Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

The Student Volunteer Army has organised a Big Clean-Up of flood-damaged areas around the Auckland region for this weekend. Spokesperson Robbie Nicol joined Kerre Woodham to discuss the plans. LISTEN ABOVE  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We have the cabinet reshuffle, of course, and although to me it's simply shuffling the same pack of cards, the same deck that has the same jokers and the same wildcards in it. You would have to say that Labour's done a pretty good job of rebranding itself as new and shiny and exciting. We no longer have a Minister for Covid, thank heavens. We do have a Minister for Auckland the first time since Judith Tizard was Minister for Auckland. You wouldn't have to do much to better her performance. So you know, Michael Wood doesn't have a terribly high threshold. After leaving Auckland to languish and lockdown for the better part of a year, the Prime Minister has decided that Auckland is in fact important, and important enough to have its own minister.   More interesting is going to be rather than the reshuffling of the deck is what policies are going to be put on the back burner and what the PM has decided to forge ahead with.  He's made it very clear that the focus is going to be on cost of living, on the fact that people are doing it tough. And this new look Government will be focusing on that. So more interesting to me is going to be the policies. What's he going to shelve? What's he going to focus on to reinvigorate the economy? You can't just keep taxing people to get your money. You need to have successful small business to have a successful country. So that is what the Prime Minister is going to need to focus on. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A business leader claims Kiwi companies are being hit hard by a workforce shortage. Stats NZ's latest labour market figures for the December quarter, showing unemployment has inched up to 3.4 percent. Employers and Manufacturers Association head, Brett O'Riley, told Kerre Woodham we don't have enough highly skilled people. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There have been many stories emerging from frustrated travellers still stranded overseas because of flooding at Auckland Airport.   Leanne Geraghty, Air New Zealand Customer and Sales officer joined Kerre Woodham with the latest developments. LISTEN ABOVE  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Auckland, Northland and the Coromandel Peninsula have been given red level weather warnings, the most severe warnings as more rain is forecast to fall on the sodden regions. NEMA has issued a safety warning that the heavy rain could cause flooding, slips and damage because the ground simply can't take any more. And one way of trying to minimize the load on already stretched first responders and emergency workers is to minimise traffic on Auckland's roads while vital infrastructure is repaired.   Accordingly, businesses were told to ask their employees to work from home and the Ministry of Education responded by directing all of the regions school', early childhood centres, and tertiary institutions to stay closed until the 7th of February. So again, there has been criticism about how this was communicated. Most schools found out thanks to the media after some confusion as to whether they should be opening, and eventually the Ministry of Education took the decision to impose a lockdown, in effect, on schools in Auckland for a week.   I totally understand why they want to minimize any chance of first responders being stretched thinly. I get that. But when you look at school attendance, truancy has never been worse. It's been steadily declining since 2015. Covid exacerbated the problem and that decline in school attendance has been across every decile, every year level, every ethnicity, in every region, and the biggest drop among primary and intermediate kids, who are the very ones that we can't afford to be skipping school.   Fewer than 60 percent of students currently attend school regularly. So you've got kids who haven't been at school for more than two years, who are street smart but educationally below the line and who are using their street smarts to survive.  We had callers last year saying they found it really difficult to get their teenagers to school. And these are kids from erstwhile “good” families where there is an expectation that young people will attend school. But you can hardly drag a six foot two, 100kg bloke into his school uniform and into the through the school gates. They have to want to go. But when the schools haven't prioritised attendance, when they've said look, you can learn at home. Why would you bother going?  I think they are between a rock and a hard place that you need to give first responders and emergency workers the opportunity to patch up and repair what's broken before the forecast heavy rain.  But we have seen just how badly school closures have impacted young people. The principals warned that there would be a spike in youth crime with the Covid closures. Schools should be shut as a measure of last resort, surely?  The schools in the worst-affected areas can be shut. Schools that can open should open. Schools have their own unique characters, personalities and communities. Surely they can decide for themselves what is best for their children and their families. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Timothy Welch, a senior lecturer in urban planning at the University of Auckland writes in The Conversation, when it comes to the Auckland floods, even stormwater reform isn't enough. He says we need to become a 'sponge city' to avoid future disasters. Auckland University's Timothy Welch joined Kerre Woodham. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One Auckland restaurant was forced to evacuate mid-service last Friday. Cassia owner Chand Sahrawat told Kerre Woodham that the prep kitchen was completely flooded. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Insurance Council Chief Executive, Tim Grafton told Kerre Woodham that for people with damaged homes, the most important thing is to photograph everything. He advises people to contact their insurer if they're experiencing vulnerabilities. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I am not surprised at all at the complete and utter chaos surrounding the transport to and from Elton John's concert at Mount Smart Stadium tonight. I'm really not. It's Auckland Transport for heaven's sake. Anybody who has lived in Auckland who has visited Auckland will know that AT are not terribly good at planning – and a massive piece of understatement - nor are they any good at executing, even the average plans they come up with. So the council has known for more than a year that Elton John will be performing a sold out show for 40,000 people at Mount Smart this weekend. And what do they do? They shut the trains down, to take advantage of the generally low passenger numbers over the long weekend. Auckland's rail network will be closed, meaning no trains will be running on Saturday. Yes, probably over any given long weekend, passenger numbers will be low. But not when you have Elton John performing a concert and you need to shift large numbers of people into and out of the region the way other cities seem to do. So what's AT's advice? To drive, or to walk. Brilliant. 740 car parks are available for 40,000 people. That's the first problem. Second one is the gates to Mount Smart will open at 5:30pm. Right on rush hour traffic time, right on people heading away for the long weekend time. Anybody who's had the misfortune to try and drive into or out of Auckland at 5 o'clock on a Friday, we'll know that it's chaos and that it's a nightmare. So compound that with 40,000 people trying to drive to Elton John and then add torrential rain, the prospect of thunderstorms and the possibility the Harbour Bridge will be closed due to high winds. What have we got? We've got a disaster. Aucklanders A) don't know how to drive and B) don't know how to drive in the rain. So perhaps if you want to walk, which was AT’s other brilliant suggestion, if you're staying at Sky City and you want to head to Mount Smart, walking in the torrential rain will take you 2 hours and 12 minutes if you go via Great South Road, you're welcome. "Oh Kerre, don't be so dramatic they'll put on buses." An organization that's devoted the past six years to pushing people out of cars and onto trains and buses and bicycles will have buses available, and they do. But they warned that capacity will be severely limited, so they suggest you plan early and drive or walk. What crack are they smoking in those offices? Official figures show close to 25,000 people have left Auckland in the past two years. As in who used to live here and then have a road to Damascus experience and think why am I doing this to myself? I'm out of here. What an absolute embarrassment for the city. My sincere apologies to visitors. Those people who have been looking forward to this concert for a very long time Ah, look, I'm not surprised at AT’s incompetence. I'm really not, but where you can colour me absolutely shocked is that the people are still intending to go to the concert. I haven't got a ticket to Elton John, I didn't buy one, but if I had a ticket to Elton John I would probably roll it up, shove a substance in there, sit at home, and listen to a 1973 album and forget about going and seeing him in person. What an absolute farce.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Look, we're not much into the year, are we? I suppose we're almost at the end of January. But there's another awful story about emergency housing about motels and the people being sequestered away in motels because authorities say there is nowhere else for them to go. In this case it is young people. It absolutely beggars belief that Oranga Tamariki can consider motel accommodation the best option for at risk young people, yet that's what they told analysts from the New Zealand Herald whose story is in the paper today. A young person in state care lived in a motel for nearly two years until suitable accommodation could be found. Other young people have spent more than 100 and 200 nights living in motels across the country. Oranga Tamariki said that while most motel placements were for one to three nights, 14 young people spent more than 100 nights, of those seven spent more than 200 nights. And what stunned me is that Oranga Tamariki tried to justify the use of these emergency motels. They're quoted as saying we work hard to ensure that the young people experience consistency of accommodation and staff and are able to access education and spend regular quality time with whanau and people who are important to them. At the emergency motels. Some young people, said Oranga Tamariki, enjoy and are able to take part in cooking, tidying and some cleaning. This will always be supported by the carers who are with the young people. Depending on the young person, a range of options could be used to supervise them, including security guards outside motel rooms for the highest risk cases. It makes you want to weep. What chance do these kids have? If any at all? You've seen the sort of motels that are being used for emergency accommodation. You've seen this state of them. In what universe does Oranga Tamariki imagine that the young people in these motels are going to enjoy taking part in cooking, tidying and some cleaning?  They're describing some bucolic paradise where the children with an apron around their waists are in a farmhouse, while a rosy cheeked carer helps them turn out perfect scones and a whacking roast for the entire family? I mean, come on. How can they possibly justify it? In 2019, then Children's Commissioner Judge Andrew Beecroft. demanded Oranga Tamariki stop using motel rooms. That's how long they've been around. But OT says that while motels are not preferred, they're often the only option for children in care. How have we come to this? I get that it's very difficult to place difficult children. I get that. There are children who have multiple issues that would be very, very difficult to place, but to justify their use of motels as the only possible option and then try to paint some idyllic day-to-day activity that these children are supposed to be involved with. We've seen the state of those motels. We know what they look like. Children should not be there. At risk children should not be there. I don't care who changes this. Who makes this better. I don't care what party of what colour changes it, but it has to stop. It has to stop now. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.