As we draw closer to the 2026 US Congressional mid-term elections (where all US House of Representatives and 1/3 of Senators are up for re-election along with Statewide races but NOT the US President), the mainstream media’s rhetorical war with President Donald Trump is ramping up. Any incumbent administration is anxious to tout their successes and since Trump won the Presidential election in November 2024 he is no different. In a normal media environment, left leaning media tend to downplay any right leaning administration’s efforts and play up criticism from their left leaning opponents. In the right leaning media world, they do the opposite and will praise Trump’s 2^nd term and pan the Democrats. The current media environment is the most hostile and biased I have ever seen. Mainstream media no longer merely show a long standing left leaning bias, they engage in outright deceptive practices frequently telling blatant untruths about Trump and, more frequently, completely ignoring his achievements or significantly downplaying them. This post will illustrate this. Ask yourself, how many of these 45 demonstrable achievements that Trump has made since his swearing in on 20 January 2025 (so only 21 months ago) have you seen reported on in the New Zealand media? My guess is at best 5. If anyone claims Trump has done little to fulfill his campaign promises, here is the list with multiple links:

1. Illegal migration into the US has been entirely stopped. The Biden Administration’s catch and release policy has been ended and there have been 15 straight months of ZERO releases into the country. Illegal migrant entry in the US has dropped from a peak of 10,000 a day to zero. 2.6 million+ illegal immigrants are no longer in the US (including 650,000 ICE arrests) of which 400,000 had other often serious criminal convictions) plus over 2 million self-deportations induced by ending Federal government payments and offering a relocation subsidy of $2,500 plus a one-way airfare.

2 . Fentanyl trafficking into the US has dropped by 56% which has led to a decline in overdose deaths of 21%.

3. Largest one-year drop in reported homicides in U.S. history with violent crime (rapes, robberies, assaults) down significantly. Signed the Laken Riley Act to get dangerous criminals off American streets. It is not coincidental that such rapid reductions in violent crime have occurred as ICE detains and deports illegal immigrants convicted of violent crimes.

4. Targeted crime operations in major cities are delivering record-low murders in several metros.

5. Federal government funding cuts to sanctuary cities to be implemented pending final SCOTUS approval.

6. Designation of Tren de Aragua (Venezuela), MS-13 (El Salvador), and 30 other international cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organisations since February 2025. Many hundreds of the most vicious and dangerous gang members were amongst the first targeted by ICE for arrest and removal.

7. Antifa designated a Domestic Terrorist Organisation. They have been responsible for some of the most persistent violent attacks on law enforcement and government buildings in key US cities. This has enabled them to be charged with Federal crimes resulting in lengthy sentences and not released on the street as had been the case in a number of liberal cities with permissive District Attorneys.

8. Record U.S. energy production and exports at all-time highs (US is now a net energy exporter). There has been a vitual doubling of US oil capacity with the recent agreement to ramp up once compromised and faltering Venezuelan oil production.

9. 600,000+ new private sector jobs added since January 2025.

10. Largest blue-collar wage growth in 60 years.

11. Inflation tamed to 2.6% (2025 average) down almost 70% from 8% peak under Biden (2022 average).

12. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed (July 2025) making the 2017 Trump tax cuts permanent plus no tax on tips, overtime or Social Security.

13. $5 trillion + in deregulation savings

14. $215 billion in government efficiency cuts ($1,335 per taxpayer) – said by Government Accounting Office (GAO) to be closer to $120B. If the two figures are averaged, it’s still an impressive amount of saving of taxpayer dollars.

15. $10 trillion + in re-shored/domestic investments and secured domestic manufacturing (semiconductors, autos, heavy equipment) expanded.

16. Trade deficit at its lowest level since 2009 and $300 billion+ in tariff revenues collected.

17. Stock market hit record highs. Dow Jones and NASDAQ.

18. Trump has brokered 7 peace deals:

(i) Gaza ceasefire + hostage release secured

(ii) Armenia-Azerbaijan lasting peace

(iii) India-Pakistan cease fire

(iv) DRC-Rwanda peace agreement

(v) Cambodia-Thailand border conflict resolved

(vi) Kosovo-Serbia dispute resolved

(vii) Egypt-Ethiopia dam dispute resolved

19. Abraham Accords proposed to be expanded to: Azerbijan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon,

20. Iran’s nuclear capability significantly degrade plus a maximum pressure campaign waged (450+ sanction designations) with the financial sanctions having the most teeth and reach.  I’m going to analyze the Iran war in more detail in a separate post.

