Today on Newshub Nation ` a bold plan for clean rivers, but will it put some farmers out of business? Environment Minister David Parker joins me live. Then, no capital gains tax and no 100,000 houses ` two big fails for Labour. Housing Minister Megan Woods fronts up on KiwiBuild. And former Prime Minister Helen Clark on recreational cannabis law and life after the UN. www.able.co.nz Copyright Able 2019. Kia ora. Good morning. I'm Simon Shepherd, and welcome to Newshub Nation. An interim report into the public health sector has found it's too complicated, lacks leadership and needs to be more patient-focused. The health and disability system review panel, which wrote the report, is tasked with finding solutions by March. Labour's key election pledge has crumbled, with the promise to build 100,000 homes in 10 years put on the scrapheap. Housing Minister Megan Woods admits the KiwiBuild policy was overly ambitious and led to the government making bad investments. In a win for the Greens, the housing reset will include a $400 million rent-to-buy scheme, alongside the promise to continue building houses without any of those pesky targets. And the government's rolled out an ambitious plan to make our rivers, lakes and wetlands swimmable within a generation. It will mean greater controls in farm intensification. Currently, 70% of waterways do not meet swimming standards. Well, the freshwater announcement drew both praise and criticism from across the political spectrum, so let's take a look at how it played out. BROOKE FRASER: # Do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. This government has made a point of unfairly targeting farmers. Farmers probably think we have been thrown under the tractor in this particular case. Fonterra's come out and` Did I tell you what I think about Fonterra? No, no, we don't wanna go down that track. Just one at a time. No. No, Fonterra now, I really worry about them. Cos they seem to be very intent on cosying up to government. These issues are not new for farmers. Farmers have known for many years that they need to manage their environmental impact. What we have to do is work with the farmers, who are under pressure at the moment. They feel bombarded by people in the cities, who don't understand what they do. The concept of Maori is a holistic one ` we're all in this waka together, water is a precious taonga to us all. This has to be a negotiated arrangement between the Crown and the tribes. # There's something in the water, something in the water. # All right. Some polarising views on water there. Watching that with me is Environment Minister David Parker. Welcome to the show. Good morning. Good morning. You promised swimmable rivers in a generation. How long is a generation? Well, it's a number of decades. A number of decades? Yeah. What we've promised is that within five years, we'll have turned the corner and got things getting better rather than getting worse. And many parts of the country, they're still getting worse. So a generation is a number of decades. That's, what, two decades? Three decades? Four decades? Are you putting any target on it? Well, look, I'll be long gone in politics, whichever of those is true. I think my job is to stop things getting worse and getting them on an upward track and, you know, and then I think society will give land users a generation to fix things up. I don't think we should, you know, fixate on whether it's 20 years or 30 years. Labour failed to deliver on KiwiBuild and the capital gains tax; how can we trust that Labour's capable of turning this around in five years? Well, trust me, I know what I'm doing. Well, see, it's a question of trust. Well, actually, on this, I do know what I'm doing. And, you know, the quality of the work from, you know, the scientific advisory group, the freshwater leaders group, the Maori group led by dairy farmers, I think we're landing it. All right. So one of those advisory groups is being how Maori, sort of, you know, contemplates water and how the mana of the water is being taken into account. It's different to how it has been in the past. Why are you introducing those kinds of terms now into how water is being seen? Well, Te Mana o te Wai as a concept is in the national policy statement on freshwater management; we're just elevating it. It's effectively saying it's about the intrinsic worth of water. It says that you should serve the needs of the river first. Someone sent me a text during the week saying, 'Someone needs to speak for the rivers, 'cos the rivers can't speak for themselves.' So you put the health of the river first, human needs second and commercial uses third. So the health of the river comes before humans? Well, there's no healthy water for humans out of the river if the river is not healthy, so yes. So do you think people are going to be happy with the fact that this is quite a radical approach to conserving water or making waterways healthy? I don't consider it radical at all. Indeed, you know, I think the world's got a lot of environmental problems, as we all see ` burning fires in the Amazon, forest fires inside the Arctic Circle, depleted fisheries, coral reefs. You know, if New Zealand can't deal with our share of these environmental problems, then who can? But we can. It's not going to be the end of farming as we know it. Well, let's talk about that, OK? Because the proposed cut of some nitrate reduction in certain catchment areas leaves up to 80%. That's infuriated Federated Farmers, who say that, you know, some businesses, some farmers will go out of business ` they can't meet those levels. What do you say to that? Well, they're reactionary comments. I noted that the president of Federated Farmers walked back a wee bit from them yesterday. And I know that there's divided views within the farming community. All we're really asking is for the best practice for use by everyone. There's a long time to make these adjustments. There will be some change in the way in which land is used, but you're not going to see wholesale movement of land out of pastoral farming. You're not? No. OK. I'll give you two examples of things that can be done in Canterbury. We know that if you are more careful about how you use irrigation, you can reduce your nitrate losses by 20% because you're not flushing the nitrates into the aquifers or the rivers and you're still leaving them in the root zone for plants. So that's 20%. Well, that's a big start. That's a big start, but isn't the average reduction needed to be 27% across all farms, and in some areas down in Canterbury, up to 80%? Well, then you add to that plantain, which is a new forage crop, which both utilises nitrogen better and also causes the cows to have smaller urine patches, which are the cause of the problem. So you're saying there are tools there? There are lots of tools, yeah. Are you happy for some businesses to be collateral damage that we pay as a nation for clean waterways? No, I'm not. And indeed the things that bite here are rules that stop things getting worse. You know, you can't make things better if they're still getting worse. And so there are strict rules on the quantity of the risky practices that are causing these problems growing. Because if we don't stop things getting worse, the clean-up, it'll take longer, it'll cost more, and it'll be harder to do. So we've gotta halt these things getting worse before we can make them better. OK. Do you think that Federated Farmers represents the farming community, or have they gone rogue when they're saying those kinds of things which you have labelled absurd? Well, I think they've often pleaded for delay. The