Breaking Views Update: Week of 5.4.26

Wednesday April 8, 2026 

News:
Applications open for tangata whenua board vacancies at Council Controlled Organisations
People with the ability to represent and articulate tangata whenua perspectives and views, and have strong local tangata whenua relationships, are invited to apply for upcoming vacancies on two TCC CCO boards.

Mayor Mahé Drysdale says the roles are an important opportunity to strengthen governance and ensure tangata whenua perspectives help shape decision making.

Pee Kay: This is a social and financial fraud of massive proportions…

It was no surprise to see the “usual suspects” swiftly turn to their harmonised friends in the MSM to condemn the coalition governments, 2025 announced, review of the Waitangi Tribunal.

“This review is not about efficiency or clarity, it is about control.”

“For nearly 50 years, the Waitangi Tribunal has played a vital role in advancing justice for Māori.”

Colinxy: The Failure of the New Zealand Right - Why National Keeps Losing Even When It Wins

For decades, the New Zealand Right has been trapped in a strange political purgatory: it wins elections, but it never governs. It occupies the Treasury benches, but it never wields power. It campaigns as a counter‑force to the Left, but once in office, it behaves like a timid caretaker for the very institutions that oppose it.

National’s problem is not electoral. It is philosophical, cultural, and moral. It is a party that has forgotten what it is for — and worse, a party that is terrified of remembering.

Mike's Minute: Trump's way or the UN way?

So what is the alternative to what Trump has done in Iran?

The answer was discussed at a meeting over the weekend.

The British appeared to host it. 40 countries took part, including ours, and they were talking about what you might remember is the “global rules-based approach”.

That broadly was the way things were done pre-Trump.

JC: How Low Do National Wish to Go

The poll numbers are not kind to National or Luxon. Why? The answer is simple. National is not kind to its voter base. Can we identify the problem? Yes: it stems from the leadership of the party’s parliamentary team – Christopher Luxon, Nicola Willis and Chris Bishop. These three are driving the party down a road paved with ‘politically correct’ bitumen. Bitumen is a raw and sticky binding agent, now preferred to tarseal in the paving of roads, and National is using a political equivalent when it comes to matters of climate change and race relations. They are binding themselves to these issues in a ‘sticky’ manner that is very much at odds with their voter base.

Steve Gibson: Why Councils Need to Live Within Their Means

Across New Zealand, councils are drifting away from a simple principle that every household understands. You cannot spend more than you earn and expect it to end well. In Hastings, where I serve as a councillor, we are seeing this play out in real time.

Our council has approved a draft annual plan with a 9.1 per cent increase in spending. That is roughly three times inflation. At the same time, ratepayers are being asked to accept higher rates while the council borrows $4.8 million just to fund day-to-day operations.

DTNZ: Wayne Brown to scrap council meeting lunches

Auckland’s mayor has ordered an end to ratepayer-funded lunches at full council meetings after scrutiny of a catering bill that reached $1.4 million in the past year and nearly $5 million over four years, though meeting lunches themselves accounted for a relatively small portion of that total.

Centrist: The kids are alright – but the system still isn’t

First, the good news

Despite showing a sharp drop in serious youth offending and improvements across several frontline indicators, the report appears to have attracted little, if any, attention from RNZ or the wider New Zealand mainstream media.

Read straight, the latest annual report on the Child and Youth Strategy shows that, across several frontline indicators, New Zealand children and young people are doing better.

David Farrar: Fitch says we need fiscal consolidation

Fitch Ratings released:

Fitch Ratings has revised the Outlook on New Zealand’s Long-Term Foreign-Currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to Negative from Stable and affirmed the IDR at ‘AA+’.

The Outlook revision reflects our view that a substantial debt reduction is becoming more difficult to envisage, as fiscal consolidation has been delayed in the past few years. The general government debt-GDP ratio has increased substantially over the past six years as the economy has been buffeted by a number of shocks.

Tuesday April 7, 2026 

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Ryan Bridge: Should we be preparing to go to war?

An interesting article in the Herald yesterday about army training at Waiouru.

The troops are singing from the same song sheet as Winston and Judith in terms of how threatening the world is at the moment.