21. Trump brokered a groundbreaking deal with Denmark regarding Greenland enabling the US complete and independent ability to bolster necessary security with permanent basing rights, non-NATO bases banned and blocked from investments deemed not in US interests and these rights in perpetuity even if Greenland gains full independence. The deal was praised by both the Greenland and Danish Prime Ministers.

22. NATO allies now working toward 5% GDP defense spending greatly reducing the total US defense bill required to be spent defending allies overseas.

23. Over 100 foreign detained Americans released and returned to the US.

24. Destruction of 69 narco-terrorist drug carrying vessels

25. Nicolás Maduro captured and stabilization of Venezuela gradually from previous status as the world’s most corrupt narco state.

26. Record surge in military recruitment and the largest military investment ($5 trillion) in decades

27. Veterans Administration hospital backlog reduced 60% and 51,936 homeless veterans housed.

28. Employment, benefits and back pay restored for those discharged from the military due to Biden era vaccine-mandates.

29. Transgender enlistment barred and transgender treatments to military personnel stopped.

30. DEI eliminated across the military.

31. DEI discrimination banned in federal contracting and agencies and race-based hiring ended.

32. Men/boys banned from women/girls sports and upheld by SCOTUS

33. Federal government no longer funds chemical/surgical transgender procedures for minors.

34. Trump reduces prescription medicine costs with “Most Favoured Nation” drug pricing in the US with 16+ major pharma companies.

35. Eight artificial food dyes phased out (40%+ industry compliance).

36. Childhood vaccine schedule revised from 72 to 11 consensus shots in line with European nation average.

37. US withdraws from the World Health Organization (WHO).

38. Created a lasting transparent crypto regulatory framework via GENIUS Act and a strategic Bitcoin Reserve created.

39. Election integrity and citizenship verification measures expanded nationwide. The DOJ is aggressively cleaning up state voter rolls bloated by ineligible voters. US military cyber security experts will monitor election integrity. DOJ/ODNI seized Fulton County, Georgia 2020 ballots over suspected fraud and FBI 2020 fraud investigations in Maricopa County, AZ.

40. Energy dominance unleashed: National Energy Emergency declared and Green New Deal progressively scrapped. 6,000+ drilling permits approved (55% increase) and 13.1 million acres opened for coal leasing and record LNG exports (>100 million tons) and record new nuclear projects advancing toward online status.

41. Trump Accounts launched for newborns with federal seed funding + corporate matching.

42. 175,000 visas of criminals, fraudsters and foreigners calling for violence against the US revoked.

43. 275,000 illegal aliens removed from Social Security rolls; and benefits terminated for 1.4 million illegal aliens.

44. Crackdowns on the rampant rorting of the H1-B business visa programme with the Admin aiming to curb H1-B abuse with a $100,000 application fee.

45. 62,000+ missing migrant children rescued.

A guest post by Ian Boag:

Anyone fortunate enough to own a Pak’N’Save or a New World has an annual income measured in millions. The business model is relatively low margin (4% after tax) plus rebates (maybe 2% or so) for a total of maybe 6% – on a turnover of $100m that is a few millions. Nice for them. There are some novelties about how you get there – eg I can’t just rock up with $10m and tell Fred I want to buy his New World. Even if he likes the number – he can’t sell it to me. And if I already own a New World I can’t buy a Pak’N’Save as well. 

Co-op rules and all that – it is what it is. A “worthiness” check. It would be novel if Fonterra worked that way …

When a small non 4-square grocery gets to buy stuff retail from Pak’N’Save for less than what the (Foodstuffs) wholesaler will sell it for you can see that small non Foodstuffs groceries don’t have much future.

