On today's show, Poto Williams unpacks a fast and furious week as Police Minister; Europe correspondent Lisette Reymer joins us live from Kyev; We get the skinny from Australia a week out from the general election, and Erika Stanford explains why she'd make a better Immigration Minister than Kris Faafoi and a better Education Minister than Chris Hipkins. www.able.co.nz Copyright Able 2022 Ata marie. First up ` guns, gangs and ram raids. Retailers are reporting an increase in ram raids, with 40 in just the last month. A spate of ram raids across Tamaki Makaurau Auckland continued overnight. - Another day, another ram raid. Businesses frightened and facing ruin because of ram raids. - It's really sad to see this kind of things happening in your business. - They have lost their faith in police and the judicial system. (CRASH!) - The ministers and I are working on some measures currently. - This is a spike. It's not a trend. (ALARM BLARES) - Sooner or later, we will be finding a dead body lying on our retail. - All right. Police blame parents, the Nats blame the government, and that means Police Minister Poto Williams, who joins us live now in studio. Te minita, tena koe. - Kia orana. - Is it true that you're too soft on crime? - You know, I have just delivered, for police, a budget of $562 million. That takes a lot of negotiation and effort and work, and it means that we believe, as a government, the police need the resources to do the hard mahi which is in front of them. - That is a huge amount of money and we will touch on that, on the fact that you have announced that amount of money for police and general crime, but the question is, are you too soft on crime? Because, according to our Newshub Reid Research poll, 68% of Kiwis believe you are. - Well, that's` You know, I would dispute that and I would dispute it very strongly because, in terms of what I am delivering as Police Minister, if you compare that to what was delivered under the National Party, you know, 16% more police on the streets, which means our people feel safer. You know, record budgets ` $450 million was the budget under the previous Police Minister in Labour, and now I've delivered a budget of $562 million` - Yeah, but` - to really counter what we're seeing in front of us. - The thing is, none of that money has been put towards ram raids. Why is that? - Well, we are out of the budget cycle currently, as you know ` with the budgets, they're prepared months ahead of time. This spike is one that is happening right now and we have been able to access the Proceeds of Crime Fund for that. - The thing is, Minister, it looks like a kneejerk reaction that, you know, it's late to be discussing ram raids when it's not a late` you know, it's not something new. It's been happening for a while and it makes you look like you're not across your portfolio. - Well, I dispute that because, in the Waikato, for example, we have Operation Pryor that's been running for a few months now. They've made 110 arrests. So the police have been active in this space. What is happening now is we have to deal with the problem that our retailers are telling us. We want our small businesses to be able to operate safely, and this is what we're going to announce in the next week. - Speaking of small businesses, specifically dairy owners, the ones we've spoken to say that, you know, the government's forgotten about them. It wasn't until ram raids occurred at Louis Vuitton and Gucci stores that the government took notice of the dairy owners. - No, look, I dispute that and I go back to Operation Pryor which has been operating in the Waikato, where we've had most of the ram raids, for some time now and the arrests that have been made, even at the Ormiston Mall` issue that happened a couple of weeks ago, arrests have been made in that. We have been active. What we're saying is, what we haven't done, is supported the retailers to protect their businesses and they've had a tough time. COVID's been tough for them. So we're looking to support them to be able to operate safely. - Do you want to announce something about that? - Well, you know that` (CHUCKLES) - Now's the time. - Cabinet ministers are making the decision on Monday and the announcement will go out after that. - OK. Well, how` - Not after cabinet, but after... - How many dairy owners have you, personally, gone and seen, especially those ones affected, here in Auckland, by the ram raids? - Well, I've been dealing with Retail New Zealand, which is the` - Dairy owners themselves. - No, no, I haven't. But I've been dealing with Retail New Zealand, who is the body that looks after, you know, businesses, small and large. Just yesterday we were having a conversation about what needs to go in place. - Would that change anything for you, though? Meeting those people face to face and having those conversations, seeing the results of ram raids, you know, these shops torn apart? - Absolutely. Absolutely. And I` Look, I want to be able to support them in a way that's meaningful for them. - Ka pai. Police blame parents, National blames the government, you say communities need to resolve the problem. Is everyone just passing the buck here? - No. I think there is an 'and' and 'and' here. Police are at the end of the problem. They pick up the pieces. But in order for us to, kind of, get ahead of this, we need to deal with the drivers, and there's no doubt that communities have a real role to play in that. So do other government agencies. And I have to say that, you know, looking at this specific issue, we've taken two tranches ` How do we support our retailers to be safe? But how do we also support our tamariki to thrive, our children to thrive, so that they're not engaged in criminal activity? And that's a piece of work that we will have a couple of ministers co-lead. - Ka pai. As part of the half a billion dollar announcement you made this week, tactical response teams are now being rolled out across the country. Are you comfortable with police having access to firearms? - They need firearms to do their job` - Are you comfortable with that? - Yes, of course I am, because they need to have firearms to do their work. They are operating in a very dynamic environment, where gangs and organised crime is much more overt and sophisticated, particularly with the presentation of firearms. - The thing is, we trialled armed response teams here in Aotearoa and scrapped them because they didn't work. What's the difference now? - The difference is quite` It's not subtle. It's very big. We went to the community at the time the armed response teams were problematic and said, 'What is it about this?' There were a couple of things. The fact that they were very overt in the community, not branded police. This is a police-branded initiative where they will be on shift. They will be you know, they will look like every` - Training-wise, how can the community feel safe with police officers walking around` - They won't be walking around. They will be deployed, using the best intelligence possible, for the most significant events. They will be armed, but they will be trained` - You and I both know, Minister, armed response teams disproportionately targeted Maori and were mostly used for traffic stops. - That's right. - Rawiri Waititi from Te Pati Maori says this move will see more Maori shot and dead in the streets. - This is not armed response. This is tactical response to keep police safe and to send the best trained people into the most significant situations. - But won't this put more Maori at risk? - Look, the police are very clear that they need to have a better response to Maori. And I` You know, I point to the work that they are doing with Kim Workman. The research which will look at why police stop Maori, why they question them and why they arrest them in disproportionate number to everyone else. You know, I have a lot of personal skin in this game because I don't want for Maori or Pacific young people to enter the criminal justice system inadvertently. We need to get ahead of all of this` - And targeted unfairly. - Abso` Well, but, you know, there are ways that the police can deal with this, that` Kim Workman's piece of work is one. Making sure that our police reflect and look like the communities they serve is another. And I point to, in a couple of months time, the Mana Wahine wing of graduates who are coming through Police College. Maori and Pacific are entering police in numbers like we've never seen before, and Maori woman have a strength that they bring. And we have a wing that is, you know, that's going to have so many Maori in it, they be the face that pushes a lot of, you know` You populate the police with your views and your tikanga, because of what you bring to the service. And I` - Minister, you're also committing to more police officers, one for every 500 Kiwis. Is that correct? What makes what makes you think you can reach that target when we still don't have the numbers` the extra 1800 officers Labour promised in 2017? - Well, we're up to about 1400 and we'll reach the 1800 by the end of the year. That's six months ahead of target. We actually have been proactively recruiting` We're at, now, one police officer for every 480. So we've beaten the 500 and we've committed to stay at that level, because we know that more police, more visibility, means people feel safer and we need people in the police to do the mahi. - E te minita, thank you so much for making yourself available and joining us here on Newshub Nation. Tena koe. - Me taki matou. - If you've got a news tip, get in touch. We're on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram or flick us an email ` E whai ake nei, the week's news with our panel, Shane Te Pou, Agnes Loheni and Jason Walls, plus Europe correspondent Lisette Reymer joins us with the latest from Kyiv. the countries are no closer to brokering a peace deal. In fact, Russia's bombardment of Ukraine has only intensified. The latest attack on civilians, a village school, where 90 people were taking shelter. Our colleague Lisette Reymer is in Ukraine and joins us live from Kyiv. Lisette, you've been there four times now. How has it changed? Perhaps the easier question to answer is how hasn't it? Because, quite frankly, everything has changed. The first time we were here in Kyiv, it was pre-war, and nobody really thought a war would occur. The second time we came in, we went to Lviv. That was in the West. At the time, it was considered a real safe haven. Since then, it's been hit by missile strikes. People