Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

Inflation has defied many expectations by falling in the third quarter.   Figures show it rose 5.6% in the year to September, a drop from 6.0% in the year to June.  The Reserve Bank had predicted it would be six%, and many economists picked between 6.1-and-6.2%.   Herald Business Editor at Large, Liam Dann, told Kerre Woodham that it shows the Reserve Bank is making the right moves.   He says monetary policy is obviously working and getting people to put their wallets away.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Council of Trade Unions is hoping the new Government will be more responsive to their needs.  The CTU want to see the new government's plans for infrastructure, solving child poverty, and post-cyclone recovery.  They believe the loss of fair pay agreements will impact many industries, such as those working in hospitality.  Council of Trade Unions President Richard Wagstaff told Kerre Woodham that individual workers are vulnerable.  He said that it’s not easy for them to stand up to their employers if they feel they aren’t being paid fairly.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the lead up to the election, National was clear that they would be rolling back a number of policies that Labour introduced, including fair pay agreements.  Business NZ has called for the fair pay agreement to be scrapped sooner rather than later, and they would also like to see 90-day trials reintroduced, and a commitment to a long-term programme of infrastructure.  Business NZ Chief Executive Kirk Hope joined Kerre Woodham to discuss the proposals.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The weekend. Discuss.   No there's more than that isn’t there? What a weekend. I owe my texter Muz from Hawkes Bay a bottle of Pinot of his choice. He said that it would be a walkover, that it would be absolutely obvious that National would do well and that they would have partners to support them.   I thought the election would be a bit closer, a bit tighter. But ultimately, although it wasn't a complete rejection of the left, it was an absolute decimation of Labour. Not as bad as 2014, but jolly close, and with ramifications for years to come.   Those on the left who couldn't bring themselves to vote right went to the Greens. Some to TOP (TOP got the same amount of party vote as Te Pati Maori) but of course, they didn't get the electoral seat of Ilam, which they were hoping for. And Te Pati Maori did a fantastic job taking the Maori seats from Labour. The Greens did very well too, holding on to Auckland Central and winning Wellington Central, so it wasn't a complete rejection of the left.    What it was was a rejection of Labour. Labour wasn't Labour enough for those on the left. And they were utterly hopeless for those in the middle. National did better than expected. ACT and NZ First were about what everyone was predicting in the final week of the election. I flicked around the media a bit before settling on Newstalk ZB’s coverage for the night. And I found it really entertaining. Thank you, team. I don't think I'm biased, (probably biased) but I thought it was jolly good.   Chris Hipkins's speech was odd and sort of sums up why Labour lost, in my opinion. He talked about the many, many amazing things that Labour had done and how impressive they'd been in the face of so many odds. Oh, how magnificent they were, proving yet again that by spending so much time in Wellington he is completely out of touch with what people have been feeling for at least two years.   The best moment of the speech came with the mic drop of hey, I'd like to thank my new partner Toni. Everyone said “Toni? With an I? With a Y? Who's Toni? Where's Toni?” It was that bit that got my attention.   He doesn't seem to understand how Labour lost so badly. So, my recommendation, if he's remotely interested, for him to come to a come to Jesus moment and understand what happened, would be to sit himself quietly in a corner, away from sycophants and people who just think he's the bee's knees, open up the New Zealand Herald and read Simon Wilson's column. Because Simon Wilson, who is a left-leaning columnist, has had a road to Damascus moment in his column where he talks about Labour's ability to win the war. They were fit to win the war, but not for peace. A bit like Churchill's World War II Government.   Simon Wilson writes, it isn't Labour's fault that the fallout from the pandemic has been difficult to understand. People isolated from loved ones and hardship and grief, children traumatised, businesses collapsed and still collapsing. Anger and intolerance on the rise, the health system almost broken - the social trauma has been far deeper and more widespread than expected and it will roll on for a long time to come, he writes.   Yes, we know! Is this not what we've been talking about for the past couple of years? If Simon or Chris Hipkins or whoever had turned off Nat Rad, or Concert Radio for 10 minutes and tuned into ZB, they would have known this long before Saturday night. Simon Wilson goes on: Co-governance was always going to be opposed by racists, but Labour allowed a lot of other good-hearted people to feel estranged by it too. Yes, the messaging was so poor, their delivery of it was so poor, that as Simon Wilson says, people who would normally be quite moderate and quite tolerant were like, “What the Dickens?” And Simon's, like, wow, who knew?   We did. We knew. Simon Wilson goes on: build a light rail, okay, but make sure the existing bus networks are highly functional on existing roads. Reform education, of course, but get kids back into classrooms and do not wreck the universities or the technical institutes. And yes, reform the health system, but the priority has to be the front line.   