Dr Oliver Hartwich: Losing sight of the lucky country – why we need a crisis to reform again

When I first visited Sydney in 1999, what struck me most were the cranes. They stood over the city in every direction, building towers, stadiums and rail lines for the Olympic Games. The future was being built, quite literally, in front of my eyes.

I had come partly to meet, at last, the South Australian penfriend I had been writing to since 1991 and whom I later married. Australia had always been my dream destination, but at least at the time I thought it would be a one-off holiday.

It felt refreshing to be in Australia. Back home, The Economist had just called Germany “the sick man of the euro”. Some four million Germans were out of work, and reforms were debated for years before being quietly shelved.

Australia back then was the opposite.

Nick Clark:

Localism is a wonderful thing. I recommend it to any politician in opposition. It draws applause and offers a chance to accuse one's opponents of being control freaks.

 
Last week, at the annual Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ) conference, I watched Labour, Green and Opportunity politicians champion partnership with councils. 'Communities deserve respect,' they said. 'Ministers should listen. The Coalition Government is getting everything wrong.'

Monday October 26, 2026 

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NZCPR Newsletter: Defining Election Issues

Voting for the 2026 election has started. Anyone living overseas can now vote. Within New Zealand, early voting starts on Monday. At the last election, over 60 percent of voters had already voted by Election Day.

So, with the left and right blocs neck and neck in the polls, let’s look at five defining issues as we head towards November 7.

Breaking Views Update: Week of 25.10.26

Monday October 26, 2026 

News:
Mahurangi Oyster Farmers, Te Uri O Hau, Celebrate $2.8m Investment

A $2.8m Government funding boost will allow Mahurangi oyster farmers affected by sewage-related harvest closures to shift oysters to Kaipara Harbour for purification, while supporting the establishment of a Māori-owned oyster farming operation.

Geoff Parker: Godfery’s Great Omission

Morgan Godfery’s claim that New Zealand’s latest “race relations crisis” will “almost certainly resolve in favour of Māori” is a political prediction dressed up as historical inevitability.

A political prediction — resting on remarkably convenient omissions and unexamined assumptions.

Godfery tells us that Māori power has grown. He does not properly explain how it grew.

David Harvey: Two Solicitors-General - two constitutional visions

Within the space of a couple of months, we have had the advantage of speeches from Una Jagose KC, the recently retired Solicitor-General, and Anna Adams KC, her successor in the role.

Jagose gave a reasonably relaxed speech in July 2026 at a breakfast organized by The Law Association and which was reported in LawNews. I wrote a critique of that speech which was also published in Law News.

Richard Prebble: Who else?

“It is just as important to say what you are against as what you are for”.

Political candidates take their lead from their leader. They need to know not just what the party stands for, but what it stands against.

While in no way excusing Kerrin Leoni’s attempt to cover up her gang visit, it is obvious that she and her campaign team did not know Chris Hipkins’ position on gangs.

Net Zero Watch Samizdat: Jackdaw gets the green light as Britain's energy security comes under scrutiny

This week, Labour approved the Jackdaw gas field while Rosebank remains in limbo. Meanwhile, winter blackout warnings are mounting, energy bills could rise again and ministers are reportedly considering cuts to Net Zero spending. Is the Government's green agenda becoming a casualty of its own contradictions?

Ashley Church: The new symbol of anti-western hatred

The latest face of an ancient evil

As we watch the scenes of chaos emerging out of France we see the same unifying emblems which have become synonymous with protest in the West. Disparate groups rallying for a range of causes including poverty, socialism, open immigration, climate change, and opposition to Western governments increasingly gather under the same colours and motifs: the Palestinian flag, supported by the keffiyeh and the covered face. These have become fundamental to the architecture of protest.

Dr Oliver Hartwich: Judged by their peers

The Herald's 'Mood of the Boardroom' survey has become a fixture in New Zealand's media calendar. Once a year, the chief executives and chairs of the country's largest companies deliver their verdict on political leaders.

