The Hoon

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking with:* The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s climate strategy ‘pamphlet’, its watering down of Clean Car Standards and its general lack of coherence;* University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor Robert Patman and special guest Helen Clark talking about the NATO summit, the debate about Aotearoa joining AUKUS II and how MFAT, DPMC and security establishment officials often try to push us back closer to our former ANZUS partners; and,* Greater Auckland Director and former NZTA-Waka Kotahi Director Patrick Reynolds talking about the Government’s ‘Going for Housing Growth’ strategy and its new approach on Transport.The Hoon’s podcast version above was recorded last night during a live webinar for over 150 paying subscribers and was produced by Simon Josey. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, we’re able to spread my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction other public venues. Join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments, and by subscribing.)Ngā mihi nui.Bernard 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

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking with:* The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s moves this week to take farming out of the ETS and encourage more mining and oil and gas drilling;* Robert Patman about the visit by China’s Premier Li Qiang to Wellington yesterday this week, what it means for Aotearoa-NZ’s relations with our largest trading partner, and whether we can (or should) join AUKUS II; and,* Politico Europe contributing editor and columnist Paul Taylor about the swing to the right in European Union elections this week and French President Emmanuel Macron’s surprise decision to call Parliamentary elections after his party lost badly in those elections.The Hoon’s podcast version above was recorded last night during a live webinar produced by Simon Josey. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction other public venues. Join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments, and by subscribing.)Other things we did elsewhereWe produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this interview recorded on May 27 with Reserve Bank Chief Economist Paul Conway in the immediate aftermath of a surprisingly hawkish monetary policy statement, and just before the Budget. We talked about where the inflation is coming from, why interest rates are staying high for longer than anyone expected, and whether the blunt instrument of the Official Cash Rate can affect this extra sticky inflation.We also produce the 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, free to all via Spotify. Apple and YouTube Ngā mihi nui.Bernard 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

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers features Bernard Hickey talking with:* The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer talking about the latest reports on a warming climate and the UN’s call this week to ban fossil fuel advertising;* Robert Patman talking about the growing disquiet globally over the United States’ support for Israel in Gaza, plus the latest from Ukraine;* Association of Salaried Medical Specialists executive director Sarah Dalton on the health funding crisis;* Queenstown Lakes District Housing Trust CEO Julie Scott on social housing and the shortages of housing and transport in and around Queenstown; and,* Commercial Communications Council CEO Simon Lendrum on the UN call for a boycott of fossil fuel money in advertising, PR and the media.The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about in the Hoon above and via The Kākā and elsewhere in the last week included:* Politics: Public and media reaction to Budget 2024 zeroed in on National’s breaking of election promises to fund 13 new cancer treatments and 50 new doctor training places, to not cut sick leave and holiday entitlements for part-time workers and to not cut funding for first-home buyer grants. See more in Monday’s email.* Climate: Transport and Energy Minister Simeon Brown pushing ahead quietly with plans to water down emissions reduction rules for car imports. This move and the already-banned Clean Car Discount scheme could increase Aotearoa-NZ’s climate emissions by 30 million tonnes by 2030, which could cost taxpayers $680 million extra to buy emissions credits overseas, or risk the nation reneging on our Paris climate agreements in a way that would lock our farmers’ exports out of the European and UK markets. See more in Thursday’s email.* Various cases emerged this week of ‘penny wise and pound foolish’ decisions by the Government to freeze or block funding for water infrastructure and public transport infrastructure that will dramatically slow the building of new homes, in direct opposition to the Government’s avowed ‘going for housing growth policy.’ See more in Monday’s email.* UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres used the release of key reports this week on the warming climate by the World Meteorological Association (WMA) and the European Commission’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) to call in speech for a ban on all advertising by fossil-fuel companies, and for media agencies and media companies to stop working for such companies. See more in Thursday’s email. Also, see more in the weekly climate wrap from Cathrine and myself out this morning.* Calls grew this week for deeper, more wide-ranging and more independent inquiries into Te Pati Maori’s use of data obtained during the Census and covid vaccination programmes by organisations associated with TPM President John Tamihere to promote voting for TPM. * Ports of Auckland began telling clients last week it plans to increases its peak-time container pick-up fees by 84% to $175 per container. All because the Port has been told by Auckland Council to pay more dividends, again because both flavours of Government won’t fund councils properly for all the population growth Government has enabled. It’s another example of administered prices driving up domestic inflation, which is forcing the RBNZ to keep rates high for even longer.The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey. Regular co-host Peter Bale was off this week travelling.(This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction other public venues. Join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments, and by subscribing.)Other things we did elsewhereWe produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this interview with Flick Electric CEO Luke Blincoe about what really happened during last month’s cold-snap blackout scare.We go deep into the mechanics of the electricity distribution system and market to look at how to solve the dry winter and cold snap problem without billions of dollars worth of spending on new generation and lines. We also produce the 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, free to all via Spotify. Apple and YouTube Ngā mihi nui.Bernard 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

