The Kākā by Bernard Hickey

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Friday, December 20 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus podcast above and the daily Pick ‘n’ Mix below are: * Statistics NZ reported GDP fell 1.0% in the September quarter from the June quarter, which was more than twice as bad as most economists forecast and meant the economy exper...

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking about the year’s news with: * Cathrine Dyer on climate. Her book of the year was Tim Winton ’s cli-fi novel Juice and she also mentioned Mike Joy ’s memoir The Fight for Fresh Water . Cathrine’s person of the year was David Seymour . * Robert Patman on geopo...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Thursday, December 19 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus podcast above and the daily Pick ‘n’ Mix below are: * MSD is rejecting almost one in every 16 requests for food grants, more than double the rejection rate last year after policies were toughened up under the new Government i...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Wednesday, December 18 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus podcast above and the daily Pick ‘n’ Mix below are: * Finance Minister Nicola Willis has pledged to find even more public spending cuts to achieve an earlier return to Budget surplus than the 2028/29 year forecast yesterday...

Long story short: the Government’s austerity policy has driven the economy into a deeper and longer recession that means it will have to borrow $20 billion more over the next four years than it expected just six months ago. Treasury’s latest forecasts show the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s fiscal strategy of trying to reduce the size of Government to reduce public debt is clearly counter-prod...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Tuesday, December 17 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus podcast above and the daily Pick ‘n’ Mix below are: * Finance Minister Nicola Willis is expected to have to reveal the bitter fiscal fruits of her austerity strategy in the HYEFU later today, with bank economists forecasting T...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Monday, December 16 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus above and the daily Pick ‘n’ Mix below are: * Transport Minister Simeon Brown is ploughing ahead with plans to toll all new Roads of National (and Regional) Significance ( RONS ) and some motorways already under construction ,...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Friday, December 12 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus above and the daily Pick ‘n’ Mix below are: * The National-ACT-NZ First Government, which has a ‘ Going for Housing Growth ’ policy designed to massively increase housing supply to improve affordability, has just blocked a Kāin...

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking about the week’s news with: * Cathrine Dyer on the Government’s inadequate final emissions reduction plan and pro-business climate appointments; * Robert Patman on the lightening overthrow of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria and what might happen next in Uk...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Thursday, December 12 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus and Pick ‘n’ Mix are: * Finance Minister Nicola Willis has announced a Cabinet decision to tender for two new Cook Strait ferries won’t happen until March. An actual order is not likely until late next year, before delivery i...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Wednesday, December 11 in The Kākā’s Dawn Chorus and Pick ‘n’ Mix are: * The National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government is set to announce today it will spend $900 million on new ferries to replace the two bigger ones already being built in South Korea for $551 million, bu...

Mōrena . Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Tuesday, December 10 are: * The Government is planning for a new type of privatisation of buildings in the health sector in particular, announcing last night it had directed officials to use ‘ strategic leasing ’ or what it calls ‘PPP-lite’ for health centres and other ‘te...

Mōrena. Long stories short, the six things that matter in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Monday, December 9 are: * Warkworth residents are angry that Transport Minister Simeon Brown has blocked work on a long-planned upgrade to a dangerous intersection because it included plans for walking and cycling, RNZ’s Peter de Graf reported on Saturday. It’s the latest N...

Mōrena. Long stories short, the six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty in this week were: * PM Christopher Luxon said his Goverment was ‘re-learning’ the austerity-infused economic lessons taught by former National Finance Minister Ruth Richardson in 1991, when she slashed spending to reduce public debt and the size of Government (and was then...

As part of The Kākā Project of 2026 for 2050 (TKP 26/50) and When The Facts Change ,I interviewed Octopus Energy Zero Bills Technical Director Nigel Banks from the UK about this week's launch in New Zealand of a partnership with Classic Homes to build new homes in Auckland with enough solar panels and batteries that can sell enough power back into the grid that the homeowner doesn’t have to pay a...

It’s that time of the year when we offer 50% off for a year to new subscribers for the next fortnight until December 21, which is ‘Gravy Day’. It’s our version of a Christmas/Black Monday/Cyber Monday/Singles Day/Boxing Day offer. We call it the ‘ Gravy Day Fortnight ’ New subscribers can claim the offer here . That means a full subscription to The Kākā costs $9.50 a month or $95 per year for the...

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking about the week’s news with: * Cathrine Dyer on Trade and Agriculture Minister Todd McClay saying New Zealand would not buy emissions credits overseas, effectively admitting we’ll renege on our Paris commitments. ( RNZ ) * Robert Patman on the Israel vs Gaza/...

Morena. Long stories short in Aotearoa’s political economy for Thursday, December 5: * The Government halved spending on ‘blue-sky’ research by completely removing social sciences and humanities funding, arguing only research in physics, chemistry, maths, engineering and biomedical sciences would help the economy. * The latest Government spending cuts take the numbers of Government-funded science...

Morena. Long stories short on Wednesday, December 4, with more detail and analysis in the podcast above: * Health Minister Shane Reti says spending cuts will continue for an extra year into 2027 because of a delay in Health NZ achieving a ‘surplus’. * Finance Minister Nicola Willis can’t supply a select committee with evidence austerity works to grow economies. * The actual evidence via the OECD ,...

Mōrena. Chris Bishop unveiled his major infrastructure funding and financing plan yesterday that made clear borrowing with public debt to build infrastructure would be a last resort, with private funds and user pays the main tools to both limit the amount built and pay for it. In my view , that’s unsustainable and unnecessary, given our $100 billion-plus infrastructure deficit, still-rapid populat...

Good morning. Labour appears to be leaning back towards a Capital Gains Tax and away from a wealth tax. Meanwhile, Christopher Luxon says his Government is relearning the economic lessons learned in the early 1990s. Labour leaning back towards Capital Gains Tax Labour held its annual conference in Christchurch over the weekend and voted to continue on with policy work on a Capital Gains Tax and a...

Summary In this conversation, Paul Conway, the Chief Economist for the Reserve Bank of New Zealand , discusses the recent cuts to the official cash rate and the underlying economic factors influencing these decisions. He explains the dynamics of inflation in New Zealand, the impact of administered prices, and the role of government policies in shaping inflationary trends. Conway also reflects on t...

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking about the week’s news with: * Robert Patman on the Israel vs Gaza/Iran/Lebanon, Ukraine/Nato vs Russia/North Korea and whether NZ joins AUKUS; * Special guest Community Housing Aotearoa CEO Paul Gilberd talking about the Community Housing Provider (CHiPs) se...

Kia ora . Long stories short, here’s my top things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Thursday, November 28 : * The News: The Reserve Bank cut the OCR 50 bps to 4.25% yesterday and Adrian Orr signalled another 50 bps cut to 3.75% on February 19. He told me he was concerned about administered inflation by the Government, including through bus and train fa...

Kia ora . Long stories short, here’s my top things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty on Wednesday, November 27 : * The News: Housing and Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop disappointed Community Housing Providers (CHiPs) yesterday by pouring cold water on the idea of Government guarantees for CHiPs’ borrowing from KiwiSaver managers and by proposing more...