The bottom line is that knocking 50% or whatever out of that tsunami of owner income might drop prices at the till by maybe 3%. Not enough to get excited about. So anyone who wants to make the supermarkets less profitable and give significant savings to customers – by splitting this or that – be that Chris, Chris, Nicola, Chloe or Winston  – is just pushing shit uphill.

All these creative ways to supposedly improve competition and lower prices are hot air and the only real option is to just suck it up. 

The only action that would dent it is to take GST off food and have that passed along. The “what is food?” argument could be dealt to by adopting the Australian classification list. There would be a few classification grizzles that would be dealt with relatively quickly (the Aussies dealt with their big ones a long time ago) and probably an ongoing dribble of complaints that would not really amount to a lot.  The Australians have had 25 years to sort it out. All their big ones were sorted years ago. There will always be a few funnies (hot pie vs cold pie) but they don’t amount to a hill of beans in the scheme of things.

Maybe it is unfair (?) that high earners would get much of the benefit because they spend more on food. I’ve seen numbers that suggest a 2% tweak in the top income tax rate would equalise that and fix the revenue loss. Low income earners would be significantly better off and high income earners would be relatively unaffected – savings from GST removal balanced by a small tweak in their top income tax rate. Whatever.

I can afford the supermarket prices, so they don’t keep me awake at night.  I am just suggesting that removing GST from food is the only lever available to reduce prices significantly within a reasonable timeframe. It could be done quickly, unlike the other ideas being floated. To be pernickety about it, food would be zero-rated rather than exempt. A technical issue.

 We can go on forever debating break-ups, economies of scale,  concerns about foreign investors, lockups of suitable land – yadda yadda –  and any consequent changes would take years. Probably a Royal Commission, appeals, and more. Years and years. The Think Tanks would pontificate. The legal profession would do well. Every man and his dog would pile in. Years and years and years.

GST off food would essentially be “now” …. but the ideological purity of “GST on everything” seems to be more important.  Economists at the OECD praise NZ and they would know. The rest of the world is taking  a while to catch on but we lead

To be clear – all I am saying here is that zero-rating food with a small tweak to the top tax rate would be more or less revenue neutral for the government, help those at the bottom and not be all that punitive to those at the top because they benefit more from the cheaper food. Far simpler than targeted benefits here and payments there and whatever. 

A guest post by Fish Across Face:

When outgoing RNZ Chief Executive Paul Thompson addressed the Select Committee hearing on the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill in February 2024, he began his submission with a remark about how timely the various media representatives’ appearances were.

He reminded all present that the Port Hills bush fires were burning as he spoke, and he was proud of the fact that dozens of journalists were covering the story.

Exactly why a relatively small conflagration required dozens of journalists to cover it escaped me. Certainly, there would be half a dozen on the ground from the main media outlets, but dozens? What conclusions (other than climate change being the villain) would these fearless reporters come to, that would be different to their colleagues? 

I thought, there goes a man of the State.

And indeed, there he does go. After 13 years as CEO of RNZ, including 5 during which its radio arm experienced sustained and serious decline, Mr Thompson is leaving, to be replaced by Jason Winstanley, another experienced and well-liked executive. 

But Jason is from the private sector. He is NZME’s “Chief Audio Officer” (programme director in the old money). When he arrives at RNZ, he will bring with him purpose, intent and imagination – but from the real world. 

Because of this, I imagine he will measure, re-deploy or delete under-performing assets, and with what will be easy money-saving efficiencies, possibly even go old-school and poach from his former sector. There won’t be any mutinies; there are simply no jobs elsewhere. 

As an aside, I also suspect Winstanley’s appointment was arranged at the same time as new RNZ Chair Brent Impey agreed to his new position; one simply would not undertake either job without a trusted partner – both roles are essentially interdependent. 

Soon-to-be former NZME Chief Audio Officer Winstanley may not stay within the lane of Chief ExecutiveOfficer. These positions can be the same thing, and new (ish) CAO Pip Keane will be looking over her shoulder, as will her comrade John Campbell. Whilst Keane is an extremely experienced producer, going back to Holmes days, producers aren’t programmers, and she was John’s during his Campbell Live days. This is important, because that show turned viewers off with its constant, negative advocacy journalism leading up to the 2014 General Election (which John Key won handsomely), and Keane was the gatekeeper for all of it. Campbell Live ended only eight months later.