Minister of Agriculture, on the day, said their accusations were absurd and reactionary. And I think they were. But I don't think that's a universal view from within the Feds. It's hard to move forward in unity when you have that kind of disparity or disagreement with such a big lobby group. Well, with power comes the responsibility to exercise it responsibly. And we can't just wait till everyone agrees, because there are some people who don't want to move from poor practice to good practice. And, you know, there are plenty within the agricultural community, including the farmers and dairy leaders that were on these advisory groups who say that we actually need a regulatory underpinning to actually make the laggards catch up. OK. What economic analysis have you done in terms of the wider economic impact of this kind of waterways clean-up? We've costed the likely work for dairy farmers to be about 1% of revenue, for sheep and beef, about 3% of revenue. And is 1% or 3% going to force people, push them to the wall? Is it that close? I don't believe so, and indeed I would note that dairy farmers already spend a lot on their environmental measures. So it's not new to them to have to look after the waterways, and they've made a lot of progress. They've fenced most of the waterways over a metre wide on their dairy platforms. Well, that's right. So one of the issues about that is in terms of winter grazing, you're talking about pushing up to 5m away from waterways, and they've already just done this 1 metre. And so they're having to redo and redo and redo as the goalposts move. Well, you know, I actually agree that someone that's just put in a fence shouldn't have to move it. Right, OK. They won't have to move it? Well, we're consulting on options around that. But as a fence comes up for renewal, if it's just right next to water and there's no riparian planting next to it, the fence, you know, is so close to the waterway, it doesn't filter out the sediment or the nutrients. So some of those fences over time will have to be moved. OK, so you sound like you` But that's when they're being replaced. Now, if you're putting in a new fence, it should be 5m away from the waterway. OK. Is there any other sort of, you know, reduction levels or any other kind of wriggle room for farmers here? Or is all the rest of it just, 'You've gotta do this. It's our way or the highway'? Well, the strictest rules are to stop the quantity, for example, of some of this winter grazing that we've got in Southland, which is smothering our estuaries, you know, killing the cockles, you know, filling up our estuaries. You know, we've got whitebait close to becoming extinct in some parts of the country. Those rules are quite strict, that you can't have an increase in the quantity of those risky practices. And we're also regulating for best practice of those risky practices, cos, you know, the best farmers should be matched by everyone else. OK. So, the toughening up of all these rules, how do you think, as Trade Minister, it's going to affect one of our biggest export earners, or 60% of exports? Well, it's actually key to maximising our values. You know, we try to sell our products into the highest value markets in the world. Those consumers are increasingly interested in environmental stewardship. And I see that as Trade Minister, these things coming up, not just in climate, but also in terms of water quality. So it's true to our brand as a country? Well, we pride ourselves on having a clean, green brand, you know? It's not really real if people can't pop down to their local river in summer, pop their head under without getting crook, and that's essentially what we're trying to achieve here. We've been focusing on the rural community so far, but what about city-dwellers? I mean, how should they be adapting? What responsibilities do they have here? Well, they've got similar responsibilities, and there are rules in this package that require wastewater and sewerage discharges to be upgraded, and they should be. So urban rivers, are they gonna be swimmable within a generation as well? I would hope so. Some of them still are. But others, like the Heathcote and the Avon, need to be improved, and I'm sure they will be over a generation. Auckland's just brought forward $900 million of expenditure to separate sewerage from storm water, or storm water from sewerage. And when they've done that, within 10 years, there'll be a 90% reduction in storm water flows on to our beaches. So some are doing it. OK, this is a sort of national view of the whole clean up the waterways` Doesn't sound like it's a National view, actually. But what I'm saying is that it's gonna come down to the regional councils. They've got five years to get their plans in place, but who's going to make sure that the regional councils ` which have had sort of, you know, a mixed-review on implementing water standards ` who's gonna make sure that the regional councils are implementing these things? Well, there's help on the way there. You know, this $219 million package that we had in the budget to help farmers has also got some money in there to help regional councils. Sure, that's money for them, but what about a body over the top, like a water commission? Like a water commission. Yeah, like a water commission. Well, you know, we're going to consider that in the wider RMA review. You are? Yeah, it's one of the wider recommendations from the old Land and Water Forum, now the Waitangi Tribunal. In the meantime, we've sort of got a halfway house in that we've got this new planning process, that's about to be legislated, which has a roving panel of water, you know, commissioners headed by an environment court judge, who'll be helping councils put these plans in within five years, and most councils want that. All right. Just finally, there's nothing in this plan to address the issue of Maori water rights. Why isn't there? Well, there is, in respect to water quality, which is where we said we'd start. We're talking about ownership, not water quality. Well, you know, the ownership debate one, is difficult, and it doesn't take you very far. Whether everyone owns water or no one owns water, it's true that some people have got rights and interests in water that others don't have, including people who've currently have water permits and Maori rights and interests. So we've promised that we're going to move to that next, and we will. OK. David Parker, Environment Minister, thank you very much for your time. Thank you. And if you've got something to say about what you see on our show, let us know. We're on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram ` newshubnationnz. Our Twitter panel this week is Richard Hills and Aych McArdle. They're using the hashtag #nationnz or email us at nation@mediaworks.co.nz But still to come ` we dissect this week's political news with our expert panel. Plus Housing Minister Megan Woods on rebuilding public trust. Welcome back. They came in promising transformational government, then failed to get a capital gains tax across the line. And now the government has been forced to admit it has failed in its key election promise to build 100,000 affordable homes. KiwiBuild helped get Labour elected, so I began by asking Housing Minister Megan Woods what she would say to those who now feel a little bit betrayed. We are as committed as the day we were elected to getting New Zealanders into homes, that when something isn't working the way we want it to, that we've got the courage to actually say we need to call time on it, and we need to reset it, and make sure that it is working for New