Unheard reports:

Brewdog has sold an £8.8 million Scottish forest it acquired just five years ago as part of its Net Zero drive after mounting losses forced it to cut spending. …

The site, a former grouse moor known as the Kinrara Estate, was acquired by the brewer in 2020 to help with its Net Zero credentials. At the time, the Scottish brewer had grand plans to plant millions of trees and turn it into Scotland’s “biggest ever” forest.

However the initial planting was a failure because the trees died and Brewdog had now sold the estate to rewilding outfit, Oxygen Conservation.

“The time is right to hand over the reins to an organisation that specialises in protecting and investing in natural capital,” Brewdog said.

Under then-chief executive James Watt, the company said the project would help it become the world’s first carbon negative beer brand and be funded partly by sales of its Lost Forest beer.

However Brewdog, which rose to prominence for its eye-catching stunts, was forced to retract many of the claims about the forest after unveiling the purchase to much fanfare.

These included admitting that the estate was actually 9,142 acres rather than over 12,000 acres as claimed and that the site would absorb much less CO₂ annually than original expected.

The move signals Brewdog’s bid to revive its fortunes and focus on its main brewing business after a slide in sales.

The company’s latest accounts showed it posted a loss of £37 million last year, the fifth consecutive year of losses.

A brewer that sticks to brewing would be rather sensible!

María Corina Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize. Here’s a few things about her.

• She is an industrial engineer with a master’s in finance
• She started a foundation to care for orphaned and delinquent street children
• She has a long professional relationship with the Altas Network and gave a speech at the organization’s annual Freedom Dinner in 2009
• She founded and directed the Opportunitas Foundation, an NGO that provides support to children and youth from low-income families
• Also founded of Súmate, an organisation devoted to democratic development. Through this platform, she fought for electoral transparency, judicial independence, human rights, and popular representation. 
• She was charged with treason in 2004 for supporting the referendum to recall President Chavez
• In 2010 she was elected to the National Assembly with the highest votes in the country
• She was barred from standing in the 2024 Venezuela Presidential Election, but her replacement candidate was widely thought to have won the election, but Madura claimed he won and stayed on.
• Says freedom is the guiding principle, in order to leave socialism behind

The Post reports:

Ben McNulty puts securing his record-breaking number of votes and big margin over his rivals down to communication.

It appears he has secured the highest single number of votes for a ward councillor and the biggest margin over his rivals since the single-transferable voting system came in.

“I was talking to my wife [and said] ‘this is wild’. I kind of couldn’t believe the numbers as they came through,” the Labour councillor and Takapū/Northern ward councillor said.

I’m not hugely surprised. Ben is constantly communicating with residents. He posts regularly on all the neighbourhood Facebook groups (which most residents belong to) and tells people what is happening, what is coming up, what has been decided, how he voted etc. He doesn’t do so in a campaigning way (although he is, of course) but in an explaining way. He does AMAs on Reddit, and is a constant presence in his communities.

Liam Hehir writes:

The clash between the Broadcasting Standards Authority and The Platform has exposed a troubling reality in New Zealand’s system of government: ministers can now routinely hide behind the mantra of “operational matters” to avoid accountability for regulatory overreach happening on their watch.

Minister for Media and Communications Paul Goldsmith’s refusal to engage with the BSA’s bold attempt to extend its jurisdiction over internet content represents not principled adherence to constitutional convention, but an abdication of ministerial responsibility that demands a remedy in the form of either a change in approach or a change in minister.

When the BSA announced its interpretation that an outdated Broadcasting Act gave it authority to regulate internet platforms, it was reasonable for us to expect the responsible minister to respond.

This is more than an administrative decision about processing a complaint within a widely accepted framework. It was instead a fundamental expansion of state regulatory power into new territory, on the basis of a view for which there is no consensus, with profound implications for free speech and internet freedom.

It was incredibly frustration to see Goldsmith declare a preference to let things “flow through the system” and making only broadly supportive noises about the BSA. In short, the Minister has acted as if he was the BSA’s representative to the people and not the other way around.