have died there. Any sense of safety in this country has completely vanished. The third time we went to Odesa in the south, a port city, that was very worried about being attacked, but was very confident that it could resist any advances from the Russians. And at the moment, they are being shelled quite intensely. And here we are back in Kyiv, where the Russians have already withdrawn, and the landscape is completely different. We drove in to the capital today, and from around an hour out approaching the city, it is just bomb site after bomb site ` flattened buildings, homes, businesses, infrastructure completely destroyed. So everything has changed. - No one expected Ukraine to hold out this long. Is there a sense of optimism amongst locals? - Well, perhaps that's the one thing in terms of Ukrainians that really hasn't changed at all. While the rest of the world may have doubted how strong the Ukrainian forces could be, Ukraine ` the locals ` have always been incredibly confident and incredibly optimistic that they would be able to put up an impressive fight and push Russia back home. And I think every week that's gone by, when we've seen them do that, they've had to withdraw from the Kyiv area. Even in the east, they're not making the progress that Putin may have expected. The Ukrainian forces have just recently started regaining control of some of the areas around Kharkiv. They are making all of this quite impressive and surprising progress. And absolutely that is just really reiterating that optimism that the Ukrainians have had the entire time. And they are really confident and were telling me just today that they will win this war. - Wow. And the latest development this week ` Finland wants to join NATO. How much of an upset is that going to create in this war? - Well, it's safe to say Russia will not be happy about it. Already, they they've responded by saying they will be forced to retaliate ` a threat that nobody is taking lightly, because we know better than to consider any of Russia's threats to be empty at this stage. It may not have a direct impact on this war in Ukraine, but it certainly speaks to the wider implications this war is having all around the world, and particularly on the landscape in Europe. You know, countries like Finland and Sweden both considering now joining NATO, countries that have been neutral for so, so long. So we're living in a world now, as I say, where everything has changed. It's pre-war and post-war. And there is just a lot of ongoing consequences as a result of what is unfolding here in Ukraine at the moment. - Lisette, you've been following the former Defence Minister Ron Mark around, who's on a charity mission over there. What is it that's brought Kiwis from across the world into a war zone? - I'm sure you have felt it yourself, and many New Zealanders would have ` you feel far away; you want to do something to help, and you don't necessarily know how to. A lot of people make very generous donations or offer their support in that way. But for those who have the resources or the skills or the opportunity to come over here and be on the ground and offer that firsthand support, you know, they want to do that. Ron Mark is one of those that's come over. But there have been a number of New Zealanders who have come over here under these trying conditions to offer, you know, their skills, whether that be in terms of what they can teach Ukrainians in terms of paramedic support or military support and training. I spoke to one man, a Kiwi, who's based in Bucha at the moment and is helping with the clean-up. So people are going to extraordinary lengths to try and make a difference and offer their support in what is an incredibly helpless situation. - Lisette Reymer, our Europe correspondent over there live in Kyiv. Thank you. To immigration now ` with Covid acting as a circuit breaker, now is Aotearoa New Zealand's chance to redesign immigration fresh for the future. The government laid out its plan this week. Minister Kris Faafoi saying it will attract the skilled workers that are in short supply. But the reset ran into allegations of racism and sexism, with female-dominated roles like nursing put on a slower, bonded track to residency. Simon Shepherd sat down with Minister Faafoi and asked him why. - When we engaged earlier with some of those sectors, they are worried about retention. When you do get residence, you get an open work visa, and then you can go and work in whichever sector you want. We obviously need nurses here. And I think for some of the employers in the sector, we haven't gone far enough, and they'd want us to bolt people to the jobs, if they get them. But we've said that if they spend two years here ` for the likes of a nurse, because we need those skills ` they are working in that role, that after two years of making that commitment to being here in that role in New Zealand, that they'll be eligible for residence. - So are they bonded to a job? - They're not bonded to a job; they're bonded to the role. - To the role? - So, you know, they'll be able to move from employer to employer, if they're still in that role. Nursing has been used as an example in this interview so far. But we need those nurses. And the early feedback that we got from the