Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

Questions over how the Government managed to spend $531 million on unused Covid tests. Our newsroom can reveal Te Whatu Ora has almost $60 million rapid antigen tests in stock around the country, with 30 percent of them either having already expired or due to by month's end. General Practitioners Interim Chair, Buzz Burrell, told Francesca Rudkin he's glad the figures weren't swept under the carpet. He says we need to be asking where they've gone wrong, as someone has given the Government some well-meaning but not very helpful advice. A Te Whatu Ora spokesperson says they're considering approaching the market - to seek recycling and disposal options or creative sustainable waste solutions. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When the first thing you read about the new science curriculum is a group of science teachers saying “Where’s the Science” it’s hard not to feel despondent - especially if your child is going through the school system. It’s important to say before we begin this conversation that the information being commented on has come from a leaked draft document from the Ministry of Education - which was sent to just a few teachers for their feedback. They were so taken aback by what they saw they couldn’t help sharing it. It is a draft document. Once selected feedback has been collected a full document will go out to the wider sector and public for feedback in August. So what’s been seen isn’t set in stone, but I’m grateful to those who have raised alarm bells because it’s in all parents’ interest to be engaged in this conversation. The main concern expressed by the science teachers is that the proposed school science curriculum makes no mention of physics or chemistry. I don’t know about you but I’m under the impression these are quite central to the study of science. The Ministry wants to take a more holistic approach and excite students by engaging with the issues of the day and teaching science through five contexts: earth system, biodiversity, food, energy and water, and infectious diseases. My science-loving daughter just groaned. “They’re turning it into a social studies or English class. We’re already dealing with the big issues of the day in every other class”, she said, “can’t we just keep setting our hands on fire” Some context is probably required here. My daughter loves science, not because of the curriculum or because she’s good at solving problems with a formula, but because she has an awesome science teacher who engages the class with exciting experiments to bring the science basics to life. And yes, if the class has done well or has had a good week she lets them set their hands on fire - in a perfectly safe and scientific way. There’s something in the idea of making a curriculum more relevant and fun for students. Great teachers have already worked out how to do this, but school can’t always be fun and engaging - sometimes it's work. No amount of playing around with the curriculum is going to make a kid who doesn’t like science suddenly like science. It’s one of those subjects you tend to like if you’re good at it, but will those students be happy to study just five main areas throughout their secondary education. More importantly though, how is this going to prepare our teenagers for tertiary education. From the friends I know whose offspring have headed off to university to study engineering, math or science, many speak about what a step up it is and how in some ways they didn’t feel adequately prepared. Surely the curriculum also needs to be driven by what universities require of students.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It looks like National's plan for a third medical school is being well received. The Party is promising a new school at the University of Waikato to train more doctors and address the health worker shortage. The Association of Salaried Medical Specialists is backing the idea and Executive Director Sarah Dalton joined Francesca Rudkin. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

All Members of Parliament are being urged to treat housing as a human right. The final report in the Human Rights Commission's housing inquiry says all available resources must be used to alleviate the housing crisis. It's found housing affordability has dropped, a shortfall in accessible homes and many houses, particularly rentals, are not healthy to live in. Housing inquiry manager Vee Blackwood says too many people are out in the cold. They say it's as hard as ever to find somewhere to live - particularly for vulnerable communities, Māori, Pasifika, elderly and disabled people. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

National's police spokesperson says rising crime rates is coming at an enormous human cost. Ministerial briefings have revealed police response time targets have been extended due to rising pressure on staff and resources. This comes as two people were seriously injured in a broad daylight attack at a dairy in Auckland's Mt Roskill yesterday. National's Mark Mitchell told Francesca Rudkin there's a frustration over the lack of police response - and demand has overtaken any benefit of the additional police officers. He says shop keepers are building cages around themselves - and that's not the New Zealand they want to be living in. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On Monday I reflected on a year of Te Whatu Ora, and how those within the sector rate the new centralised health system. I said that, from what I’ve been told, Te Whatu Ora has not worked hard enough or quickly enough over the last year to get staff on side, to fill the staffing shortages, to fix the postcode lottery, to shorten surgery and GP wait times, to give emergency departments some relief or provide adequate mental health services. No reasonable person expects them to have solved all these problems in a year, but we should expect they’ve made some key moves. Since Monday morning the Ministry of Health has been firing out announcements as if it’s on steroids, and doing their best to show the naysayers like myself that tangible action is on its way. So far we’ve had a new pay equity offer for nurses, another 830 clinical placements for nursing students, a new nation-wide lower threshold for cataract surgery, and yesterday the release of a comprehensive health recruitment and retention plan. It’s this last announcement which got me excited. The reason is that this recruitment and retention strategy gives us a hint the government has a grip on where they’re at. We finally have the data to know how many staff members we’re short of and in which areas. It’s estimated we’re currently short by 4800 nurses, 1700 doctors, 1050 midwives, 220 dental or oral health practitioners, 200 anaesthetic technicians, 170 pharmacists, 120 sonographers, 30 radiation therapists and 30 clinical or cardiac phycologists. There’s more. It’s also estimated we’re going to need a further 8000 nurses, 3400 doctors and 250 midwives make up shortfalls in health demand out to 2033. They’re substantial numbers, but at least now we know where we are at and what we need to work towards. The reason this is so important is because you can announce increased and improved services all you like, but if we don’t have the resources and plans to achieve these new targets, they’re pointless. Health Minister Ayesha Verrall has said she expects this plan will make a difference to workforces within a year's time. It may have taken a year to come up with the plan and a plan’s only successful if its executed, but some credit where credit is due, at least we finally know exactly what needs to be fixed. Step one – tick.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Midwives want a seat at the table for boosting their work force in the long term. It comes after the Government launched their workforce action plan - aiming to fill more than 8,000 vacancies of doctors, nurses and other health staff. It includes boosting offshore recruitment, rural training, earn-as-you-learn schemes and wellbeing support. College of Midwives Chief Executive Alison Eddy told Francesca Rudkin midwifery has had one of the most significant shortages in the health sector. She says Government claims there's a 40 percent shortage but Eddy says it's likely higher. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Health advocates are calling for mandatory consent education, throughout someone's high school years. It's often paired with health class, which isn't required past Year 10. However, Family Planning Director Fiona McNamara told Francesca Rudkin students should be learning about consent in schools, around 15 hours a year. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I like to have a good time, I let my hair down occasionally, and over the years I have by no means always behaved perfectly in public after a few drinks on a Friday night. I’ve worked in the media for 25 years after all, an industry that really can’t throw shade at anyone else’s Friday night mishaps. However, Wellington mayor Tory Whanau is likely wishing she had one less glass on Friday night. You know the story; apparently, she turned up to a restaurant with few drinks under her belt, had a meal and a few more drinks with a friend, and then made a bit of scene. Supposedly she said, “Do you know who I am” at some point to wait staff - although we’re not sure of the tone. Was it threatening, like in The Godfather? Comical? Or a genuine question? Then she accidently left without paying the bill - a miscommunication between friends. Tory Whanau would have been just one of many, many people putting on a show in Wellington, and any other New Zealand town on Friday night. But she’s a public persona responsible for leading Wellington Council, a council currently dealing with a lot of challenges. So was it a good look? No it wasn’t. It was embarrassing, and unnecessary, and another controversial headline for the Mayor. I like the way Tory Whanau is herself, speaks her mind, and doesn’t appear to be hand-held by a public relations team, but yesterday she should have come out with less excuses; instead simply apologised and moved on. The vast majority of us would have sympathised and also happily moved on. Former Mayor Kerry Prendergast made a good point on Newstalk ZB last night. She claims this kind of behaviour “diminishes the respect and mana of the office” and the issue is probably more to do with behaviour and what we deem to be acceptable as opposed to whether the Mayor can do her job. And it’s not like alcohol and politics haven’t always had a cosy relationship. There are books on it. BBC journalists Ben Wright wrote in his book Order, Order, which charts the rise and fall of political drinking in the UK, that “Politics just floated along on a sea of claret for about two centuries.” I’m sure there is a history of New Zealand politicians who can relate to that sentiment. The reality is much of politics is about relationships, and sometimes there’s no better way of getting to know someone than over a lunch or dinner. And if you’re a politician out with a friend - just remember to pay the bill, presume no one knows who you are, and beware that if they do know who you are they’ll be watching closely.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Public health and nutrition experts are calling for a national food strategy to fix our obesity epidemic. The latest Healthy Food Environment report reveals 1/5 of preventable deaths are related to unhealthy diets. At the same time, one in eight children live in households where there's not enough to eat. Health Coalition Aotearoa Co-Chair Lisa Te Morenga told Francesca Rudkin Government hasn't made food safety a priority. She says not much progress has been made since governments started monitoring the safety of our food supply 12 years ago. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Questions have been asked over whether the health system has the resources to deliver the changes to those suffering with cataracts. All New Zealanders with mild vision impairment from cataracts will now qualify for surgery under the new nationally consistent threshold, which removes what's known as the postcode lottery. This will enable approximately 3,500 more surgeries to be delivered. General Practice Chair Bryan Betty told Francesca Rudkin these are likely to be rolled out slowly. He says the issue is that if you put 2,000 - 3,000 people on a operating waiting list you have the be able to resource it. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Building consents are coming back to earth after record highs last year. Stats NZ says consents fell 11 percent in the year to May. Certified Builders Association Chief Executive Malcolm Fleming says homeowners are favouring doing up their own houses instead of building new ones. He told Francesca Rudkin that doesn't mean builders haven't been busy. Fleming says there was already existing high demand so builders have good workloads. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The family of a French teenager killed by Police is calling for riots around the country to stop. France has seen its most violent riots and protests since 2018, following the death of a 17-year-old by police at a traffic stop. Thousands have been arrested since it started last week. Europe Correspondent Gavin Grey told Francesca Rudkin that 45-thousand Police Officers have been deployed across the country. He says the relatives of the dead 17-year-old want the riots to stop, and say they just want a re-evaluation of how Police carry arms. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Time will tell whether a move to ease nursing shortages will be sustainable long-term. The Government has announced more than 800 additional clinical placements for nursing students, with 130 starting from the July and August intake. For the 2024 intake, Te Whatu Ora will work with nurse education providers to bring in another 700 placements. College of Nurses Aotearoa Executive Director Kate Weston told Francesca Rudkin that the country needs to increase its supply, but questions whether it will be sustainable. She says they'll need to see high quality placements but the other main concern is the considerable financial pressure on the university and polytech sectors. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Auckland Transport says it's been working hard to trim down the bus driver shortage. It's managed to cut it by 72% since its peak, and the agency only needs to recruit another 170 drivers. Auckland Transport Metro Optimisation Manager Richard Harrison says they've searched both locally and internationally for drivers. He told Francesca Rudkin that pay has been a key factor in getting people on board. He says the average wage is now 28 dollars an hour, with hopes that help from the Government can get that up to 30 dollars. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Saturday marked a year since the new heath system Te Whatu Ora kicked into gear. Twenty district health boards were abolished and replaced with a centralised system aimed at getting rid of our postcode lottery of health care. A year ago, I wished the then Minister of Health Andrew Little good luck with his venture. Our health system had been under pressure way before the pandemic hit, and clearly needed an overhaul. I liked the fact the government was taking a big swing at this and trying to make sure that New Zealander’s, regardless of where they lived, got the same services and healthcare. Us Kiwis love fairness! But, for all the good intentions it turns out making changes as large as this, off the back of a pandemic which had further reduced an already depleted work force, may not have been such a great idea. Nor does it seem the transition was as considered or well executed as well as it needed to be. A year later, it’s not obvious what has changed – except the automatic signature on the bottom of their email, as one specialist told me. Association of Salaried Specialists executive director Sarah Dalton said the union was giving Te Whatu Ora a mark of two out of five so far. She told me yesterday on the Sunday Session, “There are significant workforce shortages, there are gaps that are simply not being filled and acute demand just keeps getting higher and higher. Which, in turn, is making it really difficult to deliver the planned care." There was a great article in the NZ Herald over the weekend from senior investigative journalist Alex Spencer, looking into the state of our A&E's and work place conditions. I saw this first hand recently. My son and I visited Auckland Hospital Emergency Department a few weeks back and after a wait of 5 and a half hours, the doctor was very apologetic. As were we; we didn’t want to be clogging up the system. My son got excellent care, but when I asked the doctor if the wait time was normal, he unleashed an exhausted and frustrated monologue about wait times, how long it takes to get a bed in a ward, the lack of staff, and the pressure on the system. His final words were “Make sure you use your vote wisely this election.” I’ve thought about that doctor often since that night. It was an unexpected and startling moment of candour. What are we doing to these people? We can’t afford to be driving doctors away. From what I’ve been told, Te Whatu Ora has not worked hard enough or quickly enough to get staff on side, to fill the staffing shortages, to fix the postcode lottery, shorten surgery and GP wait times, give emergency departments some relief or provide adequate mental health services. No one expects them to have solved all these problems in a year. We understand this is a massive undertaking and it will take time to see results, and yet when those in the system, at the frontline, are saying they see very little change it only seems fair to question the idea and the execution. Either way, several months out from an election, the government would have been hoping for a better report card than 2 out of 5. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

If we ever needed proof this Government was one giant overlord of bureaucratic blow outs, it’s the estimated $1 billion blowout on establishment costs for Three Waters. It’s been reported now that “the cost of creating 10 new Water Services Entities over a transition period that now stretches to July 1st, 2026 is expected to reach $2 to $3 billion. The estimate before recent revisions to the plan was $1 to $2 billion.” But wait, there’s more. “The Crown is expected to foot additional costs in the first instance, costing taxpayers, but costs might ultimately be charged back to the new Water Services Entities, costing ratepayers,” it was reported. Ratepayers, that’s you and me. Us mugs who’re already facing rising rates. But there could be even more. “Official documents also showed further costs to the Crown would likely be required to operate the drinking water regulator, Taumata Arowai,” it says. “An extra $200 million in Crown costs is expected due to the later establishment date. And the fixed costs of establishing 10 Water Service Entities is anticipated to be higher than for four,” the report also said. Here’s the thing. I’m glad Three Waters is back in the news making headlines again because it got forgotten for a while there as the news cycle moved onto other things, and we all stopped being exercised about it. We were instead busy being exercised by ram raids, youth crime, truancy rates, violent offending and government minister side shows. But now that Three Waters has reared its head back into the news, it makes for sobering reading. It’s a story of cost blowouts, budget over runs and bureaucratic heavyweights raking in large sums of cash. It’s a story of more costs being sheeted our way. The Nat’s Local Government spokesperson said it’s “an extravagant example of this government spending money to set up a mega bureaucracy.. instead of using money to fund needed water infrastructure.” He said New Zealanders had been promised a plan that would cost less, but which is not panning out that way. Why are we not surprised? I think we are potentially so punch-drunk by this Government’s ineptitude now that we just shrug our shoulders when we hear figures like millions and billions being doled out. It’s par for the course, sadly. But you have to ask the question – why is this government so adamant on this? Why are they progressing on something so expensive, so controversial, so divisive and so flawed? Something that’s not likely to start until they’re potentially not even in government anymore, anyway? Something that potentially only fills consultants wallets, but alienates voters? It speaks volumes about how much this Government has lost its ability to read the room. It has all the hallmarks of a government in a death spiral frantically trying to throw everything at it before the doors close on them. It smacks of the arrogance we’ve come to expect from them, and their disregard for the voter. The crying shame here is that few would argue our water infrastructure doesn’t need upgrading, but the way this entire process has been painfully dragged out has left a bad taste. The cost of it now is making the taste even worse.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Single-use plastic items will be officially banned from shelves from tomorrow. It's the second step in the Government's plan to reduce plastic waste. Plastic cutlery, plates and bowls, cups, straws and produce bags will all be cut. Foodstuffs Sustainable Packaging Manager, Debra Goulding joined Kate Hawkesby. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Time is ticking to fill up, before the fuel tax returns. The Government's relief package ends tomorrow, meaning petrol prices will rise around 29 cents a litre including GST. It'll still be substantially less than the peaks seen after Russia's Ukraine invasion in March last year which saw oil prices skyrocket. Gull NZ General Manager, Dave Bodger told Kate Hawkesby sales have been up, rather than manic. He says yesterday's sales were about 50 percent higher than usual, and expects today will be much like a regular pre-Christmas special. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A primary school principal claims their latest government offer is bittersweet. It includes a six percent base salary increase in July, and further rises next year. There's also lump sum payments and allowances for cultural leadership and professional coaching. Auckland's Laingholm School Principal Martyn Weatherill Kate Hawkesby says it's a step in the right direction - but there's still more to do. He says more funding is still needed for learning support. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Try as we do to endlessly support the Police, they’re not making it very easy for us are they? This story of the citizen’s arrest this week irked a lot of people - and rightly so. If you missed it, a Christchurch business owner and some tradies tackled a thief to the ground after he allegedly stole motorcycle parts, he had an armload of stuff, they chased him, got him on the ground, held him down while they called Police. The guy was putting up a fight and was yelling apparently that if they called the cops he’d ‘go back to prison’. Some pause for thought there as to whether getting sent back to prison might be your motivator to not rob people in the first place, but that’s another story. So these guys call the cops, the Police ask if the offender has any weapons on him, when they say, not that they can see, the Police tell them to let him go. Let him go. An offender, caught red handed, in possession of stolen goods, let him go. They do, he runs off down the street, free as a bird. Now the Police here make a not invalid point- they can’t attend every callout, they can’t prioritize a guy stealing motorcycle parts when they have arguably more serious offences to attend like where people’s lives or safety’s at risk. The Police claimed they had several high priority family harm events to attend at that time. And I don’t doubt that. The sad reality is that they have to prioritise the crimes they attend, because there are not enough of them to attend everything. That’s not their fault, but it doesn’t endear the Police to business owners trying to get by, these guys were aggrieved there was no follow up from the cops, other than being told to file a report online - and Police didn’t contact the business owner to even do that until after the Herald had chased them up on the story. So that’s disappointing, but again you could argue they’re too stretched, and that’s not their fault. The Commissioner, Andrew Coster