TL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate news for Aotearoa-NZ this week, and a discussion above between Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer:* A year of record-breaking surface temperatures has spawned a month of global extreme weather chaos in May, including howler monkeys falling dead from trees in Mexico during a ferocious heatwave that is also threatening to run Mexico City dry of water* Meantime, Brazil has more water than it can handle as biblical-scale floods displace more than half a million people in the state of Rio Grande do Sul.* Tornado-spawning thunderstorms killed 21 people, destroyed hundreds of buildings and disrupted Memorial Day weekend traffic in the US. The so-called‘kitty cat’ storms (as opposed to ‘nat cat’ for nationally catastrophic storms) have sent the insurance industry reeling at the accumulated scale of losses.* North India has been suffering through an intense heat wave that experts say has surpassed 50˚C on the heat index (the apparent or experienced temperature) due to high levels of humidity. Hospitals in Delhi have been forced to set up special facilities to treat the increasing numbers of patients experiencing heat-related illnesses.* And then there was the devastating landslide in Papua New Guinea that buried an entire village, part of a series of landslides driven primarily by the country’s unique geography. However, experts warn that climate change, particularly in the form of intensified rainfall events, can overwhelm the landscape’s ability to cope and contribute to landslides.* Climate change could be producing more diarrhoea-causing cryptosporidium outbreaks in Aotearoa, according to a new study from the University of Otago.(See more detail and analysis below, and in the video and podcast above. Cathrine Dyer’s journalism on climate and the environment is available free to all paying and non-paying subscribers to The Kākā and the public. It is made possible by subscribers signing up to the paid tier to ensure this sort of public interest journalism is fully available in public to read, listen to and share. Cathrine wrote the wrap. Bernard edited it. Lynn copy-edited and illustrated it.)Monkey fall from trees, water runs short in brutal heatwaveWhat follows a year in which average surface temperatures exceed the pre-industrial average by more than 1.5˚C, adding energy equivalent to four Hiroshima bombs (or Hiros) per second to Earth’s climate system? That massive pulse of energy, amplified by the effects of El Niño will take some time to dissipate.In May alone we have seen extreme weather events unleash chaos in multiple locations around the world. Howler monkeys were falling from trees in Mexico, dead from heatstroke and dehydration as they suffered under a brutal heatwave that has killed at least 26 people since March.“Wildlife biologist Gilberto Pozo counted about 83 of the animals dead or dying on the ground under trees. The die-off started around 5 May and hit its peak over the weekend.“They were falling out of the trees like apples,” Pozo said. “They were in a state of severe dehydration, and they died within a matter of minutes.” Already weakened, Pozo says the falls from dozens of yards (meters) up inflict additional damage that often finishes the monkeys off.Pozo attributes the deaths to a “synergy” of factors, including high heat, drought, forest fires and logging that deprives the monkeys of water, shade and the fruit they eat.“This is a sentinel species,” Pozo said, referring to the canary-in-a-coalmine effect where one species can say a lot about an ecosystem. “It is telling us something about what is happening with climate change.” The GuardianThe effects of climate-driven drought, heatwave and low precipitation are combining with Mexico City’s long-running infrastructure problems to create a crisis in which the sprawling metropolis could run out of water entirely within weeks.  The water crisis has become a bone of contention in the country’s upcoming presidential election“In a Sunday debate between Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico’s governing Morena party, and Xóchitl Gálvez, who represents an opposition coalition, Gálvez blamed the water issues on the inaction of Sheinbaum’s party. Sheinbaum, an environmental scientist who co-authored the 2007 Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, is the former mayor of Mexico City.” The Washington PostMeantime, Brazil has more water than it can handle, with epic, biblical-scale floods displacing more than half a million people.  Concerns are mounting that conditions could spawn a health crisis as the displaced gather in temporary shelters ill-equipped for the scale of the disaster.“More than 580,000 people have been displaced, with almost 70,000 of them depending on shelters, according to a state government report. A total of 2.3 million people have been affected by the torrential rain and floods.City, state and federal governments are working to provide assistance, but the authorities estimate that the situation will take months or even years to return to normal. More than 90% of Rio Grande do Sul’s 497 municipalities have been affected, with 418 declaring a state of emergency or disaster.” The GuardianTornado season becomes even deadlier‘Tornado-spawning thunderstorms’ have killed at least 21 people and destroyed hundreds of buildings across four US states, disrupting Memorial Day weekend travel plans for millions. At least 30 million people were under severe thunderstorm advisories in New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania on Memorial Day this week as the storms headed Northwest from Arkansas, Texas, Kentucky and Oklahoma.Just last week, the BBC warned that climate change was altering the behaviour of tornado season, in terms of both location and duration. Establishing the link between fleeting weather events like tornadoes and climate change is more complex than for other weather events like hurricanes and heatwaves, but there most certainly is a connection they report:"We expect that the number of days in any given year that are favourable for tornadoes… are going to increase in the future and specifically increase earlier in the season," Victor Gensini, associate professor of meteorology at Northern Illinois University, tells the BBC.Across the US's southern Plains states like Oklahoma and Kansas, "what might have been May and April as your peak months are now March, April, and May or even February", Gensini says. He notes that there hasn't been an uptick in strong tornadoes – tornadoes at EF4 ratings and higher – over the last 50 years, but where they occur has been changing.States notorious for tornadoes such as Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas are actually seeing a decrease in tornadoes while states like Tennessee, Georgia and Arkansas as well as upper Midwest states like Minnesota, Illinois and Iowa are seeing an increase."We have way more people living in the mid-south and east of the Mississippi River than we do in the Great Plains," Gensini says. The higher population densities of the states seeing an increase in storms means that they have the potential to do more damage.” BBCThe billowing cost of homeowners insurance is becoming the most prominent symptom of climate change in the US, as the recurring damage from so-called ‘kitty cat’ storms in heartland US join the effects of hurricanes in Florida and Louisiana, and fires in California.