Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

According to research from Inland Revenue and Treasury, the wealthiest New Zealanders pay just 12 per cent of their total income in tax on average.The same research found 42 per cent of the wealthiest New Zealanders were paying lower tax rates than the lowest tax rate paid by people who earn their money from an ordinary job or a benefit.The reason for the disparity between New Zealand’s wealthiest people and regular salary and wage earners is that the wealthiest New Zealanders tend to earn a large part of their income in parts of the economy that are either taxed lightly or not taxed at all.So how do we better calculate the wealth of rich people?PwC partner Geof Nightingale was a member of the Government's Tax Working Group which was created to consider the future of tax.He joined Kerre McIvor to share his knowledge on the issue.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson says lives will be 'incomparably better' in England's spring and summer as he sets out a plan to fully ease lockdown rules by June 21.A paper published yesterday shows the two vaccines approved and in use in Britain showed high efficacy rates in trials.The first doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccines in Scotland led to a substantial fall in Covid-19 hospital admissions.Dr Chris Smith, medical consultant of virology at Cambridge University and founder of the Naked Scientist podcast, joined Kerre McIvor this morning to update us on the latest developments from Britain.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A Christchurch man says the scene that confronted him ten years ago felt like it was straight out of a movie.Lawyer Andrew Riches was sitting in his office when the building started shaking and filing cabinets fell down.He ran outside and was one of the first rescuers at the PGC building, which had pancaked, claiming 18 lives.Riches told Kerre McIvor when he heard people calling out for help he sprang to action."When I stopped and looked at it, the whole building had collapsed down many floors on top of each other."You run through your head, how many people would be working on each floor - there must be a pile of desks in there."Riches, alongside fellow lawyers David Lang and Toby Giles, were honoured with awards from the Christchurch Mayor of that time,  Bob Parker, for heroism during the earthquake.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Calls for a purpose built quarantine centre that is located miles away from our cities and our biggest population masses are growing. All the big names in immunology - Nick Wilson, Des Gorman and Michael Baker - have said its absolute madness to house returnees carrying the different Covid strains into hotels in our biggest cities. We have 18 hotels in Auckland, three in Hamilton, two in Wellington and six in Christchurch - our most populous cities and we bang quarantine facilities smack bang in the middle of them. People are people and, despite the very best of intentions, accidents happen, and people, on occasion, will behave badly.  Since the army have taken over the running of the hotels, there haven't been quite as many returnees going walkabout and popping into their local Countdown but nonetheless the possibility is always there - and once the Covid cooties are out and about, the ramifications of Covid in the community are devastating.Now National's Covid spokesman Chris Bishop has jumped on the bandwagon and called for a purpose built facility on the outskirts of Auckland. He says, and he's quite right and nobody would disagree, that NZ can't afford to keep yo-yoing in and out of lockdown and the Auckland economy can't afford to keep bleeding $30 million a day. While employees probably enjoyed their three days off this week in Auckland, it's caused major disruption in the city and indeed for the rest of the country. We're going to have to learn to live with Covid - vaccinations or no vaccinations - and if that means forking out for a purpose built quarantine facility, then that's the price of living with this virus.Listen above as Chris Bishop joins Kerre McIvor to discuss his proposalSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A Christchurch man says the scene that confronted him ten years ago felt like it was straight out of a movie.Lawyer Andrew Riches was sitting in his office when the building started shaking and filing cabinets fell down.He ran outside and was one of the first rescuers at the PGC building, which had pancaked, claiming 18 lives.Riches told Kerre McIvor when he heard people calling out for help he sprang to action. "When I stopped and looked at it, the whole building had collapsed down many floors on top of each other."You run through your head, how many people would be working on each floor - there must be a pile of desks in there."Riches, alongside fellow lawyers David Lang and Toby Giles, were honoured with awards from the Christchurch Mayor of that time,  Bob Parker, for heroism during the earthquake.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Unsafe lead levels have been found in the blood of East Otago-based children.It was revealed earlier in the month unsafe levels of lead had been discovered in the southern towns of Karitane and Waikouaiti. The levels go back to as early as July 2020.Back in 2017, a Government inquiry found 20 per cent of the country's tap water was not up to standard, with as many as 750,000 New Zealanders exposed to drinking water that was not safe.Water New Zealand is the industry body for the three water sector - drinking water, waste water and storm water.Water NZ Technical Manager Noel Roberts told Kerre McIvor the main problem is resources."Both people capability and funds, and stretched between multiple needs for funding, especially from rates.A Beca report says New Zealand needs to look at desalination and purifying of waste water. Mr Roberts says the level of expertise required is not cheap, and there are not many individuals around the country who can do it."That's sort of why the DIA is looking at the three waters reform and what the options are there."See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Salvation Army's released its annual State of the Nation report focusing on areas such as crime, housing, and poverty.One of their biggest concerns is that the large increases in hardship are going to linger long after the Covid-19 pandemic - exemplified by food parcels given out last year, doubling to more than 110-thousand.They're urging the Government to take harder action against the housing crisis as it's key to addressing income poverty, which is worsening.Salvation Army Lieutenant Colonel Ian Hutson says increasing benefits, or any income, doesn't work if the cost of housing just keeps rising too.He told Kerre McIvor the housing register is continuing to climb. "It's got up to over 22,000 people, those