admits trust and confidence in police is declining but says it's an international trend. Is it? And if it is, does that make it OK does it? Do we justify things based on whether they're happening overseas or not? He says he's proud of the Police and their work, but that it is a thin blue line. Many of us would argue it feels thinner than ever before. He says they're dealing with high demand, but that doesn't soothe the concerns of law abiding citizens or help placate the plight of victims. It’s disappointing if you’re a victim of crime, no matter how much you may appreciate how busy and stretched cops are, that they can’t or won’t follow up on incidents. Part and parcel of us all knowing this these days though, unfortunately, is that more people are turning to citizen arrest style action. More people are reticent to call cops and think they can just deal with it themselves. We’ve seen it time and time again with retail crime and witnesses jumping in to try to stop offenders. It’s a dangerous path to go down though, because there could be a weapon involved, you could make things worse for yourself or others. Admirable as it is to have people try to jump in, it’s preferable the professionals are left to deal with it. The glaring problem here is, there are seemingly not enough professionals available, or willing to do so. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Is Meta finally doing better at protecting kids online? The tech giant is adding new safeguards across Messenger and Instagram. It's the first time parental supervision tools will be connected to their instant messaging app. Tech commentator Paul Spain joined Kate Hawkesby. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's D-Day for Let's Get Wellington Moving. The council will vote on a motion of no confidence today as seven councillors push for the programme to be scrapped. Yesterday, the capital's Mayor Tory Whanau rejected a compromise from the group. Diane Calvert is one of the councillors who's signed the motion - she joined Kate Hawkesby. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Former President Donald Trump is trying to turn the tables on the advice columnist who won a $5 million jury award against him in a sexual abuse lawsuit, saying in a countersuit that she owes him money and a retraction for continuing to insist she was raped even after a jury declined to agree. Lawyers for the Republican presidential candidate filed papers late Tuesday saying E. Jean Carroll should pay Trump unspecified compensatory and punitive damages and retract her damaging statements. The countersuit comes a month after Carroll's lawyers filed a rewritten defamation lawsuit seeking at least $10 million more from Trump over comments he made after the jury verdict in May. The jury concluded after a two-week trial that Trump sexually abused Carroll in a luxury department store dressing room in spring 1996. It also found that he defamed her in comments he made denying the attack last October. But the jury rejected Carroll's claim, first made in a 2019 memoir, that Trump raped her in the Bergdorf Goodman dressing room. At trial, Carroll testified that the rape occurred after a chance encounter with Trump at the midtown store, initially friendly and flirtatious, turned into a violent assault after they teased each other to try on a piece of lingerie. Trump has consistently denied ever raping Carroll or knowing her. He said the department store encounter never happened. In his countersuit, Trump's lawyers cited comments Carroll made in a CNN interview after May's verdict, saying that when she was questioned about the jury's finding that she was not raped, Carroll responded: "Oh yes he did, oh yes he did." And they said Carroll also revealed that when she spoke to Trump attorney Joe Tacopina immediately after the verdict, she said she told him emphatically: "He did it and you know it." The lawyers, Alina Habba and Michael T. Madaio, wrote that Carroll "made these statements knowing each of them were false or with reckless disregard for their truth or falsity." "The Interview was on television, social media and multiple internet websites, with the intention of broadcasting and circulating these defamatory statements among a significant portion of the public," they added. In a statement in response to Trump's counterclaim, Carroll attorney Robbie Kaplan said that Trump "again argues, contrary to both logic and fact, that he was exonerated by a jury that found that he sexually abused E Jean Carroll by forcibly inserting his fingers into her vagina." She said four of five statements cited by the counterclaim were made outside of the one-year statute of limitations when a claim must be made and predicted the other will be dismissed by U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan. "Trump's filing is thus nothing more than his latest effort to delay accountability for what a jury has already found to be his defamation of E Jean Carroll. But whether he likes it or not, that accountability is coming very soon," Kaplan said. Kaplan is not related to the judge. Trump, who is seeking the Republican nomination to run for president again next year, did not appear at the initial trial. But extensive excerpts of his recorded deposition were played for jurors, along with an infamous video revealed shortly before Trump's 2016 election in which he bragged that celebrities can grab women sexually without consent. - LARRY NEUMEISTER Associated PressSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A new peak has been reached in our drunk driver fatalities. Last year, 111 people died in incidents where a driver was over the limit - up from the 53 seen in 2013. In the last five years, the highest numbers were recorded in Waikato, Auckland, and Northland. Crash Investigator and former Police officer, Hamish Piercy told Kate Hawkesby there's no doubt there has been a spike, but it's important to remember the legal limit changed in 2014. He says they made the limit zero for under 20s, and 250 micrograms per litre of breath for adults - meaning more people have potentially been captured in the statistics. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We are in for a bunch of cost increases over the next few weeks. I know, more. It’s not like we haven’t been facing a steady stream of rising costs for a while already, but a couple of things are coming up to bite us. One, the Government’s petrol subsidy is coming to an end this Saturday, which’ll see petrol prices jump by 29 cents a litre. That’s a lot, and it’ll hit hard in a cost of living crisis. Not just in our tanks, but it’ll be passed on across the board in terms of transport and logistics for pretty much everything we buy. Two, fruit and veges. That’s been rising steadily too, in fact food inflation is at its highest level in 36 years, according to a recent report. “Stats NZ’s food price index rose 12.5 percent in the year ended April, the highest annual rate since late 1987. The main drivers over the year were a 14 percent rise in grocery prices, and more than 22 percent for fruit and vegetables prices,” the report said - more than 22 percent. That’s huge, and we know it because we see it in our trolleys at the supermarket, we get less food for more money, it’s depressing. But there’s more pain to come it would seem. Producers are struggling to get stuff out of Gisborne, due to State Highway 2 north of Gisborne being closed due to flooding and storm damage, which has made all transportation of goods a logistical nightmare. Gisborne’s Mayor said the closure’s having a big impact on the region. Meanwhile, Countdown this week put out a release saying that due to those weather events, there’s going to be limited supply of fruit and veges on supermarket shelves everywhere. “Due to road closures, key produce suppliers are facing difficulties in transporting fruits and vegetables from Tairawhiti and Hawkes Bay, unfortunately it may take some time before the situation improves,” they said. They highlighted bagged salads, lettuce, broccoli and mandarins as an issue, and acknowledged it’s been a challenging time for growers this year. You’ve got to feel for them, they’ve been up against it. So if you’re lucky enough to find broccoli and mandarins on supermarket shelves, you might find you’re paying a bit more for them too. And it’s not like we don’t already pay through the nose for fruit and veges, the sector was the ‘second-largest contributor’ to the hike in food prices this year, ‘driven by tomatoes, avocados, and potatoes.’ Haven’t avocados been dodgy? Lack of supply, hiked up prices to $10 an avocado for a while there, and now though they’re trickling back onto shelves at better prices, the quality’s still not great. I will admit they’re hard to grow though, trust me I’m trying, I have three avocado trees on the go and am still, a couple of years later, waiting for them to produce fruit. So we pay more for the good stuff, it’s going to be harder to get for a while due to road closures, and then as of Saturday we’re going to pay more for petrol too. So, I'm just wondering, what basics are left these days that don't cost a bomb?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In the UK, the former health secretary says the UK's pandemic planning was "completely wrong". Matt Hancock, the secretary during the pandemic, has told that country's coronavirus inquiry the attitude was to plan for the consequences of a disaster. He claimed medicines for intensive care were within hours of running out. UK and Europe Correspondent Gavin Grey told Kate Hawkesby Hancock says he's "profoundly sorry" for the response. He says Hancock told the inquiry they should've been looking at how to slow down or stop the spread of Covid-19. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Tertiary Education Union is welcoming the $128 million cash injection to the struggling sector. Split over the next two years, it'll increase tuition subsidies by an extra four percent at degree-level and above. The Government is also promising to review the funding system for universities. Union National President Julie Douglas is hopeful the boost will allow Vice-Chancellors at Otago and Victoria universities to reconsider job cut proposals. She says the universities have a level of autonomy over what to spend it on, but the money wasn't given for a new building and stems from a long union campaign. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There have been mixed feelings about Resource Management Act reforms. The Environmental Select Committee has suggested amendments including faster consenting and enabling local voices. AUT Professor of Construction John Tookey says it will be impossible to have both increased community say, and a faster consenting process. Part of the RMA reforms is reducing the number of RMA plans from 100 to 16, one for each region. Tookey told Kate Hawkesby this will bring positive changes. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Concerning new research from Otago University suggests alcohol is the most harmful drug in New Zealand. The first of its kind study ranked alcohol as the most harmful drug for the overall population, followed by methamphetamine, synthetic cannabinoids, and tobacco. Researcher Dr Rose Crossin says the findings suggest the need for policy reconsideration to reduce overall drug harm. She questions the current drug policy settings given that a legal drug is the most harmful. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

So another day, another study on alcohol - in fact I’ve seen two just in the last two weeks and of course they say different things. One says even the smallest amount of alcohol can age your brain, another says a small amount is beneficial. So which is it? I honestly believe a lot of it has to do with the makeup of your own body and metabolism, and what makes you tick, what’s in your DNA. As in, some people drink like fish their whole lives and live to almost a hundred (looking at you Prince Philip), others are lightweights who can barely finish a glass of wine without falling asleep (a.k.a me). We all have different tolerances and constitutions. Different strokes for different folks. I also think we get to know ourselves better as we get older, we work out what we can and can’t tolerate because our body lets us know. CNN reported the other day that “For decades, large epidemiological studies have shown that people who consume moderate amounts of alcohol - less than one drink a day for women, and one to two drinks a day for men - have lower risks of major cardiovascular events like heart attacks and strokes compared with people who abstain from alcohol completely as well as those who drink more. Scientists have never been able to tease out exactly why this is the case, however,” they reported. So if the scientists can’t tease it out, God help the rest of us trying to understand it. Constant mixed messaging certainly doesn’t help. A small amount of alcohol is good for your brain and heart, shouts one study, a small amount can increase your chances of cancer, shouts another. We do of course have Dry July coming up, starting next week, where we’re all encouraged to stop and think about how much we’re drinking and why, and pause for a month. I think the why’s important. Mostly I reckon its habit. A glass of wine or a beer after a hard day, or on a hot day sitting in the sunshine – it’s sort of a rite of passage. It wasn’t until I voluntarily stopped drinking one day many, many years ago that I realised I didn’t really miss it, didn’t really need it. Felt better without it. But I’m a lightweight who was never really that into alcohol in the first place. I get that if you’re a wine collector like my husband is or someone who savours the taste or just appreciates the addition of alcohol in their lives then it’s far tougher to give up. And not everyone needs to or should give up. I think if we’re aware of what we’re doing, and we’re not starting drinking at 9am or binge drinking, then we can by and large regulate ourselves. But what it’s doing to our bodies remains a mystery that I’m not sure any number of studies will get to the bottom of. The same way we hear coffee or chocolate is good for us one day, bad the next. It’s hard to keep up. I think we’re best served, as my Nana used to say, by sticking to the mantra, ‘everything in moderation’.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hopes a multi-million dollar government loan to Ruapehu Alpine Lifts liquidators gets the skifields off thin ice. The Government is chipping in up to $5 million towards the liquidators, as a new bid has entered the table A group on behalf of iwi is now proposing to take over operations of the skifields - the bid for operations to be split between two other companies is still on the table. Ruapehu Mayor Weston Kirton says it's a complex situation, but the financial backing helps jobs. He's sure businesses and communities are clapping with joy, and he's hoping for a good snow season. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There are hopes Prime Minister Chris Hipkins can shine in his first meeting with Xi Jinping. The pair will meet to discuss topics like trade and the war in Ukraine tonight in Beijing. New Zealand China Council Executive Director Alistair Crozier says New Zealand needs to be sold as an accessible and open country. He told Kate Hawkesby it will be a chance to make up for lost time. Crozier says it will be the first trade delegation of its kind for seven years. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A $6 million cash injection has been welcomed by food banks, as the number of families struggling with food insecurity rises. The latest funding top up by the Government will be given to community food providers and distributed to areas in need. Zero Hunger Collective Executive Director Tric Malcolm says it's great news, but the question is whether it will be enough. She told Kate Hawkesby the number of people struggling, as well as the level of support needed, is increasing. Malcolm says this is particularly evident in communities that have experienced weather events - where many have lost their basic items. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A reminder of the importance of judge's discretion as the National Party pitches a crime crackdown. It's called for a limit on the sentence reductions judges are allowed to grant, limiting it to 40%. National would also reinstate three strikes and remove taxpayer funding for cultural reports, instead diverting funds into victim support. Criminal Lawyer Steve Cullen told Kate Hawkesby that the law often deals with people who have had horrific childhoods. He says that's when it's important for judges to have discretion to put them on the right path again. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A survivor of child sex trafficking for 16 years is pushing for more to be done over New Zealand's alarmingly high rate of sexual abuse. The Handing the Shame Back campaign aims to give children who have suffered abuse a way to communicate - including using an open palm signal. Our country has a high rate of sexual abuse with one in three girls sexually abused by the age of 16. Author, survivor, and advocate Gloria Masters told Kate Hawkesby that they've spoken to police but there's still work to be done. She can't sit back and watch these rates, and is wondering where the outcry from the public is. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I’ve decided we need to build more roads. I don’t know why we don’t just build roads everywhere all the time. The most transformational thing this government –who said they’d be transformational– could have done was build more roads. I don’t know why they hate them so much and cancelled so many of them. The irony of this government having to officially open the Puhoi road the other day, that they originally opposed, was not lost on anyone. It’s a fabulous piece of road, makes the journey smoother, faster, more scenic, it’s actually such a thrill, we were so excited to finally get to drive it now that it’s finally open. But it really is transformational. Trucks were flowing without clogging up a small winding one lane hilly road, cars weren’t held up by them with dangerous bends and passing lanes. Traffic was flowing, and markedly reduced. It was genuinely an amazing experience. I know I sound super excited about just a bit of tarseal, but honestly, roads are fantastic. They get us from A to B safely. They get goods and services to people, they provide access to and from communities and cities. They reduce traffic and wait times. They make our lives easier. Why have we demonized roads so much? It felt so much safer being on that highway, it made the whole experience so much more enjoyable. I know there was similar excitement for those on Transmission Gully and the Waikato expressway. Locals in both those areas still rave about the difference those roads make to their lives. There’s genuine excitement around infrastructure that improves our quality of life, saves us time, makes commuting easier. It’s delusional to think we just don’t build any more new roads. How can we not? Why would we think just adding bus and cycle lanes is it? Surely that can’t just be the be all and end all. We are not hopping out of our cars anytime soon, despite all the carrots and incentives and free public transport enticing us to do so – we still love our cars. We need our cars, there are a million reasons many of us can’t or won’t take public transport, and so we need the roads. Not helping the cause of buses at the moment is a video floating round the internet of an Auckland bus driver getting severely verbally abused and sworn at by someone threatening the driver for several minutes until the bus is stopped. Even then the abuser doesn't hop off before yelling more obscenities. It’s uncomfortable viewing and makes you think twice as to how safe you’d really feel on a bus with an experience like that. Who wants their kids on a bus like that? We do of course want safer roads once we have kids of driving age. Smooth roads with no pot holes, wide roads with plenty of space. Why do we put up with such substandard infrastructure in this country, and such crappy roads? I’d almost forgotten what it was like to drive on a big wide clean straight road. Yes they cost a lot of money, but so does lost productivity due to gridlock, and accidents due to poor road conditions. I think we don’t realise how bad our roads are until we drive on a new one and see how slick they can be. We put up with long winding clogged single lane traffic because we forget how it once was. Roads don’t have to be a thing of the past, they don’t have to be the big evil they’ve been made out to be. Drive a nice new stretch of highway sometime soon like we did at the weekend, and come back to me on how good that feels.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hard to believe it's taken so long to get this new firearms register up and running. Then again - it's a government IT project and we all know there's a well-established track record of these things going way past deadline and of course way over budget. On top of that, it's likely to be clunky, overly complicated and not very well thought out so don't be at all surprised if it needs a multi-million dollar overhaul within the first couple of years. And don't be surprised either if it has no impact on the rampant crime wave we're enduring. Police themselves say there's been a marked increase of guns being used for criminal activity. That's in spite of the fortune we spent on gun buybacks, after the Christchurch mosque attacks. And they say a lot of the weapons they're seizing these days are being traced back to legal buyers. Some get stolen in burglaries, but some have also been on-sold to people who simply shouldn't have them. So, the logic for collecting all this information on legally licensed gun owners and the weapons they're holding is that some of these weapons end up in the wrong hands. The Council of Licensed Firearm Owners doesn't like it; they say legitimate owners are being singled out for police failures. I see their point, but maybe because licensed owners are mostly legitimate owners with legitimate intent - maybe they've lost sight of the potential carnage a gun can be used to inflict. So, while those owners say they're being scapegoated, do they not have a major part to play in making sure these weapons don't get into the wrong hands? Is owning a gun a right or a privilege? Like driving, I'd say it's a privilege. A privilege some people shouldn't have. So, on the face of it, keeping good records of what weapons we have, who has them, and where they are, has to make sense. All we can hope is that the people who've built it haven't ballsed it up and that police use the information they get from it to come down hard on people who shouldn't have guns.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Super Rugby final is tomorrow night - with tickets now sold out. It's Chiefs versus Crusaders - and Scott Robertson's last match in charge of the Crusaders. Crusaders CEO Colin Mansbridge joined Tim Dower. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Auckland has scraped into the Top 10 in a new ranking of the world's most liveable cities. It comes in at 10 - tied with Osaka, in Japan. 173 cities were compared by the economist intelligence unit on factors like stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education and infrastructure. Viv Beck is the CEO of Heart of the City and joined Tim Dower. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There is optimism the country's first digital gun registry will put criminals under the pump. The online registry goes live tomorrow, aiming to track nearly 240,000 licensed gun owners. It relies upon people registering within five years. Police Association president Chris Cahill told Tim Dower it'll be a key tool to reducing crime, as it would track those selling guns to criminals. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry at this point for the Labour Party and Chris Hipkins. I mean the state of it. It really is from the sublime to the ridiculous. Who's left? Who around that Cabinet table is capable enough to seriously manage all the portfolios of the other ministers who are dropping like flies? It’s a shambles. But is it all a shambles of their own making? Have they played a bit fast and loose with the rules, been a bit slow to react, a bit slow to follow up on anything, a bit cavalier about the importance of being beyond reproach? Is it arrogance? Is it incompetence? The PM sounded absolutely fed up with Michael Wood yesterday and I’m not surprised. Wood hung him out to dry. How you can claim to be so busy and so important that you don’t run a ruler over your potential personal conflicts of interest is beyond me. Especially when you’ve already been in the gun for conflict of interest - how do you take that long to clarify any other conflicts of interest? I initially defended Wood as being probably just a decent guy who’d stuffed up. But now I’m not so sure. Is he decent? Or reckless? Or arrogant? Or both? But imagine being Chippy right now. Week after week after week, distractions and implosions in your own party, in your own cabinet, that keep undermining what your government is trying to do. I mean don’t get me wrong, what this government is trying to do is nothing short of disastrous at the moment anyway, but this is a major distraction Hipkins doesn’t need. He sounded angry and over it. He threw his former Transport Minister right under his much loved bus in saying he was disappointed and it was ‘deeply frustrating’. And we are frustrated as voters too. Frustrated this keeps happening, frustrated that this clown show is still bumbling along unable to follow its own rules, unable to discern what’s appropriate or not appropriate. It’s laughable, but as I said before, do we laugh or do we cry? They’re a joke, but the tragedy is many New Zealanders still take them seriously. But how can voters trust that this Government’s abiding all the rules? How much confidence do you have in their transparency? Honesty? Openness? Are we still falling for that? Speaking of transparency, Nicola Willis alleged yesterday in Parliament that Grant Robertson’s been looking at some further tweaks to tax and has been seeking advice on possible options for increasing or decreasing income tax. Grant Robertson wouldn’t answer about it, she asked if he could rule out tax changes rejected by Cabinet re-emerging as part of the Labour party manifesto. Robertson would only say the manifesto’s not finished yet. Nicola Willis took the public interest route – that we deserve to know what the Government’s planning re tax. Robertson wouldn’t budge. So what do we deduce from that? That tax changes are coming as part of the Labour election campaign, you can almost bank on that. But we don’t know exactly what because Grant wouldn’t answer. What we should be working out by now as voters, is how much we trust this Government, how much we trust what they do with our hard earned money, and whether they can get their act together in a cohesive way between now and October.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The political headaches continue to pile up for Labour, four months out from the election. Chris Hipkins is expressing his disappointment in Michael Wood - who's resigning as a minister after more revelations about his failure to declare shareholdings. The Prime Minister is also promising to take another look at the rules around ministers' investments. Victoria University political analyst Bryce Edwards told Kate Hawkesby while many voters won't care about the specifics, the sheer number of scandals will be hurting Labour's credibility. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A victim advocate believes there will be more disclosures during a review of Oranga Tamariki. The department has revealed two staff members have been stood down as they're investigated for alleged sexual misconduct with young people in the past year. Former Police Commissioner Mike Bush will conduct a review. Victims' advocate Ruth Money told Kate Hawkesby there could've been a vetting issue. She says if people haven't been convicted or had a notation on their file before, they'd look clean - which is a huge issue with the vetting process around the country. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Only about half of kiwifruit growers expect to break even this year, amid a particularly bad harvest. Production this year is down about 35 million trays on 2022, mostly due to storms. Kiwifruit Growers CEO Colin Bond told Kate Hawkesby there are ways to mitigate the risk like frost protection and artificial shelters. He says the quality of this year's harvest is higher than last year. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I was at my physio yesterday, she’s South African. She moved here to an allegedly ‘safe’ country with her children, they live on Auckland’s North Shore, they’ve eaten at the Albany restaurants where the axe attack took place. She said it could have been them, her, or her children. She asked me what’s happened to this country and why it’s so violent now. It’s hard to answer that question without feeing embarrassed as a New Zealander that our little slice of paradise has come to this. “It’s complex”, I told her, sounding like a Labour politician trying to explain away our many and varied issues. From being soft on crime and reducing the prison muster and leaving too much crime out on the streets, to an increase in gang memberships and gang notoriety thanks to an apologist media and government who seem enamoured with them instead of appalled by them. Then to a mental health system in crisis, to the prevalence of drugs in our society, to a broken and divided country which got locked down for three years and has never really come right since then. I don’t know what the circumstances are around the axe attack, but I’m assuming it will be a combination of one or more of those factors. None of that excuses the act. Just like none of the apologists standing up for gang culture, excuses the way they intimidate and offend. The other day in Auckland’s swanky shopping precinct Newmarket, outside the new Westfield mall, a group of girls picked on an innocent victim, another young girl, and beat her up. In broad daylight, four in the afternoon on a busy Saturday full of shoppers walking by.. none of whom stopped to do anything about it – she got slapped, punched kicked, fell to the ground then got kicked in the head some more. She was 12 years old, did not know the offender apparently, who grabbed her by the hair and just randomly started beating her up. That’s someone’s daughter, age 12, middle of the day in a busy shopping area, just randomly being savagely attacked. Imagine what that does to that girl once her injuries and bruises heal, what has that done to her mentally? Who are these children attacking other children and why are they so vicious and so unfiltered as to think this is in any way acceptable behaviour? And where are the offenders now? Will it just be another case of tag and release? If they even get caught? I was talking to a bunch of high school kids the other day, they’re in their final couple of years at school, I was asking them what they’re doing when they leave, where they’re going for uni. “ABNZ”, they all replied. Anywhere But New Zealand. They don’t want to stay here, they’re all seeking uni applications offshore. When I asked them why, they looked at me like I was insane. “Why would we stay here?” they replied. That’s heart-breaking. ‘Where is safe these days for our teenage kids to go?’ my physio asked me. Where can they go that you don’t worry about them ending up a victim of crime? It’s horrible to even have to ask that question in New Zealand now, it’s even worse that I can’t answer it.