“These so-called “severe-convective storms” are large and powerful thunderstorms that form and disappear within a few hours or days, often spinning off hailstorms and tornadoes as they shoot across the flat expanses of the central United States. The insurance industry refers to these storms as “secondary perils” – the other term of art is “kitty cats”, a reference to their being smaller than big natural catastrophes, or “nat cats”.But the damage from these secondary perils has begun to add up. Losses from severe convective storms increased by about 9% every year between 1989 and 2022, according to the insurance firm Aon. Last year these storms caused more than $50bn in insured losses combined – about as much as 2022’s huge Hurricane Ian. No single storm event caused more than a few billion dollars of damage, but together they were more expensive than most big disasters. The scale of loss sent the insurance industry reeling.“As insurers, our job is to predict risk,” said Matt Junge, who oversees property coverage in the US for the global insurance giant Swiss Re. “What we’ve missed is that it wasn’t a big event that had a big impact, it was a bunch of small surprise events that just added up. There’s this kind of this reset where we’re saying, ‘OK, we really have to get a handle on this.’” The GuardianHeatwaves and landslides now, food insecurity to grow North India has also been suffering through an intense heatwave in which temperatures have approached 50˚C at times.  “Several regions are facing water and electricity shortages due to spikes in power consumption. On Wednesday, Delhi's peak power demand reached 8,000MW, the highest in the history of the Indian capital. Delhi is experiencing a brutal heat spell, with temperatures hovering around 45-46C through this week.Weather experts say that the heat index - or the apparent or experienced temperature - has crossed 50C because of the high levels of humidity.Hospitals in the city have set up special facilities to treat patients experiencing heat-related illnesses, which are also on the rise.” BBCAnd then there was the catastrophic landslide in Papua New Guinea (PNG) that buried an entire village of up to 2000 people. PNG is extremely landslide prone and has a long history of such disasters, that often fail to make headlines elsewhere. The latest event follows a series of smaller, but still deadly landslides in recent months in which scores of people were buried alive. These events are primarily driven by the country’s mountainous and deeply weathered terrain, combined with a tropical climate that frequently delivers heavy rain and storms. The country also sits in an active seismic zone on the border of two tectonic plates in the Pacific’s  ‘Ring of Fire’. Deforestation from mining can also play a part. And then, on top of all of that, there is climate change – itself exacerbated by deforestation. ABC News Australia spoke to  Professor Dave Petley, vice-chancellor of the University of Hull in the United Kingdom, and a globally recognised expert on landslides.“Professor Petley says climate change has a particularly pronounced effect on landslide activity because it results in more eclectic weather systems, with sudden changes in conditions overwhelming the landscape's ability to cope."Slopes are particularly sensitive to short-duration, high-intensity rainfall events," he says."You can go back to first principles — imagine a landscape evolves to deal with the most intense rainfall it experiences."If you increase that intensity, you're taking the landscape into an environment it's never experienced, and it will respond. And a landslide is the inevitable response. ABC News AustraliaClimate-related disasters have always occurred, it’s true, but this understanding of the world can veil the scale of change that has occurred in recent years and the mounting toll on both the human and physical environments. Whilst insurance premiums are currently figuring large as a symptom in some developed countries, the next global broadside may come from food insecurity, linked directly to climate change through the loss of agricultural production (which rarely fares well in a context of weather chaos), or indirectly, as a contributor to conflict and economic shocks.The number of people suffering from food insecurity has grown every year since 2019, according to the 2024 Global Report on Food Crises. In 2023 almost 282 million people in 59 countries suffered acute food insecurity that required urgent food and livelihood assistance (24 million more than the previous year).Doomsday glacier update and other climate newsIn other climate related news this week:* Satellites have revealed water intruding miles below the Thwaites Glacier, otherwise known as the Doomsday Glacier because of its potentially dire impacts on sea level rise.“As the salty, relatively warm ocean water meets the ice, it’s causing “vigorous melting” underneath the glacier and could mean global sea level rise projections are being underestimated, according to the study published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [...]Thwaites, which already contributes 4% to global sea level rise, holds enough ice to raise sea levels by more than 2 feet. But because it also acts as a natural dam to the surrounding ice in West Antarctica, scientists have estimated its complete collapse could ultimately lead to around 10 feet of sea level rise — a catastrophe for the world’s coastal communities.” CNNCombined with another recent study on the loss of Antarctic sea-ice cover, this news supports the claim that a long-lived regime change has occurred at Antarctica, with profound global impacts. The loss of sea-ice cover and its associated loss of albedo (in which white snow reflects heat back into space, whereas dark, open water absorbs it) creates a heat feedback effect, ultimately hastening global heating. Inside Climate News* A ‘catastrophic’ global decline in migratory fish populations has seen their number drop by more than 80% since 1970s. A recent study  warns that dams, mining, pollution and humans diverting water are destroying river ecosystems”“They form the basis for the diets and livelihoods of millions of people globally. Many rivers, however, are no longer flowing freely due to the construction of dams and other barriers, which block species’ migrations. There are an estimated 1.2m barriers across European rivers.Other causes of decline include pollution from urban and industrial wastewater, and runoff from roads and farming. Climate breakdown is also changing habitats and the availability of freshwater. Unsustainable fishing is another threat.Herman Wanningen, founder of the World Fish Migration Foundation, one of the organisations involved in the study, said: “The catastrophic decline in migratory fish populations is a deafening wake-up call for the world. We must act now to save these keystone species and their rivers.