The Mike Hosking Breakfast

EV uptake is chugging along nicely. Registrations for EVs has increased by 56 percent on previous years, market share has jumped from three percent to eight percent, and EVs made up 20 percent of sales in March and April. Transport Minister Michael Wood is pleased with the impact the Clean Car Discount scheme is making. He told Mike Hosking most car manufacturers will have transitioned to zero emi...

Today New Zealand launches a new health system replacing 20 district health boards with a national body - Health NZ - in a bid to end postcode lottery. Health reporter Emma Russell talks to a bowel cancer patient, a hospital anaesthetist and a GP about the changes. Roz Tuitama's bowel cancer should've been picked up at least two years earlier. Our country's health system let her down. In 2015, the...

The Reserve Bank is warning housing may no longer be a one-way bet for increasing wealth. Its Chief Economist Paul Conway says changes to the tax system, zoning and slowing population growth mean the housing market isn't going to be as strong. He told Mike Hosking it will mean people will need to increase their financial literacy and building wealth will become more complex. Conway says New Zealan...

After four years of often torturous negotiations, New Zealand and the European Union have agreed a free trade deal. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who helped conclude negotiations in Brussels said it would help grow exports to the European Union by $1.8 billion a year by 2035. Ardern had played down hopes of a deal earlier this week, saying she was "very willing to come away from Europe without fi...

At PWC in Britain, the pay rise coming is 9 percent. They employ about 20,000 locally. Some pay rises will be as high as 10 percent . The chairman says you can't ignore reality, which is true. Given the job market, if you are not offering the 9 percent, someone is. And that person will be hoovering up the scare resource that makes up today's labour market. Locally, Air New Zealand is offering in h...

Time to catch up with one of sporting stars that deserves far more attention. Paul Coll topped the squash world rankings earlier this year and became the first New Zealand man to achieve that. Add to that he's taken home the prestigious British Open and a slew of other tournament wins. He's back home for the first time in three years and is playing in the New Zealand Squash Championships this week...

New Zealand researchers could provide the answer to the opioid epidemic. Victoria University has received a $1.2 million grant to advance the development of a safer opioid alternative to the pre-clinical phase. Associate Professor Bronwyn Kivel told Mike Hosking one in five New Zealand adults suffer from chronic pain, and half of those report current treatments don't offer much relief. She says th...

Concerns about understaffing at a mental health service that treated a 37-year-old man accused of killing a mother-of-four in Christchurch were escalated to the Minister of Health Andrew Little, the Herald has learned. In a briefing on January 20, officials at the Ministry of Health told the minister that the workforce at the Canterbury regional forensic mental health service was so stretched that...

Auckland's Mayor says the Central Rail Link project hasn't derailed,  despite concerns from the Auditor-General. A report from the Auditor-General's office praises the project's governance, but has found its budget and timeline is likely to change. It's found supply chain disruption, rising material costs, and trouble recruiting overseas expertise is all contributing. Phil Goff told Mike Hosking h...

NATO's agreed to a fundamental shift to how it responds to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The alliance has wrapped up a summit in Madrid, agreeing to set up a permanent army headquarters in Poland and make an unshakeable commitment to Ukraine Jacinda Ardern has addressed the summit, and says the war is the single biggest issue facing the continent. Ardern is now on her way to Brussels, where she'll...

We have a couple of trends in the small business sector that are performing stronger than a couple of international heavyweights. Xero has released their Small Business Index for May, revealing small business wages and jobs grew during the month. Wages were up 5.3 percent, the fastest pace since January 2017 while the number of jobs grew 4.1 percent. That's better than the likes of the UK and Aust...

Police Minister Chris Hipkins has accused National MP Mark Mitchell of making comments that suggest diversity among police undermines confidence. Hipkins' comments on social media came after he and Mitchell clashed during an on-air interview on Newstalk ZB this morning. Hipkins tweeted that Mitchell "attacked" him during the interview for talking about increased diversity in police and the fact th...

Christianity is losing its lustre across the Tasman. The first numbers from the Australian 2021 census are out and it shows that for the first time, less than 50 percent of the population identify as Christian. 52 percent down to 44 percent. And the non-religious numbers are increasing – 39 percent compared to 30 percent in 2016. Professor Emeritus of Religion at Massey University Dr Peter Lineham...

