Ani O'Brien: A week is a long time - 5 July 2025

A NZ Politics weekly wrap-up

Luxon’s plans for Quarter 3

Despite not quite completing two of its 38 objectives for Quarter 2, Christopher Luxon and his Government are correct to call it a success. The two that were missed relate to removing barriers to capital markets and a Government AI strategy. Both are underway. In Quarter 3, there are 28 actions on the checklist and Luxon puts this drop down to the size and scope of the objectives. That didn’t stop the NZ Herald from running with the headline “Government gives itself fewer actions to do this quarter…”

Some notable inclusions:

• Next steps to improve supermarket competition.

• Repeal ban on offshore oil and gas exploration.

• Launch one-off Major Events fund.

• Pass the Resource Management (Consenting and Other System Changes) Amendment Bill

• Progress legislation to make stalking an illegal and jailable offence.

• Start delivery of rehabilitation and reintegration services to remand prisoners.

• Start delivery of an additional 21,000 elective procedures like hip replacements and cataract surgery in 2025/26.

• Implement the largest-ever annual funding increase for GP clinics.

A bad week for Erica Stanford

Erica Stanford is polished, clever, and probably in the wrong party. Her name often crops up in future leader conversations, in my opinion, mostly because of how she presents; she looks the part. This week, however, the Education and Immigration minister experienced her first bout of real political pressure and she failed miserably in her response.

Her scathing rebukes on Newstalk ZB to New Zealanders who are raising concerns about her Education and Training Bill was the first time many observed her lose her cool. She resorted to ad hominem and accusing others of lying. Note these are by and large not opponents of the Government. She launched an attack on their own voters. Her reaction should concern the National leadership as internally they are well aware of her notorious temper and refusal to listen to inconvenient advice. The pressure will only ramp up as we get closer to the election and this episode will not be filling the party with confidence that Stanford will be able to handle it.

ACT opposes Stanford’s inclusion of tikanga, mātauranga Māori, te ao Māori, and te reo in section 127. New Zealand First aren’t happy either. Now word on the street is that National ministers are frustrated at the rate at which she is burning through political capital. There are calls for her to back down and remove the section, but she is digging in. For now.

Additionally, the Government’s base have not responded positively to Stanford’s Parent Boost visa either. The new visa will allow New Zealand citizens and residents to sponsor their overseas parents to stay in New Zealand for up to five years and renew it once. Concerns range from those based on changing demographics, the problem of enabling de facto settlement and then saying people have to leave, pressure on the health system and infrastructure, and the fact that large numbers of elderly people who won’t contribute to the tax take will be nevertheless using public services.

A week of law and order announcements

The Government announced several new law and order policies and laws this week and their sentencing reforms came into action. The reforms place restrictions on how much judges can discount sentences based on things like remorse, youth, difficult upbringing, and other mitigating factors. It also introduces new aggravating factors and encourages cumulative sentencing for offences committed while on bail, in custody, or on parole. This is an improvement and should be celebrated, however, I do wish that the restrictions on discounting had been taken further. A maximum of 40% is still a large discount and I would prefer that discounting be limited to remorse and maybe youth.

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith, along with Ministers Winston Peters and Casey Costello, also announced the introduction of higher penalties for people who assault first responders. Police are already covered but this brings in other first responders and prison workers. They also will be creating a new offence for the “Coward’s Punch”. Winston will be thrilled to see this finally happening after New Zealand First was stymied by Labour in previous attempts to address the issue.

Funding for those in need pays for professional rugby team and contracts for family

Last week, it emerged that Whanau Ora funding had been used by a commissioning agency, Pasifika Futures Ltd, to fund the Moana Pasifika professional rugby team. This falls far out of the intended purpose for the funding which is meant to be a government-funded initiative with the purpose of empowering Māori families to take control of their own lives by providing holistic, family-centred support.

Now, the plot thickens and it emerges that Debbie Sorensen, the chief executive of Pasifika Medical Association Group (PMA), which includes Pasifika Futures, used Whanau Ora contracts to hire Ah Mau Sports and Wellbeing which is owned and controlled by her daughter and son-in-law. It turns out that Sorensen was also a director of both Moana Pasifika Ltd, the company that operated the Moana Pasifika professional rugby team and the shareholding entity, Moana Pasifika Charitable Trust. She is no longer on these boards.

Te Puni Kōkiri chief executive Dave Samuels has announced an independent review into the matters, including the conflicts of interest. I highly recommend Kate MacNamara’s reporting on this for the New Zealand Herald.