Worth reading the entire article, but I think it nicely captures the frustration so many of us feel on this issue.

I am well and truly documented as being no fan at all of the teacher unions (PPTA/NZEI). The nature of the collective contract – that assumes all teachers are of the same quality and prevents schools with greater need providing any incentives for staff – is a major handbrake on the quality of our education system.

After a two day education summit I organised in Cambridge in 2022, with some outstanding people (and the, to be Minister Stanford in attendance), I compiled a summary of recommendations and tabled it while presenting at the 2023 Economic Forum at Waikato University. A summary is here.

Of high relevance at present is this one:
8)     Deal quickly and effectively with the Union demands after the next election. They offer nothing helpful to the dialogue so throw them a bone and walk on.

The Minister has signalled plenty of changes and made some. Some are positive and could be effective – others – such as the significant alienation of Maori through the bizarre work of Elizabeth Rata, and many process breaches – will only be damaging. The sheer volume of work and pace of change is also highly problematic – as is the major split between schools who are positive about a new qualifications system and more that are not.

To bring about significant change you need the teachers on your side – you need to carry the sector. It is no use telling them to just “suck it up and get on with it” – as they have alternatives – e.g. heading off to Australia, protest action, just ignoring changes in their teaching practice.

It is no use telling them that there is no money available as, if the Minister was serious on that front, there would not still be nearly 4,000 Ministry of Education FTE’s with vastly superior contracts to teachers (including OT, call-out payments, etc).

The teacher unions are a well known and predictabe animal. You don’t stand in a cage with a hungry lion and just give them a bit of beef jerky. If you want to survive you either shoot them (but there is no political will/courage to do away with the collective contract and truly challenge Union power) … or give them a decent meal so you can get on with cleaning the cage.

With inflation still running near 3%, plus all of the demands being put on teachers, the person/people who kicked off this fiasco by offering seondary teachers a salary rise of 1% per annum over three years (an approximately 6% drop in real wages) … is/are either really stupid or a massive Labour supporter. The Minister should have seen the very predicatable effects and stepped in immediately. National is reading the room on this like a dyslexic trying to get through War and Peace in a week.

Alwyn Poole
[email protected]
alwynpoole.substack.com

Radio NZ reports:

A union for primary principals has been able to secure a pay rise, because – according to them – it has not threatened strike action.

The Primary Principals Collective Bargaining Union has accepted a 2.5 percent pay rise this year, followed by a 2.1 percent rise next year, after four months of negotiation with the Ministry of Education.

Offered by Public Service Commissioner Sir Brian Roche last week, the deal was set for the next 26 months.

Of their 515 members, 85 percent voted on the proposal, 95 percent of them voting in favour.

President Mark Ellis said the union never reached a point where it felt a strike was necessary.

“Our membership has gone and accepted it as a good offer,” he said. “We can appreciate that, right now, we’re in a crisis for living costs and living wages, and things like that.

“In particular, our principals want to do their jobs, be in front of kids, be supporting teachers.

“I think the good-faith negotiations continued because we had not threatened strike action.

“I believe firmly that we were at the table in constructive conversation, we had clarity of communication and, in particular, we had prioritised our priorities very carefully.”

Great to see a deal done, and with both parties saying the other operated in good faith.

The difference here is PPCBU is a union with a sole focus – negotiating a good salary deal, and supporting principals. The NZEI is a political lobby group that listed Palestine as the first item on its agenda for a meeting with the Education Minister.

PPCBU only costs $300 a year for principals to join, while NZEI charges almost $800.

Radio NZ reports:

The coronial inquest into the Whakaari/White Island disaster has begun to look into how emergency services responded to the 2019 eruption and whether decisions impacted the chances of survival for those on the island.

The Whakaari/ White Island tragedy killed 22 people and seriously injured 25 others on 9 December, 2019.

The counsel assisting the bereaved families and the survivors of the tragedy, Anna Adams, said questions remained over why help didn’t arrive sooner.

She had previously told the inquest that 39 people were rescued from the island on the day of the eruption, entirely by civilian boats and helicopters.

