David Farrar: The Attorney-General gets it in one

Attorney-General Chris Bishop had made a hugely important speech. He politely but firmly pushes back against the courts making law, rather than interpreting law. He notes:

Peter Williams: National's Big Day

This post will be relevant for a very short time.

In the famous words of another National Party leader, the current one will be “gone by lunchtime” so these words will be out of date before the clock strikes 12.

Mark down Wednesday August 12, 2026 as the day the National Party took one of the biggest gambles in its 90 year history.

That Christopher Luxon has to go is a no-brainer.

Chris Bishop, Simon Court: Better planning for growth and environment

"Alongside the Committee's recommendations, the Government has agreed further amendments to the legislation.

"One of those changes relates to Mana Whakahono ā Rohe agreements.

“The Bills as introduced provide that Mana Whakahono ā Rohe that existed or had been initiated prior to the Bills being enacted would transfer into the new system, but that there would be no provision for new ones.

Bob Edlin: Bishop aims to trim outdated laws from the statute books....

Bishop aims to trim outdated laws from the statute books – but won’t this permit sales of watery stuff as “milk”?

This rates among the more bemusing headlines to attract the attention of the PoO team this week:

Bob Edlin: Remember when John Key backed down on mining plans?.....

Remember when John Key backed down on mining plans? Let’s see if Luxon can dig in and hold his ground

The Minister responsible for RMA Reform shied from giving guarantees about protecting the Waitākere Ranges under new planning and development laws when questioned in Parliament yesterday.

The PM was no more committed to protecting World Heritage sites. To the contrary, he declared he was gung-ho about mining – and he wasn’t too fussed about where miners should dig.

Damien Grant: Chris Bishop has emerged as the main pretender to a shaky crown.....

Chris Bishop has emerged as the main pretender to a shaky crown. How shall we assess his performance?

“Will no one rid me of this turbulent bishop?" cried King Henry the Second, yelling to the ceiling in frustration at the antics of the archbishop of Canterbury, the soon-to-be-murdered Thomas Becket. It is, if you forgive the literary fudge alert readers will have noticed, a sentiment our Prime Minister may be feeling as his premiership is undermined by the persistent stories that the current Hutt South MP has been counting the numbers. It is also a lesson in being clear with your retinue on your intentions.

Mike's Minute: The Govt's housing vision – a school project gone wrong

The Auckland housing number and the Government's housing vision now looks like a school project gone wrong.

Chris Bishop, by anyone's standards, is a competent, if not excellent, political operator but he appears to have come unstuck on Auckland housing.

Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Chris Bishop's housing u-turn is basic common sense

Well, finally Chris Bishop has done the right thing and made the u-turn on the two million new houses he had planned for Auckland.

It’s not altogether a surprise that he did this and announced it this afternoon, because it’s been rumoured for months - for the obvious reason that it’s election year.

Anglo Saxon: New Zealand's proposed new planning laws won't support detribalisation.

Chris Bishop's new planning and environment laws sadly miss the mark and won't fix the single biggest problem facing resource management in New Zealand. What's really needed is full detribalisation.

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John McLean: Critical Social Justice "Criticisms Of Reforms

A Woke battle for victimhood supremacy drowns out mature debate on resource management reforms

The current Government has proposed legislation designed to reform New Zealand’s resource management laws. National Party Government Minister Christopher Bishop is leading the reforms.

Ani O'Brien: New Zealand’s Planning Revolution - bye bye RMA

Inside the reform that will change how New Zealand is built

If you’ve ever tried to build a deck, subdivide a section, or watched a major infrastructure project slowly suffocate in a decade of “consenting hell,” you already know the RMA is New Zealand’s great productivity killer. For over 30 years, it has been the bedrock of New Zealand’s environmental and planning law. It is also, by almost universal agreement, broken.

Chris Bishop, Simon Watts: A better planning system for a better New Zealand

New Zealand’s new planning system will make it easier to build the homes and infrastructure our country needs, give farmers and growers the freedom to get on with producing world-class food and fibre, and strengthen our primary sector while protecting the environment, RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Under-Secretary Simon Court say.

“This Government’s central ambition is to lift growth, productivity and living standards,” Mr Bishop says.

Kerre Woodham: Regional councils need to be streamlined

Regional councils are being abolished – or are they?

Thomas Coughan writing in the Herald makes a very good point, it's not the councils that are being abolished, it's the council laws.

Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: The talk of rolling Luxon is very real

Either Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith is telling porkies, or he’s the most out-of-the-loop person in Wellington. His claim that there’s “no talk” of rolling Chris Luxon is complete nonsense. There is talk—serious talk.

Perspective with Ryan Bridge: Chris Bishop has done a Tory Whanau

The story about Chris Bishop and the funding switcheroo is mostly a beat up, I think, and nobody will care. He's the Housing Minister, the Transport Minister, and the MP for Hutt South.

Basically, some Kainga Ora housing project cash was transferred to transport to pay for a bridge. He signed it off - so far, who cares, right?

Ani O'Brien: Nicola Willis is no Ruth Richardson and that’s the problem

Nicola Willis promised discipline. She promised to rein in spending, shrink the bloated public service, and put New Zealand’s economy “back on track” after Labour’s disastrous run. Instead, she has drifted. Spending remains high, the bureaucracy is still bloated, and taxpayers see little sign of the tough decisions we were promised.

The result? Labour, of all parties, is polling neck and neck with National, less than 13 months out from the election. That should be a political impossibility, given the wreckage they left behind. But it speaks to the central failure of National and its Finance Minister. Voters expected change, and what they got instead was continuity.

Bob Edlin: Repair work for Transmission Gulley......

Roman roads are remembered as the Govt signals repair work just three years after Transmission Gully opening

The PoO team has been reminded that the Romans built an extensive, durable, and standardised network of roads that spanned the entire Roman Empire from Britain to the Middle East.

Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Does Chris Bishop have a point about house prices?

I'll tell you what I found interesting over the last few days it's the enormous surprise at the start, and now the debate about Chris Bishop saying it's a good thing that house prices are falling.

He was asked about this on Friday and he said, yes, it's a good thing and that we've got to decouple the idea that the New Zealand economy is driven by house prices - labelling it 'artificial wealth'.

Ryan Bridge: cone overkill must stop

Chris Bishop says we're sick of over-the-top cone use and expensive traffic management plans.

And he'd be right. They are so annoying and often, to the untrained eye at least, completely pointless.

They take a $100 job and make it a $1000 job.

So why is this till happening?

Stephen Franks: Parliament trumps the lawyer/clerics – blow against ‘heritage blight’

What a delight to see Minister Chris Bishop using Parliamentary sovereignty to roll over the heritage numpties. Sound resource management law would have made it unnecessary. Those claiming benefit from the ‘heritage values’ in the Gordon Wilson Flats should have been forced to compensate the losers from planning paralysis in Wellington. Thousands of young people paying exhorbitant rents, and young families forced to commute from Upper Hutt. Just a serious possibility that the decision-makers would have to bear the costs of their decisions would have seen replacement of that building decades ago.