Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

Bleak news has come for dairy farmers this morning. Fonterra has drastically reduced its forecast Farmgate Milk Price for the current season due to ongoing reduced demand from China. The midpoint has plummeted from $8/kg of milk solids, to just $7. Fonterra boss Miles Hurrell is blaming a recent 12 percent drop in the price of whole milk powder, due to much lower than expected demand from China. T...

Act’s Deputy leader Brooke van Velden, gave the Government’s Willow Jean Prime  an uncomfortable few moments in Parliament yesterday. She questioned her on the fact that pregnant mothers are receiving $50 Prezzy cards simply for turning up to pregnancy assessments, and then when the child is born, the six week assessment. The catch? You have to identify as Maori to get the Prezzy card. Van Velden...

In a new documentary that screens tonight, community leader Dave Letele explores the impact of alcohol and addiction in Aotearoa New Zealand. Heavyweight with Dave Letele retraces his own personal journey of gangs, addiction and alcohol and looks at the issues facing communities now. Whether it's pokies, fast food, drugs or alcohol, Dave says to create change and break cycles, we all need to have...

As we all know there are lies, damn lies and statistics. Just read the New Zealand Herald series on the claims and counter claims being made by National and Labour around crime and you'll be left none the wiser as to whether crime is indeed out of control in New Zealand and whether Labour is indeed soft on crime. For example, Labour has claimed youth offending is down 60 percent over the past deca...

A slighter higher rise to the unemployment rate than expected. Stats NZ figures show it reached 3.6 percent for the three months to June. That's up point-two percent, on the preceding quarter. Most economists were predicting a point-one increase. Herald Business Editor at Large, Liam Dann, told Kerre Woodham it means there's more tension in the labour market. He says it's been seen through more pe...

Now this is another tricky one and we have talked about it before, and it's in the news again. I am all for personal responsibility in owning your own mistakes. Case in point is me overpaying my insurance premiums by thousands and thousands and thousands for about 10 years because I hadn't checked the fine print. Nobody to blame but me. Unfortunately, as much as I had tried to squirm and writhe in...

BNZ is under fire for refusing to reimburse scam victims who lost nearly half a million dollars in an elaborate scam. Consumer NZ is urging banks to raise their game and provide better protection to New Zealanders who fall victim to scams. Most big banks in the UK are signatories to a voluntary code where they typically refund scam victims for their losses. Consumer NZ would like to see a similar...

Timely indeed for National to release its transport policy, given that infrastructure groups are tearing their hair out, growing increasingly frustrated by the months-long delay in the Government publishing its direction for land transport. We have been hearing about this for some time, the Government said yes, yes, yes, yes, it's coming.  They're putting the delay down to the fact that they have...

National is promising a radical shake-up of roading priorities if it wins the election. Leader Christopher Luxon said that the party will prioritise 13 roads of national significance, including the previously announced four-lane highways between Tauranga and Whangārei. He reckons the projects can be fully funded without raising fuel excise taxes. Labour has slammed the Nat's transport projects as...

I was about to write my opener this morning on Labour's widely anticipated move to announce the removal of GST on fruit and veg, when an ACT party press release landed in my inbox and I thought David Seymour said it best: “If Labour announces a policy to remove GST from fruit and vegetables, that's not a sign they want to address the cost of living. It's a sign of a truly desperate political party...

National's claiming Labour is poised to announce scrapping GST from fruit and vegetables, however, Labour won't confirm or deny, saying we all have to wait for their announcement. Is it just a vote buying exercise or does it have merit? Dentons Kensington Swan Partner and tax expert, Bruce Bernacchi spoke to Kerre Woodham. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

National is labelling emergency housing as a social and economic disaster. Since Labour came to office in 2017, $1.4 billion has been spent on putting people up temporarily in motels. National's Housing spokesman Chris Bishop told Kerre Woodham it's an extraordinary sum of money - an average of nearly a million dollars a day being paid to motel owners. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for...

