Roger Partridge: Why the Left Keeps Misdiagnosing Populism

This column was first published by CapX, the online newspaper of London’s Centre for Policy Studies, on 3 June 2026. It was written for a British audience, but the diagnostic mistake it identifies is universal.

Andy Burnham has one prescription, and he means to fill it, whatever the patient walks in with. The man with the broken arm, the woman with chest pains, the child with a fever: each leaves the surgery with the same pad of repeat scripts, which call for higher taxes on the rich, more generous benefits, and the nationalisation of something.

Dr Oliver Hartwich: The performative politician who paved Ardern’s way

When I read last week that Tony Blair had published a 5,600-word essay on everything that ails Britain, every instinct told me not to read it. But I could not help myself and read it anyway.

The essay, published by Blair’s own institute, covers the world order, AI, China, the transatlantic alliance and the Labour Party’s future. It is a grand “world explanation” piece, just as one would expect from Sir Tony. His arguments are lucid, his diagnosis sharp, and the prose, as always with Blair, elegant.

Simon O'Connor: China's bullying on full display

China's decision to sanction New Zealand MPs for visiting Taiwan is outrageous, yet how New Zealand's parliament and political leadership responds will be even more insightful and important.

This is a joint opinion piece written by myself and Louisa Wall. She and I are both former Members of Parliament, and the founding co-chairs in New Zealand for the Interparliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC).

As I share on Substack today, The Post have kindly shared our thoughts while other legacy media outlets have chosen to ignore.

The sanctioning of four New Zealand Members of Parliament for visiting Taiwan is a matter of serious concern, not simply for those individuals, but for the integrity and independence of New Zealand’s democratic institutions.

Kerre Woodham: The police have earned the right to bear arms

I wanted to start today with a landmark study from Monash University. It's found that a routine arming of police officers does not lead to a spike in trigger happy coppers. In fact, after Aussie coppers were armed in the early 1990s, there was a downward trend in shooting rates. The research, which investigated 50 years of officer-involved shootings in Australia between 1970 and 2020, challenges the prevailing assumption that increased firearm availability among police inevitably results in higher rates of lethal force. And I think that assumption exists here.

Bob Edlin: Let’s listen to Dame Lynda on the matter of Defence spending....

Let’s listen to Dame Lynda on the matter of Defence spending – Bob Jones (who contributed to NZ Ballet) was dismissive, too

Bob Jones created his libertarian New Zealand Party in 1983 out of disgust with the Muldoon-led National Government’s policies, such as wage and price freezes. And Supplementary Minimum Prices (SMPs), the government-funded agricultural subsidy scheme introduced in 1978 to guarantee floor prices for pastoral products like meat and wool.

Friday June 5, 2026 

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Heather du Plessis-Allan: The Opportunity Party could be the dark horse of the election

I'm not one to get excited at election time about the outside chance that small parties like Opportunity make it into Parliament.

But I reckon this year is different. If Opportunity plays this right, they might just do it.

Yesterday’s Roy Morgan poll had them at 6%.

Breaking Views Update: Week of 31.5.26

Friday June 5, 2026 

News:
Govt sued for $43m over confiscation of Māori fishing quota
The iwi trust that owns New Zealand’s biggest fishing companies is suing the Crown for more than $40m in damages for the prolonged confiscation of fishing rights in violation of the Treaty of Waitangi.

Stuart Smith: Are We Captured by the Bureaucracy?

Voters elect members of parliament, mayors and councillors to make decisions, set priorities and keep a tight rein on spending. But over my political career, I’ve observed too many instances where real power seems to sit with the bureaucracy that writes the reports, sets the agenda and controls the information. It is fair to ask: have some elected representatives been captured by the machines they are supposed to lead?

Ani O'Brien: Henry Nowak was dying; police didn't believe him

The cost of identity politics

The murder of Henry Nowak should be a cultural turning point, a wake up call, a trigger to reset the moral compass in Britain. On its face, it is the story of an 18 year old university student stabbed to death while walking home after a night out. That alone is tragic and would warrant UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s commentary on knife crime. Yet what has made Henry’s death reverberate so powerfully across Britain and the rest of the West, despite initial total silence from the media, is not merely the brutality and senselessness of the attack itself. It is the extraordinary sequence of events that followed, and what those events reveal about the institutions that are supposed to protect us. What’s more, the terrible event underscores a growing problem that our elites do not want to address and get deeply uncomfortable about, that is the scourge of anti-white racism.

