Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Is there a bright side to all the bad economic news?

I’m sorry to say it’s a bit of a bad day - a day of rather unpleasant economic news, I’m afraid.

Let’s start with the GDP number. It came in at 0.2 percent for the final quarter of last year, which is very much at the low end of expectations. We were looking for something in the range of 0.2 percent to 0.5 percent, with 0.5 percent being the Reserve Bank’s forecast.

Breaking Views Update: Week of 14.3.26

Friday March 20, 2026 

News:
Taxpayers’ Union Backs NPDC Mayor For Halting $1m Hapū Deal
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is backing New Plymouth District Council Mayor Max Brough for pausing a proposed service level agreement reportedly worth close to $1 million with Puketapu Hapū.

Taxpayers’ Union Investigations Coordinator, Rhys Hurley, said:

Dr James Allan: What’s So Great About Diversity?

‘Diversity is our strength.’ One hears this, or myriad variants of the same idea, unrelentingly. Certainly I work in an Australian university where the extent of higher-ups pushing this notion does indeed qualify as unrelenting, even matching totalitarian state levels of propaganda. But even outside the hallowed halls of impartial, politically balanced academia (did I write that with a straight face?) the mantra or cliché that diversity somehow delivers a stronger balance sheet or a more cohesive society or just better outcomes is pervasive in today’s democracies that have committed themselves to multiculturalism and to the various neo-Marxist versions of feminism. Sure, those spouting these ‘diversity is a panacea’ nostrums never cash out the claim. They never tell us precisely how ‘diversity’ is making society better or wealthier or more unified. We are all just supposed to take it on faith, as it were. We’re just to believe the bureaucratic, political and various professional bodies’ elites who push this line, and believe it simply because they are the ones telling us it’s so.

Dave Patterson: Trump Wants Help Securing the Strait of Hormuz

Securing and keeping the Strait of Hormuz open is a key objective of the war against Iran. It’s a big job that requires the suppression of Iranian anti-ship missiles and drones and the destruction of Iran’s capability to produce more such weapons. Though the United States is capable of doing the job, other countries, particularly those in Europe and NATO, have an interest in ensuring the strait remains secure. Consequently, President Donald Trump is asking for assistance in protecting ships transiting the Hormuz Strait. Initially, he received a cool reception.

Graham Adams: Media Campaign Against Luxon Risks Backfiring

Barristers often warn their juniors of the dangers of excessively badgering or humiliating a witness in court. There is always the risk that the jury’s sympathy will shift sharply towards the witness if they are suddenly seen as a victim of bullying.  

The media may be making a similar error in their attacks on Christopher Luxon, which many voters will see as going well beyond reasonable political criticism. In fact, some media outlets are making themselves look recklessly partisan in what appears to be an attempt to unseat the Prime Minister and reduce the chances of a National-led government returning to power in November.

Mike's Minute: Further proof the taxpayer poll was an outlier

Does the Talbot Mills poll out yesterday blow wide open the overt and corrupt actions of the parts of the media that went to town last week, and the week before, on the Prime Minister?

Does the Talbot Mills poll out yesterday with National on 32% also build on evidence that they are not 28%, nor were they ever 28%, therefore there was never a need to go to town last week, and the week before, on the Prime Minister?

Kerre Woodham: At what point does it become unaffordable to work?

To me, what is news is the fact that there are so many people who are working vital jobs, who are doing incredibly important work like our home support workers, and they are really struggling because of the petrol prices. That to me is news, and that to me is something we can do something about. That is going to impact us all as petrol prices surge past three bucks a litre. Sky appears to be the limit. It's going to impact all of us, even the EV drivers who'll end up paying more for anything that's delivered by road. But it's the people like the home support workers who rely on their own cars and fuel to visit their clients that you worry about. It's particularly tough.

Bob Edlin: Māori activists are buoyed by decision to drop Treaty vandalism charges....

Māori activists are buoyed by decision to drop Treaty vandalism charges – but Te Papa prefers to stay stum

An outfit called Te Waka Hourua issued a press statement to welcome a court’s dismissal of all charges against someone named Te Wehi Ratana “for action taken At Te Papa In ’23”.

Action?

That’s one word for it.

Blatant vandalism is another.

David Farrar: An outrageous legal complaint decision overturned

An Area Standards Committee of the Law Society fined Stephen Franks and Franks Ogilvy for, well being lawyers. They sent a letter on behalf of their client to health professionals involved in “gender affirming care”.