consultation from the employers in the sector is that because we need them, and we want them to stay in those roles, that being able to have them for two years in that role before they went to residence is something` And again, it gives them certainty after those two years that they can make` They'll put roots down in New Zealand and stay here for good. - If I was an engineer, can I walk in and then change my job as soon as I've got residency? - Absolutely. Those skills are at high demand. - Yeah, but the nurses have to stay in their role, though. - Again, because of the early engagement that we had with the likes of employers of those nurses, they were worried about nurses coming, and then arriving, and then not necessarily staying within the sector. - Who asked for that specifically? - Look, we spoke to the likes of the aged care sector, and I think it's those kinds of` - Aged care sector? - Yeah. It's those kinds of stakeholders that I think probably would have wished that we'd gone further. But we think we've got the balance right, because we need those nurses to stay in those roles. Obviously, as we come out of the pandemic, there's a shortage, but we obviously need those critical health workers for the jobs that they do. They do continue to have some certainty about their residency after two years working in those jobs. - But the nurses themselves say they weren't consulted about this; only the employers. Should the nurses have been consulted? - We work with the likes of the Ministry of Health. I understand early in the piece that the likes of the CTU were also involved, but it was really important for us to understand early in the piece that the retention of the workers was important. I think those nurses organisations should also understand as part of this rebalance is that we're broadening the ability to bring more types of nurses. - It's not just nurses, though, that are unhappy with this. Midwives have come out and said that they've been blindsided and that this is just gender discrimination. - Well, I disagree with that. The list is actually after work that is done by the skills that we need in the country. The midwives, again, are on the two-way` two-year work to residence pathway. And, again, it gives them certainty about being able to be in the country. So they will continue to be able to bring more midwives into the country,... - Yeah. - ...and to have a certain pathway to residence after two years. - But they're calling for you, and Plunket nurses as well are calling for you to rethink this policy. - Will you consider rethinking it? - Look, we're going to review this list after 12 months, and after that, it'll be reviewed every three years. These are not` These are skills that we need in the here and now, especially after the borders being closed. And we've worked with the likes of the construction sector, the likes of the tech sector, the likes of the health sector, working with the Ministry of Health to understand what we absolutely need now. So that green list gives those occupations on it ` I think it's close to 85 ` certainty about residence when we need those skilled workers here. - There is a global war for talent. I mean, you acknowledge that. So isn't this going to mean that if you can't give a nurse residency straight away, that they will just go off to Australia or America? - Yeah, but residency isn't the only thing that will attract nurses here. I think` - What, the pay conditions? - Well, pay conditions is certainly something that the Government wants to make sure is sorted. But I also think that if you think about the last two years, this is a wonderful place to work in terms of the safety and our own health sector. We need those nurses. And again, the pathway to residence after two years gives them certainty. If they come here, work in the role, after two years they are eligible automatically for residency. And I think that is an enticement that those employers can use to make sure that they can attract workers here. - There are other people who were on the skills shortage list which seem to have dropped off, like truck drivers. - Yes, but I want you to understand that the green list is about residency, and the long-term shortage skill list was about bringing visa workers into the country. So the Accredited Employer Work Visa` - So we don't want to give truck drivers residency. - No. We want to make sure that if there are skills that need to be filled here in New Zealand, that we've got a simple way to do that. And with the Accredited Employer Work Visa, that happens. If you're an accredited employer and you're paying the median wage, you test the local market and you can't find someone to fill that role, you will be able to bring a migrant worker into the country. We want` At the heart of our rebalance changes is making sure that we have got a higher wage, higher skilled workforce in migrants coming into the country. We still need those skilled workers. 