Zealanders. Your government talks about being transformational. Capital Gains Tax, 100,000 houses, both two big fails. How can voters actually trust Labour now? Well, voters can trust us because, actually, what we're saying is that we need this to work, that we've seen this problem a long in the making ` the fact that we haven't had enough houses in the affordable end of the spectrum coming through, and we're willing to say that we're going to do everything we need to do to fix it. This isn't easy. Let's bear in mind the previous government had a target of 39,000 houses through their special housing areas, they delivered 3100. That wasn't a success. KiwiBuild wasn't working for us the way we needed it to, so we're saying that we need to lift the hood, have a look at what's not working, and find ways to remedy it. We have not given up on our commitment to build houses. Sure, but the target has gone 100,000 affordable homes in 10 years ` scrapped ` so how are you going to be held accountable for this policy now? Every month I'm going to publish the figures of what we are building, what we are consenting, what's in the pipeline, what's for sale, what's sold, but I'm going to put that also within the context of everything that we're doing in housing, that actually, as a government, we have built more public houses than any government since the 1970s. Sure. When we got into government, we realised that KiwiBuild was part of what we needed to do around housing. And I think the other thing, Simon, that we have to make sure that we're tracking, and making sure that we are keeping an eye on, is what the private sector is delivering at the affordable end of the spectrum, because we were not having those houses coming through. Yeah, sure. And what we're finding is that KiwiBuild is a lever that means the private sector is starting to deliver below the KiwiBuild threshold. Can I just ask about the targets, though, because it's OK for you to have a target for state homes when you exceed it. Target 1600, you built 2000. Hooray, you say that's a good target, but not for KiwiBuild. So you don't want a target when you fail. No, it's not about failing. It's more complicated than that, Simon. When we had a look at what wasn't working with KiwiBuild, what we found was the targets were driving perverse outcomes. They were meaning that we were going for quantities in an effort to meet those targets, rather than thinking about what is the right house in the right place for KiwiBuild buyers, who are essentially first-home buyers. Yeah. When I see a target that's driving perverse outcomes, not as a way of holding a policy accountable, then I am willing to call time on it, because our fundamental aim has to be building homes that are suitable for first-home buyers, rather than just buying as many as we can to meet a target. Let's talk about one of the main policy announcements in the reset ` a progressive home ownership scheme ` shared equity, rental home. So, when is that going to be up and running? So, what I've said is I'll take the details around that to Cabinet by the end of the year, and we're looking to have that up and running next year. Let's see if you've got any details in mind. You've allocated $400 million towards the policy. That's right. How many families will that house? So, that's 2500-4000 over four years, and that depends on the final design features that we have around how far down the income scale we go, so that's why we've given such a big range, because it will all depend on the number on the final design detail. So that means that the government's willing to invest $100,000-$160,000 of equity into each of these houses. Well, it may not be` Is that right? Well, it may not be spread evenly across those. It depends. But we are looking at those kind of levels. It is recycled money, of course. This is shared equity ` the idea, of course, that the families pay back some of that equity as they go through, and what we see is the Housing Foundation are running a successful scheme with people already that are doing this. So we know there's so many people that are out there essentially paying a mortgage payment in rent, but what they're really struggling to do is get the deposit together. If it's recyclable, how long is somebody going to have to pay back the government the equity that the government's put into the house? So, this is the preliminary discussions that we've started having with the people that are doing it already. The Housing Foundation work on a recycle rate of less than five years. I think it's 4.7 years is their average recycle rate. Habitat for Humanity who are working way down the income spectrum, they've got a 10-year recycle rate, so actually it's got a reasonably fast recycle rate on it. So you're going to spread it across those, are you? Across that whole income gap or do you have-? Yeah, that's the detail work we're doing at the moment, is looking at what the spread needs to look like, how it is that we can maximise the number of people we help, but how it is, importantly for me, that we're actually setting up a scheme that will help people that would otherwise be excluded from the opportunity of homeownership. How much money would I have to bring into my house to be eligible? What is the income level ` household income level? Yeah, look, that depends on the final design details. We know from what is happening out there already through some of the other organisations. You have Habitat for Humanity who are operating sort of into the high-40s, early-50s, right through to 90,000. Cabinet documents has some figures on $110,000. Marama Davidson has said $70,000-$90,000. Your coalition partner is sort of off the mark with the Cabinet document. I think- It's not the Cabinet document, it's the advice from officials. So, this is the early advice we've got. Since we got that advice, we've been talking extensively with the sector about what is possible. OK, just quickly, you've asked for the Commerce Commissioner to undertake a market study into the building and materials industry. Do you believe we're being ripped off? Over the weeks that I've had the portfolio, people have been expressing frustrations about how it is they can build a house far cheaper in Australia than they can in New Zealand. Deloitte did a study this year, which compared Australia and New Zealand, and didn't really find any major differences. I'm getting consistent feedback from people who are working in this sector who are doing this every day, who are buying the materials, that they think that there are some things we need to look at, and this exactly why our government made the changes to the Commerce Act so we could have these kind of market studies. One of the criticisms of the KiwiBuild reset is that there are no new initiatives, really, to speed up the delivery of homes. Is this a missed opportunity to do something radical to address the housing shortage? I think one of the things that- People were expecting houses to appear overnight, and certainly we set that target for ourselves ` 1000 in the first year. I think when you step back and have a look, actually, if you compare the first Labour government who's probably held up as the epitome in New Zealand history of a government that built houses, it took two years for them to get the first state houses up and running, and tenants moving into them. So you're happy with the state? In that time, in that two years- You're happy with that rate? No. No, absolutely not, but what I'm saying is down the pipeline, we actually do have more houses coming, and the changes that we have made in the reset to KiwiBuild about