The cancellation was simply because of low ratings; Mr Campbell told New Zealanders every night that their country was a hellhole, and it was all their fault. They hated him for it and changed channels. 

Fast forward to 2026 and Campbell and Keane are back. Their installations at RNZ are a giant FU to the Luxon government, but one way or the other, Impey and Winstanley will fix this, from Morning Report all the way down. 

Neither man is a seat warmer.

Make no mistake; Jason Winstanley’s appointment is significant; and it’s not just that we now have two proven, professional heavy hitters from the commercial sphere in charge of state owned RNZ (between Winstanley and Impey they have over 70 years’ experience). 

It means the current administration is not doing nothing; they are slowly changing the most left-aligned organization in the country from within, and nobody (except the NZH’s Media Insider) seems to understand how important it is. John Key’s government only trimmed RNZ’s funding. This is systemic.

In 12 months, Radio New Zealand National will be nothing like it is now. If Luxon’s government can do that to this hallowed organization without anybody feeling the needle going in, wait till you see what they do next. 

I’m kind of impressed.

My ears pricked up a week back when ZB reported on recently released 2025/2026 suicide stats.

Like many NZers, people taking their own lives has had an impact on me. My birth father took his own life when I was sixteen and close to meeting him for the first time.

I have also been in schools when suicides have occurred and seen the toll it takes on so many people.

I have, many times, spoken to my good friend, Mike King, about causes, effects and solutions – and had him present in schools I have been involved in and to three separate groups in Russell when I lived there.

As background; many will be aware of a recent interview with David Seymour by Tova O’Brien.

O’Brien asked Seymour whether he thought Māori received special treatment.

“Of course they do,” he responded.

She responded:

“Only 7% of Māori get superannuation when Māori make up 15% of the population. 62% of the prison population is Māori.”

She continued: Māori are less likely to get a prescription, 50% more likely to experience psychosis, and experience diabetes at one and a half times the rate. Māori die younger. Māori receive poorer healthcare. Māori disproportionately fill our prisons.

O’Brien questioned why he had supported the addressing of historic inequality issues for women but not for Māori. Seymour’s response was that “women are a specific group of people” but he does not apply that to Māori.

I know the NZ education system and stats very well – and see no evidence of Māori privilege. Quite the opposite.

The suicide statistics for 2025/2026 are another stark reminder of the societal position of many Māori in our nation. (NB: Most recent stats are listed as “suspected” as full coroner process, etc, have not yet been completed).

Summary 2025/26

– Overall there were 10.5/100,000 (602) suspected suicides. This is down on a high of 13.2/100,000 in 2018/19.

– The male rate was 15.8/100,000
– The female rate was 5.1/100,000
(I have never seen anyone express qualms about targeted programmes for men).

– The highest age group rate was 17.4/100,000 for age 30-34.

– The Māori rate was 15.8/100,000
– The European rate was 12/100,000
– The Pasifika rate was 5.9/100,000
– The Asian rate was 3.2/100,000

It seems clear that there is a strong ethnicity component in these statistics that needs full addressing rather than the brush off that all people need to be treated the same and that Māori in NZ currently receive “special treatment”.

Two quotes from Mike King:

“A lot of young Māori men coming into puberty are thinking about what it means to be a man and I think Māori men in particular have a skewed outlook on that,” says King.

“They believe being a man in Māori culture is to be staunch, to be the protector and the provider and to show strength at all times. A depressive thought or a suicidal thought won’t kill you. But holding on to that thought and trying to battle through it alone, that’s the killer. So, what we need to do is create a society that makes it OK for men to talk about their problems.”

[email protected]

The previous Labour Government abolished almost all the health targets, did a distarous mega-merger during a pandemic, and outcomes in the health sector fell across the board. The health sector is still under great strain, but the data shows that there has been considerable improvement in all five target areas. This is the latest data to June 2026.

Those getting cancer treatment within a month fell from 90% to 84% under Labour. It is now halfway back to the 90% target at 87%. In real terms that means 600 more people a year with cancer got to start treatment within a month.

