Heather du Plessis-Allan Drive

The Government has recently announced that a Royal Commission of Inquiry into New Zealand's response to the Covid-19 pandemic will be taking place. This Royal Commission of Inquiry will be used to prepare the nation for future pandemics, and evidence will be considered from February 1st, 2023. Political editor Barry Soper has observed that this inquiry will conclude midway through 2024, and wonder...

Six Australian MPs from both Labour and the opposition will visit Taiwan later this week. This will be the first visit from an Australian parliamentary delegation in years, and this visit is designed to maintain a close relationship with both Taiwan and mainland China.  Australian correspondent Oliver Peterson says that this visit is unusual, as China and Australia's relationship hasn't changed an...

World Rugby has officially confirmed that New Zealand is out of the running on a list of countries set to host the Sevens World Series tournaments. This announcement makes the upcoming Hamilton World Sevens Series tournament the last event of this type. World Rugby has selected seven locations to host the tournaments, and New Zealand's absence is perplexing to Weekend Sport's Jason Pine. LISTEN AB...

Auckland Airport is still struggling to fill major gaps in its workforce. It has 1600 job openings, ranging from roles in check-in to bag collection, through to food and beverage to security. Air New Zealand expects to carry 2.8 million passengers between December 15 and January 31, up from 1.1 million last year. Chief Executive Carrie Hurihanganui says they're doing all they can to make things wo...

A leading child protection charity says the report into the death of five-year-old Malachi Subecz highlights fundamental flaws in a system that has been failing for years. Malachi was murdered by his carer in November last year, the carer was jailed with a non-parole period of 17 years in June. Following a damning review, sweeping changes were recommended to the child protection, education, welfar...

Gore's deputy mayor has stepped down to bring unity back into council. Stewart MacDonell has resigned from his role following a request signed by seven other councillors. They say the decision came after attempts to work collaboratively to provide the best governance structure for the community. Mayor Ben Bell told Heather Du Plessis-Allan he was disappointed the challenge happened so quickly. He...

Lady Susan Hussey, a lady-in-waiting to the late Queen Elizabeth II and Prince William's godmother, has recently stepped down following allegations of racism. Lady Susan repeatedly asked Ngozi Fulani, chief executive of a UK charity for survivors of domestic abuse where she was "really from", despite Ngozi's insistence that she was from east London.  UK correspondent Enda Brady says that this inci...

Covid-19 restrictions have abruptly lifted in two Chinese cities, but the country is still retaining its' commitment to their 'Zero-Covid' strategy. This comes after days of rare mass protests from residents, where citizens clashed with police over Covid control orders and restrictions. So what's all this doing to our markets? Investors were understandably worried as the restrictions and ensuing p...

Fieldays 2022 is currently underway. This years Fieldays has had five and a half months of extra buildup, as it was delayed to avoid the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic. The attendance numbers for the opening day are lower than they were in previous years, with only 17,000 people turning up as opposed to the 29,000 who were there for Fieldays 2021. Rowena Duncum, producer of The Country says that t...

Westpac has just released their building consent numbers, and they've dropped down lower than predicted.  Dwelling consent numbers are down by 11 percent, which is larger than the 5 percent drop that Westpac had forecasted. This drop goes deeper than the normal month-to-month volatility, and tougher financial conditions play a role in these figures. Liam Dann, NZ Herald business editor says that t...

Today on The Huddle: Georgina Stylianou, Director of BRG NZ and Sam Johnson, social entrepreneur joined in on a discussion about the following issues of the day- and more! The Government has given police new powers to directly target fleeing drivers, as well as establishing harsher penalties for fleeing drivers. These include disqualification from driving for offenders for up to two years and perm...

According to data from Kiwibank, net migration figures are expected to go up by the end of 2023. Kiwibank is forecasting a 'significant' net gain of 36,000 migrants entering the country by next year. Kiwibank Senior Economist Jeremy Couchman was surprised by this data, as it is a larger figure than he expected. Despite this, it's still not as high as New Zealand's pre-COVID migration statistics. J...