I am glad this will be a focus of the inquiry. Basically if civilians hadn’t gone in, there would very possible be an additional 25 dead people. I can’t recall many disasters where emergency services rescued no one, but civilians rescued 39 people.

First responders are heroes. Their job requires them to go into dangerous situations. Firefighters go into burning buildings. Police have to confront armed offenders. Like most NZers, I am in awe of first responders.

A few months ago there was a school shooting in the US, and an armed police officer didn’t enter the building, leaving the kids at the mercy of the shooter. There was huge criticism of that.

There is no expectation that first responders should go into a situation where death is certain or even probable. But the job is to take a higher degree of risk in order to protect or save people. The cop who got shot by Tom Phillips is an example of that.

I suspect there were many first responders who would have happily helped rescue people from White Island, and that it was at the command level that the decision was made not to go in. A decision that would have probably led to 25 more dead people if it were not for the civilians who went in and rescued them.

It has been interesting to read the various reasons put forward as to why Tory Whanau failed to get elected to the Maori Ward.

I can’t recall the equivalent of a incumbent Mayor who has been elected with a huge majority, standing for a ward seat and failing to win that seat.

Some say Whanau has been the victim of racism, but as this was an election in a Maori ward, where the only voters are Maori, and all the candidates are Maori, this can’t be the case.

Some say it could be sexism. I guess you can argue that Maori in Wellington are sexist, but personally I see no proof of that. And after all Whanau got elected by a massive majority to the Mayoralty in 2022, by all Wellingtonians.

In fact four of the last seven Mayors have been women, and have resgned for 21 of the last 33 years. So I don;’t think Wellington is a sexist city, let alone Maori Wellingtonians.

The Spinoff says it is because the local Iwi endorsed Matthew Reweti. Now Reweti stood in 2022 and lost to a low profile Green Party candidate, so for him to now win against a high profile Green Party Mayor is a huge turnabout. I guess it could be the Iwi endorsement but he doesn’t mention it on his candidate statement. AFAIK the Iwi just out out a statement once, and didn’t campaign for him in any way. There was one local story about it in The Post.

We can’t know for sure, how influential this was, but if you are to claim it is the reason Whanau lost, then what is the proof behind that assertion?

Also of relevance is of the 20,000 Maori in Wellington City, only 1,000 are affiliated to Te Āti Awa. They are only 5% of Maori, and she lost by a 17% margin. There are 3000 Ngati Porou, 2,600 Ngapuhi and 2,400 Ngai Tahu.

There is of course another possible explanation. Which is simply that Maori in Wellington didn’t think Whanau had performed well as Mayor, and didn’t want her on Council.

A poll Curia did in January 2025 found that of residents in the Maori ward only 32% thought Whanau had done a good job as Mayor. Now to be fair that is higher than any other ward (11% in Eastern) but still not great.

It also found only 16% of Labour voters and 34% of Green voters thought she was doing a good job.

So I wonder if it is just possible that her performance in office is why she failed to get elected to the Maori ward, rather than racism, sexism or Iwi endorsement?

• The fact that public sector employees are paid an average of $2,003 a week compared to $1,592 a week for private sector employees whose taxes fund the public sector
• An offer to primary teachers that would see those paid over $100,000 increasing from 40% to 66%
• An offer to secondary teachers that would see those paid over $100,000 increasing from 60% to 76%
• An average total remuneration package for senior doctors of $343,500 a year, plus six weeks annual leave and a three month paid sabbatical every six years.
• A 2% increase for senior nurses whose average salary is already $125,662
• An offer to graduate nurses whose current salary of $75,773 would see them earning $84,150 by June 2026.

Radio NZ reports:

Leading credit agency S&P Global Ratings has reaffirmed New Zealand’s AA+ rating with a stable outlook, but noted budget deficits and debt need to be tackled.

They do. And there is some progress.

But conversely progress in tackling the state of government finances might lead to an upgrade.

“Indications of this would include the general government deficit contracting to less than 3 percent of GDP, and net general government debt or interest expenses falling on a structural basis to less than 30 percent of GDP and 5 percent of government revenues, respectively.”