“Migratory fish are central to the cultures of many Indigenous peoples, nourish millions of people across the globe, and sustain a vast web of species and ecosystems. We cannot continue to let them slip silently away.” The Guardian* A landmark international case has found states have legal obligations to reduce emissions under the Law of the Seas.“The tribunal found "anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions into the atmosphere" do count as pollution of the marine environment, and State parties to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) "have the specific obligations to take all necessary measures to prevent, reduce and control marine pollution from anthropogenic GHG emissions".They also need to "endeavour to harmonise their policies in this connection".The tribunal's finding was released this week, in response to a query from the Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law in December 2022.” RNZ* Social networks play a big role in influencing perceptions about climate change risk according to a new study.* Yale climate connections looks at the enduring influence of ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ movie, twenty years after it was released. The films ‘unusual’ take on the effect of a collapsing AMOC sparked climate conversations that had both positive and negative implications, according to experts.* Some states in the US are aiming to use climate attribution science to hold the fossil fuel industry to account for damages associated with their emissions.* Climate protestors are facing increasing suppression in Europe, with arrests escalating in France and new charges being trialled in Germany this month. The escalating pushback from authorities may or may not be related to the expanding body of evidence proving their effectiveness.* Finally, climate change could be producing more diarrhoea-causing cryptosporidium outbreaks in Aotearoa, according to a new study from the University of Otago.Ka kite anoBernard and Cathrine 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

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking with:* The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer about extreme heat in India and Mexico and the prospects climate migration to Aotearoa-NZ;* CTU Chief Economist Craig Renney and Good IDEAs founder Max Rashbrooke about Budget 2024; and* Community Housing Aotearoa (CHA) Deputy CEO Chris Glaudel about Kāinga Ora and social housing.The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere in the last week included:* Housing, Climate, Poverty and Economy: The new National-ACT-NZ First Government unveiled its first Budget on Thursday, deciding to go ahead with long-promised tax cuts despite a weaker economy that is forcing $68.3 billion of net new borrowing by mid-2028. The income tax cuts cost $14.7 billion over four years and debt will rise by $12 billion more than Treasury forecast in December. Willis argued the tax cuts were ‘fully-funded’ by spending cuts and tax increases, and therefore it was not borrowing to pay for tax cuts. That would be true if the economic forecasts had not changed between the election and the Budget, but they have in a way that means there’s less money to spare. See and hear my full analysis in the podcast above, in Friday’s email and Friday’s podcast here featuring a discussion with Ganesh R Ahirao…There’s also this discussion with Toby Manhire in a Budget Special ‘co-pro’ with Gone by Lunchtime for my weekly When The Facts Change podcast:* Housing: Kāinga Ora’s board released the feedback it gave in April on Bill English’s review of the state-owned house-builder and landlord, criticising his comments about KO’s financial sustainability and performance as variously ill-informed, wrong and/or based on anecdotes, as also reported by Newsroom’s Tim Murphy. Newshub’s Jenna Lynch reported on Tuesday that Chris Bishop arranged for English to lead the ‘independent’ review in a series of text messages. See more analysis from me in Tuesday’s email and in comments I made on The Detail broadcast on RNZ and Newsroom on Thursday, and also listenable here directly.* Housing and Economy: The Reserve Bank confirmed plans to limit mortgage lending for loans worth six and seven times the income of owner-occupiers and landlords respectively from July 1. These DTI limits won’t reduce lending much now because lending at those multiples is currently low, but will stop most high DTI lending growth in future as interest rates fall. It affects landlords more than first home buyers because loan to value limits are the main restraint on their borrowing. LVR limits were also loosened a bit from July 1 to offset any effects of the new DTI limits. See more analysis from me in Wednesday’s email.* Housing and Economy: Key leaders in housing and infrastructure construction sent a joint letter to the Government pleading for more project certainty and warning its funding freezes for councils, water reform and transport projects had significantly damaged confidence and risked driving staff overseas,  Newsroom’s Fox Meyer reported on Tuesday. See more analysis in Tuesday’s email.* Cost of living: The Commerce Commission announced its draft decisions on regulated electricity transmission costs for the next five years. It decided the nationwide transmission and local lines distribution costs will rise 48% in the next five years to a combined $17.8 billion. These costs make up 37.5% of power bills and mean that monthly bills will rise around $15 from July 1, 2025, followed by $5/month hikes in each of the following four years. See Thursday’s email.