Guest Post: Littlewood and the Treaty - How we are being taken to the cleaners

Guest Post by the Cantabrian on Brash & Mitchell.

The controversy around the Waitangi Tribunal, the rapid growth of Maori attempts to exert authority over the government and country, and the question of the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi omits one major and crucial element - The 'Littlewood Treaty'.

It has always been a source of debate that there are two official versions of the Treaty - Te Tiriti O Waitangi in Maori and the Treaty of Waitangi in English. There are significant differences between the two documents. One of the functions of the Waitangi Tribunal is the exclusive authority to determine the meaning and effect of the Treaty as embodied in the 2 texts and to decide issues raised by the differences between them. (Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975, s 5 (2).)

Pee Kay: And they thought ex mayor Hazelhurst was bad!

Tuesdays announcement by Local Government minister Simon Watts that legislation will be passed that strips unelected appointees of their power to vote on your council committee, as expected, all the usual suspects leapt to the cell phone to call their favourite journalist.

Hasting Mayor was no exception!

Bob Edlin: A lot of fuss about a simple Bill......

A lot of fuss about a simple Bill – its purpose (to make English an official language) is spelled out in 22 words

A researcher and computational linguist says the government’s push to make English an official language raises a question of “what exactly is English being protected from?”.

But that invites another question: why should English have to be protected from something to be entrenched as an official language?

Ashley Church: The real obstacle to a Palestinian State

Why have the peace talks always failed?

At the end of the First World War, the League of Nations gave Britain sovereign control over some of the Middle Eastern territory that had formed part of the defeated Ottoman Empire in the expectation that the Brits would resolve longstanding territorial and political issues between the various peoples who lived in this region.

David Harvey: A Nuclear Conversation

A conversation the Prime Minister would rather not have

There must be something in the air in the Prime Minister’s suite of the Beehive — a virus of omnipotence and omniscience that seems to infect whoever occupies the office. Jacinda Ardern demonstrated it in spades, with her authoritarian kindness and her government’s self-appointment as the nation’s single source of truth. Christopher Luxon now ventures forth in the same spirit, shutting down any debate on the nuclear question before it can begin.

What he does not appear to understand is that the nuclear issue reaches well beyond the Bomb. Nor does he seem aware of the actual limits of New Zealand’s “anti-nuclear” legislation, which does not prohibit the peaceful use of nuclear energy at all. But the more troubling thing is the arrogance of trying to close a conversation down.

David Farrar: Meet the Greens – ACC

Labour appear to have decided on a strategy of releasing as little policy as possible, making it difficult to assess the impact on us of a Labour-led Government.

Fortunately the Greens are not shy in releasing policy, so in the absence of Labour policy I am going to look at Greens policy to get some idea of what the costs will be of a change in government.

Thursday June 4, 2026 

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Heather du Plessis-Allan: Simon Watts made the right call - but it should go further

Credit to Simon Watts.

Some time ago he told me he was going to do something to stop councils like the Far North District Council.

They put ten iwi representatives, not elected by ratepayers, on a committee with six councillors who were elected, with full voting rights, thereby outnumbering the elected folk.

Kerre Woodham: Have a reckon, but not a vote

The Government will stop unelected individuals from voting on council committees, a move an Act MP has described as closing an anti-democratic loophole. It seems like a no brainer. Why should unelected individuals have the right to vote on council committees? Of course people who have never been elected to a council or a government shouldn't be given voting rights. You can certainly ask people for their opinion, their informed comment, but voting rights?

Dark Jester: The Case for Nuclear Energy

It is becoming clear the ‘clean’ energy we have been using is insufficient to power New Zealand. While there are calls to reexamine the use of fossil fuels, I would propose there is another energy source to consider: nuclear energy.