So if we can cut the deficit, we may even get a credit ratings upgrade. This would mean paying less interest on the debt, freeing up money for health and education.

Radio NZ reports:

He said the then-government’s various big-spending policies, such as the wage subsidy and other pandemic support policies, also worked against the RBNZ’s approach and contributed to the inflation spike.

“Containing inflation over this period required the OCR to be higher than otherwise, if fiscal support during the pandemic had been more timely and temporary.”

This should be bigger news. The Reserve Bank Chief Economist explicitly says the spending of the last government contributed to the inflation spike. He correctly says that the problem wasn’t fiscal support but the fact it wasn’t temporary.

The Post reports:

It promised a better experience for pedestrians, attractive spaces for all, faster bus times, a quality safe cycling route into the city and ultimately a bigger spend by tourists on accommodation, food, and other activities.

But business owners along Wellington’s Thorndon Quay, where tens of millions of dollars of “improvements” have just been completed, say the project has all but destroyed them.

“It’s ghost town stuff,” said Steve Piper, owner of Co Kids childcare, “it’s dying”.

Piper said he had been forced to lease five secured car parks from the neighbouring hotel to ensure parents using the facility had somewhere to safely park, following a “near death miss accident” when a bus wiped out a car door as a pregnant mother with two children was about to exit her vehicle, and “endless complaints” from parents about abusive and fast cyclists.

A newly opened bus lane had reduced car park numbers even further, with 60 unable to be used between 6.30am and 9.30am.

They destroyed most of the car parks there, and surprise no one goes there anymore.

They now want to do the same thing to Lambton Quay!

Stuff reports:

Online radio stations and TV news shows could soon be regulated in the same way as terrestrial broadcasters currently are.

Media and Communications Minister Paul Goldsmith said the likes of The Platform, Reality Check Radio, and Herald Now are currently not covered by the Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA), even though some competitors are.

“It’s not obvious to me why one group of people who are broadcasting in a very similar way should be subject to the BSA and another group shouldn’t be,” he said.

Because one group need to get a broadcasting licence from the government, and the other does not.

But the best solution would be to have neither group subject to the BSA, and just have the Media Council as an industry self-regulator for everyone.

The comments come after Prime Minister Christopher Luxon told The Platform founder Sean Plunket that he had “sympathy” for him over what he called the BSA’s “overreach”, following revelations the agency was looking to widen its remit to include online media networks.

When asked if he agreed with Luxon’s comments, Goldsmith replied, “I always agree with the prime minister in the general sense,” but added, “the world has changed significantly”.

This is very messy.

The PM has clearly said that the BSA is overreaching, while the Communications Minister seems to be defending the BSA and saying it isn’t right that some media who produce video and audio are not covered by the BSA.

Surely they can all agree that any changes to what the BSA covers should be decided by Parliament, not the BSA?

Labour and Greens want us to run out of gas, having banned future exploration. They think the country can be powered by 100% renewables.

One problem is that many New Zealanders have gas powered heating and cooking. So what would be the cost of doing away with gas?

We now have an answer with this analysis by Castalia for the Gas Industry Company.

They find:

Consumers face higher direct cash costs from switching off the gas network than the BAU. Holding historical energy prices constant, switching off the gas network increases consumer costs by $1 billion over the 25-year forecast period, a 45 percent rise compared to the BAU scenario, as shown in Figure 0.2.

So an extra $1 billion cost to consumers.

At a regional level, switching off the gas network is projected to reduce emissions by 1.2, 0.2, and 2.1 million tonnes CO₂e in Hamilton, Gisborne, and Wellington, respectively. Under the historical energy price scenario, this produces an abatement cost per tonne of CO₂e of $879 overall.

Note the current ETS price is $57, so turning off gas would cost 15 times as much as other ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The Post reports:

A new charter school will be opening in Wellington – one of three new charter schools given the green light by the Government.

Altum Academy will be taking over the site of Wellington’s Cardinal McKeefry Catholic Primary School in Wilton from term one, 2026, said the school’s trust executive director, Jonathan Ayling.