Taxpayers' Union-Curia Poll - April 2026

Here are the headline results for April's Taxpayers’ Union – Curia Poll:

Dr Michael John Schmidt: Pragmatic Water Management

In my previous article “WCC’s Actions Are a National Moral Hazard”, the objection to transferring water assets was framed in moral and ethical terms: councils hold critical infrastructure in trust for the public, and irreversible transfers undermine trusteeship and create moral hazards by allowing responsibility to be exported rather than exercised.

Colinxy: The Lie of “Endless Growth”

Why Marxists Keep Repeating It — and Why It’s Nonsense

One of the most persistent talking points in Marxist circles — and among their fellow‑travellers in academia, activism, and the bureaucratic class — is the claim that capitalism supposedly promises “endless growth.” According to this myth, economists and capitalists are engaged in a kind of metaphysical delusion, imagining that markets will expand forever until the planet melts, the seas boil, and Jeff Bezos personally blocks out the sun.

It’s a neat story. It’s also completely false.

Peter Dunne: No-frills leadership

Christopher Luxon's mentor Sir John Key quickly and successfully transitioned from international businessman to national political leader when he became Prime Minister. Luxon, on the other hand, is still struggling to do so. And nor is it clear that he even wants to.

Key's smooth transition occurred because he was both driven, and a sponge for new knowledge. He knew what he wanted to achieve, and was always eager to learn the best political ways of doing so.

Dr Eric Crampton: If free parking is a problem, the solution is obvious: Put a price on it

It’s hard to compete with free. Who wants to pay for something if you can get it for nothing?

Unfortunately, sometimes free comes at others’ expense, as it can with on-street parking. Better council parking management, including pricing, would encourage better decisions.

Nick Clark: How to fix RMA Reform

New Zealand's resource management system is broken. Many attempts have been made over the past three decades to fix it. All have missed the mark.

Cue the latest attempt, the Planning Bill and Natural Environment Bill.

Dr Michael Johnston: Teachers deserve better than their union

Every two or three years, the Ministry of Education and the teachers’ unions engage in the spectacle of ritual combat known as collective bargaining. In 2025, the Public Service Commissioner took over from the Ministry in the arena. But the exercise remains a ritual.

Everyone knows, more-or-less, what the outcome will be before bargaining even begins. The education budget is fixed, so the government negotiator has very little room to move.

Typically, the ritual goes as follows.

David Farrar: Murder data

I read an overseas article that cross-tabulated homicide data by ethnicity for both the victim and the killer. I thought this was interesting, so asked for NZ equivalent data. Sadly it was declined on privacy grounds, but they did provide the data without the cross-tabulation.

For those interested the breakdown by ethnicity for homicide victims for the last ten years is:

Mike's Minute: I can help Steve Abel

Steve is the Green's agriculture bloke and he wants an urgent inquiry into the Wattie’s and Heinz mess in Hawkes Bay.

He is wasting his time. Not because he shouldn’t be concerned, because he should. We should all be concerned.

But the answers he seeks are already readily available.

Monday April 6, 2026 

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Anglo Saxon: New Zealand's indigenous wealth transfer scam

Transcript:
“Radio New Zealand, is also a maori broadcaster in all but name and its granular source of funding.

 
Radio New Zealand is taxpayer funded, but separately from the funding dedicated to other Maori propaganda agencies.

We are in effect paying twice to hear about what a bunch of entitled thieving pricks we are.

The whole idea of Maui broadcasting has become a mission to transfer more taxpayer funds into the hands of Maoris.....”

Click to view  

David Lillis: Workplace Bullying and the Education and Workforce Select Committee

Recently I published a submission that I had made on the Health and Safety at Work Amendment Bill and indicated that I had asked to make a related verbal presentation to the Education and Workforce Select Committee (Lillis, 2026). The 5-minute presentation, given on 30 March, covered workplace bullying. See:

Caleb Anderson: The Economic Smoke Machine – Ignoring the Real Crisis

For decades, we have been told that "it’s all about the economy." It is the ultimate political conversation stopper, a blunt instrument used to narrow the scope of public debate to GDP, inflation rates, and the cost of living. While economic security is undeniably crucial, this relentless refrain has become a masterclass in distraction, masking a deeper, more insidious erosion of our social fabric, and inevitably of any sense of common good.

Pee Kay: “…the language is the lifeblood that fosters Māori identity.”

This Auckland University newsletter was sent to me by 1 of my mailing group.