making sure that we're building the right house in the right place, places that will solve, that we're getting our capital out of the houses that haven't sold in places like Wanaka, is all about being able to get that money working in developments where we know there will be demand and we will be able to keep producing more homes for KiwiBuild buyers. One of the small tweaks you've done in the reset is abolishing the asset testing for second chances ` that's people starting again after a separation. How many times can somebody be separated and yet still be eligible for KiwiBuild? Many people across New Zealand know that once you half your assets after a relationship breakdown, that you do find yourself back in that kind of situation. The income test still applies, so you still have to be earning at or below the KiwiBuild income threshold, but we recognise that people who are coming out of- So it can happen again and again and again? Oh, well, if you're below the threshold, yes. OK, all right. But I think most individuals probably wouldn't want to be finding themselves in that situation. The other really important thing about second chances that is in there is that this could apply to someone who's moving from one housing market to a far more expensive market, so I think the example that I've been using is a teacher from Ashburton who moves up to take a job in Auckland, who finds themselves in quite a different housing market than they were in, but they previously owned a home before. OK. All right, just finally, your predecessor Phil Twyford staked his job on the success of KiwiBuild, right? We know how that turned out. Are you going to do the same? Will you stake your job on the success of KiwiBuild? Look, as a government, we have made a commitment to New Zealanders that we need to be active around getting homes built, and helping people have those expanded opportunities for home ownership. We're the first to admit that this hasn't played out the way that we needed it to. And I know you've admitted that, but will you stake your job on it, Minister, just like your predecessor did? I don't know that that's a particularly useful way to put it. Does that mean that you don't trust your own policy? I absolutely trust my policy, and what I also trust is our ability and our courage to call time when things aren't working and say, 'We need to change this.' Let's remember that we have not had a government active in housing like this in decades in New Zealand. This is a problem a long time in the making. Some of the issues that we campaigned on and that we have implemented and that we have been able to bring through are making a difference for people, and we need to continue to do that, and we are making that commitment to New Zealanders. OK. Housing Minister Megan Woods, thank you very much for your time. Thank you. All right. Up next ` our expert panel on the highs and the lows of the political week. Plus ` Helen Clark on recreational cannabis, Jacinda Ardern and life after the UN. in favour of legalising recreational cannabis. It's new report argues our current laws are a waste of time and money, and worse, they punish our most vulnerable. I spoke with Former Prime Minister Helen Clark about the case for 'yes'. So, cannabis convictions have dropped by 62% over the last decade; that's fewer police and justice resources being wasted. Is this really that big a deal? There's still the 4000 Kiwis who are dragged through the courts each year on cannabis offences. If you look at the demographics, Maori are disproportionately impacted by this, so it is a social justice issue as well. I dont think any time and money of the police and justice and prison system should be wasted on this. Isn't this being addressed, though, because the Ardern Government has already directed police to use discretion when it comes to dealing with drug users and treat it as a health issue? So the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Act that went through a few weeks ago is an improvement, but there's still two issues. One, the discretion, and the discretion still sees these 4000 people brought through the courts on the cannabis offences a year, and also it leaves supply in illegal hands. So if you legalise and you regulate, you can deal with the supply issue. You can say what age it can be sold at, you can say how it can be sold. You could actually stop it being marketed, which is my preference, you can say what the contents of the cannabis are. Just before we get onto what it might look like ` you just referenced the fact that Maori are overrepresented in terms of those cannabis convictions ` the Police Minister has admitted on this show that there's unconscious bias in the force. Do you see that as well? Do you agree with that, and is that one of the reasons why you want to see this legalised? I'm always very reluctant to criticise our police because they've done a great job protecting me over the years, and they work for society, but the outcome of our justice system is that Maori are disproportionately in prison. And that is something that we as a society have to deal with. Okay. You talk about finding the Kiwi way to grow and sell cannabis. What is that Kiwi way? So, my foundations discussion paper looked at the models. You go from Colorado, which is kind of free-market USA, all the way to Uruguay and Latin America, which says you can use cannabis legally if you grow your own, you're in a cannabis club or buy it from a government store. Now, we all think, We dont have government stores here in New Zealand. So we have to find somewhere that's in between, and I think we should start with looking at the tobacco level of regulation. We do specify an age, we dont allow any advertising or promotion including at the point of sale in the shop, and we can specify content. So that's where Id start. Do you want people to be able to grow their own or do you want the supply regulated? I think people should be able to grow their own. I think its futile to try to prohibit that, but if you're then regulating sale, sale, of course, would have to have a specified content of THC and CBD ` the technical components of it. And so I dont think the grow-your-owners should be supplying. I think that needs to come through a legal channel. OK, all right. Just quickly, you say that you want to go down the tobacco route, but you dont want big business involved in this, do you? I mean, your paper says that you want to discourage large commercial and profit manufacturers. And that's why I say look at how we've ended up dealing with tobacco. And its been a battle, believe me. I've still got the scars on my back from the Smoke-Free Environments Act of 1990 where I stopped the promotion and sponsorship and advertising of tobacco. So lets not even let cannabis go down that route. OK. Your report says people who are most affected by the current laws ` growers and users ` should be given equal access to become producers and retailers. In other words, that means giving people who could be current criminals a leg-up. Is that right? Well, they've got the experience of growing it. This is an issue the Global Commission on Drug Policy, which I'm a member of, has commented on a lot. If you're moving to a legal market, why would you exclude the people who have traditionally been growing? What sort of leg-up would that mean? I mean, is it a grant to get them to be able to supply or sell? Are you thinking the Provincial Growth Fund? (LAUGHS) Well, you could ask Shane Jones. Although he is dead against any cannabis use. Well, you see the referendum is not about whether or not people should use