* Poverty: The Fairer Futures advocacy group and the Disabled Persons Assembly published a report titled A Thousand Cuts that estimated a disabled person could already be up to $256 per fortnight or $5,742 a year worse off because of the Government’s changes to disability support, bus subsidies, benefit indexation, the minimum wage and prescription charges. See more detail in Thursday’s email.What we talked about on ‘The Hoon’ on Thursday nightIn this week’s ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers at 5pm on Thursday night:* 5:00 pm - 5:10 pm: Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale opened the show with a discussion about the Budget and some international news. Peter referred to a Rest is Politics episode featuring Kwasi Kwarteng and this Haaretz article about Gaza* 5:10 - 5:25 pm: Peter and Bernard spoke with The Kaka’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer about extreme temperatures in India (52.3 degrees celcius) and Mexico and the prospects for Aotearoa-NZ to become a climate refuge. * 5:25 - 5:35 pm: Peter and Bernard talked with Craig Renney about the Budget. He referred to the chart below in Chart of the week from the Budget (Page 52).* 5:35 - 5:45 pm: Peter and Robert talked with Max Rashbrooke about the Budget and his launch with others of a new thinktank, the Institute for Democratic and Economic Analysis, which has its own substack Good IDEAs.* 5.55 - 6:00 pm: Peter and Bernard spoke with Community Housing Aotearoa Deputy CEO Chris Glaudel about Kāinga Ora and social housing. * The ‘skateboarding dog’ story this week referred to this video of a man with a suspended driver’s license joining a court appearance about his unlicensed driving via a Zoom call. While driving in his car.The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey. Regular guest Robert Patman was off launching his new book New Zealand's Foreign Policy under the Jacinda Ardern Government: Facing the Challenge of a Disrupted World. It is available now via Amazon on Kindle and in hardback form from June 15. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction other public venues. Join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments, and by subscribing.)Other things I did elsewhereWe produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this discussion with Toby Manhire. We also produce the 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, free to all via Spotify. Apple and YouTubeChart of the week: National’s debt track above Labour’sNgā mihi nui.BernardPS: This week we produced 10 daily podcasts averaging about 10 minutes each, three weekly podcasts of around 30 minutes each, ten daily emails averaging over 1,000 words per email, a weekly diary, and I appeared in The Detail podcast. That’s nearly four hours of podcasts, 10,000 words of news and analysis, all edited and sent to your inboxes. I also participated in a CPAG post-Budget analysis panel discussion in Auckland yesterday. We hope that’s value for money and we’d love you to 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

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking about this week’s Kainga Ora and first home loan news, along with regular guest Robert Patman on China’s warning to New Zealand and special guests Michael J Field on the riots in New Caledonia and Giorgi Lomsadze on the escalating protests in Georgia against Russian influence. The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:* Housing: The Government extended its freeze on new housebuilding by Kainga Ora into next year after releasing a report on the state house builder and manager by former National PM and Housing Minister Bill English that said its rapid expansion over the last five years was financially unsustainable. Housing Minister Chris Bishop also announced the cancellation of first home buyers’ grants to save $245 million over four years, of which $140 million would be used to fund 1,500 new social housing places by Community Housing Providers (CHPs) and to help pay for tax cuts for landlords. See Thursday’s email.* Economy: The Reserve Bank held the Official Cash Rate at 5.5% as expected, but extended out its forecast for a first cut by three months to August 2025 after also increasing its forecast for inflation. The central bank blamed sticky domestic services inflation, mostly from rents, council rates and Government fees and charges, and insurance premiums, which tighter monetary policy is unlikely to influence much. The announcement dampened hopes for mortgage rate cuts this year and questions the Government’s decision to freeze funding for councils in a way that forced them to hike rates dramatically, as well as various decisions to impose new fees and charges on motorists, migrants and importers. See Thursday’s email and Wednesday’s email.* Geopolitics: China’s ambassador to New Zealand, Wang Xiaolong, told PM Christopher Luxon at the annual China-NZ Business Summit in Auckland this week that relations between China and New Zealand were at a ‘critical juncture’ because of New Zealand’s consideration of joining Aukus II, which the ambassador said directly supported the nuclear-powered Aukus I. He said Aukus was targeting China and New Zealand joining Aukus II would mean we were ‘taking sides.’ Luxon said he didn’t think joining Aukus II would hurt New Zealand’s trade with China much, and that New Zealand wanted to diversify its trade in a strategy he described as: ‘China and…’. The risk for New Zealand is diversification will be difficult when any trade agreement with India would have to exclude dairy and meat exports, and our recently signed EU and UK trade agreements include clauses forcing New Zealand to abide by its Paris emissions reductions commitments, which the current Government has challenged with a series of emissions-increasing decisions on EVs, motorway building, railway cancellations and farming rules. (See more in the podcast above)* Climate: The massive offshore wind project backed by the NZ Super Fund has told ministers in a briefing it can't operate off the Taranaki Coast if seabed mining is allowed to go ahead. It said the dredging of 10m of sands was incompatible with building turbine platforms and running power cables to shore. It was based on this study released in March. See Tuesday’s email.* Climate: Energy Minister Shane Jones announced a strategy of mining more coal and precious minerals on Department of Conservation-controlled land and other areas to double such exports by 2035. The announcement did not mention climate once and the strategy did not detail if any climate emissions analysis had been done. EU and UK farmers will find this interesting.