Geoff Parker: Three Flags, One Country

How missionary ensigns and modern protest symbols came to fly over a single civic state

Before European contact, Māori had no flags or symbols representing a single nation or tribe. Identity and authority were expressed through iwi, hapū, and hapū-based networks, not emblems. Yet today New Zealand naively — and without public mandate — flies flags from public buildings that are not the flag of New Zealand. We are told this reflects history, respect, and recognition. In reality, it reflects the modern imposition of symbols to advance political claims they were never designed to carry.

Breaking Views Update: Week of 1.2.26

Saturday February 7, 2026 

News:
RIF funding supports 100 new homes in Kaikohe
The Government is investing $4 million from the Regional Infrastructure Fund for infrastructure to support the Bisset Road social housing project in Kaikohe, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones and Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka say.

The Regional Infrastructure Fund (RIF) will support essential infrastructure such as roads, stormwater and wastewater, and infrastructure for carrying utilities like power and telecommunications.

Ani O'Brien: Waitangi 2026 - the year of in-fighting on the Left

Labour and Te Pāti Māori competed in the drama stakes airing their dirty laundry

Waitangi Day is an annual time of remembrance, renewal, grievance, self-flagellation, and competing narratives. The summer ritual at the Treaty Grounds is part civic commemoration, part political theatre, and part family reunion. It is also, the ultimate testing ground for the mettle of centre-right politicians. There is a difference between demonstrating respect and grovelling, and often leaders fall into the trap of the latter.

Waitangi is where speeches are met with heckling and iwi remind the Crown of nearly 200 years of promises as well as issue new demands. This year’s commemorations were charged with protest, apology and juicy gossip, yet they also contained glimmers of hope and common sense.

Pee Kay: The Theatre That is Politics

“It’s that kind of Aotearoa – generous, confident and united – that I want my children to grow up in.”

Does that comment resonate with you? Is that a statement that would influence the way you voted?

Other than the Aotearoa nonsense, yes it probably could influence the way I voted.

David Harvey: I Cannot Live Without Books - The Library

All of my life I have been involved in libraries. We had a library at home when I was young and on the bicycle ride to and from school I went past the Remuera Library on Remuera Road and often stopped - through the doors and hard right to the children’s section – for a browse and often a borrow.

There was a library at school and when I went on to the College – surprise surprise – I volunteered as a librarian.

When I was in the US on my AFS year I haunted the local library at Redwood Falls – one of the Carnegie Libraries. It was in this establishment that I began to develop and learn research skills.

Dr Michael Bassett: The Treaty or Te Tiriti? It Matters.....

If you are watching the bizarre goings on at Waitangi, keep an eye out for which politicians use the term “The Treaty”, and which refer to what was signed on 6 February 1840 as “Te Tiriti”. The Treaty is the term that was used originally, and it described a three-clause document that ceded sovereignty over New Zealand for ever to Queen Victoria. In return, the Queen guaranteed Maori chiefs control over their lands and “taonga”, and in the third clause guaranteed Maori the same “rights and duties” as were enjoyed at that time by Englishmen. The Treaty of Waitangi is the name by which the document was known for more than 150 years.

Dr Eric Crampton: The misguided fuss over ‘2 million more’ houses for Auckland

Right now, Auckland Council’s zoning allows people to build about a million shops selling tasty pies.

Tomorrow, someone could buy or lease a commercially-zoned site near you and turn it into a shop selling pies. The shoe store could turn into a pie shop. So could the butcher’s. The barber shop too.

It would be possible to buy up every storefront in your local village centre and have nothing but pie shops. Zoning would usually allow it.

Kerre Woodham: The unemployment figures make for grim reading

Stats New Zealand released the labour market statistics yesterday while I was on air talking to my caller Troy, and the numbers were not good.

KW: The unemployment rate is 5.4% in the December quarter, up 5.3 in September. So we'll discuss that with Liam Dann in a minute. There we go.

T: Interesting in an election year, that will be interesting for sure.

Peter Dunne: The state of the economy

The election year blame game over the state of the economy is underway, with all the accompanying fanatical partisan vehemence that makes the politicians' claims and counterclaims tedious and pointless.

