The Kākā by Bernard Hickey

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night featured co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking about geopolitics, the economy, climate change and politics. It included special guest Shamubeel Eaqub talking about fiscal, monetary and KiwiSaver policy. We referred to this substack post he wrote: And also the Zombie town documentaries he did, referred...

I interviewed Green Party Co-Leader Chloe Swarbrick this evening about the party’s fiscal plan for Election 2026. The full interview is above and available for all. We talked about why the Green Party had scaled back its wealth tax, whether it would have to increase it a later date to fully deliver on its welfare ambitions, and whether the Public Finance Act (Section 26G ) should be replaced (and...

Thank you Virginia McMillan , PixieMatt , Alistair Schorn , Gill Franklin , Toni S , and many others for tuning into my live video with Ganesh R Ahirao ! Join me for my next live video in the app. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

Mōrena. It must feel frustrating to be a taxpayer who sees massive growth in public health funding, but can also see public hospital EDs, ICUs and wards struggling to cope with tidal waves of new demand from an ageing and sickening population. Where did all the money go? Is it being wasted by all the nurses and doctors and administrators in hospitals? Perhaps not. Most of the growth in the last th...

One way to ‘win’ an election is to make sure your opponents’ potential supporters can’t vote at all. It seems to be working for the National-led Government, which has carved two weeks off the time to enrol and vote, which will affect younger and more transient voters who might have been expected to vote for opposition parties. There are 107,000 voters missing from the electoral roll with three day...

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night featured co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking about geopolitics, the economy, climate change and politics. It included regular guest Robert Patman talking about Donald Trump’s friendly relations with Vladimir Putin, events in the Middle East and what’s at stake for New Zealand. This week’s special gue...

Discussion is building within National Party circles that Christopher Luxon will have to be replaced as Leader immediately after the election if he sticks with his promise not to talk to Opportunity to form a Government. “I have no desire to see Labour back in power. And that’s why, I say, he should come out now publicly and disclose that he would be prepared to form the coalition with Opportunity...

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

I talked in the video above last night with Elliot Crossan about about his analysis of Labour’s fiscal plan, including how its National -like focus on returning to Budget surplus and cutting debt will force big real cuts in welfare and other Government spending. I have asked Labour spokesperson Barbara Edmonds for an interview. Here’s the essence of what Elliot is saying (bolding mine): Labour and...

I talked with Dr Mona Krewel in the video above about how New Zealand’s political parties and leaders are using Facebook so far in Election 2026. She is the director of the Internet, Social Media and Politics Research Lab at Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington and was reporting back after the first week of the 2026 New Zealand Social Media Study , including analysis of 544 Facebook p...

Mōrena. This election should be about choices we make for the young and future generations, especially the choices made by those voting for the first time and who will have to bear the consequences (or reap the rewards) in decades to come from the decisions made on November 7. Unfortunately, or perhaps deliberately, the National -led Coalition Government’s unprecedented decision to block enrolment...

Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app. Here’s the post from Rosie we discussed. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

Thank you Ken Howell , Graham Collins , and many others for tuning into my live video with Huhana Hickey ! Join me for my next live video in the app. Here’s the post we discussed. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

Kia ora. This election is all about cost-of-living pressure, stagnant economic growth and a healthcare system in the deadly and awful process of collapsing, yet neither of the potential Government-leading parties are proposing substantial reforms to address these issues. That was underlined by desperate pleas for substantial action over the last three days from child poverty charities and doctors,...

University of Otago finance academic Morgan Edwards has discovered through an Official Information Act request to Treasury and the Reserve Bank that the Government ‘ran out of money’ 272 times since 1997 when the Crown Settlement Account went into overdraft, sometimes to the tune of billions of dollars. In theory, that’s not possible, but it happened. Here’s Morgan’s substack post documenting the...

The discussion above is about Bryce Edwards ’ substack post on this University of Otago survey published this week. I also covered the survey results yesterday. Thank you Felicity Letcher , Morgan Edwards , Paul Singh , Gaylene Middleton , Alex Clarkson , and many others for tuning into my live video with Bryce Edwards ! Join me for my next live video in the app. This is a public episode. If you'd...

Mōrena. This election campaign has struggled so far to focus on one issue or find a major policy conflict that resonates and ignites intense public debate. This week’s revelations that Auckland’s Starship Children’s Hospital has had to suspend cancer treatments for at least a week because of staffing shortages could be the story that does it. There has been a drumbeat of news about Emergency Depar...

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night featured co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking about geopolitics, the economy, climate change and politics. It included regular guest Cathrine Dyer , including a discussion about this article she wrote for Newsroom. Bernard’s three things of note this week were: 1. Starship’s cancer treatment closure i...

Mōrena. Voters are most focused on cost of living and underfunded hospitals in this election campaign. National leader Christopher Luxon was criticised in the second leaders debate last night for wrongly saying the minimum wage was keeping up with those living costs. This came as a big new survey published this morning has found the biggest group of New Zealanders (27%) now feel they’re struggling...

Both National and Labour are relying on Treasury forecasts of household and business investment growth happening at the same time as falling house prices. These are the forecasts Finance Minister Nicola Willis is using in the election campaign to say her Government’s policies will create 220,000 jobs over the next four years. The trouble is Treasury forecast in Willis’ first Budget in 2024 that it...

Mōrena. The six things to know in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate today are: * National has released its fiscal plan, which matched its outlook in Treasury’s Pre-Election Fiscal Update (PREFU), including prioritising a return to multi-billion dollar surpluses and debt reduction by 2029/30. Labour’s plan is very similar, also forecasting a move into multi-billion su...

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night featured co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking about geopolitics, the economy, climate change and politics. It included regular guests Cathrine Dyer and Robert Patman and discussions about climate change science distrust, National’s election policy to cut foreign aid and the near identical fiscal polic...

Thank you Maurizio Piglia , Brian Rathbone , Ken Howell , Tim , Tony Pomfret , and many others for tuning into my live video with Elliot Crossan ! Join me for my next live video in the app. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe