strong position compared to other countries.”  Who knew? I did not realise that we were world leaders in road user charges. At first glance, it makes sense. The Minister said that as our vehicle fleet has changed, so too must the way we fund our roads. It isn't fair, Chris Bishop said, to have Kiwis who drive less and can't afford the fuel-efficient cars paying more than people who can afford one and drive more often. He said the intent is to make paying RUC user friendly and similar to paying a power bill online or a Netflix subscription.   The thing is though, if you don't pay your power bill or your Netflix subscription, the service is cut. You don't get it anymore. You don't pay, you don't get it. You can't do that with roads. It's not as though all of a sudden a barrier is going to appear at your driveway, and you're not allowed to go onto the road because you haven't paid your RUC. And according to number of mechanics, the number of vehicles that turn up where the RUC have not been paid is extraordinary. So the system will only be as good as the technology that can isolate the people who are not paying. I'm sure you'll be able to fiddle the electronics if you can fiddle odometers, and people have been doing that ever since there's been the buying and trading of vehicles. The technology has to be as tamper proof as we can make it. It's the right move, but we just have to ensure we have the technology to ensure that users do indeed pay. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Prime Minister's blaming New Zealand's rising unemployment on the last Government's economic management.   The rate's hit a five-year high of 5.2%, just shy of Treasury’s predicted 5.4%.    Christopher Luxon told Kerre Woodham when inflation rises, interest rates go up, the economy shrinks, and people lose their jobs.  He says Labour had a lovely big spend-up party, but it's left a significant hangover.  Luxon says we have to work our way through the economic cycle, which is what we’re doing now.  China's doubling down on its deal with the Cook Islands.  Ambassador to New Zealand, Wang Xiaolong says China wants to co-operate on seabed mining research, an inter-island cargo ship between the two countries, and infrastructure.  The partnership has prompted backlash from New Zealand, which has a special relationship with the Islands, including the withdrawal of aid.  Meanwhile, Luxon told Woodham the Governor-General is visiting the Cooks to celebrate our 60 years free association.  He says he's proud of the people, but has an issue with their Government's moves.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

An artificial intelligence expert says the tech will always need human input for marking school exams.   Education Minister Erica Stanford says AI's already partly used to grade assessments, and it could do most of them by 2028.   It's alongside Government plans to replace NCEA with entirely new qualifications.   New Zealand AI Founder, Justin Flitter, told Kerre Woodham the tool should supplement a teacher's process, not become it.  He says the teacher should apply the AI assessment to their lived experience and knowledge of the student.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You might remember a month or so ago we had Justin Flitter, an AI expert, in the studio for an hour talking about the fact that AI is here, it's already being used by numerous early adopters, it's not going away, and you'll have to get on board or you'll be left behind. And as you can imagine, the calls were a mix of oh no, it's a disaster, stop it now and King Canute trying to turn back the tide, and others who were saying it's brilliant, already using it, been using it for over a year. A woman in her 70s who was working with disadvantaged kids found AI enormously helpful in terms of teaching tools.  So some people are ready, willing, and able to embrace change, technology, advancements. Others don't see it as an advancement, they see it as taking jobs, as concerning, as worrying and I get that. But it is here, and it would be pointless to bury your head in the sand and say I don't want it to come. It's already here. It's already being used. Job seekers are using AI to write their CVs and cover letters. AI’s being used by employers to screen job applications. It's being used in job training. It's being used in research and now, Education Minister Erica Stanford says the use of AI as a marking tool will be expanded over the next few years. It's already been used for the literacy and numeracy corequisite exams. Now, she says, it will be used as the education system moves away from NCEA Level 1. She says AI is as good if not better than human marking. It will undoubtedly be as good, if not better, at setting exams.   Remember 2016? Late changes in a top-level school exam math's paper led to a mistake so bad that students could not answer the question. It was unanswerable because of a mistake made by a human, leading to students walking out of the exam doubting themselves and beside themselves. That same year, it was revealed for other external NECA maths and stats exam papers were affected by mistakes, but they weren't considered as severe. Now if you can iron out those kind of glitches, all well and good. And if AI can free up teachers to teach, not doing the boring admin tasks, again, so much the better.   It's not perfect. It's only as good as the human input it receives, but like automation it is brilliant at doing the basic repetitive jobs. So for those of you who are on board, love to hear from you, those of you who have had bad experiences too love to hear from you on that as well. And is it suitable to be used for setting exams, marking papers? The sort of admin that takes up so much of a teacher's time in school. I would say absolutely get on board. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Economic recovery is taking longer than many hoped.  Unemployment's risen to a five-year high of 5.2%, up from 5.1% in the March quarter.  New Zealand officially moved out of recession last year.  The Herald's Liam Dann told Kerre Woodham the job market is taking longer to catch up, so many people may not be feeling better off.  He says economists can tell us numbers are improving, but it takes longer for life to improve.  Dann says anxiety about job security and AI is having ripple effects across the economy.  