Bonfires, bread, butter and a boost in the polls

The government borrowed a leaf from the opposition’s book yesterday with a save and spend announcement that sees more policies heaped upon the pyre and benefits lifted

Mōrena and welcome to The Bulletin for Tuesday, March 14, by Anna Rawhiti-Connell. Presented in partnership with Z Energy.

In today’s edition: Te Pūkenga staff told they must remain politically neutral; $1.6b deficit modelled for TVNZ and RNZ if left as separate groups; government to give Pacific countries greater control over the climate change aid; but first, Hipkins unloads more policies and increases benefits in line with inflation

More policy binned and benefits lifted

We usually only get this much alliterative B word magic on Budget day but prime minister Chris Hipkins is sticking with the idiomatic “bread and butter” and the word “bonfire” is better in headlines than “bin”. If Christopher Luxon took a leaf out of Labour’s book the other week with the early childhood education and consultant spending cuts announcement, Labour took a leaf out of National’s by delivering a “save and spend” announcement yesterday that set more policies aside and allocated an extra $311m to increase benefits in line with inflation. Jettisoned policies include: the clean car rebate, legislation to lower the voting age, alcohol reform, a recycling container return scheme and a review of who should be considered a “contractor”, “employee” or “consultant”. Stuff’’s Glenn McConnell has a breakdown.

Food prices saw their biggest increase over the last year since 1989

Kudos to the Herald’s Claire Trevett for just leaning into the language at hand and sticking the landing in her assessment of yesterday’s announcement (paywalled) by quoting the literal cost of bread and butter from yesterday’s Stats NZ food price index data. Trevett writes that the “bonfire is slowly starting to starve National of things to attack Labour on” and that Hipkins has more to come with the Budget in May. Food prices saw their biggest increase over the last year since 1989, so the increase to benefits needed to be more than business-as-usual adjustments. The Herald’s Michael Neilson breaks down the boost to benefit levels.  

Cost of living issue most likely to influence voters at election

Last night’s 1News Kantar poll now has Labour in a position to govern in coalition with the Green party and Te Pāti Māori. Hipkins got a 4% increase in the preferred prime minister rankings and is now at 27%, while Luxon has fallen 5% to 17%. The poll also canvassed which issues were most likely to influence the way people vote and 48% of New Zealanders said the cost of living. Climate change came in second but at 12%, it’s a long way behind. While a couple of commentators have posited this year might be the “climate change election”, unfortunately, and despite the floods and cyclone, that looks as likely as making fetch happen. Former Green party MP Gareth Hughes was one such commentator, and he now says “This will be the cost of living election for sure.”

“We keep making short-term decisions at the expense of the future. It drives me nuts”

In April 2022, a press release from environment minister David Parker announced that the government had plans to “transform recycling”. Three schemes were touted and now one, the container return scheme, is gone for sure. It’s just one of the numerous measures promoted by the Green party to come a cropper yesterday. Green party co-leader James Shaw, admitted to Toby Manhire yesterday that he is “pissed off” and has been for a while. “It’s just exasperating and disappointing that we keep making short-term decisions at the expense of the future. It drives me nuts,” he said. Last night’s 4% poll bounce for the Greens, taking them to 11%, may provide something of a balm. Newsroom’s Jo Moir describes yesterday’s policy purge as “a depressing reminder of how cynical politics can be.”

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Te Pūkenga staff told they must remain politically neutral

We just can’t escape the notion of political impartiality at the moment. The latest call for political impartiality comes from Te Pūkenga CEO Peter Winders. The head of the country’s merged polytechnic has told staff, including academics, that they are “public servants” and must remain politically neutral ahead of this year’s general election. As prime minister Chris Hipkins pointed out, academic freedom has protection under law. Hipkins said legislation afforded academics a “different position” in terms of their ability to criticise the government, and that they had a role as “critic and conscience of society”. No doubt we’ll be having some discussion of academic freedom in the next few days, so here’s a couple of reads on the matter. The first is from the University of Auckland’s Matheson Russell on whether enough has been done to define the limits of academic freedom and the second is from the University of Canterbury’s Jack Heinemann and Garrick Cooper on serving as both critic and conscience and the balance required. 

Public broadcasters could face a $1.6b deficit over the next decade

BusinessDesk’s Daniel Dunkley reports (paywalled) that Deloitte were commissioned by the establishment board of Aotearoa NZ Public Media (ANZPM) to model the fate of TVNZ and RNZ if no merger went ahead. The report said the public broadcasters could face a $1.6b deficit over the next decade if left as separate groups. The report emerged one month after prime minister Chris Hipkins cancelled the merger. According to Deloitte’s draft paper, the two groups face a series of structural challenges including wage competition from large international players, the “significant” costs faced by TVNZ as it looks to overhaul its IP platform (the digital infrastructure behind its streaming offerings) and the rise of subscription streaming services like Disney+ and Netflix.

A message from me, editor of The Bulletin and head of audience at The Spinoff

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Government to give Pacific countries greater control over the climate change aid

Newsroom’s Sam Sachdeva reports on the government’s plans to give Pacific nations greater control over the climate change aid they receive from New Zealand. A new “high-trust model” is being rolled out for several countries with Pacific nations given climate aid directly, rather than being connected to specific projects. As Sachdeva writes, the Pacific's annual climate financing needs had been estimated at roughly US$1b per year, or up to 9% of the region’s GDP, with current levels of funding falling well short. As global temperatures continue to climb, regional GDP is expected to decline further by an average of 8.8% per year in the event of 2.5 degrees warming, or 9.8% if temperatures rise by more than 5 degrees.

Click and collect

• National leader Christopher Luxon tests positive for Covid

• Warning consumers may be saddled with costs of weather damage to powerlines

• Why New Zealand should lower motorway speed limits for SUVs and other high-emission vehicles

• Plenty of Oscars news round the traps and I admit to indulging in a lot of “people, everywhere, all at once” up in arms about the champagne-coloured carpet, but this is very effective from the New York Times on the significance of Everything Everywhere All At Once winning seven awards yesterday

• How lingerie sellers in China are bypassing the country’s strict internet censorship

Got some feedback about The Bulletin, or anything in the news? Get in touch with me at thebulletin@thespinoff.co.nz.

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“We do not understand these systems, and it’s not clear we even can”

Since moving to the Bay Area in 2018, New York Times writer, podcaster and all-round brilliant thinker, Ezra Klein says he has tried to spend time regularly with the people working on A.I. “I don’t know that I can convey just how weird that culture is. And I don’t mean that dismissively; I mean it descriptively,” he writes. “They are creating a power that they do not understand at a pace they often cannot believe.” Klein’s latest piece is a fairly urgent call to address the rapid development of artifical intelligence.

“One of two things must happen. Humanity needs to accelerate its adaptation to these technologies or a collective, enforceable decision must be made to slow the development of these technologies. Even doing both may not be enough.”