75% of temporary migrants are being paid above the median wage. - What about the other 25%? Are you abandoning, like the Greens say, the low-paid migrant workers who kept the country going through the pandemic and now can't get residency? - No, look, I think what you've seen in the last 12 months` We've had the 2021 residency visa. So those types of workers that have been here a long time, or have been in skilled or scarce work, have been` this government has committed to making them residents. We've got about 192,000 people who are on temporary visas in the country for some time, who we have given hope to be able to lay roots here in New Zealand. That is a huge commitment to make to them. - The Greens are also calling your policy sexist, because tier one treatment for, say, lucrative, male-dominated jobs, they can walk into residency. Whereas the female-dominated jobs have to wait. - I think that's an assumption that is wrong. We have gone out and looked at the roles and the occupations and the skills that we need in the country to make sure we can recover from the borders being closed in the Covid pandemic, and we've given fast-track residence pathways to those roles because we need them. Some of them` - So this has got nothing to do with sexism? - Look, traditionally, nurses have been` has been a female-dominated occupation. But to say that it's sexist when we have based all of our work for the green list on what the country actually needs in terms of skills is what` is the foundation of that green list. - It seems to be the employers dictating the immigration policy with the nurses, though. Is that right? - Well, it's important` They are an important stakeholder. What's important to make sure we've got more nurses is our serious need to fill the labour shortage in terms of nurses and also making sure that when they are here, they stay in those roles as well. I think if we hadn't engaged those employers at the beginning of the process and understand what they need, then they'll be grumbling, and you'd be criticising us for that as well. - Anyone who earns, say, twice the median wage now can come and work for two years and then apply for residency. - Yes. - That's right, isn't it? - Correct. - Okay. Given the gender pay gap, have you ever thought about having two levels? So women would have to qualify for 105,000 rather than, say, 116,000? - No, we never thought of that. I think we thought about another pathway to residence to make sure that those who are highly skilled, that didn't necessarily make the green list, had a pathway to do that. - Because this way, more men will be accepted into residency than women, according to the gender pay gap. - Look, I think we want to make sure that we're attracting high-skilled workers. That's why to try and make the system as simple and streamlined as we possibly can, we have the pathway through the green list, and we also have two times. If people are paid extremely well and want to work here for an amount of time, they get the residency pathway as well, and I think that's really important that we have those options available. - Will Immigration New Zealand be able to actually process these visas on time? - I've asked for assurances that we'll be able to get the likes of working visas done within 20 working days. I've been given that assurance. I've asked for assurances that the likes of Accredited Employer Work Visas can get done within 30 working days. I've been given that assurance. - And what happens`? - I've asked for assurances around the residency visa. I've been given those assurances. We'll be obviously watching that very closely. - What happens if they don't meet those targets? - Well, I'll get grumpy, and I'll ask officials to make sure that they can put more resources and effort into it. - Well, just finally, how many people do you want to come in? - It's not necessarily about how many. And I think that's going to be` A lot of people talk about the net number. It's going to be interesting to see what the kind of Covid, post-COVID travel patterns are and the ability of people to come. We want to make sure that we're getting high-skilled, high-paid migrants into the country to fill the high-skilled jobs that we need in the country. - I agree. But you need to know roughly how many, because that translates to stress on housing and infrastructure and things like that. So do you have a ballpark figure? - We don't have a ballpark figure, because I think it's extremely early days to be able to understand what those flows are. - So the Labour policy of 2017, which was to slash` - Well, it's 2022 now, Simon, and a year ago we committed to making sure that we looked at the long-term settings of our immigration settings and to move away from the overreliance on lower-paid workers, and we've done that by the announcement that we've made this week. - All right. Minister Kris Faafoi, thanks very much for your time. - Thank you. - Up next ` will it be ScoMo or Albo? We cross live to Canberra ahead of a feverish final week before Australia's polling day. Plus, Erica Stanford tries to convince you she would make a better Immigration Minister than Kris Faafoi and a better Education Minister than Chris Hipkins. So will it be Scomo or Albo who becomes the next Prime Minister? Recent polls show Labour's Anthony Albanese is ahead of incumbent Scott Morrison, but these still is one last week of campaigning to go. Taylor Aitken is covering the election campaign for Channel Seven and she joins us now. Taylor, tena koe, with Albanese in the lead, can Morrison turn this around in just one