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Rescuers in a remote area of the Atlantic Ocean are racing against time to find a missing submersible before the oxygen supply runs out for five people who were on a mission to document the wreckage of the Titanic. Despite an international rescue effort, US Coast Guard officials said the search covering 26,000 square kilometres had turned up no signs of the lost sub known as the Titan, but they planned to continue looking. Authorities reported the carbon-fibre vessel overdue Sunday night, setting off the search in waters about 700km south of St John’s, Newfoundland. Aboard were a pilot, renowned British adventurer Hamish Harding, two members of a Pakistani business family, and a Titanic expert. The submersible had a 96-hour oxygen supply when it was put to sea at roughly 6am Sunday, according to David Concannon, an adviser to OceanGate Expeditions, which oversaw the mission. That means the oxygen supply could run out tomorrow night (NZ time). Titanic tourist submersible missing graphic CBS News journalist David Pogue, who travelled to the Titanic aboard the Titan last year, said the vehicle communicates by text messages that go back and forth to a surface ship and safety pings that are emitted every 15 minutes to indicate that the sub is still working. Both systems stopped about an hour and 45 minutes after the Titan submerged. “Either they lost all power or the ship developed a hull breach and it imploded instantly. Both of those are devastatingly hopeless,” Pogue told CBC yesterday. The submersible had seven backup systems to return to the surface, including sandbags and lead pipes that drop off and an inflatable balloon. One system is designed to work even if everyone aboard is unconscious, Pogue said. The Titan is prepared for a dive into a remote area of the Atlantic Ocean on an expedition to the Titanic on Sunday, June 18, 2023. Photo / AP Experts said the rescuers face steep challenges. Alistair Greig, a professor of marine engineering at University College London, said submersibles typically have a drop weight, which is “a mass they can release in the case of an emergency to bring them up to the surface using buoyancy”. “If there was a power failure and/or communication failure, this might have happened, and the submersible would then be bobbing about on the surface waiting to be found,” Greig said. Another scenario is a leak in the pressure hull, in which case the prognosis is not good, he said. “If it has gone down to the seabed and can’t get back up under its own power, options are very limited,” Greig said. “While the submersible might still be intact, if it is beyond the continental shelf, there are very few vessels that can get that deep, and certainly not divers.” Even if they could go that deep, he doubts rescuers could attach to the submersible. By Tuesday morning, 26,000sq km had been searched, the US Coast Guard tweeted. The Canadian research icebreaker Polar Prince, which was supporting the Titan, was to continue conducting surface searches with help from a Canadian Boeing P-8 Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft, the Coast Guard said on Twitter. Two US Lockheed C-130 Hercules aircraft also conducted overflights. The Canadian military dropped sonar buoys to listen for any possible sounds from the Titan. Concannon, who said he was supposed to be on the dive but could not go, said officials were also working to get a remotely operated vehicle that can dive to a depth of 6km to the site as soon as possible. OceanGate’s expeditions to the Titanic wreck site include archaeologists and marine biologists. The company also brings people who pay to come along, known as “mission specialists”. They take turns operating sonar equipment and performing other tasks in the submersible. The Coast Guard said Monday that the Titan carried a pilot and four “mission specialists”. However, OceanGate’s website suggests that the fifth person may be a so-called “content expert” who guides the paying customers. Authorities have yet to formally identify those on board, though some names have been confirmed, including OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, who, according to the company, was a member of the crew. Billionaire adventurer Hamish Harding looks out to sea before boarding the submersible Titan for a dive into the Atlantic Ocean on an expedition to the Titanic. Photo / AP Rush told the Associated Press in June 2021 that the Titan’s technology was “very cutting edge” and was developed with the help of Nasa and aerospace manufacturers. “This is the only submersible – crewed submersible – that’s made of carbon fibre and titanium,” Rush said, calling it the “largest carbon fibre structure that we know of,” with 12cm-thick carbon fibre and 8cm-thick titanium. Harding, who lives in Dubai, was one of the mission specialists, according to Action Aviation, a company where Harding is chairman. Harding is a billionaire adventurer who holds three Guinness world records, including the longest duration at full ocean depth by a crewed

Uncertainty is plaguing Ruapehu. A bid to liquidate Ruapehu Alpine Lifts is being heard in the High Court in Auckland this morning, dubbed a 'worst case scenario' by some. The Government and local council's preferred option, to allow two companies to take over skifield ownership, did not make it over the line in meetings yesterday. Ruapehu Mayor Weston Kirton told Kate Hawkesby everyone is waiting with bated breath to see if companies step in and make a purchase. LISTEN ABOVESee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A strong message has come that New Zealand's cash-strapped councils cannot make money out of thin air. The Future for Local Government Review has made more than a dozen suggestions. They include lowering the council voting age to 16, introducing transferable votes, and an annual transfer of around a billion dollars a year from central to local government. Local Government New Zealand agrees with ten of the proposals. President Stuart Crosby told Kate Hawkesby increasing funding has been a priority. He says it's been a cry for a long time with them being asked to do more and more with the same funding tools. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Is it just me, or is this Government going out of its way to lose the upcoming election? I mean, I’ve had the vibe for a while they’ve given up. Chris Hipkins sounds more and more over it and uninterested in what’s going on in the country he’s supposed to be running. Grant Robertson has sounded despondent for a while – I’m sure he quietly quit months ago, many of the Ministers behave in a way that would suggest they too have given up, but this latest revelation from the Health Ministry.. come on. Race-based healthcare is of itself not new in this country, we kind of knew how it worked, and then Covid came along and the focus again was Māori and Pacifica, but this latest revelation on the surgeries. That just takes the cake. As one texter to me yesterday pointed out, this is not just a jab in the arm vaccination we’re talking about here, it’s major surgery. It can be life or death. No one’s suggesting health outcomes for Māori and Pasifika aren’t worse; there just must be another way. The problem with this Equity Adjustor Score as it’s called, is, as Dr Shane Reti pointed out yesterday, the metrics are not clear. No wonder surgeons are pushing back on it. The Health Minister Ayesha Verrall, when asked about this scheme by Reti, confirmed to him that the measuring process was ‘dynamic’.. in other words, there’s no set method to how patients get scored or prioritized, it’s just ‘dynamic’. Meaning, it can change and flex anytime. So if you’re in the health system, and you’re on a waiting list, you potentially will never know exactly where you are on that list because it could shift anytime based on any given surgeon’s ‘dynamic’ scoring. There is a real problem here to be addressed in terms of inequitable access to healthcare but this solution just doesn’t feel right. A chunk of the texts I got yesterday were from people who were either Māori or Pacifica themselves, saying they were embarrassed by this, felt demeaned by it, or were just sick of the government using race as political leverage. One woman said it was absolutely racist in her view, she was Māori , she’d never used that as a lever in the hospital system before, but now that she was awaiting surgery and heard of this measure, she said she’s going to use it. She acknowledged it’s not fair, and said in her view it was racist. But if it gets her surgery quicker, then she’ll take it. And you can’t blame her. Blame the system. Some surgeons have said it’s medically indefensible and they’re disgusted by it. David Seymour said it’s completely wrong and promotes racial discrimination. Dr Shane Reti said the Nat's would repeal it. However the government defends it, and again I think that shows us just how out of touch they really are, how far they’ve pushed us without even realizing it, and how this election is just getting further and further away now from their grip.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.