He says a lot of professional people are uncertain about the future, and that's putting them off spending money.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the wake of the changes to NCEA, you would have to ask whether the Knowledge Economy is the biggest political bust of recent times?   Back in 2001, then Prime Minister Helen Clark launched the Knowledge Wave project. Like many ideas, it came from a good place. Helen Clark had a vision for a nation which was confident, progressive, more prosperous, tolerant and which cared for its people. She said New Zealanders would ride to the Knowledge Wave because they too sought a society capable of sustaining its first world status with well educated, innovative citizens who choose to stay in New Zealand because it's the best possible place to be.   Do you remember back to those times? They were hopeful, and she was a great Prime Minister, and it sounded fantastic. Educated, prosperous, tolerant, reasonable people. It hasn't worked out so well. In a nutshell, the government believed that New Zealand's economy and its society would be driven far more by knowledge, skill, technology, and innovation. They looked across government to see how all policies could contribute to that end. Obviously, she said at the time, education was critical. She said by addressing the worst features of the student loan scheme and stabilising tertiary fees, we aim to improve access to education for all. We will have to invest more as fast as we have the capacity to do so.   So, educate the people, they'll become more prosperous, they'll become more tolerant. We'll have a better place to be. We'll be living in Utopia. Twenty-four years on, how are we looking? Have we ridden that Knowledge Wave to the shores of prosperity and tolerance? Hardly. Young people were steered into degrees they weren't particularly interested in. They were saddled with student loans and some of them now feel they were sold a pup. Universities went from centres for critical thinking and academic excellence to factories that churned out degrees for people who were barely literate. And far from tolerance and critical thinking, they became bastions of intolerance and Orwellian thinkspeak.    I think the Government's decision to reform NCEA is a step in the right direction. Instead of steering people into degrees they're not particularly interested in and they don't really want to do, there will be more options, more choices about what sort of future they can have. Not everybody wants to sit in a classroom, regurgitating a lecturer's opinion. Some people actually like to get out there and do stuff. The MTA, the Motor Trades Association, James McDowell, was talking to Mike Hosking this morning, and he reckons the changes to NCEA will be an overdue step towards a more relevant practical and future focused education system for young Kiwis.   JM: What we would very much like to see now, and it's part of the consultation process, is saying look okay, we're going to do these big core subjects, let's say in our case, an automotive subject, and we all work with the polytechs and providers like MITO that do the on job training and start them early.   MH: So I want to be an engineer in F1. Is that how it's going to work for me? I'll do my maths, I'll do my English, and I'll do something that channels me towards that?   JM: Yes, it's a lot like the old days. It's a lot like the old system. Or perhaps more contemporarily, more like Cambridge at the moment, where you have your core subjects. There'll be much less choice for sure. I mean that's the problem with NCEA – there's just far too much flexibility. You've got something like over 11,000 unit standards you can choose from that make up these qualifications. That's just a complete mess. You know, you might get a few credits for learning how to put oil on a car – that does not make you an automotive engineer, unfortunately.   Absolutely. Skills Group, New Zealand's largest private vocational training provider, concurs, saying the major overhaul of NCEA will hopefully create more robust and coherent vocational pathway options, ensuring that young people can pursue valued industry related learning and develop the real-world skills demanded by industry.    I just wonder how many bright young things we have lost to the trades because they've been stared into doing a meaningless degree where they get a B- pass, which means absolutely nothing. There are some occupations, some professions, some vocations where you will need a degree and you will enjoy it. You'll love doing the research. You'll love doing the reading. You'll love the learning. It'll be great. But not everybody is meant for that, and I think we saw back in 2001 this utopian vision that Helen Clark had, that everybody would be able to sit around and having Socratic debates with one another and intellectual discourse about theories and ideologies, that's not for everybody.   Now I think we're seeing a recognition that not every young person is cut from the same cloth. We need all sorts of minds, all sorts of abilities, all sorts of passions and all sorts of interests. And I think by giving the trades a greater focus, the idea of vocational education a greater focus, we will have a more tolerant society. I'm all for it.   How many of you have degrees that you think is absolutely worth every cent you paid for it? How many of you think “if only I hadn't done that degree”? How many employers are thinking “yes, we're finally going to get the right people motivated, inspired, capable people coming into our trades and adding value”? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Big players in the energy space are putting forward a new 10-year deal they say will secure supply at Huntly Power Station.   Genesis, Mercury, Meridian and Contact have agreed to co-invest in a strategic energy reserve – pending Commerce Commission approval.   It includes adding up to 600-thousand tonnes of coal to current stocks.  Meridian Energy CEO Mike Roan told Kerre Woodham that although some may find it surprising, it’s more cost effective to import coal than it is to mine it in New Zealand.  He says the Huntly deal will give them 10 years of confidence in thermal fuel that they can use to continue investing in renewable generation.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.