it; its recognising the reality that its there now. And we could put some rules around it or we continue to have it as a complete free for all with no rules at all. So that's why I come down for rules. Yes, our paper also argues that those who have cannabis offences should have them wiped, and that includes for growing if there's been no other factor. If there's been harm, violence and they fought the police or brought out a firearm, that's a different matter. But if its a simple cannabis offence, it should be wiped. All right. Would legalisation actually really smash, sort of, the black markets that deal in cannabis because they're still going to exist, aren't they? Well, not for cannabis because you've made it a legal market. There has been criticism that this government is, sort of, losing the public support around this issue because they haven't properly explained the issue or the referendum in question. Do you agree with that? I think it is early days. Andrew Little has put the Cabinet paper out there. He's given the basis of the government decisions, but they haven't started any information campaign around this. Would you like to see them move a bit quicker on that? Well, they're going to have to concretise what is going to go in the proposition, so that people know when they vote yes that this is the shape of what they're voting for. The sooner you have that information out, the quicker the public will be reassured. The sooner the better, and Peter Dunne has commented in his article this week that our foundation actually makes some quite good points about what that market should look like. So the government wants a more health-focused approach to drug use. In terms of health, your former chief of staff, Heather Simpson, released a scathing report this week on the state of the health and disability system. The government says its putting enough investment into health, but do you think it is enough from your experience as Prime Minister. Well, first point is that I haven't seen the report. I think its in the mail, as it were, but secondly, Heather worked for me for many, many years. She is a very, very acute mind, and whatever analysis she's put out there I think is well worth taking extremely seriously. In terms of level of investment, I mean, probably the proportion of GDP that we spend on health isn't too far from wrong. But you've got to look at where are we spending it? Are we doing enough on the prevention, health promotion, harm reduction ` all the things that actually keep people out of hospital. Right, okay. Jacinda Ardern has described her government as the most pure form of MMP government. I dont know whether you'd agree with that. I had a few pure forms. (LAUGHS) Well, that's what I'm saying. That also means dealing with Winston Peters, which of course you have. In this run-up to the cannabis referendum, whats your advice for her dealing with the coalition partners and especially Winston Peters? Well, I think Jacinda is absolutely a class act. She did an incredible job taking Labour from the doldrums to being in a position to go into government. So she's going to judge for herself how she positions on this one. Look, I've been in the top seat ` everyone's urging you to take a position on this or that and the other. I think she should take her time and figure it out for herself. All right. Just finally before you go, you've been prime minister, as you say, head of the UNDP and now you're part of this ` the Global Commission on Drugs. Whats next? What else do you want to achieve? Mostly I'm focussed offshore. I've ended up chairing some big multi-stakeholder partnerships ` one of them, Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, which tries to drive corruption out of oil, gas and mineral sectors. And we have many developing countries who are members. The other big partnership I've taken up chairing is on maternal, newborn and child health. Right, so its quite diverse, isn't it? Its very diverse. Does that mean that without the constraints of leadership now, that you are enjoying yourself? Well, I am enjoying myself, but they are leadership positions as well, and they involve a lot of dealing with governments, with private sector, with civil society, academics, universities, so yeah, I'm loving it. OK. Helen Clark, thank you very much for your time this morning. Thanks. All right, time now for our panel. I a joined now by Trish Sherson from Sherson Willis PR, management consultant Peter Fa'afiu and Greenpeace executive director Russel Norman, thank you for your time this morning. Let's talk water first. Russel, has David Parker got it right with his freshwater proposals? Yeah, you know, we've got a freshwater crisis. You know, more than half of the sampling sites are getting worse in terms of the life and the macroinvertebrate community. So we need a really serious intervention. These regulations are a necessary step in the right direction, obviously we wanted them to go further. But I think they're a very significant step forward. He's talking about a generation to make our rivers swimmable, but what is a generation, Trish? What is a generation? Well, to me, a generation is 25 years. Right. But it's a pretty aggressive programme. I would say, on the whole, that I think the Government has come out and tried to tread a pretty careful line with all of the interests. And these are very difficult interests to manage. I actually agree with the comments by Dover Samuels in your earlier piece, where he said that we said we are all in this waka together. And if I were a government in this day and age, you know, clean water, clean air, clean healthy oceans are absolutely critical, and you asked him the question ` are you putting rivers ahead of humans? Yeah, that's right. And actually, if we don't get our ecology right, then, you know, we can all forget about it. So I think these are needed. The good news here is that New Zealand is a leader in the global pastoral dairy system, we are so advanced we are coming off a really good base. And, you know, I think the answer here is going to be a mix of things. It's going to be these kind of regulations, it's going to be genetic advancements in our dairy cows, it's going to be precision farming, and we are well-placed to do that. But so many stakeholders involved here, Peter, and we've got Federated Farmers who seem to be on the pitch when they're saying that 'this is going to put us out of business.' And David Parker's pushing back against them by saying that they're not really representing the complete agricultural sector. Yeah, well, it's going to be an interesting 6 week submission process. You know, he touched on that in that iwi have yet to provide a view. I mean, there were a couple of iwi leaders on the advisory group, but others have already come out and said they, you know, they support the government. Others have said, you know, they support realistic targets. So I guess it's gonna be a balancing act. A lot of stakeholders will have their say. But at the end of the day, I think all New Zealanders agree that we need to do something in terms of water quality. As a former trade negotiator, I can tell you that, you know, when you're negotiating market access, one of the biggest issues now for negotiators is around trying to get to that high-value end part of the market, and the Minister's right on that. OK, but what about our, sort of, this idea of it being on brand for New Zealand. Like, we're clean and green, Russel, and those kinds of things, and yet our waters are not great. Is this going to hinder us in terms of the farmers saying this is going to push them out of