Pride, police, and kindergarten: sexual predators in positions of power

Safeguarding principles and guidelines exist precisely because sexual predators will use any opportunity to position themselves in roles of power with access to potential victims. This week there have been several high profile cases in which predators have been able to victimise women and children because safeguards failed.

In Britain, prominent Pride figure Stephen Ireland was sentenced to 30 years for multiple sexual abuse convictions. In a case that is reminiscent of Jimmy Saville in some ways, Ireland often attended events with police as a guest speaker and was able to influence their policy. The state enabled his access to young boys.

In Australia a horrific case is unfolding of Early Childhood worker Joshua Brown whose prolific offending against very young children is coming to light. More than 1200 children have been referred to be tested for sexually transmitted diseases including syphilis, gonorrhoea and chlamydia. The Victorian government is commissioning an urgent review, including on whether CCTV should be installed in childcare centres.

And, in New Zealand, we learned more this week about a police officer who pursued a sexual relationship with a 22-year-old woman whose rape case he was managing.

The New Zealand Herald reported:

The New Zealand Police code of conduct states staff must not enter into a sexual or intimate relationship with someone they met in a professional capacity, if an imbalance of power exists or if that person is vulnerable.….

“They need to accept that there is a huge issue with the police officers and sexual misconduct and relationships with victims. It seems that they’re okay with police officers taking advantage of vulnerable people.” - Alex McPhail

Rawiri Waititi has a murderous, anti-democratic, homophobic, authoritarian hero

The week ended with the revelation of more extremism from the ethnonationalists in Te Pāti Māori. ACT published a screenshot from the Te Pāti Māori co-leader’s Instagram account in which he calls Ibrahim Traore his “modern day hero”. Traore is the unelected President of Burkina Faso having taken the country in a coup in 2022. He initially promised an election in 2024, but he has since pushed that out to 2029. He has explicitly said that elections are “not a priority”. Much like Waititi, he is “not a fan of democracy”. According to human rights watchdogs, Traore’s government and militia forces have committed several massacres against civilians and when media report on them, Traore has them imprisoned or kicked out of the country.

Click to view

Traore’s most notable backer is Vladimir Putin who has encouraged the leader’s hardline stance against the French and provided material support.

To top it all off, in 2024 Traore introduced legislation criminalising homosexuality. He has characterised this as a return to African values and another step in turning their back on the imperialism of the West.

Usually front and centre to ram anything rainbow down our throats1, the New Zealand media was reluctant to report on Waititi glorifying a man who wants to kill gays or throw them in prison. They framed it as David Seymour “criticising” Waititi and sanitised the horrors of Traore’s violent leadership. Of course Seymour and ACT were looking to capitalise politically from attention to Waititi’s post. That’s what political parties do; they amplify their opponents flaws. But ACT’s criticism is also fair and right to point out the media’s bias. These are the outlets that gave us wall-to-wall coverage of Todd Muller’s MAGA hat (he had a Hillary pin too). Let’s be honest, if Christopher Luxon glorified a white, conservative Christian leader who shared Traore’s anti-gay beliefs the press would go apeshit.

It is time the media and New Zealand started taking Te Pāti Māori’s ethnonationalist and extremist rhetoric seriously. Believe them when they glorify violence in the name of race politics.

In short - other stuff that happened:

• One of New Zealand’s greatest writers Maurice Gee passed away this week aged 93.

• New Zealand's business confidence improved in the second quarter according to the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research's (NZIER) quarterly survey of business opinion.

• A 32-year-old woman has been charged in relation to a dead newborn being found in a wheelie bin in Auckland. She is in hospital and was unable to appear in court.

• Dr David Wilson replaces Tanya Unkovich as a New Zealand First MP.

• A New Zealand woman has been killed by a charging elephant while on safari in Zambia. She and a British companion had moved further away to avoid a mother and calf, but not far enough. The mother charged.

• Lawyer Graeme Edgeler has suggested that scrapping the census won’t be as simple as many think. It is mentioned in the Electoral Act as a way of outlining electorates and the section cannot be repealed or amended without a 75% majority in Parliament.

• The coroner has instructed New Zealand Police to reinvestigate the death of Southland toddler Lachie Jones, but has specified that investigators must come from outside of Southland.

Ani O'Brien comes from a digital marketing background, she has been heavily involved in women's rights advocacy and is a founding council member of the Free Speech Union. This article was originally published on Ani's Substack Site and is published here with kind permission.