The Mike Hosking Breakfast

If you missed the interview with Marc Ellis in the NZ Herald over the weekend, read it. One of the great sadnesses around Ellis is he got successful in business and, as a result, disappeared. I miss people like him in public life. What made him successful was that he was himself, no matter what he did, whether it was rugby, TV, or orange juice, he was himself. It's actually a skill. And that’s why...

A new angle of Alzheimer’s research is being investigated. Biomarkers are a molecule found in blood, other body fluids, and tissues that are an indicator of an abnormal process, condition, or disease, and could be a tell-tale sign of Alzheimer’s. Otago University Researcher Dr Ashleigh Barrett-Young says that while there are several biomarkers could indicate Alzheimer’s, it’s still unknown whether...

Chris Hipkins and Trade Minister Damien O'Connor are addressing the Chinese Ambassador and New Zealand business leaders, at the China Business Summit in Auckland. O'Connor told Mike Hosking their message to the ambassador will be simple. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

ACT has added some fresh faces to the top of its party list for October's election. It's demoted MPs Chris Baillie and Toni Severin to make way for newcomers Andrew Hoggard and Todd Stephenson. Hoggard —a former Federated Farmers President— will be number five on the list. Leader David Seymour told Mike Hosking that Stephenson —a founding Act Party member and former Act Party staffer with a backgr...

Universities say people care more about value than price in the wake of data showing New Zealand's among the most expensive for international students. Money Management Service, Wise, ranked Aotearoa the second most pricey country for tuition, costs, and transfer fees. The United States is the most expensive. Universities New Zealand Director Chris Whelan says that Kiwi universities are a good cho...

Sweltering heat and raging floods are sweeping across several parts of the globe. Almost a third of Americans are under extreme heat advisories, while at least four people have been killed by floods in Pennsylvania. US Correspondent, Richard Arnold, told Mike Hosking that Death Valley will likely hit over 54 degrees Celsius today. He says Phoenix just broke its daily high, with temperatures reachi...

Christopher Luxon is adamant the numbers stack up in National’s plan to redirect Government spending from road safety to road maintenance. The National Party leader is promising to re-prioritise if the party wins October's election. It would spend less on road safety measures like speed bumps, median barriers, speed limit reductions, and ad campaigns, so more could be spent on road renewals and po...

If owning your own business wasn't hard enough - new data shows us that nearly half of small business owners are not actually even paying themselves. That is on top of dipping into their savings and increasing prices just to keep afloat. BusinessNZ chief executive Kirk Hope joined Mike Hosking. LISTEN ABOVE   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Has the Government's desire to bail out their dire fortunes in the election, in fact, made them worse? The revelation that the Government was indeed considering a wealth tax this budget has been blown wide open by the release of budget papers - and the Prime Minister confirming that he killed it. For months now there has been a suspicion of this. I first got wind of it in a speech the Statistics M...

At the end of each week, Mike Hosking takes you through the big-ticket items and lets you know what he makes of it all.   Sam Cane: 6/10 Tricky call this. No, he shouldn’t have done it. But, then having done it I don’t think anyone would begrudge him sending a message to an idiot. But then the mistake was the apology and the All Blacks gear. When the All Blacks are out-woking the woke, the world i...

Loneliness and social isolation is said to impact as many as one-third of the world population - and here we have new research into how AI-powered robots could provide some companionship to help combat this. But as AI develops further and gives companion robots better skills to build social connections, researchers are saying some guidelines are needed. Researcher from the faculty of Medical and H...

Grant Robertson admits he's disappointed Chris Hipkins has ruled out capital gains and wealth taxes. The Finance Minister told Mike Hosking he understands the reasoning for Hipkins' decision, even if he doesn't fully agree with it. “We’ve got a very volatile economic situation that we’re in, we’ve got to get through that.” LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Concern that three quarters of new school principals feel unprepared when starting the job. Research from the Education Review Office also finds more than a third nationwide have been in the position for less than five years. Secondary Principals' Association President, Vaughan Couillault told Mike Hosking many of these new principals have only experienced 'crisis mode' while in the role.   He's w...

James Shaw says whether New Zealand gets a capital gains tax or wealth tax is ultimately a matter for voters. Chris Hipkins has ruled out either form of tax while he's prime minister. But Greens Co-Leader James Shaw says his party could demand those taxes, as part of any post-election negotiations on Coalition or Confidence and Supply arrangements. He told Mike Hosking the election outcome should...

The Education Minister's defending a million dollar campaign that aimed to encourage kids to go to school Last August, Education Minister Jan Tinetti launched the Every School Day is a Big Day campaign. But documents released under the Official Information Act reveal it wasn't expected to have a direct, quantifiable impact on attendance rates in itself. Education Minister Jan Tinetti told Mike Hos...

One of the unfortunate side stories of the FIFA Women's World Cup is it doesn’t look to be the bonanza they hoped it might be. Ticket sales have been an issue and the hoteliers claim to be bitterly disappointed. It might well be that football as a sport is big globally, but not here. And even if it is big, at the women's level it's not a massive spectator event. Anyway, it also hasn’t stopped the...

MPs Megan Woods and Mark Mitchell joined the Mike Hosking Breakfast to wrap the week's political news. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Hamilton-Auckland Te Huia train service will no longer be travelling into Parnell. The temporary ban follows two incidents where the train driver has failed to obey a red signal and has entered a section of track where there is the potential for conflict with another rail service. These incidents were reported by Waka Kotahi leading to the issuing of a prohibition notice to KiwiRail, preventin...

After all that, it turns out Chris Hipkins will actually be meeting with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy. But right now he is in attendance of the Nato leaders' summit in Lithuania focusing on what he says are 'matters of global importance'. While back in New Zealand we have this new report from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade highlighting the grim reality of the future of New Ze...

An Auckland barrister says there's no silver bullet to fix court system delays. The average number of days to resolve criminal cases in the District Court is 176 days - a jump of 62 days from five years ago. National says the system should make better use of technology to clear backlogs, such as remote access options. But Nick Chisnall KC says it would be a major step to conduct trials and sentenc...

We have another OCR day, many are expecting the Reserve Bank to take a breather - with no change to the current 5.5 per cent. Westpac chief economist Kelly Eckhold joined the Mike Hosking Breakfast. LISTEN ABOVE See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

According to the latest polls from the Labour party's own pollster , Labour has well and truly fallen -sitting at 31 per cent - it's lowest point since 2019. National rose one point to 36 per cent, making it the first time National has been ahead of Labour by five points or more. It is also the first time the centre-right has been ahead of the centre-left by five points or more since the 2017 elec...

An independent monitoring system and more rights for caregivers are part of the Act Party's plan to improve Oranga Tamariki. Leader David Seymour says the agency has failed our most vulnerable children. Act wants to split social worker duties between mentors and child protection officers to serve both a tough and a nurturing role. Also on their agenda is transferring youth justice functions from O...

A difficult decision for Nato over when Ukraine should be able to join the military alliance. Overnight, member states have agreed Ukraine will be allowed to join once allies agree and conditions are met including a halt in fighting. Newshub's Lysette Reymer says Nato doesn't want to be drawn into an active conflict. But she told Kate Hawkesby it doesn't want Russia to think it can stop Ukraine fr...

Are you reading about the economy and its performance, or lack of, with the alarm I am? More and more economists are now predicting a double dip recession. Grant Robertson is already working overtime trying to explain why we have had one already, while the vast majority of the rest of the world hasn’t. Now he may face the unedifying prospect of having to do it twice. Mind you, he will most likely...