week? Good morning. Well, it's certainly not impossible, but it is getting increasingly difficult for Scott Morrison to turn this around and pull off another miracle win. Scott Morrison knows his career in politics is on the line here in the Coalition, throwing everything but the kitchen sink at this campaign. But that's not to say it's been an easy campaign for Anthony Albanese either. He's been caught out not knowing the nation's unemployment rate, the interest rate and parts of his key policies. However, I think a lot of people have made up their minds long before this election was called. As for undecided voters, on the other hand, I do think it will come down to the final days of this campaign. And for Scott Morrison, his task is to convince them that now is not the time for change. But as they say, a week is a long time in politics, and anything can happen. - It sure is. And it's quite interesting, he's suddenly appealing to Australian voters. Why is that? When you say he's forgotten, he's left out quite a few key issues. He doesn't know his numbers. So tell us, who is Anthony Albanese? - Well for a lot of people, Anthony Albanese was not a well-known name before even this year. He has been in politics for a long time, 26 years, holding multiple portfolios over that time. He did take the reins following Labour's shock defeat in 2019, but then of course the pandemic hit, and the Opposition was very much relegated to the back of people's minds. In terms of why he's appealing now, Anthony Albanese is running a very different campaign to Scott Morrison. He's not trying to match Morrison on campaign pace or in style, but he's often speaking from the heart, sharing his own personal experiences, including growing up in housing commission with his mother reliant on disability benefits. And he truly believes that government can have a positive impact on people's lives, and he's using that to connect with voters on a more personal level. - Taylor, Scott Morrison is trailing behind in the latest polls, but the polls got it wrong the last time. Can we trust them? - They very much did get it wrong. The results of the last election, compared to what the polls were predicting, was incredibly unexpected. And while the pollsters insist that they have updated that methodology, there is a certain a sense of apprehension about trusting these polls this time around. But around a quarter of surveyed voters have remained undecided throughout this campaign. So there is still a considerable amount of people that could end up delivering a closer result than the polls are expecting next week. - Taylor Aiken, thank you very much for joining us. Channel 7 News reporter there live from Canberra. Back here in studio with me now as our panel, former Labour candidate Shane Te Pou, Newstalk ZB Senior Political Reporter Jason Walls and former National List MP Agnes Loheni. Tena kotou katoa. Thank you very much for joining us this morning. And before we kick into the Aussie elections, we just had some breaking news. The Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, has tested positive for COVID 19. So guys, what will this mean for the budget on Thursday? Well, it means she's not going to be there is the main thing. I mean, the Prime Minister is not usually in the budget lockup with the journalists. And the analysts, but it means that she won't be in the house as well. But the Budget is very much the Finance Minister's day and so Grant Robertson will still take the lead. After all, he's still the Deputy Prime Minister. But it does you know, he was saying in a speech even this week that COVID, the looming threat, kind of is standing over everything the government does. And this goes to show COVID is still ever-present. - How will this disrupt general politics, what the Prime Minister's committed to this week? - Well, I understand I understand through Jason, that the trip to the States is still on because of the timeframe in terms of it testing positive and the possible exit. Look, I don't think it does really, because, you know, we live in 2022. We've worked remotely for a year, 2, 3 years. So I don't think it does. And I think it'll be business as usual. And Jason is right, the budget is the domain of the Minister of Finance, and Grant will handle it, as he always does. - But Jason, is that realistic, though? That trip is scheduled for the end of this week because she really going to be okay to go on that trip? - Well, I mean, it's remains to be seen. Some people get COVID worse than other people. But at the end of the day, these are the rules that the government put in place. That's the job of the Prime Minister to be an exemplar of those rules, and seven days is seven days. - All right. And before we continue, we seem to be swishes to the Prime Minister. Agnes Loheni, you heard there the korero from Taylor Aiken over in Australia about the Australian elections. Do you think there's any chance of Scott Morrison making a comeback in terms of pulling those polls around and being re-elected as Prime Minister of Australia? - Well, yes, is he was Lazarus in the last election. He did make an unexpected, you know, victory in that one. And you should never write anyone off, because as we've seen, there is a large undecided vote. But