Comments I have received so far –

…….even if not compulsory. 2023-26 is viewed as a short pause.

They need their heads read! What do they think this will do for their international ranking, or the attractiveness of the university to the parents of Asian kids wondering where to send them for higher education! Absolutely bonkers!

Dr Oliver Hartwich: The end of the golden bargain

Campaign slogans used to sell the future. In 1960, John F. Kennedy promised Americans a ‘New Frontier’. Bill Clinton chose Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Don’t Stop’ as his anthem. Tony Blair swept into Downing Street to D:Ream’s ‘Things Can Only Get Better’. Gerhard Schröder promised Germans he would not do everything differently but many things better.

These were statements of faith: the future would be an improvement on the present, and democratic politics was the vehicle that would take you there.

Dr Eric Crampton: A small tweak that could avert driverless car gridlock

Friction, at least as a metaphor for real-world inconveniences and minor hassles in doing things, is usually viewed as a bad thing. Something best done away with, if possible.

And that’s usually true.

But some frictions are load-bearing. Get rid of the friction, and important things can start falling over.

Matt Ridley: The gas price shock will expose Britain’s catastrophic energy misjudgment

Since a fifth of the world’s liquefied natural gas has to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, it is no surprise that the price we pay for natural gas has spiked sharply upwards. That’s bad news for people trying to heat their homes, use electricity, start an AI business, make chemicals, find employment or buy almost anything. Energy is the lifeblood of the economy.

Bob Edlin: Invercargill weakened its democracy to give tribal groups voice......

Invercargill weakened its democracy to give tribal groups voice – but one of them has relinquished its privilege

PoO must confess to having focused on the $33,000 costs of an Invercargill City Council “Code of Conduct” investigation, thereby failing to note the savings gained from a tribal group’s decision to relinquish a place on council committees.

The council four years ago voted to enable two rūnaka to appoint representatives to committee posts. But two voices have been trimmed to one.

David Farrar: Keep history on bank notes

The Bank of England has announced that they plan to replace famous historical figures from their banknotes, and replace them with cute animals. No I’m not joking. They cite a poll and the fact animals are harder to counterfeit.

Sunday April 5, 2026 

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Victor Davis Hanson: Iran, Anti-War or Anti-Trump? The Left’s ‘Hysterical’ Opposition to Iran War Explained

Victor Davis Hanson breaks down the media hysteria over Iran, anti-Trump protests, and the stakes for 2026. After everything Donald Trump has taken on, will division hand Democrats the win?

Click to view

Geoff Parker: When Did 'Consultation' Become 'Partnership'?

Lately I’ve noticed something creeping into the way government agencies talk — especially Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency.

An increasing number of projects now seem to involve “partnering with mana whenua. (Maori tribes)”

Not consulting. Not engaging. Just partnering.

That might sound like a small shift in language, but it’s doing a lot of heavy lifting.

Because here’s the simple question that doesn’t seem to get asked:

When did consultation become partnership?

Judy Gill: New Gods for a Dying Church

Or syncretism preparing the path for a one-world religion?

Contents

1. Syncretism and the absorption of Matariki into Catholic language and liturgy

Ani O'Brien: A week is a long time: 4 April 2026

BREAKING! Stop the press! Biggest news of the week!

Duncan Garner drove on a suspended license. Our media were on top of the story from the moment news broke. Push alerts. Banners. So serious was the reporting that Garner’s dear mum got into a state because she thought he had been hauled off to prison. But these journalists missed the real scoop. No, I’m not talking about the Leader of the Opposition being caught in another lie (although that happened). You heard it here first on Thought Crimes… back in the day Duncan Garner was banned from the annual media golf tournament aged just 22. How has he got away with it for so long? Why is he able to roam the streets freely without at least an ankle bracelet? He must be cancelled immediately! Tear up his goddamn passport!!

Simon O'Connor: BSA - Ideologically compromised?

The Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA) decision to include online broadcasting under its jurisdiction is an overreach, ideological, but also part of a global push to control speech.

So the Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA) has just granted itself more powers, notably to empower the complaining class an opportunity to harass those online sharing their views.

