Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Prime Minister Christopher Luxon. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Contempt over the cost-of-living crunch, vilification of the media from an unlikely source, and bickering about burglaries.
That’s all in the last couple of weeks in New Zealand politics.
Newstalk ZB political editor Jason Walls spoke to The Front Page about what’s behind the Beehive’s top headlines lately, and whether the tide is turning when it comes to who Kiwis truly trust.
The latest Ipsos NZ issues monitor survey, which was done immediately after the May Budget, found National had lost voters’ confidence in managing inflation and the cost of living. Labour was more trusted with what is considered the main issue facing the country.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has acknowledged that it’s “still tough out there” and that the Government’s focus on “unlocking economic growth is starting to show some progress with key indicators up across the board”.
He said this as he released a “fresh set of targeted Government actions”.
Walls commented: “I wouldn’t say there’s anything [in the plan] that I would stop the press for and say, holy moly, this is happening. It’s a lot of business as usual, but as a Government, that’s exactly where you wanna be midway through your first term.”
On why the public might be feeling that the Government was not alleviating cost-of-living pressures, he said it might be simply because people were still really doing it tough.
“People do forget about things like the tax cuts because it happened quite early on in the Government’s tenure.
“But what the Government tends to forget about quite often is the fact that the last Government did have to deal with Covid and that was, no matter how you pitch it, no matter your thoughts on the response, it was a big economic shock to the economy.”
Chris Hipkins has shown that the trend of politicians vilifying the media isn’t exclusive to figures such as Winston Peters and David Seymour.
The Labour leader got himself into hot water after a throwaway line on Newstalk ZB’s Wellington mornings programme. He said ram raids no longer featured on the front pages because NZME’s “Tory owners” wanted National to look good.
“It’s still happening, it’s just NZME have decided that it’s not in the Government’s best interests, and they do the National Party’s singing for them ... so they’re not covering it as much any more,” he told host Nick Mills.
Walls said he had noticed more such criticism of the media by politicians recently.
“David Seymour specifically was the first one to be doing this. He comes to his press conferences with a camera crew, and then puts the whole thing on YouTube. The ones that don’t do very well are the ones where it’s just him answering questions with the media, and nine times out of 10, that’s what happens.
“But every time he gets into a bit of a scuffle with a journalist, the video is always [headed] ‘David Seymour destroys woke journalist’ or something like that. And that gets thousands and thousands, sometimes even tens of thousands, of views. You can start to see his rhetoric changing a little bit when he’s talking to reporters, almost like he has a KPI to have a bit of a clash, so they can get more views on YouTube.
“I’m not saying it’s wrong. If a political leader wants to have an entire exchange with the media put on YouTube, that’s absolutely their prerogative. But I think we just need to be quite clear on why this is happening. I think a lot of it is to generate outrage so you can have more people looking at your videos.”
Tougher financial penalties could be on the way for supermarkets that rip off their customers, as Nicola Willis cracks down on misleading promotions and pricing errors.
The Economic Growth Minister said she had written to the big supermarkets to remind them of her “basic expectation” that they take all steps to comply with the Fair Trading Act and ensure shoppers were not subjected to misleading price claims.
“Willis is always talking about how she’s going to bring them in line and they’re on notice and they should pull their socks up, but it doesn’t really seem that anything tangible is happening,” Walls said.
“They’re an easy target for the Government because that is where the cost-of-living crisis hits most people.
“But the Government at some point needs to start putting its money where its mouth is. They can do a thousand Commerce Commission inquiries into the level of competition and find out, surprise, surprise, New Zealand’s only two major supermarket players have a duopoly. Who would’ve thought?”
A new fines regime and an “aggravated theft offence” being introduced to deter shoplifters caught the ire of Green MP Tamatha Paul.
As part of Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith’s “Law and Order week”, where he pressed on with a raft of new legislation, came a new regime that would see stronger penalties for low-level theft. It includes an infringement regime that would see fines of up to $500 for stolen goods valued up to $500.
“This is about criminalising poor people,” Paul said. “We know that, if people don’t have enough money to buy food, then they’re going to look towards shoplifting things. And we think that criminalising people who have to resort to stealing to feed themselves is fundamentally wrong.”
She posted a clip of the above statement on her Instagram account, along with the caption: “Of course it’s about people stealing food, why else would it be announced in a supermarket? All of this while the supermarket duopoly make year-on-year profits for their shareholders and while people wait in the freezing cold in foodbank lines that stretch for miles.”
The comments sparked backlash from Goldsmith, who said Paul was giving “shoplifting the green light”.
“I think the Greens especially should probably stay away from commenting on shoplifting, but that’s a whole other problem,” Walls said.
“The Greens, you can discount their way of thinking and say it’s university-style politics that most people don’t agree with. But, if you look at their polling, they’re actually up higher than the likes of the Act Party.
“They’re consistently polling at about 12%. So, as nuts as some people might say their thinking is on some of these issues, it still resonates with quite a few people across the country. And Chlöe Swarbrick is tapping into that sort of more left-wing side of New Zealand politics and has found quite a comfortable home.”
Listen to the full episode to hear more about the cost of living, the media, and shoplifting.
The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am. The podcast is presented by Chelsea Daniels, an Auckland-based journalist with a background in world news and crime/justice reporting who joined NZME in 2016.
You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.