Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

It appears we're living in an age where it's okay for politicians to swear to the press. Donald Trump is leading the way, dropping the F bomb over Russia and using the word bullshit more often than anyone ever had.  It's a sign of the times, and you could argue it makes politicians more relatable because heaven knows we're all a lot more potty mouth in private. But you could also say that leaders of countries should be held to higher standards, and it's not hard to not swear – ask broadcasters.   So the PM almost dropped an F bomb yesterday because Chris Hipkins was calling the FamilyBoost programme a failure.   Are you okay with politicians having a swear in public, or is it something they should have the maturity to control?  Now what is the FamilyBoost programme that got Chris Luxon so fired up that he called the Leader of the Opposition “fricken” Chris Hipkins after he criticised it.  The FamilyBoost programme is a New Zealand government initiative designed to help families with the cost of early childhood education by giving you a refund on what you've paid.  Families can claim 25% of their weekly cost of childcare, up to a maximum of $75. There's a cap, if you earn over 180,000 dollars you can't claim it.  The government initially estimated that up to 100,000 families could benefit from FamilyBoost, with 21,000 potentially eligible for the full payment. Chris Hipkins claims that rather than 21,000, the number claiming the full benefit was 153.  60,000 families have received some form of payment – so it has kind of worked.  The low uptake is likely due to a combination of factors, including a lack of awareness of the scheme and complex eligibility requirements.  It's not the first time the policy has been criticised. Back in May it was revealed that nearly a quarter of the money spent on National's flagship FamilyBoost policy has gone towards running the scheme, instead of helping families – $14 million out of $62 million.  Are you sick of these virtue signalling schemes where if you have the ability to run the scheme, you have the ability to run a multi-national corporation, because applying is so complex, but all you’re doing is applying for a benefit?  The Government has since announced changes to the scheme to increase eligibility and encourage greater participation. These changes include expanding eligibility to more families and increasing the income threshold for the full rebate. It's also looking at ways to simplify the scheme and make it easier for families to access the benefits. Blah blah blah blah.    We’re living full lives running a family here. Is this worth the time to interpret all the rules and fill out all the paperwork, because when you look at this whole thing, it seems to be written in something other than English?  So the question is this: in an age of fast track this and too much bureaucracy that, is applying to get a benefit just too hard? Is the fear of being taken advantage of by a small minority of an already small minority too great?  Or is the bureaucratic minefield that is the benefit application process a good thing? Because it limits the number of people taking taxpayers money to make ends meet so we can spend that revenue on more doctors and transport options?  And can politicians fricken swear? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We all know we need more doctors. A lot more. Considering how long it takes to train a doctor, this is something that someone should have probably thought about 20 or 30 years ago. New Zealand's population has doubled since the last med school was opened, so you can see how far behind we are.  But now we have a proposed new medical school in the Waikato.  This was dreamed up last electoral cycle by the University with the help of a report and analysis by Stephen Joyce with his consultation hat on. Shane Reti was heavily involved with the university. The University called the school a present for National's second term.  Low and behold, it became National’s policy at the last election, and it seemed a vote winner. After all, we know we need more doctors  But then it all got sticky with bureaucrats and coalition partners suggesting the idea might not fly.  Now it’s back with a miraculous cut in budgeted costs and a substantial expectation that generous benefactors would make up any underfunding from the government. And if they didn't, the University had the means to cover any shortfall.  The two universities that already have medical schools don’t support it. They say just give us more money and we’ll make more doctors. A PWC report last year said a school was duplicative and expensive.  And with the need for doctors so urgent there’s the time factor – to get a school up and running takes a while. You need all sorts of specialised spaces. The Waikato Graduate School of Medicine is scheduled to open in 2028 —three years from now— versus two schools who claim they could grow intake from next year.  The whole thing seems a bit rife of political necessity.  They promised it, so it has to happen whether it's a good idea or not. It reeks of wasteful government spending as a payback to loyal supporters. It preys on the largesse of the wealthy. Is it a good idea?  If it was a good idea why has not been part of our long-term planning for longer? Training to become a doctor in New Zealand typically takes 12 to 17 years, depending on the chosen specialty.  But a third school has suddenly landed in our lap. I'm not against Waikato having a medical school in the future – health experts have said rural-origin students who train in rural areas and are trained by rural health professionals are six times more likely to work in those rural areas post-graduation. Now Hamilton is quite rural, but frankly so is Otago so I'm not sure that's a reason to have a school there. But right now, it seems a bit rushed and political.   