Dr Bryce Edwards: Democracy Briefing - The Political editors deliver their verdicts on Luxon’s reshuffle

Yesterday I wrote my own analysis of Christopher Luxon’s Cabinet reshuffle, arguing it was fundamentally about a Prime Minister punishing his rival and rewarding his loyalists. Today I want to go through what the political editors are actually saying about it, because on several points, the verdicts line up.

How the reshuffle was rushed into existence

Bob Edlin: Advice to Todd Stephenson - leave the patsies to others...

Advice to Todd Stephenson: leave the patsies to others and press on with promoting common sense in state agency names

ACT MP Todd Stephenson has used his right to question government ministers in Parliament to toss a patsy about the Government’s response to the prospect of a fuel shortage.

He could be accused of squandering his right.

Patrick McLaughlin: Capturing the Administrative State, Word by Word

Congress can tell you, to the dollar, what a new program will cost over ten years. It’s much harder to answer a simpler question: how much regulation are we adding—or subtracting—when we change the rules of the game?

We treat fiscal policy like a ledger. We treat regulation like a weather report: lots of feelings, few numbers.

David Farrar: Why are taxpayers lending money tied to airports?

Shane Jones announced:

A project to extend Hamilton Airport runway will receive a $6.5 million loan from the Regional Infrastructure Fund, boosting resilience for Waikato and the national aviation network, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says.

Dr Michael John Schmidt: WCC’s Actions Are a National Moral Hazard

At the heart of the Wellington City Council’s (WCC) decision to transfer water assets to a new, externally governed entity lies a fundamental ethical failure. These assets were not created by the Council, nor do they belong to councillors in any moral sense. They were paid for by Wellingtonians over generations through rates, charges, and debt serviced by the public. The Council holds them in trust, charged with their care, maintenance, and prudent management on behalf of the community.

Saturday April 4, 2026 

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John Robertson: The New Zealand Army Has Been Hijacked...

.....quietly, structurally, and without democratic consent. What should be a disciplined, secular fighting force has drifted into something else entirely: an institution requiring its personnel to participate in a belief framework they may not share. This isn’t about language or symbolism; it’s about compelled conduct.

Breaking Views Update: Week of 29.3.26

Saturday April 4, 2026 

News:
Preparing for reforms: new co-chairs for Regional Leadership Committee
News from Greater Wellington Regional Council Te Pane Matua Taiao
Regional council chair Daran Ponter and Ngāti Toa Rangatira Chief Executive Helmut Modlik will chair the Wellington Regional Leadership Committee (WRLC) for the 2025-28 triennium. While appointed as chair and deputy, the two will act as co-chairs.

Ani O'Brien: More advice ignored, Hipkins prioritised vaccine targets over safety

What the documents reveal about dose spacing, myocarditis risk, and political priorities

You can read my first dive into the Official Information Act requests here.

In this article, I focus on the tension between what evolving evidence and medical experts were advising about the spacing between first and second doses of the vaccine and the decisions regarding spacing made by the New Zealand Government, plus the way promotion of the vaccine may have breached law.1

David Neumark: The Minimum Wage Is a Dead End

Policymakers and voters care about reducing inequality and poverty, although they have historically disagreed about how to do this. In recent years, though, higher minimum wages having emerged as one of the most—if not the most—politically popular approaches to supporting low-wage workers and low-income families.

Dr Bryce Edwards: Democracy Briefing - Luxon’s reshuffle reveals a PM punishing rivals and rewarding loyalists

Christopher Luxon has announced his election-year Cabinet reshuffle. Chris Penk and Penny Simmonds enter Cabinet. Cameron Brewer and Mike Butterick become ministers outside Cabinet. Simeon Brown picks up energy. Paul Goldsmith gets the public service. Louise Upston becomes Leader of the House. The details matter. But the real story is what happened to Chris Bishop.

Bishop has been stripped of three roles: Leader of the House, associate sport, and most significantly, his position as chair of National’s election campaign. In return, he picks up the Attorney-General portfolio. On paper, you might call that a lateral move. In practice, it is a demotion dressed up as a promotion.

David Harvey: The Distant Yet Pervasive State

The Shepherd and the Flock: De Tocqueville’s Warning and the New Zealand Condition

This article arose after I had read a number of different pieces. One was Bryce Edwards’ “Democracy Briefing: The Establishment joins the electricity insurgency”. That in turn led me to Danyl McLuchlan’s Listener article “Fuel for a Crisis”. Then from out of the blue arrived a piece about the state of social media discourse and how volatile, vicious and elemental it can be. All this gave rise to some thinking about how remote Wellington seems to be, how out of touch the bureaucrats (who control the decision making process) actually are and yet by the same token when the going gets rough the howl goes up “The Government must do something.” These general themes prompted some research and and some thinking. The results follow.