The ASC found that they had “used a legal process for an improper purpose”, censured them and fined them.

David Farrar: Desperation from Labour

A journalist asked Nicola Willis whether she would advise people to “ease back on the accelerator” or consider working from home due to higher petrol prices.

Nicola explicitly said she was “very reluctant to adopt the role of the schoolma’am telling people what to do with their own lives”. She went on to say that people will make their own choices based on their circumstances. That NZers are sensible. So she was explicitly saying, no she won’t tell people what to do.

Thursday March 19, 2026 

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Insights From Social Media: National’s ‘Service Delivery Plan’

Re National’s ‘Service Delivery Plan’ Graeme Spencer writes.

Since the inception of the "Local Water Done Well" reforms, I have always questioned what the end game is.

Forgive my scepticism, but anything involving water reform now tends to raise the hackles. After years of "improving water quality", we’ve seen millions, possibly billions, flow steadily into consultants, strategies, delivery plans, reform programmes, governance models, transition frameworks, and then revised versions of all of the above. None of this expenditure has reached our pipes, plants, or reservoirs.

Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Another common-sense move from Erica Stanford

Okay, once again - not for the first time on this show and probably not the last - thank goodness for Erica Stanford.

Normally, she’s righting wrongs in education but today it’s her other portfolio: immigration.

Ryan Bridge: Why today’s GDP number is not irrelevant

Old, yes. Backward looking, by its nature, but not irrelevant.

We’re tipped to grow around 0.3%-0.4% for Q4 2025. It would mark, barring any surprises, the second straight month of per capita growth on the trot.

That means average income and standard of living was ticking up on a per persons basis, albeit from a low base.

Mike's Minute: The Hipkins allegations and effect

I suppose the ultimate question is, what do you want in a leader, or more specifically, the Prime Minister?

Chris Hipkins is immersed in a growing mess around social media and an angry ex-wife.

Hand on heart, if it hadn't been sent to me I would not have asked, because I genuinely don’t care.

Guest Post: The Path Back: New Zealand’s 50‑Year Drift — And How We Can Still Turn Around

Wayne Jackson writes on Point of Order

New Zealand likes to imagine itself as a small nation that punches above its weight. But for the past 50 years, we’ve been punching underwater.

Since 1973 — the year Britain joined the European Economic Community and our guaranteed market vanished — New Zealand has been drifting while the rest of the world has been moving with purpose. The countries we once outperformed have overtaken us. The ones we used to pity now lap us. And the reason is painfully simple: when the world changed, New Zealand didn’t.

Peter Williams: National about to lock-in co-governance of local water

The following was written in Peter's capacity as Taxpayers' Union board member

In 2022, I joined the Board of the Taxpayers’ Union to fight Nanaia Mahuta’s plan to confiscate community-owned water assets and put them into ‘co-governed’ Three Waters entities.

And with the Luxon-led Government being elected with such a clear mandate, I thought we had won.

So it gives me no pleasure to give you the bad news. Co-governance of local water is back.

Centrist: If ministers can’t interfere, who fixes state-media bias?

Who is accountable at TVNZ?

Editorial independence protects TVNZ from political interference. But when balance fails, who is actually accountable?

Tim Donner: On the Brink - Long National Nightmare for Cuba Is Almost Over

Poverty. Hunger. Disease. Darkness. Misery. These have, for 67 years, been the defining characteristics of life in Cuba, a beautiful island nation 90 miles from American shores, brought to its knees by communism. Since Fidel Castro seized power on New Year’s Day 1959, the country has been in a death spiral, propped up for years by Soviet communists, then by Venezuela’s discount oil courtesy of President Nicolás Maduro until his capture. But now, finally, the totalitarian regime that has enslaved the people of Cuba has weakened to the point that its demise appears imminent.

Roger Partridge: Supreme Court matters - Why lawyers need to speak out

Imagine a system in which those who understand it best see a problem developing – slowly, incrementally, case by case – but choose not to say so publicly. Not because they are forbidden to speak. Not because they are ignorant. But because speaking carries personal cost, while silence is professionally safer.

The system continues to function. No single failure is dramatic enough to force action. Each adjustment can be defended on its own terms. Outsiders assume that if something were seriously wrong, those closest to it would say so.

Over time, the problem becomes structural. By the time it is widely acknowledged, it is no longer easy to reverse.