What has made the past years different is that they are passing judgement on a government led by one of their former peers. National's leader Christopher Luxon was CEO of Air New Zealand, and his deputy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis, was a senior Fonterra executive before they entered politics.

Dr Michael Johnston: Stay the course with maths reforms

The Reserve Bank adjusts interest rates to keep inflation under control. This does not work with perfect precision, but it works. There is one measure, one lever and a well-understood relationship between the two.

Not every policy goal is like that. Education Minister Erica Stanford took office promising to reverse a decades-long decline in New Zealand school education, especially in literacy and mathematics.

Kerre Woodham: That wasn't a family gathering, that was campaigning

The gangs, as we know, create wholesale damage and destruction in our society through their drug trafficking. Now it looks like they're causing wholesale damage to Labour.

After roundly criticising members of the Greens and Te Pati Māori for visiting a mongrel mob gang pad and posing for photos, putting it on your social media, Labour leader Chris Hipkins ruled out his coalition partners holding the justice or police portfolios in any government he was in charge of. He was talking tough. Now it transpires one of his own MPs was campaigning with gang members, with a video circulating of Kerrin Leoni in a Labour jacket handing out Labour Party flyers to mobsters.

LilBaP: The Five Demands for Opportunity’s Bottom Lines

Guest Post on GoodOil by LilBaP

Opportunity has published five policies it calls non-negotiable. The five are short. They name problems most households already recognise. They contain almost no numbers, definitions, legal instruments, costs or transition rules. Any partner must accept them before the party will support a government.

The party’s larger policy platform – a 1.75 per cent annual tax on urban land (0.5 on rural), a Citizen’s Income of roughly $19,400 a year for most adults, compulsory KiwiSaver contributions rising toward a combined 12 per cent and Citizens’ Assemblies of randomly selected people to whose recommendations a government must answer – has drawn resistance.

Bob Edlin: Reserve land gift, a $200,000 rift.....

....and when the Mayor was miffed, a councillor was given short shrift

Good questions were raised at a Rotorua Lakes Council meeting this week about the proposed surrender of more than $200,000 in annual lease revenue.

But some questions are best not asked – at least, not when Mayor Tania Tapsell is chairing a meeting.

Sunday October 25, 2026 

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Richard Prebble: Grievance Politics

It will outrage supporters of Te Pāti Māori and New Zealand First, but their parties are remarkably similar.

Both are grievance parties.

Both are led by politicians who specialise in outrage.

Dr Bryce Wilkinson: Cost of living crisis won’t be solved by subsidising prices

Voters are rightly worried about the cost of living. How can they balance the household budget? Should they move to Australia?

It is a nationwide issue. After allowing for inflation, population growth and seasonal effects, real national disposable income per person fell 4.3 percent from the September quarter 2022 to the September quarter 2024. A modest subsequent rise has reduced this decline to 1.5 percent.

If you are feeling harder up now than in the second half of 2022, you are not alone. If you are not, you should feel fortunate.

Ian Bradford: The horrendous cost of getting to Net Zero in the UK and in NZ

Net Zero in the UK

In the UK it’s all about Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS). The cost of installing and operating CCS could reach a staggering £408 billion by 2050. In NZ Dollars this is $963,124,800,000. The reason for such a cost is put down to the technology being risky and technologically unproven. 

Geoff Parker: The Dog Tax War — Or Another Māori History Fairy Tale?

RNZ's treatment of the 1898 Hokianga “Dog Tax War” fits neatly into today's preferred colonial narrative: RNZ's treatment of the 1898 Hokianga “Dog Tax War” fits neatly into today's preferred colonial narrative: Māori were subjected to an oppressive colonial regime, the dog tax became the final outrage, and an armed confrontation with the colonial authorities was the inevitable result.

But before accepting that version, it is worth looking at what the law actually said - and at the wider issues surrounding the dispute.