* Economy: Global funds management behemoth BlackRock said it thought central bank rate hikes designed to tame inflation actually worsened inflation because higher interest rates give savers more money from their savings accounts, which they then spend and pump up demand and prices. See more in my interview with Kiwibank Chief Economist Jarrod Kerr for my weekly When The Facts Change podcast via The Spinoff titled: An interest rate bludgeoning. What we talked about on ‘The Hoon’ on Thursday nightIn this week’s podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers at 5pm on Thursday night:* 5:00 pm - 5:10 pm: Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale opened the show with a discussion about the Government’s release of Bill English’s report into Kainga Ora and its decision to scrap first home buyer grants in favour of adding 1,500 social housing places and helping to pay for tax cuts for landlords.* 5:10 - 5:20: Peter and Bernard spoke with The Kaka’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer about Microsoft’s revelation this week that its heavier use of AI is increasing its climate emissions, and signs climate change is increasing mid-air turbulence for high-flying passenger jets.* 5:20 - 5:35 pm: Peter and Bernard talked with Robert Patman about a tough speech this week by China’s Ambassador to New Zealand, Wang Xiaolong, warning PM Christopher Luxon not to join Aukus II. * 5:35 - 5:50 pm: Peter and Robert talked with veteran Pacific issues journalist (and substacker) Michael J Field about this week’s riots in New Caledonia.* 5.50 - 6:00 pm: Peter and Robert spoke with Georgian journalist Giorgi Lomsadze from Tblisi on the escalating protests in Georgia against Russian influence.The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread the work from my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction around in other public venues. I’d love you to join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments.)Other things I did elsewhereI produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this interview with Kiwibank Chief Economist Jarrod Kerr from Wednesday afternoon. We talked about the bluntness of the Reserve Bank’s main monetary policy tool and a developing view that high interest rates actually increase inflation, rather than decrease inflation. We also produce this 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, which you can sign up to via Spotify and Apple and Youtube for free.Ka kite anoBernard 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

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for subscribers features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale , along with regular guest Robert Patman and special guest former PM Helen Clark on Aukus II and much more. We also spoke with Ngāti Toa CEO Helmut Modlik about why his iwi opposes the Fast-track Approval bill.The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:* Housing & climate - Opposition to the Government’s Fast-track approvals bill mounted in submissions to the Environment Committee this week. Helen Clark warned in the podcast above of the dangers of placing so much power in the hands of the executive. Helmut Modlik warned of a repeat of the top-down damaging of the long-term prospects of Ngāti Toa and the land around Porirua, just as happened with mass house-building in the 1950s and 1960s. * Infrastructure - The pressure on Council finances from Government funding freezes and a fundamentally borked system of infrastructure financing for fast population growth is becoming so intense it is forcing them to sell assets sales and force unsustainable dividends, as evidenced by a shock resignation of Christchurch’s asset management company and intense debates in Auckland and Wellington about selling airport shares. See more in Thursday’s email. * Economy - Aotearoa’s biggest and last-best-hope of being a global business, Fonterra, announced plans yesterday to sell its global consumer brands businesses and 17 of its remaining factories overseas, including brands such as Anchor, Anmum, Anlene, Fernleaf, Mainland and Kapiti. The assets up for sale employ capital of $3.4 billion and generating $190 million or 20% of its earnings in the first half of the year. I spoke in this week’s Hoon above about how this represented the final victory for the housing market in its quest to focus spare capital on investing in land appreciation for tax-free capital gains, rather than real businesses and assets that increase real wages and real business wealth.* Population - Stats NZ reported this week a record-high 52,496 New Zealand citizens left the country permanently in the year to the end of March. That equates to about one full A320 leaving each weekday, with just over half of those citizens going to live in Australia. They were replaced by people on temporary work and student visas (with work rights) from India, the Philippines and China, in that order. See Wednesday’s email.* Environment - ECan reported this week more than half of the wells monitored in its annual survey last year showed nitrate levels were likely to be increasing, with water from 35 of the 349 wells having nitrate levels above the maximum acceptable value for human health. South Canterbury has the highest incidence of bowel cancer in New Zealand. See Wednesday’s email.* Economy - Surveys this week showed the economy is settling into a state of suspended animation as the Government’s funding freezes and job cuts chill confidence and combine with stubbornly high interest rates to extend the recession of late 2023 through the rest of the year. See Tuesday’s emailWhat we talked about on ‘The Hoon’ on Thursday nightIn this week’s podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers at 5pm on Thursday night:* 5:00 pm - 5:10 pm - Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale opened the show with a discussion about Fonterra’s decision to sell its global brands and give up on its global value-added ambitions.* 5:10 - 5:40 - Peter and Bernard talked with Robert Patman and Helen Clark about whether Aotearoa should join Aukus II and how the new Government was performing.* 5:40 - 6:00 pm - Peter and Bernard talked with Ngāti Toa CEO Helmut Modlik about why his iwi opposes the Fast-track Approval bill, as he detailed in this Op-ed via The Spinoff.The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread the work from my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction around in other public venues. I’d love you to join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments.)Other things I did elsewhereI produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this interview with Transpower’s GM of Grid Mark Ryall about the Redclyffe substation near Napier. It is Aotearoa’s climate canary. Where it goes, we go. It was flooded during Cyclone Gabrielle and turning it off turned off the power for much of Hawkes Bay and Taitawhiti. Transpower fixed it, but has had to make a big call: should it rebuild it where it is now, next to a stream? Or move it up a hill? The choice tells us a lot about how to think about our climate future. We also produce this 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, which you can sign up to via Spotify and Apple and Youtube for free.Ka kite anoBernard 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

