The Mike Hosking Breakfast

This week on Politics Wednesday, Mark Mitchell and Ginny Andersen joined Mike Hosking to delve into some of the biggest topics of the short week so far. They discussed New Zealand First's new Member's Bill calling to legally define gender, conscience votes, and Kieran McAnulty's Easter bill. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On the Mike Hosking Breakfast Full Show Podcast for Wednesday 23rd of April, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has met with Sir Keir Starmer, signing a new weapons deal.  NZ First are occupying themselves with gender issues, trying to follow the UK Supreme Courts decision - we talk to Suzanne Levy from Speak up for Women about the bill.  Mark Mitchell and Ginny Anderson discuss conscience votes and request a special shoutout on Politics Wednesday.   Get the Mike Hosking Breakfast Full Show Podcast every weekday morning on iHeartRadio, or wherever you get your podcasts.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Key services are lagging behind in Canterbury's Selwyn district as it tries to cope with exponential population growth.  Stats NZ data shows it remains the fastest growing district in the country, with 3200 new arrivals in the year to June.  Rolleston and Lincoln experienced the biggest jumps, at 9.6% and 8.1% respectively.  Massey University sociologist Paul Spoonley told Mike Hosking Selwyn falls behind when it comes to infrastructure.  For example, he says that of the 20-odd primary schools with more than 700 students, five of them are in Selwyn.   LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Catholic Church is at a crossroads as it prepares to vote for a new leader.  Pope Francis died aged 88 on Easter Monday following a stroke and heart failure.   His funeral will take place outside St Peter's Basilica on Saturday evening, and then Cardinals will be summoned to Rome to elect his successor.   NPR Vatican correspondent Christopher White told Mike Hosking it's anyone's guess who the new pope will be.  He says they have to decide whether to continue on the path of reform initiated by Pope Francis —a more welcoming and inclusive church— or to course correct.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The International Monetary Fund is slashing its global growth forecasts due to impact of Donald Trump's tariffs, and expects the US to be hit particularly hard.  US markets have been rallying, with the White House confirming it has 18 trade deal proposals on paper, is talking with 34 countries this week, and has a China deal in the works.  But China's warning it will hit back at countries that make deals that go against its interests.  Export NZ Executive Director Josh Tan told Mike Hosking it's still unclear how New Zealand and its exporters will be affected.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A former Foreign Minister says New Zealand's new weapons deal with the UK reflects a strong relationship.  Christopher Luxon and Sir Keir Starmer have met in the UK overnight.  They've announced a deal worth more than $60 million for New Zealand-made drones and discussed the war in Ukraine.  Sir Don McKinnon told Mike Hosking it's another step in joint support for the war-torn country.  He says New Zealand and the UK have always been closely linked, but there's a long way to go before the war can be stopped.  Luxon and Starmer are also pushing for even closer military ties, coming after the Government announced it's boosting military spending to hit more than 2% of GDP.  McKinnon told Hosking it'll help New Zealand's international reputation.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Differing opinions on New Zealand First's Members' bill regarding the definition of 'woman'.  MP Jenny Marcroft is proposing legally defining a woman as being an adult human biological female.  Rainbow Auckland co-chair Sibyl Mandow says it's a political move to be divisive, stir up hate, and generate a narrative to distract from more pressing issues.  Mandow says the bill is trying to denounce the existence of trans people – who have no agenda and just want to exist.   But Speak Up for Women spokesperson Suzanne Levy told Mike Hosking polling on this issue indicates people don't want trans people to be treated poorly.  But she says at the same time, people don't think sex can be changed.  Levy says laws need to be definable, as sex has never had any other meaning than biological sex.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Transport Minister says there's a chance the new Northland Expressway project will have a budget blowout.  The road will go from Warkworth, east of State Highway one, and over the Brynderwyn Hills to the east of the current route, then through Whangarei.   It's expected to take around 15 years to complete and is one of New Zealand's most expensive infrastructure projects.   Transport Minister Chris Bishop told Mike Hosking they're doing a lot of preparation work now to make sure there aren't any slip-ups.  He says they're working on detailed designs, consenting work, and getting the funding model right, but slippages in cost can't be ruled out.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Some questions for you around the Reserve Bank and their funding.  Firstly, the Finance Minister is to be congratulated on her handling of the fiscal matters in reducing the expenditure by 25% – this is a DOGE like achievement.  In fact, if you have been following DOGE, what they said they would do and what they have done is like a lot of the Trump output so far, mainly hot air. So in fact, Willis leaves them somewhat in her dust.  Then came the revelation from the cabinet papers that a lot of the extra money the Reserve Bank had got hadn't been spent... this is possibly referred to as waste and was a good insight into how Adrian and Grant ran the place.  But despite the fact it hadn't been spent, all of a sudden just before Nicola came along, it did get spent. Budgets in areas like people and tech info and data were spending like drunks.  So clearly Willis has seen their scam, called their bluff, and got her way. Good on her.  But the bigger question is this, with all that money, tens of millions a year, were they any good, and did that money buy good results?  Were good people doing good work?  Well history shows us obviously the answer is no.  Our Covid response is now widely seen as inept. Our three recessions, the outworking of a complete and utter cock up when it came to handling a financial crisis.  We have smaller issues still at play like the reserves for commercial banks, an out working of the OCR paranoia.  For all that money we seem to have employed a Central Bank that did worse than most, to this day Treasury —and this might be on Treasury not the Reserve Bank— cannot work out the value of all that money flooding into the economy. What did it do? What was its value?  If they can't work it out, did the Reserve Bank know going in or were they panicked and flying blind?  Why did they give that free money to the banks with no restrictions on what happened to it next? There remain the unanswered questions years later, the out workings of which we economically are still paying for.  So the 25% cut is one story, the other is what we got for our investment. How would you describe a return that bad?  And given it went to the inept, is 25% enough? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Andrew Saville and Jason Pine joined Mike Hosking to reflect on all the sport that took place over the long Easter weekend.  They discussed the Warriors’ golden point win over the Broncos, a kick from Luke Metcalf allowing them to claim the win. Also on the agenda was the latest in Formula 1, Super Rugby, and Reiko Ioane’s sabatical location.  LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.