business, or is it gonna enhance us on the world stage saying that we are pushing this way? If you think about it as this, we're creating a bottom line of environmental performance. And Fonterra, you know, and it's notable Fonterra did not come out swinging against them. No, they didn't, now. Farmers did, but Fonterra said, 'We can work with this.' Fonterra needs to be up here. Like, if Fonterra's gonna be pitching itself to the world, then these bottom lines, they have to be way clear of those, right? And I would slightly disagree, I think the agricultural system needs quite significant change. So, you know, I think we need to move much more towards a regenerative system, and, you know, that's quite a long way from where we are now. So this is a step forward, but I think that actually our pastoral-based agricultural system really does need to go forward a lot further. And that's the challenge for us, if we're gonna sell our products to the world, and use this kind of branding, then I think we actually need to do quite a lot better than we're doing. Yeah, I mean, I think the issue here also is recognition. And I do think Fed Farmers were at one end of the spectrum, but I think you would find that farmers these days, they totally understand their environmental responsibility, and they also understand that into the future, absolute line of sight from cow to customer is going to be critical for selling their product. So I think you would find the majority of them are absolutely on board, but these are big changes and we need to make sure that they are supported through those changes. One of the things that they're trying to combine into this freshwater management system is this concept of the mana of the water, and putting, as you say, water above humans. How are they going to combine these holistic water concepts in with the science of it all, though? Russel. Well, I mean, if you look at some of the metrics they're using. So, MCI, macro invertebrate community, sounds kind of all, you know, it's a scientific measure, and essentially it measures the insect life, if you like, in a river. So that's one way to look at the health of the river, the health of the spirit of the river is measures like that. So you could say that it's hard to measure at a spiritual level, I guess, if you like. But there are actually some real measures. Look, fish densities as well. You can look at how many fish are in a river. They're good indicators of the health of an ecosystem of the water. So you don't believe it is an impossibility to mix the two together? Well, Wanganui river through the Treaty process, I mean, there's recognition in there. And of course, around the world, it's around how indigenous cultures see the health of the river as well. So, we've seen it through the western lens, right? So there's other lenses we can look through as well. OK, I just wanna move on quickly to Kiwibuild, Trish, how big a dead rat is it for this Government to swallow? Well, it wasn't a reset, it was an actual demo job. And I'm just amazed it took them so long. The thing that I can't get over here is that lovely old saying that, you know, 'wisdom is about listening and knowledge is about speaking.' There was no listening when the government came in, they knew it all, and the entire New Zealand construction industry didn't know what they were doing. So I think there is a lot of anger in that sector because they weren't listened to, and they were repeatedly saying, 'Hey, we're actually quite good at this compared to what others do internationally.' And there was an incredible arrogance around this, I think what they're angry about now is the huge wastage. So even since the election` You're talking in the industry? Within the industry itself, the wastage that has occurred, and even now through this reset, the amount of money that's going to be wasted to try and, you know, kind of bandage this thing up and let it limp along. One of the bandages, it's a big bandage, $400 million worth of bandage. Peter, you've had first-hand experience with the shared-equity system, your brother is involved in one. What do you think about that bandage, as it were? Yeah, I mean, as Trish said, I think what you see now from both Minister Woods and Kris Fa'afoi on the social housing side of it is pragmatism and humility. That's the first thing, right? 'Humility'. Humility is very important within politics. So the reset has always been about that. In terms of the details, more details to come, but in terms of progressive home-ownership, there's some good organizations doing it. Again, it's around the income levels and the detail around how households participate in that. My brother's in a Habitat For Humanity scheme at the moment, into his seventh year. And also it's also about ensuring that, how do you get them to a place where they can contribute to society as well. So, my brother's a Baptist Minister, and he's contributing through his community work, etc. So you measure participation and community not only from an income perspective, but your participation in a community as well. So the government's having to eat humble pie at the moment, Russel, the Greens aren't though, are they? Just quickly. Uh, yeah. I mean, we'll see what comes of this scheme. I mean, how and what scale it is. Cos the issue I've got is actually it requires action at scale on the supply side of the housing market. And you really do need to leverage the crown balance sheet to do that. So it's a missed opportunity, in your view? Well, I do think that not going down the state house path created layers of complexity. And so, had they gone big on state housing they could have made a lot more progress. You're still gonna have the same challenges, right? The first challenge in the industry is capacity, right? So you've got one end of the spectrum where, with the review of the industry. I'm going to end` we're going to be talking about this a lot more` And then we've got capital capacity. You've got, you know, construction companies going bust. So capacity's gonna be the main issue. Secondly, Phil Twyford's still got a role in this. He's Minister of Urban Development. And his issues are big, freeing up crown land, ensuring the infrastructure is adaptive. And that's a lot of issues. Sorry panel, I'm gonna have to catch up, just out of time, that's all. Thank you very much for your time everybody. Up next, should the Transport Agency and local councils use macrons for Maori place names, John-Michael Swannix reports ahead of Maori Language Week. Plus, David Seymour gets touchy about whether the Epsom deal will go ahead in 2020. but how well do most New Zealanders understand the language? Often overlooked is the importance of tohuto or macrons ` the little lines above the vowels that change the meaning of words. Take the Northland town of Ruakaka. Spelled without its macrons the name translates to 'two poos', but as John-Michael Swannix explains, this mix-up obscures a rich history, and locals want the name changed on official signage. Right. I want you to have a look at this word rua kaka. What does 'rua' mean? Two. Is it the number two? Nest. A hole. A hole. Cave. Cave. Ka pai. So it has lots of different meanings, doesn't it, rua. What about kaka? Wiremu. A native parrot in New Zealand. Ka pai. What happens if I do this, te mahuri? (ALL LAUGH) The name of Northland's Ruakaka has long been a source of local amusement, but the neighbourhood primary school, which has three bilingual classes, is leading the charge to change this. None of our signage at school had Ruakaka with macrons on the 'kaka' until the beginning of last year, and now everyone throughout the school is using it. And all our kids know why it's important. Because it can just mean a totally different thing. Matua is like uncle or your dad and matua is your parents. Peke and pe-e-ke ` bag and jump. Keke and keke. The one without the macron is cake and the one with the macron is armpit. (ALL LAUGH) We can't just say, 'He, tino reka tenei keke.' Otherwise we would be saying, 'Oh, this armpit is really good.' (ALL LAUGH) But while the areas' school kids are clued-up, the correct use of macrons hasn't made it to where most people see it ` local road signs. In Ruakaka they're spelled without a tohuto, leading to the common misinterpretation. Growing up, as a kid, we were always called 'two shit school', and quite often 'kaka' gets misinterpreted as the action of doing a number two. There are many stories about the origin of the name Ruakaka. One, tells of two kaka parrots that flew in different directions along the beach, but local iwi say it's an ancient name with special significance. This, here, is the Ruakaka river, and as you come along here, the Ruakaka pa, which was a decoy to send messages over to the bigger pa, so the first line of defence as a tupuna would have been coming in, it would've looked to them as if it was a rua-like feature. Up from there, you would've have an awesome view right down the river, all over the moana. Ari says the name Ruakaka is also a reminder of how much Patuharakeke has lost to colonisation. We've lost one of the toanga species, as in the kaka, and also that part is now all in housing. He says putting macrons on signs bearing the name Ruakaka is the least authorities can do. Although it's a small change, it's very, very important to be able to respect the history of the area. Ruakaka isn't the only place in New Zealand where a macron makes a difference. Take matua or matua, Mangonui or Mangonui, or Weta Workshop in Wellingon, named after our native insect the weta. Without its macrons it translates to 'poo workshop'. In English language, you know, it's really important to dot the i's and cross the t's. Well, that's the same for our te reo Maori. On state highways, road signs are owned by NZTA, and on regional roads, the local council. The New Zealand Transport Agency are happy to change the road sign names with regards to macrons. Jacqui Hori Hoult says local iwi just need to apply to the Transport Agency and their local council. Making sure that when we do sign these off, it's got a remit from the local mana whenua, but also from the New Zealand Geographic Board. In June, the board approved the spelling of 824 Maori place names, including Ruakaka, but NZTA says it doesn't have the funding to do a proactive national roll-out of macrons on road signs. So it's going to take a few more communities like this one giving rua kaka before we start seeing macrons on our road signs. It's about who we are as a people. It's about respecting who we are and where we've come from. So yeah, I think making sure our signage is correct around our community is a big step. And the at Ruakaka primary are doing their bit to make it happen. Bring me your stories to the New Zealand Transport Agency and to the District Council, please. Kia ora. John-Michael Swannix reporting. Stay with us. We'll be back after the break. Welcome back to The Pitch, where an MP has just five minutes to convince you of their ideas. He's a lone wolf in Parliament, but Act Party leader David Seymour has been a vocal advocate for both euthanasia reform and free speech. He's now proposing sweeping changes to education. Reporter Finn Hogan asked him about his policies and how it feels to know they'll probably never been implemented. The government spends 250 grand on the average kid's education. But parents get no control over that. We propose to put it in a student education account over the kid's life, and parents can actually decide to go to any school that'll enrol them. If they wanna stay at their state school, that's fine ` they wanna take it to a private school, they can do that. And I think that would create a real ecosystem of new and exciting providers, so that parents can get some better options to engage their kids. But isn't that just going to cause more and more competition between desirable schools? Well, you definitely hope you'll get more competition. You'll get people setting up new and interesting schools to actually compete for parents' dollars and kids' attention. Cos too many kids just aren't engaged by the schools we have now. That's why you've got one in five coming out, you know, functionally illiterate and innumerate. It's a disaster, and we've gotta do better. What's to stop a desirable school just cherry picking students? Sure, a school can try and cherry pick good students. But what they're gonna find is that there's another person setting up a private school down the road that can do better. And that's the kind of competition we expect in every other part of society, but we don't have right now in education. So is this an end to school zoning? No. You can still have school zones, because the schools get to decide what their policies are for enrolment. But what it does mean is that when there's more interesting alternatives out there, I think that the emphasis people will place on zones might decline. Won't this mean that in maybe some poorer households aren't gonna have guaranteed access to a local school? Poorer households in particular are gonna have the kind of choice that wealthier households have. Wealthier households can actually pay twice ` once for their taxes, and then pay again for private schools. We wanna give that kind of choice to poorer households, as we saw with charter schools. Given the choice, poorer households will actually take their share of the education funding to new and innovative schools that engage their kids better. You wanna pay teachers more on a performance basis, but how are you gonna pay for them? We spent half a million on Ministry of Education bureaucrats. There's more bureaucrats in the Ministry of Education than there are schools in this country. I've been in charge of some of them, and I can tell you we wouldn't miss half of them. And that would actually allow us to raise teacher wages by about $5000 straight off the bat. OK, but under what election outcome do you actually see these policies being implemented? People said charter schools would never happen; now every party accept charter schools to some extent. People say student education accounts can never happen. Now, they need to remember what happened with charter schools. OK, but what happens if National doesn't continue the Epsom deal? Well, what does happen? I guess Epsom people vote for me. That's a lot of door knocking and a lot of saying hello. Well, I dunno why you assume what the outcome would be. You know, have you actually got any polling to suggest it's one way or the other? So you're confident you're gonna get in without National's support? Yeah, absolutely. Because ultimately, it's up to the people. And they know that A ` I'm a good local MP and B ` that if they vote for me, they get twice as many MPs than if they don't. Have you talked to Simon Bridges already? How do you mean? Have you already had discussions about continuing an Epsom deal next year? No. No. No, it's not really a priority for me. So you're not guaranteed a seat next year? Well, no one's guaranteed a seat next year ` it's up to going out and campaigning to the voters, and I think you people in the media need to start respecting the relationship between voters and politicians and stop emphasising relationships