Yes, Simon. We know. We've been saying this all along. Where were you? Where were you in the lead up to the election saying this? This is why people turned against Labour, because they could see all of this ineptitude. Not because they're racist, or anti trans, or venal money grubbing capitalists who want to squeeze more out of the oppressed working men or women.   Basically, it's because Labour were completely and utterly hopeless at delivering all the myriad promises they made to New Zealanders. And when it came down to it, they simply could not deliver what New Zealanders needed and wanted. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I had no desire to watch that debate last night.   What was the point? I'd interviewed both leaders within the past week. I'd had the ability, as had you, to hear their vision for the country over an hour (commercial hour of course, I know you grumble about the ads). What they thought they could do right, what they thought the others were doing wrong. Rather than spend an hour watching two tired men snipe away at each other, I would much rather have spent it with my family, reading books, playing board games, having great chat with a six-year-old and a four-year-old instead of hearing recycled tropes from both sides.   But the boss had a face like a twisted sneaker when I told him I'd nearly missed the last debate due to technical difficulties, so as a dutiful employee I sat and watched terrestrial TV and it was every bit as awful as I thought it would be.   When you look at Chris Hipkins’ boyish face you forget that he can be a nasty piece of work. He's had to be. He was doing a lot of Jacinda Ardern's dirty work during the Covid response. The hard jobs, making decisions that had the most terrible implications for so many families. Dishing dirt on a journalist who was locked out of the country pregnant. He got shirty with her so out came the information that really he shouldn't have been leaking. He's not the sweet, wee boy from the Hutt who's found himself an accidental Prime Minister.   But you forget that until the comment last night. That comment about a National backbencher in the bed leg, I thought, was unforgivable. Christopher Luxon quite rightly pointed out Hipkins had lost five ministers, when Hipkins doubted Luxon's ability to control a coalition government.  He said you won't be able to manage ACT and NZ First.  Luxon said will you lost five ministers from your own Government, you can't even look after your own party. Hipkins snapped back that at least none of my MP's beat people up with a bed leg, referring to Sam Uffindell’s confession of being a bully at high school.   For the record, Uffindell says he doesn't remember ever bullying with a bed leg, but nonetheless. I know we can all say stupid things under pressure. I say them regularly. We can all say cruel things when trying to score points. I've done it and in one case I hurt a former friend badly, as a result, I've never taken part in a debate since. I think Hipkins should apologise. It was dirty, dirty pool and it reflected on him badly.  Christopher Luxon looked exhausted and a bit shell shocked at the level of hectoring coming his way. I also found it really interesting reading the blow-by-blow accounts of the debate on both Stuff and the Herald - they were supposed to report in real time what the leaders were saying. Only the Herald bothered to report the response from a woman invited to ask a question of the leaders.   Agnes Magele, from Auckland Action Against Poverty, wanted to know what both parties would do to protect and support beneficiaries. When Hipkins tried to say that Labour was the friend of the beneficiaries and had lifted children out of poverty, Agnes Magele interjected from the audience and said sorry, but in saying that Mr Prime Minister, Labour hasn't done anything to eliminate it at all.   The New Zealand Herald saw fit to report that, and I think it was a valid point coming from someone who would know. Stuff chose not to.  What, they didn't hear it? Selective reporting? What? What is the point of these debates other than looking for cheap headlines? Thank God I don't have to watch another one for the next three years, and even then, I wonder if they're not past their use by date. They're not debates. We don't hear the core points about policy.   It’s the Colosseum all over again with a couple of exhausted lions, snarling and tearing at each other and trying to draw blood.   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

National Leader Christopher Luxon joined Kerre Woodham live in studio to take calls and answer questions from listeners. WATCH ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

If you listen to Labour's ads, and you can't really avoid them right now as we lead up to final days of the election. If you listen to Labour's ads, you'll be able to go in and make an appointment to get all that dental work you can't afford right now done, once the dentists open up at 7am next Monday. If Labour become the next Government.   Wrong.   Taxpayer-funded dental work is going to only going to be for the under 30s. It only kicks in at the next election in 2026, three years away, and it only covers the very basics. Those wisdom teeth and implants you'll still have to pay for.   If you listen to National’s ads, which you can't avoid and that lead up to the election, households all over the country will be showered with money when their tax bracket adjustment kicks in.   Well, no.   Most households won't get the $250 that's been the razzle dazzle figure of the campaign ads. Sure, there was an ‘up to’ $250 in there and ‘an average household’ in there, but people only really hear what they want to hear, don't they?   If you listen to Labour and you're on the Super, they'll tell you that Super will end should the Nat’s become the Government. Clear message - They win, you lose.   Wrong.   