Labour pledges vaping crackdown as Hipkins' honeymoon lead goes up in smoke

The party added pledge to policy this morning, promising to restrict the number of vape stores. Last night's poll suggests people are looking for the party to offer up bigger fish to fry

Mōrena and welcome to The Bulletin for Tuesday, August 22, by Anna Rawhiti-Connell. Presented in partnership with Z Energy.

In today’s edition: senior doctors and dentists to strike; further allegations of migrant exploitation emerge; thousands of families and cyclone victims subject to tax on family home under new rules; but first, new pledge on vaping from Labour as polling continues to surface cost of living as the most pressing issue on voters’ minds

Christopher Luxon and Chris Hipkins. Image: Tina Tiller

What does Labour do now?

According to last night’s 1News Verian poll results, if an election were held now, Labour would receive just 29% of the party vote. The same poll had Labour on 38% in January. The Greens are on 12%. National and ACT would have the numbers to govern with 65 seats in parliament between them. Labour is now sitting on an average of 29.3% across the five most recent polls according to The Spinoff’s polling snapshot. Toby Manhire writes this morning that the trajectory is unmistakable, and Labour leader and prime minister Chris Hipkins is running out of options. Manhire suggests that Labour now needs “a policy thunderbolt. That, and National stepping on a giant rake.” He argues that if the party is projecting out to 2026 to make good on the full realisation of the promise of things like paid parental partner leave, why not also stage out something bigger?

Cost of living still number one issue

Finance minister Grant Robertson told NewstalkZB last night that the party’s GST policy isn't driving its slump in the polls. It’s tempting to read last night’s poll results as a judgement call on that policy. It was conducted between August 12 and August 16. It’s perhaps less of an indictment of the policy itself and more of an indictment of how it measures up as a tactic to address the cumulative impacts of the cost of living. The 1News Verian poll found 48% of those polled cited the cost of living as the number one issue on the minds of voters. The next on the list was crime at 14%. 

Education policy prompts accusation of “stealing homework” 

Parties and voters are more than capable of addressing and assessing a range of important issues as campaign promises roll out. However, that result once again highlights that some of them might be getting swallowed up or consigned to the piles marked “tinkering” or “political football” in the face of what continues to be the most pressing issue. Yesterday’s announcement on education might also stand as another example of main-party convergence and a lack of differentiation in voters’ minds. Education minister Jan Tinetti announced the government would make core teaching requirements for maths, reading and writing compulsory. It was government policy and has been in the works for a year, but this close to an election, lines blur. As Stewart Sowman-Lund notes, National took the opportunity to immediately accuse Labour of stealing its homework saying it was a copy of its policy to “teach the basics, brilliantly”. The primary school teacher union disagrees with Natiuonal's assessment, while the Post Primary Teachers Association acting president Chris Abercrombie said the government's move was highly unusual.

Labour wants to restrict the number of vape stores to 600

This morning, Labour announced it will introduce further measures to address youth vaping if elected. It follows yesterday’s government announcement of the commencement date of September 21 for a series of new vaping restrictions including weaker nicotine concentration in vaping products and a requirement for all flavours to have generic names. Labour wants to go further, halving the number of vape stores around the country, limiting it to 600. It also wants all retailers to hold a licence to sell vaping products. Under Labour’s pledge, penalties for adults supplying children with vapes would double from $5000 to $10,000, while the fine for a shop selling to an underage person would rise from $10,000 to $15,000. No doubt we’ll hear from the National party on what policy it's planning on offering up on this issue soon.

The science camp helping Māori and Pasifika students to thrive

Diversity in academia is essential to expanding our knowledge systems and getting better outcomes for communities. Free hands-on science programme DiscoveryCamp is helping expose more young people to the possibilities of science. Applications are open now for the 2024 camp, so if you are, or know any young Pacific or Māori students keen to give it a go, read more about DiscoveryCamp on The Spinoff, and apply today (sponsored).