who are in most need of housing."Hutson says the number of social housing needs to be ramped up. "There is a real need to increase the number of social housing that is being built."See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Remember Shamima Begum? The entitled little schoolgirl who ran away to be a terrorist with two of her mates, married two terrorists, gave birth to three babies who all subsequently died and then demanded the right to return to the UK and that the UK return her citizenship - she was stripped of it in the interests of national security. She's still battling for the right to return to the UK claiming she's a citizen and she has the rights of a citizen but at the moment, she's cooling her heels in a refugee camp while her lawyers battle for her to be allowed back in the UK so she can plead her case. There was a glimmer of hope that she could be palmed off to Bangladesh as her parents were originally from Bangladesh, but the Bangladeshi government quite sensibly washed their hands of her and said she was the UK's problem. And so the battle goes on. Now we have our very own Shamima Begum in the form of Suhayra Aden - a New Zealand born, Aussie raised woman who ran away to join the ISIS from Australia. Although the Australian and New Zealand authorities had been working on how they could solve the problem of Suhayra for a number of years, the decision by Scott Morrisson to strip Aden of her Australian citizenship means she and her two children are now solely the responsibility of this country. How did our PM take that news?  Fair to say, not well. She says she told Morrison if the issue became public she would speak very strongly on New Zealand's view.Australia's PM was unrepentant. Morrison told media  Australia does not want to see terrorists, who fought with terrorist organisations, enjoying privileges of citizenship, and he has to put his country's interest first.This is what Australia has been doing. If there's a sniff of a hope that some thug was born in New Zealand, back they go. It doesn't matter if they went over as a babe in arms, back they go. I find it incredible our Prime Minister would be shocked and surprised.They don't want to deal with thugs, with criminals, with hardcore recidivists, and they've found a way of divesting themselves of that problem. Even if they raised them and didn't give their families the kick up the bum to raise them right, they see them as our problem. We do the same - to Samoans, to Tongans, Irish and Americans have been sent back. If we find a way to kick you out, we do the same. It was the most angry I think I've seen Jacinda Ardern been at a press conference, but I had to wonder why - this is what they do. The difference here is does this woman even want to come back? She was caught trying crossing the border from Syria into Turkey to join the 3.6 million other refugees registered as Syrian that Turkey is trying to manage.The Turkish authorities detained her and now they want to deport her - it's simply a matter of which country is prepared to take her.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Researchers are looking into how to expand Covid-19 detection - with a Kiwi at the forefront of developing more accessible technology. Air New Zealand employees undertaking regular surveillance testing are participating in a Institute of Environmental Science and Research study, that will test saliva for the virus.The study will include the SalivaDirect Covid-19 testing technology developed by Nathan Grubaugh and New Zealander Anne Wyllie at Yale University in the US.While the Ministry of Health say at this stage there is still no indication that saliva PCR testing could replace the mandatory nasopharyngeal testing, health experts say it's only a matter of time.The ACT Party has come out this morning calling for daily mandatory saliva tests for border and MIQ Staff.  So just how is saliva testing progressing?Dr Wyllie told Kerre McIvor that she wanted to make a test as effective as possible, and they worked off developing the same PCR technology as the nasal swabs but make it more affordable. "We started playing with this back in April. There's still such a dire need here in the US for testing, so anything we could do to increase access to testing." She says they validated their method with the National Basketball Association and their bubble.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Kerre McIvor shares her thoughts on housing intensification and NIMBY-ism below, and chats with National Party leader Judith Collins about finding the balance. Residents in Christchurch are up in arms about ugly intensive housing developments popping up in their neighbourhoods. They've started a petition, and National MP David Bennett is also behind a petition in Hamilton to halt a Kainga Ora housing development as it was a “high density development in a low density suburban area” that would “change the character of the suburb”. I can totally understand how residents would feel.  When we were living in Grey Lynn and Wellpark College, which was a big college on a large piece of land went from one side of the block to the other, when that was sold, we assumed it was going to be an apartment complex put up there. Why wouldn’t there be? It made absolute sense that an apartment building would be put there.  Though, as it turned out, beautiful, single level dwellings were put up.I still think they should have put apartments there. It was a perfect site for an apartment building, if you were looking to create lower cost housing in the central city.When residents of Point Chevalier, a lovely seaside suburb close to the central city complain, about six storey apartment blocks popping up next to family homes, again, understandable. But if the only reason to oppose the development is because you don't like it, that's simply not good enough.  Not when people are desperate to get into their own homes in the cities. Even the National Party is now backing the Government’s National Policy Statement on Urban Development, which will stop councils from enforcing height limits of less than six storeys near major transit routes in an attempt to intensify cities. There is no need for intensification to necessarily be ugly. I can understand why people are opposed to intensification when you look around and see what’s happened to the monstrosity that is Auckland Central. But we need more homes – more thoughtfully planned, well designed homes, and that cannot be impossible.And interestingly, successful NIMBYs seem to come from the leafier, more expensive suburbs.  They know how to use the process.  But one of their more potent weapons may be done away with under the changes announced to the RMA.  The NIMBY's weapon of choice is the RMA appeals process - blocking consents - and the Environment Minister won't commit to keeping it.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.