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for subscribers features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale , along with regular guest Robert Patman on geopolitics, and special guest Jesse Richardson from A City for People on a big victory for YIMBYs in Wellington this week.The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:* Housing: In a big win for YIMBYs over NIMBYs in the nation’s capital, Housing and RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop approved almost all of the Wellington City Council’s recommended zoning changes to allow many more apartments and townhouses in its inner-suburbs. He went even further on densification than the council by allowing six-storey apartments in Kilbirnie, but decided not to strip the derelict Gordon Wilson flats of their heritage status. See Thursday’s email.* Poverty: Associate Education Minister and ACT Leader David Seymour announced the continuation of the Healthy School Lunches Programme known as Ka Ora, Ka Ako for two years, but with cheaper packaged food for intermediate and secondary school kids at lower decile schools, rather than hot meals. He said it would save $107 million. See Thursday’s email.* Tax: Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced in her first pre-Budget speech in Wellington an expansion and renaming of the Social Wellbeing Agency (back) into the Social Investment Agency. She also said the Budget would include “meaningful, but modest” tax cuts that would increase the take-home income of 83% of New Zealanders over the age of 15 and 94% of households. * Climate: A cold snap increased power demand and forced Transpower to warn of potential shortages this morning. Wholesale prices leapt 50-fold. Meanwhile, Genesis Energy is resuming coal imports because of gas shortages and a lack of investment in the last decade by (mostly) state-owned gentailers who have prioritised high profits, high dividends and capital returns over investment in (already consented) wind farms. See Thursday’s email.* Poverty: MSD cut funding for budgeting services, debt restructuring advisors and helping Christchurch attack survivors, surprising those working with poor families stuck with loan shark debt and survivors struggling to rehabilitate. Willis confirmed in her speech this week the Government had found $1.5 billion of savings to help pay for lower taxes for landlords. See Thursday’s email.* Climate Minister Simon Watts announced this morning the Government had agreed that Parliament’s Finance and Expenditure Committee would conduct an inquiry into climate adaptation. This followed the Environment Committee’s inquiry into climate adaptation last year, which reported back in February. What we talked about on ‘The Hoon’ on Thursday nightIn this week’s podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers at 5pm on Thursday night:* 5:00 pm - 5:20 pm - Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale opened the show with a discussion about climate change, school lunches, woke sushi and Christopher Luxon’s very, very bad week.* 5:20 - 5:50 - Peter and Bernard talked with Robert Patman about the latest moves in Gaza and a growing lack of confidence in US leadership.* 5:40 - 6:00 pm - Peter and Bernard talked with Jesse Richardson from A City for People on a big victory for YIMBYs in Wellington this week .The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread the work from my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction around in other public venues. I’d love you to join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments.)Other things I did elsewhereI produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this interview with Otago University public health Professor Nick Wilson on the true costs of tax cuts paid for with higher tobacco taxes. The Government has repealed various smoke-free measures to ensure it keeps collecting $1.2 billion a year in tobacco taxes, in order to pay for tax cuts already being delivered to landlords. But an economic analysis done by Wilson and colleagues found keeping the smoke-free measures would have made consumers $51 billion better off by 2050 through earning more and spending less, which would more than offset the $19 billion net losses of the Government, given less tobacco tax and more pensions spending because more people will live longer and past the Super age of 65. We also produce this 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, which you can sign up to via Spotify and Apple and Youtube for free.Ka kite anoBernard 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

TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for subscribers features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale , along with regular guests Robert Patman on Gaza and AUKUS II, and Cathrine Dyer on climate change. Special guest Craig Renney talks about public sector job cuts this week and the Government’s big investment freeze at the end of the podcast.The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:* Housing: A global survey by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) found surveyors in Aotearoa-NZ reported sharp contractions in activity and expectations for infrastructure and public housing in the March quarter because of project cancellations and funding freezes for councils by the new Government. See Thursday’s email.* Economy: Business confidence fell across the board in April, falling in some areas to levels last seen during the lockdowns because of a collapse in construction activity after the new Government froze or reversed spending decisions on water, housing and transport investment. A drumbeat of state sector job losses and austerity rhetoric has further chilled retail spending and the housing market. See Wednesday’s email.* Politics: A 1News-Verian poll showed the collapse in business, consumer and voter confidence about the country’s direction in March and April has translated into the worst polling performance for any first-term Government since the introduction of MMP in 1996. See Monday’s email.* Housing: The Government’s hopes landlords would fund the building of new homes for rent and reduce rents from better after-tax returns from their existing rentals are falling on deaf ears, a survey landlords found this week. Investor intentions to build or develop new homes hit a record low in April, while more than 80% plan to increase rents in the next 12 months, back at pre-election levels. See Monday’s email.