The Government is giving police new powers to target fleeing drivers in an announcement made to the media in Hamilton. Justice Minister Kiri Allan stated that if you're thinking of being a fleeing driver, there will be tougher consequences. These include taking away an offender's vehicle for good and harsher penalties around loss of licence. Police can also impound a car for 28 days if its' owner...

Accomplished Kiwi athlete and founder of the Halberg foundation, Sir Murray Halberg recently passed away at age 89. Between his accomplishments in the 1960 Olympics and the 1958 and 1962 Commonwealth Games and his charity work supporting children with disabilities in sport, Sir Murray Halberg impacted a lot of lives. NZ Herald sports journalist Phil Gifford was one of those people, and he said tha...

Oranga Tamariki's CEO says there's been accountability within the child protection agency after a scathing review into the murder of Malachi Subecz. The five-year-old whose mother was in jail was abused and killed by his carer last November, inspiring an investigation into the company. A review released today found five critical gaps in monitoring, care and agency co-operation. Some key recommenda...

Maori Development Minister Willie Jackson has recently been saying that he wants to put co-governance on hold for 2023. The Government has been working on plenty of co-governance based projects and policies over the last few months, including the establishment of Maori wards in local councils, the Canterbury regional council reforms and the Three Waters discussion. Recently, Willie Jackson has bee...

Australia's Socceroos got a 1-0 win over Denmark in the Fifa World Cup and secured a place in the Round of 16. The Socceroos haven't made it this far in a Fifa World Cup since 2006, and the fans are elated to the point where they've taken to social media to ask for a public holiday in honour of the victory. The fans have taken their requests to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese as well, and he hasn'...

Sir Murray Halberg, Olympian and founder of the Halberg Disability Sport Foundation passed away aged 89 on Wednesday evening. Sir Murray Halberg was the first Kiwi to break the four-minute mile and won the 5000m gold medal in the 1960 Olympics. He also won gold at the Commonwealth Games in 1958 and 1962.  Sportstalk host D'Arcy Waldegrave said that Sir Murray Halberg will leave behind a strong leg...

Sandringham Business Association chair Jithin Chttibomma has enlisted the help of Sir Ray Avery to give trial emergency watches to Sandringham businesses to let workers in trouble alert police. These watches will send alarms directly to the police, who will apparently respond to an emergency call within three minutes. This trial was launched a week after Sandringham dairy worker Jamal Patel was fa...

A man who was connected to an incident in which 27 people drowned in an attempt to cross the English Channel in a dinghy has been arrested in the UK. This man is set to appear in court later this week and is accused to have been part of a gang who conspired to transport the migrants into the UK from northern France. This man has been identified and tracked down by the UK's National Crime Agency. U...

Westpac has increased their interest rates following the OCR increase announcement, making them the second bank to do so after ANZ. Both special rates for these banks for one year are sitting at the 6.5 percent mark, with the expectation that they'll go up to 7 percent in the first few months of 2023. Brad Olsen, Infometrics Chief Economist says that these rates will be stressful for borrowers, as...

ANZ released their latest business survey and it's showcasing a bleaker look at the economy than in previous years.  The survey states that the expected own activity outlook is at its' lowest level since September 2020 and that employment intentions have dropped down to negative for the first time since October 2020. There is also a broad weakness across various industries, especially construction...

In this year’s budget, the Government said it has increased Pharmac's funding by 43 percent over the last 5 years. To get that huge increase, the Government simply took money from the DHB Hospital Medicine budget and gave it to Pharmac, according to new data from NZIER. The NZIER Principal Health Economist, Sarah Hogan, is among the people who have been looking into this. "There has been a little...

Should our banks be doing more to help cover the cost of money printing? The RBNZ is holding $49 billion dollars of banks' reserves, thanks to all the money printing of 2020. The problem is, the RBNZ is now having to pay interest on that at the rapidly rising OCR rate. NZ Herald Wellington business editor Jenee Tibshraeny weighed in on this issue. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for priva...

Today on The Huddle: Nick Leggett, Chief Executive of Transporting NZ and Jack Tame from Q&A and ZB's Saturday Mornings joined in on a discussion about the following issues of the day- and more!  An urgent court hearing has been called for Tuesday following a set of parents requesting unvaccinated blood for their baby's open-heart surgery and Health NZ seeking court guardianship. What do we ma...