Yet again, unintended consequences have put the kibosh on the Government's best intentions. A loophole in a law designed to curb youth vaping will allow dairies and supermarkets to avoid the new proximity rule, and they'll be able to start selling vapes within 300 metres of schools and marae. Special vape retailers - basically, they're just little holes in the wall - they have been banned from sel...

Tammy, a board member and parent at Parakai School called in to Kerre Woodham Mornings with concerns over a new vape shop opening beside their primary school. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What I did want to talk to you about this morning was prompted by a piece written by Rob Campbell in Newsroom, talking about the dire state of aged care in this country. Aged care providers have warned the shortage of rest homes is leading to longer wait times for elective surgery, overcrowded emergency departments and other pressures on the health system. The Aged Care Deputy Chair Warrick Dunn s...

The former head of Te Whatu Ora, Rob Campbell believes the lack of attention given to aged care is yet another example of politicians kicking the can down the road. In an opinion piece in Newsroom, Campbell writes that chronic underfunding by successive governments, has meant there has not been enough capital or operational investment in aged care facilities. Estimates indicate that by 2040 there...

You have to feel for Chris Hipkins as a person, don't you? As a boss, fresh from dealing with the shootings in downtown Auckland on the eve of the FIFA Women's World Cup, a few days later he then has to deal with one of the few remaining ministers formally known to be competent, self-destructing in spectacular fashion. The former Justice Minister Kiri Allan resigned this morning, after being charg...

Kiri Allan has resigned from Cabinet after being charged by Police over a crash in Wellington overnight. Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has confirmed the Justice Minister was taken into custody after the crash on Evans Bay Parade in Roseneath just after 9pm. She was charged with reckless driving and resisting arrest, and was released about 1am. Newstalk ZB Political Commentator Barry Soper joined Ke...

If you were listening to the Mike Hosking Breakfast this morning, and why wouldn't you be? You would have heard the Police Commissioner and the Police Minister trying to explain the inexplicable. How a young man with violent tendencies had assaulted his partner, threatened to take out her family, was able to get his hands on a shotgun and wreak havoc with it in downtown Auckland, killing two, woun...

Following the shooting in Auckland's CBD yesterday, there has been much discussion around the merits of reducing prison numbers and scrutiny has come again on judges around sentencing.  Labour might say there is no interference between the Government and the judiciary, but they campaigned on cutting prison numbers by a third.   To discuss this, criminal lawyer, Marie Dhyrberg KC, joined Kerre Wood...

There’s no doubt about it; New Zealanders are hard workers. But according to the productivity stats, we work hard and we worked dumb - like good, solid oxen. We put our necks under the yolks and we trudge up and down our respective paddocks, but our output simply doesn't match our input. The Productivity Commission released a report earlier this month and it shows that we work more hours per week...

New Zealand's inflation rate has taken another tumble - dropping from 6.7 percent to 6. Today's 0.7 point drop in the Consumer Price Index represents the largest fall in annual inflation in more than two years. Despite the drop, prices are still increasing at rates not seen since the 1990s. Food prices remain a major driver of the inflation - up more than 12 percent annually. NZ Herald Business Ed...

There's an interesting piece in Newsroom about social media groups tackling crime. More and more community groups are forming to report and sometimes solve local crime. The Hutt Valley Security Noticeboard has 14,000 members and was started by Jonathon Gilbert five years ago, after he was robbed and police couldn’t help. Jonathan Gilbert joined Kerre Woodham to discuss. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio...

In an article in the NZ Herald, Police admitted that it's impossible to identify overseas scammers, and investigators aren't focused on solving International scam crimes. Nigel Latta is hosting a new show that focuses on the growing issues of scams, called ‘You've Been Scammed.’ Nigel Latta joined Kerre Woodham to chat about the situation. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy infor...

What a weekend of sport.  It's been exhausting — and that's just watching it. The All Blacks, the Warriors, a new Wimbledon champion who looks to be beginning a new era in men's tennis, and we have the FIFA Women's world cup kicking off this Thursday.  So, a lovely weekend of escapist exhilaration — and now it's back to reality. Back to an election campaign, and a busy weekend for our politicians....