What National have said is that they'll gradually increase the age of eligibility to 67, with adjustments not beginning until 2044, 20 years after the legislation is passed. This change wouldn't affect anyone born before 1979. So if you're getting the pension now, whichever government gets in, you'll be getting it till you turn up your toes.   Oh, but if those Nat’s get in, say Labour, they're going to cut the winter energy payment, leaving frail old ladies shivering in the cold. These weren't ads, but this was expressed on Labour MP's Facebook pages. They're going to cut the winter energy payment. You're going to freeze to death.   Wrong again.   And in fact, National’s been roundly criticised for not doing away with the winter energy payment. The Taxpayers Union says it needs further targeting to go to those who actually need it, and this is exactly the kind of wasteful spending that National should be campaigning against. Instead, they're choosing to do what they think is popular. National will continue to fund the winter energy payment for all retirees, regardless of whether they need it or not.   So misinformation. National would have you believe that if Labour cobbles together a government, it'll be with the Greens, Te Pati Maori, and the gangs. And it won't, of course. I mean, Labour's given money to gang affiliated community programs, as indeed have National in the past. But you know, it’s an example of hyperbole - driving home the point that the Nat’s are going to get tough on gangs, Labours soft on gangs and they'll be part of the Government. Of course they won't be an official part of the Government. And yet there are people that believe it.   The misinformation and negative campaigning is part of modern life, I suppose, and part of the final days of election campaigning. But it is a bit dispiriting. You roll your eyes, and you think surely people know that that is not strictly true. You only have to go to any of the parties' websites and see their policies for yourself, it's really not difficult to find.   But people don't do it. They'd rather take the snackable bites that come through the media as advertising and believe them to be true. Even though mistrust in the media is huge, according to polls, doesn't matter, people will believe what they want to hear. If they perhaps are biased against Labour or biased against National, they will hear what they want to hear. They will stop all deductive reasoning and critical thinking.   If you still haven't voted yet, just have a long hard think about why are you going to vote? How you want the country to look? What direction you want it to go?  And don’t listen to the ads. Because that's all they are, they’re ads that are, at the very best, gussying up information to try and appeal to you. To try to frighten you into voting.   It's a bit of a shame, really, it it'd be better to go for the positives. This is what will happen. This is what we can do and to represent it truthfully. But I guess that is too much to hope for in 2023, Anyway, only three days to go. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The 2023 election campaign is entering its final days.  With just three days left Labour and National have both descended into negative campaigning as they scrap for every last vote.  NZ Herald’s Deputy Political Editor, Thomas Coughlan, told Kerre Woodham that at the end of the campaign, they’ll tally the time they spent talking about each other versus the time they spent discussing their own policies.  He thinks that relative to previous elections, they’ve been spending so much time obsessed with each other.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Still more election news. It just gets weirder every day really.   The death of a respected and much loved community member in Port Waikato means a quirk of our election process will be triggered. The ACT party's Neil Christensen has died just a week before the election. And that means the electorate vote in Port Waikato will not count on Election Day, however, the party vote will still count.   Now a by-election will be held after the election. That will mean there are 121 MPs in parliament after the by-election, instead of the usual 120. It's an overhang. Why? Well Otago University law professor Andrew Geddis attempted to explain it to Mike on the Mike Hosking Breakfast this morning.     MH: How is it that you get an extra seat, 121 in the Parliament, and then once you hold the by-election, you still have 121? I don't get that part.”  AG: First of all, the reason for the rule is to throw back to our old first-past-the-post days when we only elected people out of electorates. And so if you had a candidate, especially one of the leading candidates, say a National or Labour candidate die, then that could really affect the overall election result. You know, given that people were only elected out of electorates. We just kept the rule.   But under MMP, on election night, 120 seats get distributed by the Electoral Commission. So if someone died, you could just fill that seat with an extra list seat. But because we have this by-election, what's going to happen is we'll fill 120 seats. There'll be an extra list seat added to bring it up to 120. Then at the end of November, we'll have another seat added when the by-election happens, and the new MP comes out of Port Waikato.”    MH: Why don't, when we get the new MP, the list for MP drops out, thus keeping 120?   AG: But that's not what the rules say the rules say.     MH: No, I know that. But why don't we have a proper rule that makes sense?   AG: That would be one way to do it. Or the other way to do it would be to say that unfortunately, things like this happen, people pass away, and so on and so on. And what you can just do is continue the election, elect someone out of Port Waikato because whoever wins that electorate really won't change the overall makeup of Parliament – it will just change whether people get list seats or electorate seats.     