So do you support the establishment of a school in Hamilton?  And then there's all the other issues around medical staff.  The proposal to date aims to produce proportionately more rural and primary care doctors via a four-year graduate programme, largely based in the community and the wider region’s general practices, yet drawing also on the many excellent clinicians at Waikato and other regional hospitals, so that graduates (as at Otago and Auckland) are equipped to go into any area of medicine.  Many in the medical sphere say the real problem in banging out doctors is not in the number of places at a school, but where they go to get on-the-job training – placements  So to train more doctors we need more doctors to train more doctors.  And this school does nothing to solve that problem.  Once they're trained in theory, how do we train them practically? Once they are trained, how do we pay them properly, and then how do we keep them from disappearing overseas?  And then there's the question of where we find people with the ability and desire to go through the arduous process of training to be a doctor.  Because doctors don't grow on trees.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Inflation's cooling in many corners of the economy, but not headline inflation. Latest Stats NZ figures suggest core inflation and domestically-driven non-tradeable inflation are trending downwards. But annual inflation has risen to 2.7 percent, up from 2.5 three months ago. NZ Herald business editor at large Liam Dann says these figures will provide relief for the Reserve Bank, as they work on getting the OCR down. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

So here we go again. A national conversation about whether NCEA is C.R.A.P A damning Government briefing presented in June has raised significant concerns about the credibility of New Zealand’s main secondary school qualification. It’s worried about the flexibility built into NCEA, including regarding what assessments students sit, means courses can be structured around those perceived to be “easier” to accumulate credits. The briefing says the system encourages students to stockpile credits across often disconnected subjects at the expense of engaging in a “coherent” course that supports a clear pathway for their future. The kids are also passing courses based on internal assessments. Many are avoiding external examinations. More than 250,000 kids students skipped exams last year. The briefing says that the qualification is hard to assess if you’re an employer and it’s hard to compare it with anything internationally. So Erica Stanford is working on proposals, and I’d like to know what you think she should do with the system. This morning Mike Hosking asked Auckland Grammar's Headmaster Tim O'Connor what he would do:  "I think you change it to an examination based system. We make it pretty simple. Here's a thought, we assess at against the national curriculum because currently in NCEA doesn't do that. So the primary mode of the system is examinations that would give benchmarking across the country. Every student whether you're in Invercargill through to Auckland. you'd know where you stood. And you can have some internal assessment in it because not all types of content, you know, are best under exam conditions, but these should be marked by NZQA. Teachers wouldn't mark their students own work, no, and they shouldn't receive their marks back before they get their externals back."  Now, both my boys did NCEA and they’re literate and numerically great. It did not fail them In fact my oldest had the choice of doing NCEA  or International Baccalaureate. So, why did we go NCEA? It’s because that boy was dyslexic and dyspraxia.  He cannot write well and his spelling is atrocious. So a system that had a large quotient of internal assessment catered for his learning difficulty. But the difference between his school and others is that the school made sure that the standards of IB were replicated in their teaching of NCEA The concentrated on the basics, which is not just reading writing and arithmetic. They also included science and social studies. Social science, including history and not just New Zealand history, but the history of the world over the past 200 years in particular. They didn’t include the so-called cheat courses like barista studies reasoning if you want to learn how to be a café worker you can enrol in extramural courses He got a great education and has gone on to have double degrees and a thriving professional life My point here is that one of the main problems of NCEA is not the system, but the way the schools teach it and the abdication of parental input into the student’s choices. You can’t just sit back and complain that you don’t understand how it works as a parent. You have to educate yourself if you want your children to be adequately educated for their future and the chance to do even better than you did. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A late night safe zone has found success in Wellington, and is being brought to Auckland.  For the past eight years, Take 10, an initiative run by Vulnerable Support Charitable Trust (VSCT), has been offering a late-night safe zone on Wellington’s Courtenay Place.  Now, with the support of Auckland Council, the volunteer-run initiative is launching a 10 week pilot in Auckland’s city centre.  Operations Manager Leigh Keown told Kerre Woodham that they get a lot of students and young people on their night out, but it’s for anyone who wants to have a break, get a glass of water, or charge their phone.  She says everyone is welcome, and rather than walk around the streets, not knowing what to do, people can come to them for shelter.   LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There’s no doubt the news that the number of people on a benefit in New Zealand is up to the 400,000 mark will have some people tut-tutting.    But before we start ripping into the so-called “benefit bludgers”, we need to be very careful.   Because at the same time that we’re finding out that benefit numbers are up —and the number of people on the dole in particular— 10% compared to last year, we’re also hearing about people over-50 being knocked back time-and-time again when all they’re doing is just trying to find work.   So the number of people on the Jobseeker benefit is up right around the country.    The biggest increase has been in Northland but overall, there are 216,000 people on the dole. Which is just over half the overall number of beneficiaries.   That’s with 81,000 people off a benefit and into work thanks to moves made by the Government, which had former WINZ boss Christine Rankin all excited when she was on Newstalk ZB this morning.    Social Development Minister Louise Upston also said this morning that thousands of jobs are on the way with the big infrastructure projects in the pipeline.    Which is all very well, but not everyone works in construction. And the prospect of these big projects coming online won’t provide any reassurance to the over-50s who are over the hill in the eyes of many employers.    Which is why we shouldn't make assumptions that everyone on the Jobseeker benefit is not in the least bit interested in working.   Because there are plenty of people —thousands of people we’re being told today— who desperately want to work but can’t because of their age.   Or, more to the point, they desperately want to work but can’t because some employers are only interested in hiring younger people.   The founder of a website for people over-50 seeking work has been saying this week that thousands of people have contacted them with stories of being sidelined just because of their age.   Ian Fraser is the founder of the Seniors at Work website, and he says employers need to change their thinking about these so-called older workers.   For example, he says not everyone over-50 struggles with technology. He says that excuse comes up all the time. Not that that’s what comes through in the rejection letter – if you do get a rejection letter.   Then there’s the old line about being over-qualified. But we’re not talking here about people all that long in the tooth, we’re talking about people my age.    I’m in quite a privileged position of having a job for the next two years. All going well, that is. Providing I don’t completely blow it.   I’ve got a contract that says, “we want you for the next two years”.   But I’m as aware as the next person that, when contracts expire, that can be it.   Which means in two years time I could very well be joining these thousands of people in their 50’s who are finding it impossible to get work because employers aren’t interested in them because of their age. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Around about 30 years from now the AI bot, who will be presenting the 9am to midday show, will announce breathlessly that single-cell classes are to be done away with and open plan classrooms are planned for future school builds to allow greater collaboration between students and teachers. A more relaxed style of learning, yadda yadda yadda – what do you think? 0800 80 10 80, the AI bot will say, because as sure as God made little apples, this is going to come around again.   Anybody who's been around since the 70s, perhaps earlier, will know that the great open plan versus single-cell classes debate has been going on, and on, and on for decades. Honestly, for people who preach collaboration and open minds, academics within education are awfully territorial and guard their own patch. Whole word learning versus phonics is another cracker, but we'll save that for the AI bot of the future.   While open plan designs were originally designed to foster collaboration, they have often created challenges for schools. So it was stop the presses yesterday when the Minister of Education announced that open plan classrooms aren't meeting the needs of students and teachers. Colour me pink and call me shocked! Whoever would have thunk it? We did. We all knew it.   They were originally intended to foster collaboration, and you can imagine a bunch of pointy heads sitting around a table saying: it'll be amazing – teachers will be able to draw support from one another, and those that perhaps aren't getting results from one student can look to another. Teachers will be able to foster the kind of energy and creativity that we need to see, and the children will be able to mingle. But no, it's been an abject disaster. It was an abject disaster in the 70s. It was an abject disaster in the 80s and it's been an epic disaster since John Key and Hekia Parata introduced them in 2011.   Erica Stanford says in many cases, open plan classrooms reduce flexibility rather than enhance it. She says we've listened to the sector; new classrooms will no longer be open plan. But this is the good thing: they're not going back to the future again. They’re going to create classes that prioritise flexibility over open plan layouts, so the use of glass sliding doors means spaces can be open when you want to have a wider collaboration, but then they can be closed for focused learning.    This idea doesn't mean we're going back to the prefab – the cold, uninsulated prefabs for every class that possibly you went to school in. If teachers want to open up space, they can, when they want to shut themselves off, they can. There is no one-size-fits-all for every class and that is the way it should be. The thing I really liked about Erica Stanford's announcement was the flexibility. This is a good thing. This is a very good thing. And I want to hear positive, joyous, fabulous response to this announcement from the Minister of Education, as one Minister who really understands her portfolio. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Education Minister's stressing schools can still be flexible as the Government pulls the plug on open plan classrooms.  It was introduced by John Key's Government in 2011.  Erica Stanford announced yesterday all new builds will now have more traditional layouts.  She told Kerre Woodham there are good examples in the best modern learning environments.  She’s also looking into helping fund schools to modify existing open-plan rooms.  Stanford told Woodham she's tasking the school property agency to look into ways to help schools revert their teaching spaces.  In the meantime, she says, schools have five year property budgets, with a category for classroom modifications they can use.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Over 8,000 divorces are filed in New Zealand annually, and the process isn’t cheap.   While the dissolution fee only costs $242, legal costs can reach into the thousands.  Many couples fall into the so-called ‘missing middle’ — earning too much to access legal aid, but not enough to afford private lawyers.  Australian divorce and separation lender JustFund has launched in New Zealand with the sentiment that access to justice isn’t a privilege, it’s a right.  Their Director of Family Law, Lauren Milne, told Kerre Woodham the average cost of divorce in New Zealand is $30,000 – $15,000 per person.  She says that most people aren’t putting aside a nest egg in case they get divorced, so it can be a struggle to pull together the funds.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Just how well served or poorly served are we by the engineering and the design of our roads? Residents of Waiuku are reeling after a crash yesterday that has left an adult and two children dead. Some locals say they've been calling for safety measures to be introduced on Masters Rd, known as ‘roller coaster road’, for years.   One poor man who was first on the scene yesterday lost his best mate on the same road two years ago and says he fears for his life every time he turns out of his driveway. He said if they could start focusing those speed cameras on actual known death trap sites, like Masters Rd, instead of on random corners or at the bottom of pretty safe downhills where they're just revenue gathering —please could they put those cameras where it would save people's lives instead of just collecting the tax?— “that would be a great start”. We need them on this road. He described the area where the crash occurred as being akin to an old school BMX jump.    I received an email a couple of days ago from a woman whose friend had his house destroyed in May by a speeding driver in a stolen car. She said she'd spoken at a Whangarei Council meeting to plead for barriers to stop this happening again, but they've refused to fund it, despite the fact that 10 years ago the same house was totalled and had to be rebuilt because the same thing had happened. And pleas from that owner to put barriers were ignored then too.   Franklin’s Whitford-Maraetai Rd has seen crashes every month. Locals say it's a regular traumatic experience to drive the roads, despite efforts from Auckland Council to improve it. There's been road widening along parts of the stretch, resurfacing of some of the bends in asphalt, and it's reduced the number of accidents there, but locals say they still expect to hear that awful sound of metal crunching every time there's rain.   What is a dangerous road? It's very subjective, but one indicator is a high number of fatal or serious crashes over an extended period of time. If you look at Old North Road in Waimauku, from 2014-2019 there were 13 deaths and serious injuries in five years. State Highway 2 from Katikati to Tauranga, one of the highest risk roads in the Bay of Plenty: between 2009-2018, 27 people were killed and 77 seriously injured. In response to that, speed limits were lowered in a number of places, and then flexible wire rope median barriers were put in on sections of State Highway 2 South of Katikati. But you'll remember we've had people phoning in about those because they say it's impossible to turn into side streets – it makes residents lives a misery having to drive for kilometres before they can turn around. So yes, it might stop cars from crashing into one another on a dangerous stretch of road, but it also means risky behaviour from those who are looking to avoid travelling many kilometres just to turn around and come back again. State Highway 1 from Kawakawa to Springs Flat, Northland: 14 deaths, 41 serious injuries from 2012-2016.   There is the factor of people not wearing a seat belt, that causes deaths, where they've been drinking or drug impaired, of course that comes into play, but at the same time, there are stretches of road that New Zealanders drive that are completely and utterly unforgiving. You make one small mistake, and humans do, a moment of distraction, one small mistake, and the consequences are absolutely devastating because the roads are unforgiving. Many of them are still the goat tracks that they once were. Just had a bit of metal put on them and call them a highway.   At what point do you get a road engineered? And again, it probably comes back to the resource management and the RMA and the problems we have with getting permission to reconfigure roads around the country. You would think though, in the case of the woman who emailed me, that putting a barrier up on the corner to stop a car leaving the road and barrelling into a house for the third time - surely a barrier fence wouldn't be a huge cost to ratepayers of Whangarei? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.