The child immunisation rate dropped to 71%. At the change of government it was 77% and it is now up to 84%. In real terms that is 3,000 more children a year vaccinated.

This has been one of the hardest ones to turn around. It started dropping well before Covid-19. It fell to 67%. It is now at 76%. That is 120,000 more ED patients who got dealt with in under six hours.

Another one that fell away prior to Covid-19. Has been stubborn at around 60% but is now at 67%, In real terms that’s almost 15,000 more people who got to see a specialist within four months.

Around a 15 percentage point increase in those who get elective surgery or treatment within four months. This is around 11,000 more patients who got elective surgery in the last year within four months.

The oldest bureaucratic trick in the world when an agency or council is asked to find savings, is for them to announce they will cut the most popular and liked programs, rather than the much larger wasteful pet projects.

We see this with Wellington City Council:

Funding for Te Papa, opening hours for galleries, the city’s new years’ eve fireworks display, and school swimming subsidies, are on the chopping block as Wellington City Council tries to meet rates caps.

Deputy mayor Ben McNulty said at a Tuesday meeting the council needed to grapple with “nasty decisions” to find $60 million in savings in order to comply with a four percent rates cap ordered by the government.

The staff obviously have the Crs well trained up, if this is where they are focusing on to save money.

Are they going to scrap the Organics Processing Solution, which will see CO2 emissions drop at a cost of $9,375 per tonne, compared to the ETS cost of $57?

We also have the $511 million sludge minimisation plant.

I blogged the following in 2024:

1. $593 million on social housing
2. $400 million for a sludge minimisation facility at Moa Point
3. $330 million on rebuilding the town hall so we have another music venue
4. $240 million on Civic Square 
5. $236 million on food recycling
6. $189 million on Te Matapihi library
7. $180 million on the Takina convention centre
8. $160 million on cycleways
9. $139 million on removing cars and redeveloping the Golden Mile
10. $55 million to “upgrade” Thorndon Quay
11. $42 million on renovating St James Theatre
12. $32 million to Reading Cinemas (attempted but failed)
13. $13 million on a carpark building

Yet they claim the nasty government is going to force them to stop inflicting 20% rates increases on residents, so hence they need to cut subsidies for school swimming!!

One of TOP’s five bottom lines is:

To revive our fish stocks and marine habitats, this bottom line calls for an immediate end to bottom trawling in our most damaged inshore areas (like the Hauraki Gulf/Tīkapa Moana), before phasing out the practice in stages.

This non negotiable policy is to phase out bottom trawling in our entire EEZ over time. This is an extreme proposal. Only two countries out of 200 ban bottom trawling entirely – Belize and Palau. This is ideology, not science.

We already have significant restrictions on bottom trawling. They are:

• Bottom trawling is not allowed in 40% of our deeper waters, and 31% of our EEZ
• Only 1.7% of the EEZ is bottom trawled every year, and most of this is in areas previously trawled.
• In the last year the new territory bottom trawled was only 4.3 square km, which is around 0.0001% of the EEZ

Around 75% of commercial fish catches are caught by trawling. The seafood sector contributes $2.45 billion to GDP and supports 14,500 jobs. TOP’s bottom line is to destroy 75% of that industry, so we can join Belize and Palau.

One can sensibly debate whether there should be more (or less) of the EEZ closed to bottom trawling. But that is vastly different to insisting on a total ban, over time. It would destroy jobs and an entire industry.

And again I remind people this is one of their five non negotiable policies as the price of government. And this is why the thought they could be part of a centre-right government is farcical.

The Herald reports:

Tauranga City Council chief executive Marty Grenfell has resigned after councillors held an emergency closed-door meeting this afternoon over the Davison report.

The council-commissioned review into the fatal Mount Maunganui landslide, conducted by retired High Court judge Paul Davison, KC, revealed a litany of council failures leading up to the “preventable” disaster.

A council statement said Grenfell resigned today and would finish on October 2. It did not say whether his departure was related to the review.

Grenfell had faced public calls to resign following the review’s publication last month.

