Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

The stoush between Rawiri Waititi and the Speaker of the House is absolutely absurd. If Waititi wants to wear a hei tiki shaped taonga around his neck into Parliament for goodness sake, he should be able to. This stoush has been brewing for some time. Late last year, Waititi was warned that he faced being ejected from the House if he did not wear a tie, after refusing to wear one. Well, after refusing to wear what Mallard deems to be a tie.  Peter Dunne was allowed to wear that absurd foppish bow tie in the debating chamber.  It seems Green MP Ricardo Menéndez March, who is of Mexican descent, is allowed to wear a Bona bolo tie. These are as much ties as hei tiki. The origin of the tie appears to have come about after Louis XIII hired Croatian mercenaries during the 30 year war in France.  They wore red scarfs around their necks and Louis liked the look so much, he appropriated it and thus the cravat was born, and from there came the tie. Ties came about because a French fop wanted to jazz up his wardrobe.  It has nothing to do with a mark of respect or gravitas or dignity.Late last year, Mallard said he was open to relaxing the rules around ties in the House. He had asked all MPs for their opinion as to whether or not MPs should be wearing ties in Parliament.That feedback came back in the affirmative and the rule stayed."A significant majority of members who responded opposed any change to dress standards for the Debating Chamber," Mallard said."Having considered those views, I have decided that no change in current standards is warranted. Business attire, including a jacket and tie for men, remains the required dress standard." But as I mentioned above, Mallard is open to interpretation as to what a tie should look like.  A bow tie?  A piece of string?  But not a hei tiki? Mallard is the problem, not the co-leader of the Māori Party.  What if Labour needed the Māori Party to govern in a cobbled together coalition?  You can bet your bippy then the Speakers version of what a tie looked like would include a hei tiki. Also, as we mentioned yesterday, the Speaker of the House has done more to sully the integrity of the House than Rawiri Waititi. Besides, is this really what we pay our MPs to do?  Engage in personal power struggles wasting valuable time and energy that could be spent on issues that really matter?  Get back to work like the rest of us had to do weeks earlier than you lot.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A Royal Society of New Zealand panel has been brought in to improve students' declining maths results.The Ministry of Educations National Monitoring Study of Student Achievement shows only 45 percent of students in Year 8 are achieving at the expected curriculum level.It comes after a survey late last year found Kiwi students' maths knowledge in the first year of high school, is below all other English speaking countries.Education Minister Chris Hipkins told Kerre McIvor that the politicisation of education isn't too blame, and both sides of the aisles agree it is an issue.However, he agrees that some of the solutions have been too political. "If you look at National Standards, they were tackling the right problem but they had the wrong solution." He says there has been bipartisanship in looking for a solution. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It is still a big regret of mine that I lost my way with maths. I was really enjoying maths for years and years and then I hit fifth form and either it was the change of teacher or I'd just reached my natural limit but one minute I had it, and the next minute it was gone. One minute I was enjoying the glorious purity of solving equations, the next the numerals and symbols were just incomprehensible ciphers. I managed to scrape through School C maths, then collapsed into a sixth form economics class and that was the end of maths for me. And I've had on my bucket list for years the desire to go back to school and learn the language of maths properly.  It's a beautiful language and one I got to do the equivalent of saying Hello, how are you? and Thank you very much in - just your basic essentials but that was it. And it appears I'm not alone.  For years and years, Kiwi kids have been on a slippery slope - if I knew maths I'd be able to put a maths pun in there about angles - sliding down the international league tables since global testing started in the 1990s. To be fair, we're also flunking in reading and science.  But the latest results of the Trends in International Maths and Science Study released last year were so bad that everybody's decided that somebody has to do something .And look at that, somebody has. The Ministry of Education has called in a Royal Society expert panel to adapt the national curriculum to achieve this. There are four main surveys that measure how well our education system is doing.  All show that we're in trouble.  And we've known this for years.  There are so many, many things wrong with our education system, it's hard to know where to start. Perhaps when our national curriculum advisory service was abolished with the establishement of Tomorrow's Schools.  Schools became self governing and in recent years, schools have been left to buy their own advice from approved profit driven facilitators.  Schools bid for professional development funding from a limited pool. Teachers need more support.  Only 14 per cent of NZ Year 5 primary teachers specialised in maths in their training compared with a global average of 43 per cent.  Kids are also missing out because teachers stream students into ability based groups far more than their global counterparts do. It's a shambles but it can and should be fixable.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A chance to help young people through the justice system, and reduce reoffending.The Young Adult List separates 18-25 year olds from adult court, and offers extra support.It's being trialled for 12 months at Porirua District Court, and is being described as a huge success.Principal Youth Court Judge John Walker told Kerre McIvor one of the biggest problems the programme addresses is the complicated jargon."It's a strange and scary place and the language used is often not understood by people on the street, and people from whatever walk of life have a real hard job understanding the court process." He says the current system treats them as fully functioning adults, when they clearly aren't."Unless we can have them fairly participate in the case which is about them, then there is no wraparound service or intervention that is going to work."LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A maths expert thinks politics are at play in New Zealand's record low maths results.An expert panel's been called in by the Ministry of Education for advice on improving students' maths results.A