Good to see the site won’t be wasted.

It will be teaching the “classical model” approach, and would be a secular school.

“Classical education is orientated towards the production of virtue and wisdom,” Ayling said.

He said the concepts being discussed weren’t necessarily religious or tied to any specific faith, but reflected values deeper than just transferring knowledge. He noted that the school had signalled a shared Judeo-Christian value basis.

That’s an exciting option, which parents will now have. A focus on virtue and wisdom!

Regardless of your views on whether an Internet based media outlet is a broadcaster or not under The Broadcasting Act, there can be basically no defence of how the BSA has gone about this issue.

I asked the BSA if they had ever asked an Internet based media outlet (such as The Platform or Reality Check Radio) to file an annual return with them, or broadcast a daily message of 15 seconds about the BSA complaints procedure. These are both statutory (ie mandatory) requirements of broadcasters under the Broadcasting Act. They replied (and credit to them – within 24 hours, not the 20 days they had) and said they have not.

This is not defensible. If the BSA thinks these platforms are broadcasters they should have years ago approached them and told them of these requirements. The BSA is basically saying they will define these platforms as broadcasters for the purposes of complaints, but not for other purposes. You can’t pick and choose.

Their “policy” of waiting for a complaint to then decide is a legal nonsense. The Broadcasting Act requires compliance regardless of complaints. Not filing an annual return is a $100,000 fine.

So not only is the BSA on shaky grounds legally, they are on even worse grounds in terms of fairness. The BSA has never reached out to Internet platforms to say we consider you bound by our codes. But now they are saying we may consider a complaint which finds you in breach of them – and we could fine you or order you off the “air”. This is basically entrapment.

If a media outlet knew they were bound by the BSA codes, then they might operate quite differently. But to not tell them in advance you consider them bound by the BSA codes, and then decide in a secret meeting that they are bound and you will consider if they are complaint is again against all natural justice.

Now the leaders of ACT and NZ First came out and made very clear they were appalled by what the BSA is trying to do. But sadly the Minister is not only not appalled, he even seems to be supporting them. Mediawatch reported:

“That’s in the media reform package that went out for consultation… and the government’s yet to make final decisions. But in the meantime the BSA is out there with what it considers is within its current ability to do,” Goldsmith told Mediawatch this week.

“There’s a lot of noise about it at the moment. Of course if you’re in the sector you want to draw attention to yourself and so a lot has been said. I don’t think our democracy is under threat, but it’s an interesting little exercise.”

“I think there’s a very small group of people in that category. They’re within their rights to test that and it may well go before the courts. I’m happy to let that flow through the system and see how it goes.”

So the Minister has said he sees no problem with the BSA taking an Internet media company to court to test things. Never mind that the $100,000 cost of defending this power grab in court would probably bankrupt the media organisation which run on a smell of an oily rag.

And here is where the politics is daft. trust in legacy media keeps dropping. Those on the centre right of politics especially thinks they do not get a fair go from legacy media. Taxpayers fund state broadcasters such as Radio NZ and Maori TV which are overwhelmingly hostile to centre right beliefs. But there has been some light for those on the centre right – the Internet. The Platform, Chris Lynch, RCR etc have found a niche where issues that are taboo for other media can get reported on and discussed. And now we have a government quango, with the apparent support of the Minister, doing their best to destroy them. Because make no mistake bringing them under the BSA would destroy them. They would face scores of complaints every week from activists who hate the fact they exist.

And this is (in my opinion) part of why National is losing support to other parties on the centre right. They simply don’t seem to care. How do you explain to a National Party voter who likes listening to The Platform why they should still vote National instead or NZ First or ACT, when those two parties are saying no to the BSA power grab, and National is a silent accomplice?

National needs to focus on improving the health system, schools, the economy etc to win centre votes. But unless they want to be in a government where they have no List MPs because they lose so much support to ACT and NZ First, they need to not be dismissive of issues like this.

