A glorious and historic Olympics campaign comes to an end
New Zealand's medal haul crept up by two overnight as the Paris games close.
Mōrena, and welcome to The Bulletin for Monday, August 12.
In today’s edition: Households in emergency housing down 32%, the Police Association takes aim at minister Nicole McKee over gun reform process and how the government risks being overwhelmed by issues of race. But first, the Paris Olympics come to a close as New Zealand celebrates its best ever result.
Don’t cry because it’s over
It’s good to be back, and a huge thank you to Catherine and Anna for covering me while I was away. The problem with choosing to travel to America at the start of August was that it meant visiting a part of the world that had an even more inconvenient time difference for watching the Olympics than here in New Zealand – at least for medal events we were involved in. Joel MacManus valiantly argued in favour of solitary 4am sport watching, but, while on holiday, I just didn’t have it in me. Nevertheless, from the moment I returned home I’ve been engrossed in the final weekend of the sporting action, from a monumental effort by Maddi Wesche in the women’s shot put (with a final throw that briefly perplexed even the commentators, as The Spinoff’s Madeleine Chapman explained) to the incredible Australian breakdancer Raygun who has rightfully taken over my Twitter feed. Since my return on Saturday, the front pages of all our national news sites have been a flurry of Olympic recaps, interviews and general celebration (with a side dose of Lotto fever). With the closing ceremony about to kick off, let’s farewell the 2024 Olympic Games.
Our golden games
Overnight, another two medals were added to New Zealand’s tally which now sits at 20. Ellesse Andrews won her second gold at the velodrome, followed by Ally Wollaston’s bronze in the women’s omnium. It makes this our most successful Olympics ever, equalling Tokyo for total medals but ahead of 1984’s Los Angeles campaign for gold medals with 10. Shortly, the closing ceremony will take place with Lisa Carrington and Finn Butcher named as New Zealand’s flag bearers. On the medal table, we end our campaign in 11th place (undoubtedly higher if you get into the whole “per capita” thing).
1News has looked back at all of our big wins in Paris, which will be remembered most for an exciting surge in gold medals on Saturday night when we picked up three – Lisa Carrington earned her eighth, for the K1 500m, Lydia Ko scored in the women’s golf and Hamish Kerr pulled off a dramatic victory in the high jump. Kerr explained his decision not to split the gold, as had been done in 2021, in this interview with 1News. As the Herald’s Cameron McMillan noted, the triple-gold was even more impressive given that between 1988 and 2008, New Zealand didn’t win more than three gold medals at a single Olympics, let alone on a single day.
Our greatest Olympian becomes even greater
Lisa Carrington was already our best performing Olympic athlete, but her three medals in Paris pushes her closer to being one of the greatest Olympians of all time. She’s technically ranked 44th when it comes to overall medals, but rises considerably closer to the top when measured by her eight golds. That’s equal footing with Usain Bolt and more than US gymnast Simone Biles. Dylan Cleaver at The Bounce pointed out on Friday that, mind bogglingly, Carrington’s medal wins amount to 11% of all golds ever won by New Zealand at the games (since her latest win, it’s more like 12%). The success of Carrington is not to diminish the efforts of our other athletes on the water, notably Aimee Fisher who, while missing out on a medal, contributed to what commentators dubbed the “race of the century”. The Herald’s Michael Burgess wrote a nice feature on Fisher and her friendly rivalry with Carrington, acknowledging that while the pair are not “close friends” there is “immense mutual respect”. Burgess also has a great behind the scenes look at the training routine of our Olympic canoeists.
Many highs, but some lows too
Some of the biggest highlights from Paris have been off the water. Few had predicted Maddi Wesche’s podium placement in the shot put, for example. As Dylan Cleaver reflected, her silver highlighted why the Olympics is often so exhilarating: “someone will almost always surprise you”. The games have not been without disappointment – think most of our swimming hopefuls from week one. But for me, the most confounding moments have been unrelated to our athletes.
The illness-inducing Seine, for example, which has similarities to our own polluted waterways, as The Spinoff’s Shanti Mathias examined. A comment on the article wryly pointed out that, perhaps, the Paris river had inadvertently become the best marketing campaign for cleaning up our own. Arguably less significant, though absolutely worthy of this searing Spinoff takedown by Madeleine Chapman, the state of New Zealand’s Olympics uniforms. Given how often our athletes have popped up on the podium this year, we can only hope things have improved in the clothing department come 2028.