survey has found Kiwi students' math knowledge in the first year of high school ranks below all other English-speaking countries.Massey University mathematics professor Bobbie Hunter told Kerre McIvor political agendas have contributed, leading to such things as National Standards, which derailed maths teaching. "In fact, we need to separate politics from policy, and set a New Zealand-wide policy in what we want from mathematics."She says e're still achieving at the same level as twenty years ago. "Our students haven't actually gone backwards - every other country has jumped over us."LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Whatever your views on climate change, wherever on the spectrum you might be - from total denier to a Chicken Licken who thinks the world is going to end every time a Club Sport drives by - whatever your view, it doesn't really matter. The world's governments believe that there is a moral and social imperative to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and they are enacting legislation to ensure that comes about.   New Zealand is the fifth country to pass laws to curtail carbon emissions - the others are Sweden, France, the UK and Scotland - and two countries have already declared themselves to be carbon negative - Suriname and Bhutan.  Chile and Fiji have proposed legislation similar to New Zealand - that they will reach net-zero emissions by 2050.  And on it goes. So let's not spend the morning railing against the deficiencies in the science or the fact that there were heat waves in Albion 220 BC - the decision makers and the law makers are going to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the legislation will affect us all. The PM has called the Climate Change Commission's blueprint for New Zealand to be carbon neutral by 2050 "achievable and affordable".Although ,as the Climate Change Commission points out, the cost of the transition from fossil fuels to renewable will not be paid by all of us equally. The commission has recommended subsidies for those industries most affected and least able to afford the change required and there will also be carrots in the form of rewards and incentives to take up alternatives. The commission has recommended that NZ ban fossil fuelled vehicle imports by 2032.  The price of petrol will go up.  Our animal herds need to be drastically reduced.  We all need to drive EVs and plant more trees. It's pretty much what we've heard before and what greenies has been lobbying for for years.  The good news, according to the commission, is that the "transformational and lasting" change needed could be made right now with existing technology - and at relatively little cost to the economy.Its analysis found that meeting the emissions budgets it proposed out to 2035 were likely to be less than one per cent of GDP - much lower than what was estimated when new 2050 targets were set. And that although jobs would be lost particularly in the coal mining and oil and gas industries, the commission found many workers in those energy industries most affected by the transformation had important skills that would prove valuable in others."We expect employment will rise in the circular economy, development of biofuels and hydrogen, and in deploying and supporting new technologies."Farmers are nothing if not pragmatists. They've already started to make the changes before other industries. As I said, it's utterly pointless wasting hot air ranting and railing against the legislation. It is coming. Even National sort of supports it. It is only a draft report, you can put your submissions in, but you might as well be talking to your bum if you think it'll make any changes. This government has already said it is dedicated to going down this part. It's something many of them politically believe in and personally subscribe to. There's nothing really new in what the commission has suggested. It's just put it in a draft report and has given us a blueprint for what the transition will look like over the next 20 odd years, and we're either on board, or we're left behind.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Government is set to bring in Clean Car Import Standards from next year.Legislation will be passed this year, with a target to reach 105 grams of CO2 per kilometre by 2025.In the US, General Motors has announced they plan to eliminate gasoline and diesel cars and SUVs by 2035.  They say they'll invest heavily in electric vehicles and become carbon neutral by 2040.And now, a new study on Electric Vehicles shows a more rapid uptake of EVs could save New Zealanders $15 billion in vehicle, fuel, and carbon emission costs by 2050.The study identifies three ‘core’ policy measures to deliver on  EV uptake. Two of them were proposed, but not implemented, by the last coalition government.Study author and director of Concept Consulting Simon Coates joins Kerre McIvor to talk about the issue.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Here's a great example of making the most of having to quarantine.A 40 year smoking habit stubbed out in just 14 days.Twenty Russian and Ukrainian seamen kicked the habit during their MIQ stint - thanks to the help of one Canterbury nurse.Some 570 foreign mariners have made their way through Christchurch quarantine facilities since October.Amber Rex, a nurse working in MIQ, started a smoking cessation programme with six mariners but more and more soon signed up.Amber Rex joins me Kerre McIvor.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

New Zealand First is being told it needs to turn back the clock if it has any hope of a comeback.Tracey Martin has left after 11 years in Parliament, saying the party struggles with women in leadership, and no longer reflects her values.The former Minister for Children and Internal Affairs told Kerre McIvor, in its prime, party members had a stronger voice.She says the public assumed Winston Peters made all the decisions, but it wasn't like that until constitutional changes in 2018.The party's other female MP, Jenny Marcroft, has also resigned.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Australia is taking an cautious approach to New Zealand's latest community case.All flights to Australia have been immediately suspended for the next 72 hours.Additionally, anyone who has arrived in Australia since January 14, are being told to self isolate and get a test.Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt says they took a number of factors into consideration beforehand.He says it was down to the case being the South African variant and the number of locations the woman visited.ZB political editor Barry Soper joined Kerre McIvor to discuss the ongoing situation with Covid in the community, what this means for the future of the travel bubble, and whether MIQ facilities need to be stricter.LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.