For me, the more interesting aspect of our Roe v Wade reaction is the intolerance of so many in a country that would argue the opposite. We love free speech, we love freedom of thought, and we love our ‘rights’, all of our ‘rights’, until of course it affects us or affronts us. Then we go nuts. I got a lot of reaction to the Simon O’Connor post on Roe v Wade, National had just lost half their vote...

Since December the government has spent $1.2 billion on emergency housing, with a lot of it on housing people in motels around the country. There are currently 8000 households living in emergency housing around the country, working out to $150,000 spent on each household. Rotorua Lakes councillor and chair of Whanau Ora Merepeka Raukawa-Tait is right in the thick of it all in her city and joined M...

Air New Zealand's Dreamliners are undergoing the airline's biggest cabin transformation in almost 20 years. The airline's new planes will be fitted with new-style seats throughout and will have an ultra-luxe business class area, the outdated herringbone layout in Business Premier is being modified, and there will be new areas for passengers further back in the plane to graze and stretch during fli...

There's no guarantee Jacinda Ardern will come home from this week's visit to Europe with a free trade agreement with the EU. The Prime Minister is pushing the deal during meetings with European leaders. She's received support from Spanish President Pedro Sánchez‌ during a meeting in Madrid overnight, but other EU members are more reluctant to sign an FTA. Reporter Thomas Coughlan is travelling wit...

Health Minister Andrew Little is being accused of spending too much on reform, rather than access to healthcare. The country's 20 DHBs warned the Government a year ago of "critical workforce issues", calling it an "unsustainable situation". They wrote to the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment, warning some overloaded hospitals were at "code red". National Party Health spokesperson Dr....

Contact Energy says potential electricity shortages shouldn't worry people. It follows concerns being averted both last night and last week, after warnings there were risks of insufficient power generation and reserve to meet demand. Chief Executive Mike Fuge told Mike Hosking we're never close to the edge, as the country has a robust power system and recent events show it responds well. “Sometime...

Part of the reason we started student loans is before that it was all funded by the taxpayer. So, like when anything is free, people just wandered off to university to see what it was all about, to see if there was anything they liked, and to just generally “discover themselves.“ That led to a tremendous number of people never completing anything, as they worked out tertiary study wasn’t for them....

Phil Tippett is a Hollywood legend - he's an Oscar awarding-winning animator, visual artist and supervisor. He's known as the father of stop-motion animation and CGI - and is the man behind the stop motion characters in the Star Wars universe, the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park, and is behind RoboCop. He's taken home two Oscars, a BAFTA and two Emmys for his work. Now he's making his directorial debut...

Look no further than the mighty Hamilton for how a city survives during a pandemic when it isn't locked down. A recently released 2021 economic report shows that Hamilton has had the strongest economy compared to other cities. Since 2019 it's GDP has increased 4.3 percent - compared to 3.3 percent for Wellington, 3.1 percent for Christchurch, 0.4 percent for Auckland and 3.6 percent across the cou...

Just as the excitement was building for the first All Blacks test of the year - Covid has struck. Ian Foster and his assistants John Plumtree and Scott McLeod are out of action with the virus. Add to that midfielders David Havili and Jack Goodhue testing postive. Former Ireland coach Joe Schmidt is being brought in to help - but what does something like this do for preparations? All Blacks assista...

ACT says Labour's attempt to change the rules around political party donations will have the opposite effect. Justice Minister Kiri Allan's Electoral Amendment Bill will lower the limit for public disclosure of donors from $15,000 to $5,000 by the 2023 election. But, ACT Party Leader David Seymour says no one gets any undue influence over any New Zealand party for $15,000. He says they're reducing...

Warnings from industry leaders that the housing crisis could deepen and property prices could spiral again, if new builds stall. The Master Builders Association says supply chain issues and rising material costs are behind a drop in sales and inquiries for new housing builds, as lending becomes tougher and banks want fixed-price contracts. Vice-President Johnny Calley told Mike Hosking it's the ha...