between politicians. Cos it makes you sound` OK. Let's just move on to a few other issues now. Yeah. Let's talk guns. You were the only MP to oppose the government's gun-law reform. Why do you think voters would support something that's so obviously out of step? So, I don't understand why the Prime Minister, who's supposed to be about kindness and inclusion, rammed through legislation in a way that actually almost scapegoated hundreds of thousands of law-abiding New Zealanders. You're also proposing a Freedom To Speak Bill. What does that mean? You should never be punished simply for the fact that you have said something unpopular. So we wanna remove subjective hate-speech laws and make sure that the only way you can be punished` OK. But if you are indulging in hate speech, how are you held accountable? Well, you're held accountable by the fact that you're gonna find you've got a lot less friends. People are going to criticise you. People are going to show your ideas to be the vacuous wrongfulness that they are. That's how you counter hate speech; you don't do it by the state punishing you. So, you're calling for a flat 17.5% tax rate. How much is that gonna lower the government's total tax take? So, that would reduce the government's total tax take from about $80 billion to about $71 billion. If you look at the current surplus, if you look at the current amounts of corporate welfare, if you look at policies such as fees free that have done nothing, you can actually balance a budget and have a 17.5% flat tax rate for companies and income. That would be the fairest, most aspirational, competitive tax rate just about in the world. It would be a huge boon for New Zealand. Is it frustrating for you proposing these policies when you know that you've actually got a very slim chance of ever getting them implemented. Well, I don't know. I've got a lot more chance of implementing policies than, you know, journalists who always see only the negative in things. That was Act Leader David Seymour. We're back with our panel ` Trish Sherson, Peter Fa'afiu and Russel Norman. Trish, what difference will it make with someone like Helen Clark publically supporting the legalisation of cannabis? Well, look at what she did for smoking. This is 20 years ago, when she really led the charge against big tobacco and she stopped smoking in bars. At the time, it was hugely controversial, but it was really big for New Zealand and in terms of getting our smoking rates down. What she's reflecting is a global move away from drugs being treated as a criminal matter to being treated as a health issue. Yep. And interestingly, if you look at the recent Economist graph that they put out about the amount of harm caused by different drugs, number one ` alcohol. Right up the top. And she cites that a lot. Peter, she's advocating that big business don't get ahold of this. If we do have a market for cannabis, she doesn't want big business involved. Is that a valid concern? Yeah, it is a valid concern because, I mean, big business, their job is to see opportunity. So they probably will see an opportunity here. I think, just to reaffirm what Trish said, from a demand side of, in terms of community, the biggest issues are alcohol, but also in terms of drugs ` it's P, which is permeating through all of society. So cannabis, we'll see what the referendum brings up, but the foundation has provided us some good, cogent and pretty deep analysis for us to think about. Um, Russel, I mean, she doesn't want big business involved, so what would you think of the idea of, like, a government-controlled scheme around cannabis? Yeah, I mean, maybe. You know, you've got the Amsterdam model where, obviously, there's lots of little shops all around where you can go in and have a smoke. And that's a lot better than what we've got currently, so I'm a bit ambivalent about it. I mean` You wouldn't mind seeing it in the diary beside the tobacco? Not the dairy beside the tobacco. I think that's a little too far, but I think having special places where people go to have a smoke, which is completely separate and adults-only, which is the Amsterdam model, I think that makes more sense. I think it's also` You know` It shows how change happens as well, like, you know, I'm hopeful that this referendum will get over the line, but it's been a long time to change public attitudes around this. I've been campaigning on` You know, talking about these issues for many years. And I think is shows how ideas over time do change, and that's really important for how our society evolves. Trish, I mean, you brought the smoking example up because that's the way that, you know, the acceptance of smoking being harmful and being taken out of bars is how ideas change. Is this` I mean, Helen Clark was saying that she wants more information out there sooner in that interview. Do you think that the government is actually pushing this ` getting enough information out quickly enough? Or is it losing the momentum? Well, I think it's being led largely by the Prime Minister, who's taken a, 'Hey, we'll leave it to the referendum'-type of approach. Let's see. It's interesting to see the polling swinging around on this one. So the most recent polling has looked like it would be difficult to get it over the line, but as we know, with polling at the moment ` let's wait and see what the referendum brings up. But I do think it's a good example of where Helen Clark, as a political leader, has been a real agent for change. And I note that she said if she'd had a fourth term, she would've made this change. I'm not sure that that is the case. (ALL LAUGH) Can always make those promises in hindsight. But I think, as Peter said, the work that the foundation has done, in terms of putting good information out there, I think is really valuable. OK. Let's just quickly talk about David Seymour and his education policy. Peter, would you like to see the idea of parents controlling where to spend the money rather than the state? I'm a parent of six children, and I would love to have control across most things with my kids. You'd like to have some control. Some control, yeah. (CHUCKLES) But education's just one of those areas, like health, where when you bring market forces into it, you have to be` You have to manage it. You can never control market forces. You have to manage it, in a way. Detail is rare at the moment with a lot of things coming out from David, so we'll see. From a parental perspective,` No. ...it's a no. No, and, Russel, I don't think you're keen on it. Are you? Look, there's some places` there's good places for markets. You know, so there could be a market in people who wash windows across Auckland, all right, which is fine, and some of those will go bankrupt. But do you want all the kids in a school that goes bankrupt or doesn't work for five years, that they miss out on a decent education because the market was failing and that particular school was on its way out. It's just, if we're going to have compulsory education, so we force parents to hand over their children to the education system, surely we want to make sure that we do everything we can to make every child get a decent education. And this just won't do it because some businesses will fail in a market. That's the nature of markets. OK. Thank you very much for your time. Russel Norman, Peter Fa'afiu and Trish Sherson, thanks for the panel. And that is all from us for now. Thank you so much for watching, and we will see you again next weekend. Captions by Faith Hamblyn, John Gibbs and Ella Wheeler Captions were made with the support of NZ On Air. www.able.co.nz Copyright Able 2019