National will always say that they have spent their time in government cleaning up the unmitigated mess left by the last Labour government. And Labour will shamelessly claim that National has wrecked all the economic gains they secured while in office. The only point both have in common is their blind insistence that, based on their respective records in government, the other side should never be trusted in office again. But the underlying truth is that neither should be believed when it comes to their claims about how well they can manage the economy.

JC: What Is the New World Order?

If you research for a definitive answer to this question, you will likely be disappointed. There are many ideas and theories but no one specific narrative that combines them into one coherent statement. Hence we have talk of various countries (superpowers) wanting to build a new world order. This leads to an assumption that the world could be divided into blocks. Should that happen, it’s possible more conflict than cooperation could occur. The new world order concept has also been described as a conspiracy theory...

David Farrar: A good time to be a first home buyer

Radio NZ reports:

2026 is a “Goldilocks” year for first-home buyers, with lower interest rates, lots of houses to choose from and banks willing to lend to people with small deposits, market commentators say.

Friday February 6, 2026 

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Ryan Bridge: Happy Waitangi Day!

You’ll probably see and hear a bit of argy-bargy up North today as the politicians get welcomed onto the Treaty Grounds.

If you’ve never been up there, it’s easily one of the best ‘Kiwi’ weekends you’ll experience. The sunshine’s guaranteed. People are friendly. The grub’s good and there’s plenty of watering holes filled with political chats flowing long into the night.

Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Wellingtonians should be angry about this

Here’s a question for you: Was your first reaction to the news of sewage pumping into Wellington’s water something along the lines of, “Oh well, these things happen”?

I ask because I’ve spent the past 24 hours fighting the urge to wave this away as one of those unfortunate, unforeseen things that just happen from time to time. You know — mistakes happen.

Caleb Anderson: The loss of personal sovereignty and the war on common sense

A war has been raging in our universities and institutions for over fifty years. This is a war on common sense, but also on personal sovereignty.

It was interesting to read recent data indicating that approximately 60% of those who enter psychological counselling in the United States exit counselling before the mid-point is reached. I suspect the figure would be largely similar in other Western countries. Approximately 10% complete their therapy. The primary reasons given for non-completion were lack of motivation, and inability to be contacted by the counsellor ... by simply not returning calls.

Peter Bassett: When cycleways and rainbow toilets take over, the pipes rot

There are moments in public life when irony does not merely tap you on the shoulder but smacks you in the face with a dripping length of sewer pipe. One such moment arrived this week when Julie Anne Genter, Wellington’s most indefatigable apostle of cycleways, emerged solemnly to inform us that the Moa Point sewage disaster was “a terrible reminder of the importance of investing in our infrastructure”.

Judy Gill: The Bar was Lowered — and a Third of Boys Still Failed

How ERO reporting allows primary schools to escape academic scrutiny and why low parent expectations mean it goes largely unchallenged

When an Education Review Office (ERO) report describes students as “not yet achieving,” “priority learners,” or “requiring acceleration,” it is avoiding a simpler truth: some children are failing to meet basic academic expectations.

Roger Partridge: The Crown versus the People - Reclaiming New Zealand’s democratic story

Turn on the news and you will hear endless references to the Crown: “Crown obligations,” “Crown land,” “Crown Treaty settlements.” Politicians make decisions “on behalf of the Crown.” Courts issue rulings about what “the Crown” must do.

Yet ask Kiwis what this “Crown” actually is, and many will give blank stares.

Mike's Minute: The unemployment rate dazed the Government

It could have been a coordinated knife to the Government's heart.

On the day the unemployment rate went up, the Warehouse offered a real world example of the problem by announcing another 270 jobs would be added to the pile as they look to save and outsource and generally reorganise themselves.

Pee Kay: A Biased Survey or Survey bias?

Survey bias occurs when the survey methodology is skewed to systematically favour a prescribed outcome. This, obviously, leads to results that do not accurately represent the correct or true feelings of the target population.

Survey bias can be perpetrated by phrasing the poll questions in a manner that can significantly influence, guide, and determine the answers provided by poll respondents.

Leading or loaded questions steer poll respondents toward prerequired or predetermined answers.