This is the right outcome. It’s not that Grenfell was personally responsible. In fact he didn’t even know about the risks. But he has been the CE for the last eight years, during which time his staff were aware that there was serious risks, including death, from the location of the camping ground, and those risks were never considered by the Council, and entered on the Council’s risk register so they could be mitigated. It was a system failure, and the CE is responsible for ensuring good systems.

Simon Bridges writes:

This came to mind recently when EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen got cosy with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at her 2026 state of the union address over Canada becoming an “associate member” of the European Union. If it’s good enough for them, why not us Kiwis?

Von der Leyen said she wanted to work with Carney “on opening the door for Canada to be the first associate member of the EU”. Carney is keen too, with officials saying both sides want the closest possible relationship short of full membership. …

European Parliament president Roberta Metsola later confirmed that, after Canada, Australia and New Zealand could also become associate members. Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has left the door open, echoing Carney’s call for middle powers to build coalitions in a UN General Assembly speech days ago.

A few years ago, the idea of NZ becoming a (associate) member of the EU would have filled me with horror. It would mean losing our ability to set our own laws, regulations and trade agreements. The reasons the UK left the EU are also good reasons for us not to join it.

But the world has changed. We are in a new era of might is right instead of a rules based order. Earlier this year I advocated NZ becoming the seventh state of Australia, as a way for us to survive in this new world order.

An alternative to merging with Australia could be to join the EU as an Associate Member (NB there is no such thing at the moment – it would have to be defined and created). If Associate Membership included free trade of goods and services, and free movement of citizens (not residents), then those benefits could well outweigh the loss of sovereignty involved in joining the EU.

I’d love to see a future focused debate on how NZ survives and even prospers in this new might is right era. Is it through Australia, is it through the EU, or is it some other alternative? The only thing I am sure of is that the status quo is a very unhealthy position for New Zealand to be in.

I have now profiled 62 of the 71 seats being contested, and made predictions for 60 of them. Just nine seats to go.

The running total is:

So I have 36 seats so far as safe, 11 which are likely for a party, 13 which lean towards a party and two that are too close to call.

I’ve only got the nine seats north of the Auckland Harbour Bridge to go.

The Press reports:

Christchurch City Council staff are confident rate increases can be held to 6%, 5% and 4% over the next three years without cutting services or staff.

But they warned councillors the tighter financial position will leave less flexibility and require tough choices.

Councillors were presented with the first full draft of the 2027-37 long-term plan (LTP) on Thursday, showing average rate increase of 6% in 2027/28, 5% in 2028/29 and 4% in 2029/30.

Good to see Christchurch City Council trying to get their rates increases down to a more sustainable level. Auckland and Wellington take note!

On current average of the polls, NZ First would get 12 List MPs. A few people surprised by Ron Mark being relatively low and Harete Hipango-Brownlie being so high.

The left claim that the Government is anti-Maori, and that NZ First is anti-Maori. It is worth noting that six of their top 10 candidate are Māori and a seventh is Cook Islands Māori. I guess they are the wrong sort of Māori!

Nick Mowbray writes:

I’m aware of the criticism we receive for donating to National and ACT. I’m also aware of the false narrative that we lobby the government and expect something in return.

So let me be clear: we have never lobbied the government. Less than 1% of ZURU’s revenue is in New Zealand.

We donate because we care about this country’s future and believe National and ACT have the right talent and strategy to move it forward.

We grew up with that Kiwi number 8 wire mentality. Work hard figure things out and believe you can build something from nothing.

These photos show our second small factory on my parents’ dairy farm in Tokoroa, my brother winning the NZ science fair and our first factory in China. We used fibreglass matting from the Kinleith paper mill as flooring because we had no money. We sprayed weeds and milked cows on weekends to help pay the rent.

Then we moved to China and lived on US$1 a day for many years. No exaggeration. My brother spent close to a decade living in a tiny room inside our first factory. For a decade we worked almost every day from morning until late at night sacrificing pretty much every comfort to keep building.

Today, we compete globally with some of the biggest companies in the world. We employ thousands of people globally including hundreds of Kiwis, and aim to employ thousands more in New Zealand over the next five years. We will surpass NZ$10 billion in revenue next year and are investing heavily back into New Zealand.