* Cost of living: Bus and train fares for teenagers jumped this week because of Government public transport funding cuts, adding to the inflation pressures generated by double-digit hikes in council rates, again because of Government funding freezes and cuts. The Government has also imposed road user charges for electric vehicle owners and has promised to reintroduce prescription fees, all of which are contributing to inflation pressure and keeping mortgage rates high for longer. See Monday’s email.* Politics: Labour called on PM Christopher Luxon to stand down Winston Peters as Foreign Minister after statements Peters made on RNZ about former Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr. In Parliament yesterday, after David Parker raised Peters’ description of Carr as “a puppet of China”, Peters then doubled down and referred to an AFR article that described Carr as a ‘pawn’ of China. Luxon said he thought Carr would see it as the usual ‘rough and tumble’ of politics. We discuss this in the podcast above from 30mins to 40mins.What we talked about on ‘The Hoon’ on Thursday nightIn this week’s podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers at 5pm on Thursday night:* 5:00 pm - 5:10 pm - Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale opened the show with a discussion about the economy and foxes.* 5:10 pm - 5:20 pm - Peter and Bernard talked with Cathrine about fresh revelations Big Oil is deliberately blocking a transition to carbon zero, as detailed in her weekly climate news wrap published yesterday.* 5:20 - 5:50 - Peter and Bernard talked with Robert Patman about a growing debate about whether Aotearoa-NZ should join AUKUS Pillar II, along with news yesterday Winston Peters faces defamation accusations from Bob Carr.* 5:40 - 6:00 pm - Peter and Bernard talked with Craig Renney about the job cuts in Wellington, the Government’s budget choices and a lack of investment.The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread the work from my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction around in other public venues. I’d love you to join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments.)Other things I did elsewhereI produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this interview with Auckland University’s Deborah Levy about a paper she co-wrote on the growing financialisation of holiday homes in Aotearoa. We also produce this 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, which you can sign up to via Spotify and Apple and Youtube for free.Ka kite anoBernard 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

TL;DR: The podcast above features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale , along with regular guests Robert Patman on Gaza and AUKUS II, and Cathrine Dyer on climate change.The six things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:* Climate: Ongoing double-digit hikes in council rates and insurance linked to climate change helped pump up March quarter inflation and is helping to delay mortgage rate cuts until late this year, or even early 2025. So should the Reserve Bank look through climate change inflation? It says no, but there’s a risk climate shocks drive up inflation and interest rates, delaying de-carbonisation investment. See more in Thursday’s email.* Transport Minister Simeon Brown asked Waka Kotahi-NZTA to again consider digging a 4-km-long four-lane motorway tunnel from The Terrace to Kilbirnie, shocking Wellington’s transport planners yesterday, who said the $10-billion-plus cost was prohibitive and wasteful. See more in Monday’s email.* Housing: Construction industry leaders say the Government’s freezing of funding for Kāinga Ora and water infrastructure was generating “weak” and “vague” signals about future pipelines for infrastructure and housing, which was helping to drive many builders closer to collapse. See more in Monday’s email.* Health: Associate Health Minister Casey Costello never passed official advice on to Cabinet with an analysis for the BMJ showing that keeping Labour’ssmokefree changes would have boosted consumers’ disposable incomes by $51 billion by 2050, more than offsetting $19 billion in net losses for the Government. See more in Monday’s email.* Climate: The size of the global economy will shortly peak, and then begin a steep decline, falling by at least one fifth by 2050 as a result of climate damages according to a new study by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) and published in the journal Nature. See more in the Hoon in the discussion with Cathrine Dyer and here in the article and video we published earlier today.* Population: Stats NZ reported a record-high 226,000 non-New Zealand citizens migrated here in the year to February, while a record-high 74,900 New Zealand citizens migrated elsewhere, with just over half leaving for Australia. That equals a full A320 each day, with most getting off in Australia. See more in Monday’s email.What we talked about on ‘The Hoon’ on Thursday nightIn this week’s podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers at 5pm on Thursday night:* 5:00 pm - 5:10 pm - Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale opened the show with a discussion about their favourite books and bingeing shows.* 5:10 pm - 5:20 pm - Peter and Bernard talked with Cathrine about the Potsdam paper in Nature. They also mentioned a Wired article downplaying the role of cloud seeding in Dubai’s floods this week, and an article by Auckland University’s Kevin Trenberth about the risks of geoengineering.* 5:20 - 5:50 - Peter and Bernard talked with Robert Patman about a growing debate about whether Aotearoa-NZ should join AUKUS Pillar Two. They mentioned an article by Robert and Marco De Jong on AUKUS.* 5:50 - 6:00 pm - Peter and Bernard talked about Bernard’s idea that a 1% levy on digital advertising to raise $21 million per year could support journalism by being distributed to subscription news producers at a rate of $2 for each $1 earned in new subscriptions.The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey. (This is a sampler for all free subscribers. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread the work from my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction around in other public venues. I’d love you to join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments.)I produced an episode of When The Facts Change via The Spinoff, including this interview with Kiwibank Chief Economist Jarrod Kerr about a major shift in views on inflation and interest rates here in Aotearoa and globally this week: they’re now seen high for longer because the ‘last mile’ of inflation is proving harder to reduce than expected.We also produce this 5 in 5 with ANZ daily podcast and Substack for ANZ Institutional in Australia, which you can sign up to via Spotify and Apple and Youtube for free.Ka kite anoBernardPS: Here’s the climate wrap we also produced this week with Cathrine, and the one-off podcast on the Potsdam report. 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