Senior doctors and dentists to strike 

In what is understood to be a first, around 5000 senior doctors and dentists will take strike action. Association of Salaried Medical Specialists (ASMS) chief executive Sarah Dalton said members wanted pay rates to increase with the Consumer Price Index. As the Herald reports senior medical officers have an average total salary of $318k including additional payments for shift work and superannuation. “[The vote] is a significant endorsement of collective action and reflects the extreme frustration of members over Te Whatu Ora and the government’s refusal to value our workforce, address staff shortages, and ensure that salaries maintain their real value against inflation,” Dalton said. Te Whatu Ora chief people officer Andrew Slater said they had received strike notices for September 5, 13 and 21 and were disappointed the national health agency’s “fair offer” had not been accepted. The offer would see all senior doctors get a $15-$26k pay increase and a lump sum of about $4k, topping up a settlement the ASMS accepted last year, which included a $6k increase in all pay scales and a $6k lump sum. Prime minister Chris Hipkins said the best way to resolve the dispute was to get back around the bargaining table and the government would work in good faith to resolve the dispute.

Further allegations of migrant exploitation emerge

Last week, immigration minister Andrew Little ordered an urgent review of the accredited employer work visa scheme. This morning, the Herald’s Lincoln Tan reports on further allegations of migrants being granted visas under the scheme but arriving to non-existent jobs or being offered far fewer working hours than promised. Karen Gibney, the president of the Latin American Community in Tauranga, said about 200 people from Chile, Colombia, Argentina, Uruguay and Bolivia paid thousands of dollars for visas and employment agreements to work with New Zealand construction company Buildhub. The Herald reports “many have received hardly any work or pay since arriving and some say they are ‘living like strays’ and literally begging for food.” Buildhub says it takes the allegations very seriously but categorically denies it had exploited, scammed or “sold” people’s labour to other companies, or that the employees had no work.

Reminder: Youth Wings 2023 live debate next week

We are hosting a live debate in Auckland next week for season two of Youth Wings. Chaired by Toby Manhire and featuring Dallas Kete (Young Nats), Ollie Murphy (Young Act), Keegan Langeveld (Young NZ First), Jas McIntosh (Young Labour), and Lily Chen and Ryan Blackmore (Young Greens), we'd love a good crowd their to chair them on. If you're a Spinoff member and would like to come, please email us by Friday for more info: members@thespinoff.co.nz

Not a member yet? Join up to gain access to exciting events like this, whilst also helping us bring you more of the content you love – it's a win/win!

Click and Collect

• Thousands of families and cyclone victims subject to tax on family home (paywalled) under new rules

• Prime minister confirms King Charles has approved the cancellation of sex offender James Wallace’s knighthood

• Judge finds sentenced prisoners were unlawfully moved from Arohata Women’s Prison after the Department of Corrections decided to move them because of staff shortages

• Scientists closely tracking a new Covid variant, BA.2.86, nicknamed Pirola

• What children’s bedrooms look like around the world

Right now on The Spinoff

Shanti Mathias explains why a ban on the use of cannabis for sportspeople persists despite changing social attitudes and scientific evidence. Sela Jane Hopgood was at Ōtara markets and witnessed the frantic and disrupted visit by the prime minister. B.E. Aster serves up a sequel in our series about the daily life of a children’s librarian. Max Rashbrooke assesses whether Labour has been the most “open and transparent government ever”. Sharon Lam attends the Venice Architecture Biennale and wonders if New Zealand has given up on attending these events too easily.

Sporting snippets

• A test of the country’s benevolence and maturity? Sir Steve Hansen is helping the Wallabies out for a week before the World Cup.

• Australia’s top women’s rugby players go public with grievances against Rugby Australia over alleged favouritism towards male athletes in the sport.

Cow vs. Crown

In case you missed it, I highly recommend Kirsty Johnston’s extensive three-part series for RNZ on how the government’s “world-leading plan” to reduce agriculture’s climate pollution went from hero to close to zero. As Johnston writes, “an attempt to regulate farming’s contribution to climate change has faltered” for the third time in 20 years. It traverses how the partnership between industry and government, He Waka Eke Noa, was born and how it fell apart.

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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