MH: But what, if in going to 121 seats if that's the one seat difference in forming a Government?    AG: That is entirely possible. This really could change the overall result of the election for the next three years. It could give the right block the one extra seat they need to govern.     So there we go.   It makes perfect sense as Mike was saying, so you add an extra list seat until the by-election, the electorate MP is elected, you drop off that list person. Doesn't it? I mean change the rules because this is a bit silly, really, isn't it? The extra seat will almost certainly be National’s because Port Waikato is a safe National seat held by MP Andrew Bayly. Andrew Bayly is high enough on the list, he’s 71, to get in as a List MP on election night. Christensen was ranked 35 on ACT’s list, meaning he was unlikely to become an MP without winning the seat of Port Waikato.   The Electoral Commission confirmed that if Bailey subsequently won the by-election, his list spot will go to the next National candidate on the list and that would give National one more seat than it would have won in the election. If that makes any kind of sense to you?    I mean, it's been explained clearly by a law professor. But dumb rules are still dumb rules and sound dumb, even when you say them, even when you are a distinguished law professor and saying them, they still sound dumb.    There's also another spanner in the works, depending on what happens with Te Pati Maori. If Te Pati Maori get more electorate MP's than its party vote qualifies it for, it could result in 122 or a 223 MPs in Parliament. And that would mean 62 seats were needed to get a majority.   In the Herald’s Poll of Poll’s (they look at all the different polls and sort of divvy them up and average them out) Te Pati Maori is on just 2.8% in terms of party vote but would get 4 MPs because of the electorate seats.   So even after Saturday there will still be some shuffling of the cards. There will be some shuffling of the pack before we see what the actual make-up of our Parliament looks like.   It's a fascinating thing. I mean, why can't we change the rules? If you say, yep, we've looked at this and I'm an eminent law professor, and I think it's dumb. And another one says, well, I'm an eminent social scientist looking at voting and how people vote in the country. I understand all about MMP and yep, this is really dumb. Why don't we change it? Seems really silly.   Why is there a reluctance to tidy things up? So even after Saturday, there'll be questions that still need answering.   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

 This time next week, this time next Monday, we'll have all had our say and the Government who will lead the country for the next three years will have been elected, or will it?   National and Labour have raised the possibility of another election if they fail to get the votes they need to form a government, if their partner parties fail to get sufficient votes to form a government.  Yet more proof, as if anyone needed, that MMP is not the best form of proportional representation.   Still, it's the one we've got and we're stuck with it for now - and I think far from it being a landslide to the right-wing parties, it looks like it's going to be a tight race.   I don't know if our bet was a bottle of pinot noir or a case, Muz? Muz is a texter from Hawkes Bay who predicted National would absolutely romp home. But I think if it's as close as some polls are predicting, then the bets off with honours even.  I'm very happy, to send you either the bottle or the case depending on what we decided if National is a shoe in, but I just don't think it's going to be as emphatic as the last election was.   I was in the Albany Mall on Sunday and there were queues of people waiting to cast their vote. I don't think voter apathy is a problem this election.   The leaders of the respective parties may not have the razzle dazzle stardust factor, but I think that's a jolly good thing. I don't even think it's an election of which direction we want the country to go.   More an election of how we feel the past six years have been. There's no doubt some people will have had a great six years. Others have not, and they look at Labour's record and wonder how on Earth they can even muster 27% of the public vote as the polls have it.   Some tribal voters have gone Green, they cannot bear to go to the other side. Some have gone pink/yellow, because they cannot bear to go to the other side, but they're finding their traditional party of choice has been found wanting.   But at least people are voting and that's a win for democracy. I don't like talk of a second election.   I mean, it's not the end of the world if we have a second election. But basically, it's telling voters we don't accept your vote.   Not good enough voter, back to the ballot box you go and try again. And there are some parties, or at least one,  some parties and political leaders I would never, ever in a million years vote for, but other people are perfectly entitled to.   That's democracy and if that's the party they want to represent them, then they will tick that box.   Anyway, hopefully it's a clear-cut result whichever way it goes. This time next week, we'll know what the country has decided. We also know whether the All Blacks are in or out of the Rugby World Cup as well on a sidebar.   But it's the election I'm looking forward to because I just do not take for granted the right to be able to peacefully vote in a new Government, keep in an existing Government.  Vote out an existing Government. To be able to do that peacefully, to be able to have the right to cast your vote is not something we should ever take lightly. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.