In no way should National be making the BSA issue a major issue they spend a lot of time on. But what they could do is simply have a senior MP or Minister clearly state:

• It is up to Parliament to change the definition of a broadcaster, not the BSA
• That as the BSA has never asked any Internet based media outlet to file annual returns or publicise the BSA complaints procedure, they can’t suddenly declare via a secret decision that such an organisation is in fact a broadcaster

But instead they are giving the green light to the BSA to try and cripple new media organisations.

UPDATE: Good news. I missed it yesterday but it seems the PM was asked about this issue at his post cabinet press conference and three times he said that he thought this was overreach by the BSA. Great to see the PM aware of this issue, and being very clear that he sees it as overreach. I hope the BSA is listening – this now means the PM, Deputy PM and NZ First Leader have all said this is overreach.

It will be interesting to see who Andrew Little appoints as Deputy Mayor. There are broadly three paths open to him – an independent, a Labour Councillor, or a Green Councillor.

If he chooses an independent councillor (they are all centre to centre right) this will be a sign that he wants a unity council. There are ways he can do this, beyond the Deputy Mayor such as committee chairs etc. But that would be a powerful sign that he wants one team on council. The possible candidates are Nicola Young and Diane Calvert. As Young endorsed him while Calvert stood against him, I would say Young is the most logical choice.

If he wants a Labour councillor on the basis he is endorsed by Labour then the two candidates are Ben McNulty and Nureddin Abdurahman. McNulty would be the obvious choice based on his huge majority in Northern Ward, and also his clear political and communication skills. However two white men in charge might offend the woke police.

He could go with a Green councillor which would help him have a 10-6 progressive majority for key votes. The two Councillors who have done a full term or more previously are Laurie Foon and Rebecca Matthews. Both could be challenging. Foon was Tory Whanau’s Deputy Mayor so keeping her on may look like the status quo too much. However Matthews has very bad relationships with many in Labour (she used to be Labour) and it is hard to see Little boring up goodwill on her.

So the three most likely are Young, McNulty and Foon with Calvert and Abdurahman possibilities.

Radio NZ reports:

Wellington’s new Mayor says something has “gone seriously wrong” with council management processes that have allowed project costs to spiral out of control. …

Little said he would not freeze current initiatives – such as the Town Hall refurbishment – but projects needed to be reviewed and managed differently to protect ratepayers from ballooning costs.

In October 2023, councillors voted to continue work on the Town Hall despite projected costs reaching up to $329 million in the years following it’s closure in 2013 due to earthquake concerns.

“It’s making sure that the review processes – that we’ve got during the course of a project – are such that if we get to the point where you say ‘it’s a choice between writing off $50m spent or running the risk of another $200m’ actually we’re better off to write off the $50m and either start again or do something different” Little said.

It is good to see Little reject the sunk cost fallacy which is you must keep spending on a project whose costs have blown out, because of how much you have already spent. Let’s see if he can deliver though.

Last month I blogged on what Andrew was promising, and how we could judge if he has delivered. The summary is:

• Reducing the planned rates increase for next year from 12% to under 10%
• Reducing the planned rates increases for out years from 7% to under 5%
• Reducing the median time for a building consent from 10 days
• Increasing funding for community facilities in the LTP from $60.5m
• Improving the results of the annual residents survey from 23% who think WCC makes decisions in the best interests of the city

I hope he can achieve these.

Labour’s co called Future Fund is nothing like Singapore’s Temasek Holdings.

There are decent pros and cons towards a country having an investment fund. We already have one – the NZ Super Fund. Their job is to get the best returns on their assets.

Labour is proposing basically a giant corporate welfare fund, which can will either lend money to, or invest in NZ companies. Beyond doubt, they will pick favoured industries for the fund. So it will just be another version of the corporate welfare we already have.

Temasek Holdings invests around the world. It has 14 global offices from China to Mexico to the UK to France etc. Only around 27% of its investments are in Singapore.

The Government currently gets around $1.5 billion a year in dividends from various companies. These are currently used to fund health, education, police etc. Labour is promising to take that $1.5 billion and instead stick it in a corporate welfare fund. So they will need to either increases taxes by $1.5 billion a year, or borrow more for health, education, police etc.