That’s the future we want more Kiwis to have the opportunity to build. A New Zealand that rewards hard work and sacrifice backs people willing to take a chance and encourages them to compete globally and bring that success home. A country ambitious about becoming better and more prosperous.

New Zealand gave us a lot. We care deeply about its future. We expect nothing personally in return from any party. We simply want the next generation to have the opportunities we had and the chance to take them even further.

We want NZ to WIN ! build a country of makers not takers 💪

An incredible success story.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins vowed to scrap the requirement for primary schools to spend at least an hour a day teaching reading, writing and maths.

Opportunity have published their five bottom lines for any coalition, and they confirm that they are a party of the left. Their five bottom lines would fit perfectly in a Green Party manifesto.

Jeffrey Archer has died aged 86. He was one of my all time favourite authors. I literally purchased every one of his novels, and all his short stories collections.

Kane and Abel is probably my favourite of his novels. So gripping. Closely followed by First Among Equals and The Prodigal Daughter.

He was also a very talented politician, and a flawed human being. But only Archer could use his prison time to write more best sellers. He has sold more than 275 million books, which would make hime one of the top 30 authors of all time (Shakespeare is first and Agatha Christie 2nd).

Some books you don’t reread, but I find his books so great I will often go back to them after a few years.

He always has a twist at the end of his stories, and it reminds me once when I was flying to Zurich and reading one of his novels. I had around 10 pages to go and I let out a fairly loud yell on the plane. The stewardess came over and asked me what the problem was. I showed her the book, and how there was a misprint with the final 10 pages being a copy of the first 10 pages. This meant I was stuck in the air for a further 10 hours, unable to find out how the book ended. Fortunately I managed to find an English language edition in Switzerland, where I finished the book.

NZ has had a purely online passport application process for (off memory) well over a decade. I’ve often raved about how good it is, and also how quick it is. I got my latest passport three working days after I applied – and that was a non-urgent application.

The Herald reports:

Since the 1880s, a 37-acre site in the leafy Auckland suburb of Epsom was used to train teachers. 

Now Epsom MP and Act Leader David Seymour wants the site, empty since the last of the University of Auckland students left in 2024, to be the new location of an unzoned, co-educational public school.

And not just any school – one jointly operated by two of the country’s top state facilities – the neighbouring Auckland Grammar and Epsom Girls Grammar.

“They would like to co-sponsor a co-educational high school in the ethos of those two excellent schools,” Seymour told the Herald while walking through the empty university grounds.

“The motivation is that if this land becomes housing, it will put huge pressure on their rolls. On the other hand, if they can add a new high-quality school to Auckland, then that’s got to be a good thing for everybody.”

This is an incredible visionary plan. There are so many parents in Auckland who would love to send their kids to a school in the ethos of AGS or EGGS, but can’t afford the median $3.2 million house price.

37 acres is a huge site, so the school could be as large as needed by demand. I suspect it would soon become the largest school in NZ.

Thanks to Ruth Richardson, Governments can no longer hide the state of the accounts from the electorate, The pre-election fiscal and economic update is mandatory. The 2026 one is here. And for the first time in many years it looks positive. Key details:

• Unemployment forecast to drop from 5.6% to 4.3%
• Cumulative nominal GDP to be $18b higher than forecast in the Budget
• The OBEGALx balance is forecast to almost reach surplus in 2027/28 and grow to a surplus of $12b by 2030/31
• Core crown expenses to reduce to 29.8% of GDP by 2030/31 (30% is the level that Labour and Greens in 2017 said is the maximum NZ should have)
• Net core Crown debt is expected to peak at 43.9% of GDP in 2027/28 before gradually declining to 39.5% by the end of the forecast period

It is critical we get back into surplus and start reducing debt (before the next global economic shock). A change of government will doom this prospect.

Here’s how much extra spending the four parties of the left are promising:

1. Labour $50.5b
2. Opportunity $219.4b
3. Greens $236.7b
4. TPM – incalculable

The higher our debt goes, the more money that we have to spend on interest on the debt, rather than on education and health etc.