The full list of medal winners:
Black Ferns Sevens: rugby sevens, women’s tournament (GOLD)
Lucy Spoors, Brooke Francis: rowing, women’s double sculls (GOLD)
Finn Butcher: canoe slalom, men’s kayak cross (GOLD)
Lisa Carrington, Alicia Hoskin, Olivia Brett, Tara Vaughan: canoe sprint, women’s K4 500 (GOLD)
Ellesse Andrews: cycling, women’s keirin (GOLD)
Lisa Carrington, Alicia Hoskin: canoe sprint, women’s K2 500 (GOLD)
Lisa Carrington: canoe sprint, women’s K1 500 (GOLD)
Lydia Ko: golf, women’s tournament (GOLD)
Hamish Kerr: athletics, men’s high jump (GOLD)
Ellesse Andrews: cycling, women’s individual sprint (GOLD)
Hayden Wilde: triathlon, men’s individual (SILVER)
Matt Macdonald, Tom Murray, Logan Ullrich, Oliver Maclean: rowing, men’s coxless four (SILVER)
Isaac McHardie, Will McKenzie: sailing, men’s 49er (SILVER)
Emma Twigg: rowing, women’s single sculls (SILVER)
Rebecca Petch, Shaane Fulton, Ellesse Andrews: cycling, women’s team sprint (SILVER)
Bryony Botha, Emily Shearman, Nicole Shields, Ally Wollaston: cycling, women’s team pursuit (SILVER)
Maddi Wesche: athletics, women’s shot put (SILVER)
Kerri Williams, Davina Waddy, Phoebe Spoors, Jackie Gowler: rowing, women’s coxless four (BRONZE)
Micah Wilkinson, Erica Dawson: sailing, mixed multihull (BRONZE)
Ally Wollaston: cycling, women’s omnium (BRONZE)
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Households in emergency housing down 32%
The government has welcomed a 32% reduction in the number of households living in emergency housing over the past six months, but Labour says that’s because support is now harder to access. The Herald’s reported that associate housing minister Tama Potaka called emergency housing “one of the biggest public policy failures we’ve ever seen in New Zealand” and led to a wave of children growing up in motels. From last December to June this year, the total number of households living in emergency housing has gone from 3,141 to 2,133, said Potaka. Labour’s housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty said the figures don’t paint the full picture. “[They’re] trying to crow about fewer people accessing support when they’ve made it harder for them to access,” he said. “The only honest way of reducing the need for emergency housing is to build more social houses – the very thing this government isn’t doing. Where have the families they’ve turfed out gone to?”
More reading: Kāinga Ora sold $80 million of state housing in five years (Newstalk ZB).
Police Association takes aim at minister over gun reform process
The Police Association has written a letter highly critical of the police minister Nicole McKee, reports Stuff’s Bridie Witton. The letter, from the association’s president Chris Cahill, asks prime minister Christopher Luxon to intervene in proposed gun law reforms spearheaded by McKee, who was a gun-lobbyist before entering politics. The letter alleges that the association was “deliberately excluded” from consultation on the reforms. McKee has not ruled out re-introducing the military-style weapons outlawed following the March 15 terror attacks and has asked for a review of the firearms registry. “It is our members who are literally in the firing line, combatting the threats posed by criminals all too willing to use firearms,” Cahill said in the letter. “It is police officers and employees who are responsible for administration of the Arms Act and ensuring compliance with this legislation.”
In response, reported the Herald, McKee said that public consultation had not started and the association would be able to participate in that process. “Cahill’s claims that we have been undertaking ‘restricted consultation’ and the Police Association has been ‘deliberately excluded’ demonstrate a paranoia ill-befitting of the organisation he represents,” she said.
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RNZ’s Guyon Espiner takes an in-depth look at Pharmac funding and speaks with the minister in charge, David Seymour. This piece includes some interesting tidbits around how the government’s cancer drug promise came to fruition.
This Thomas Coughlan column from Saturday on how the government risks being overwhelmed by issues of race is well worth your time. Incidentally, yesterday’s Mediawatch looked at how the media is also in the middle of the culture war.
There are a few interesting pieces about the electricity market floating around this morning, including Duncan Greive looking at what’s going on and whether it can be fixed. For BusinessDesk, Ian Llewellyn writes on the rise of SolarZero.
For the first time since May 2023, there’s a real possibility that the official cash rate might change on Wednesday.
Why is Upper Hutt’s main street struggling while the city booms?
I’m really enjoying the latest season of Taskmaster NZ. For Stuff, Amberleigh Jack looks at how the tasks are selected and I recommend you subscribe to The Spinoff’s Rec Room newsletter and read the latest edition on one of the most extraordinary moments from the show’s history.
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For his latest Windbag column, Joel MacManus looks at the shadowy conspiracy-aligned group targeting Wellington City Council. Shanti Mathias goes for a ride with endurance athlete Lael Wilcox, the woman who just doesn’t stop. For The Spinoff Essay this week, Kathryn van Beek follows the Swiss wolf, who walked 2,000 kilometres for love. Patrick Gower shares his life in TV and reveals more about his biggest story yet. Reviewer’s picks: The best value burgers at this year’s Burger Wellington. Catherine Robertson explains what it’s really like to be a romance writer.
That’s it for today, thanks for reading. I’ll see you back here tomorrow morning.
Let me know in the comments, or get in touch with me at thebulletin@thespinoff.co.nz, if you have any feedback on today’s issue or anything in the news.
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We don't get SkySports, so I was hoping for clips on the free-to-air channels, or YouTube. No such luck. I'm sure plenty of our tax goes to support the Olympics and given that it is supposed to be inclusive, etc. etc. it's disappointing that we couldn't even see highlight reels AFTER the events.
Ellesse Andrews absolutely dominating the sprint semi and final was such a great way to finish. She was amazing. The games were the best ever in my opinion. So many highlights, beyond the obvious of 10 golds.