There is a pattern to New Zealand’s political life that is so familiar it has ceased to surprise us — and that, in itself, ought to give us pause.

Brendan O'Neill: Anti-Trump catastrophism is the real menace to the West

The cultural elite’s dream of an American defeat in Iran scares me far more than Trump’s premature claims of victory.

Snark really is all that President Trump’s critics have left. They greet his every utterance, whether made in the flesh or on Truth Social, with instant sarcastic derision. Their cliquish cynicism was on full display during Trump’s address to the nation on the Iran War last night. No sooner had Trump said the US was nearing victory than his opposing army of nay-sayers was gleefully crowing: ‘Nah, it’s a disaster, we’re screwed.’

I can’t be the only person who now finds this voguish gloom more grating than Trump’s starry-eyed statements? Give me Trump’s possibly premature declarations of victory over these wet dreams of defeat any day of the week.

Roger Partridge: Wellington takes the gold

Winston Peters was in Westport on Sunday, announcing that a future NZ First government would return 50 per cent of all mining royalties to the regions where mining occurs. It is one of the more sensible growth ideas to emerge from this election campaign so far.

The logic is simple. When a mine is proposed, local communities experience the disruption – the consent battles, the pressure on roads and services, the divided town meetings. Wellington gets the royalties. In those circumstances, local resistance to development is not irrational. It is a predictable response to a badly designed system.

Dr Oliver Hartwich: NZ is too busy governing badly to govern well

There is an old joke about a man who visits his doctor complaining of fatigue. The doctor prescribes a course of vitamins and tells him to come back in a month. When the patient returns, the doctor asks whether the pills have helped. “I have no idea,” the man replies. “I could not get the bottle open.”

In this case, the joke is on New Zealand.

Andrew Dickens: Is there a magic age before we start worrying about peoples health?

I want to start with the story of Jacquie Kidd. Jacquie's a former nurse who's spent more than 20 years researching Māori health inequities. She is the AUT professor of Māori health and she is now facing her own terminal cancer diagnosis. She's got a touch of the bowel cancer, which has now spread to her lungs. She is 62 years of age.

Since she's found out about this cancer, she's penned a memoir called ‘Ngākaurua: My experience of cancer, identity and racism in Aotearoa’. Because of her work, obviously she's concentrated in her memoir and in her thoughts on how hard it is for Māori to get screened, how important it is for Māori to get screened for cancer. She's written that the system is too complex and that Māori also loathe to investigate symptoms because they don't want to be a burden to their whānau.

Friday April 3, 2026 

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Ryan Bridge: My thoughts on Luxon's reshuffle

The American President's doing a live presser today on his war.

The Australian Prime Minister's just wrapped a live address to the nation on the oil shock.

And here, our Prime Minister is making his own announcement about a cabinet reshuffle.

Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Why did Donald Trump call this speech today?

If you were hoping Donald Trump scheduling a speech meant there would be some sort of development in the war -either the US pulling out, putting boots on the ground or opening the Strait - then, like me, you would have been disappointed.

There was no news, was there? No announcement at all. Donald Trump was simply trying to convince American voters with PR - and it’s stuff he’s said before.

Rhys Hurley: MBIE paying staff for daily waiata sessions

Earlier this year, it was revealed that Health New Zealand was holding compulsory "Karakia" sessions during work hours. Now, our own research has uncovered something even more absurd, this time at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE).

While Kiwi businesses are facing economic uncertainty, the Ministry supposedly responsible for helping businesses has been spending our money on Workplace Waiata – i.e. staff singing sessions in their Wellington offices. And this isn't just a one-off thing: At their swanky Wellington offices, MBIE were hosting 30 minute sessions every work day, every week!

Point of Order: The reshuffle

• From the Beehive –

2 April 2026

PM refreshes ministerial teamRt Hon Christopher Luxon

Prime Minister

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has announced a refreshed ministerial line-up to continue fixing the basics and protecting New Zealand’s future.