it does appear the tide has turned on Scott. - It's been quite an interesting watch, especially in the last week, them going head to head. What do you make of what's happening? - Morrison ran a short race, and he had to, because he's got those vulnerabilities, I think two points. Labour's on around about 54, so that looks reasonably comfortable. But we, we remember the last election and the other thing is that there's a lot of teal, which is sort of bluish greenish candidates and independent seats that I think will be a big factor. And you know, I'm picking I'm picking Labour by 80 seats. - 80 seats?! - Which is reasonably significant. The momentum... - What do you think, Jason? - I think his hold is shaky. - I think the momentum is going towards Labour. - Yeah, well, I think that whatever happens, I mean, political parties on this side of the ditch will be keeping a very close eye on what happens. As I understand it, the Labour Party over there hasn't been campaigning on anything particularly blockbuster. They've been really running a sort of alternative to Scott Morrison, or Scomo. So, you know, I know the National Party will be taking interest. I know for a fact a senior member of their caucus was over there taking close notes to see how things are going. So, a drop happens in Australia, always ripples to New Zealand. - Agnes what will the change in government for Australia mean for us here in New Zealand? - Actually at the moment I don't think too much. We've got our own issues here and look, normally people think that we're really aligned with the Liberal Party and of course, you know, on values we are. But as different issues happening for us that we are focussed on here, and the National Party will be focussed on winning the election next year. - Let's talk about Tauranga. Of course, Te Paati Maori releasing a statement saying that they're not standing anyone in the Tauranga by-election due to the fact that it's a hotspot for hate speech. Shane Te Pou, is Tauranga too racist for Maori? - Well, as you know, Oriini, I'm from the Bay of Plenty and yeah it has always had a` (INDISTINCT) - Yeah, it always has had a reputation. That's where what I think sort of racist-based organisations do well in, such as Hobson's Pledge. You know, in and in even that sort of racist tinge that the Taxpayer Union's got on. So, yeah, for Maori I think it is an issue of significant, sort of, concern, and which is particularly one because there's a lot of very active pro-business iwi there that sort of tend to get ignored, and I think Tauranga needs to get with the with 2022, they need to do better. - Winston Peters. Jason, Winston Peters calls that a ridiculous insult. I mean, he's testament to that, he's stood there. He has been a Tauranga representative for a very long time, was in the past, Simon Bridges is Maori, of course so is Winston correct in saying that, you know, Te Paati Maori is the pot calling the kettle white. He's got a way with words, Winston, hasn't he? - He has. - He makes the point and so does national that of the past 38 years, 35 of those there's been a Maori MP that's represented that constituency. So their point is, well, it can't be all as bad as what the Maori Party is saying if that is the case. I mean of course, as Shane saying, there are definitely pockets that need to be addressed. But you know, what it's done is it's forced a bit of a reflection and a conversation, I think whichever way you look at it, I mean a conversation based on what's happening within the communities is helpful. - Agnes, Tauranga is a part of Te Waiariki. Waiariki is of course Raiwiri Waititi's electorate. Do you think this is a political stunt? - I do, and I think it's really disappointing in terms of just good democracy in our country that a party is saying that, you know, the electorate is not good enough for our representation, that we won't be here to represent you and put somebody forward. And I think that's unfortunate. - How detrimental Shane do you think this is to Te Paati Maori's lead up to` It's not? - Oh, it's not. It's not detrimental at all. The other thing is whakapapa was one thing, but kaupapa is another, and Te Paati Maori kaupapa-based organisation. I don't think it will, I think it will embolden them and I think it will create some positivity for them in Waiariki and in the other seats they contest. They're speaking to their constituents, That constituency matters little to them. - Something else developed over the last couple of days, which is Brian Tamaki is leading a HUI this coming week and he's calling on all the smaller parties to unite. I don't know if you've heard of that, but Jason, what do you make of that? Brian Tamaki's, you know, rallying all of the minor parties. - Well, that's the first I've heard of it. But you can't really expect, you know, The Outdoors Party or some of the other parties to rally around the Brian Tamaki flag. I think that in the past he has well-established, controversial credentials, and I think that he is not the right person to rally the minor parties. I'm not sure what flag or what issue he's rallying them behind, but if they're looking for a figurehead, yes, he's going to get headlines, but outcomes? I don't think so. - Yeah. Agnes, you're nodding your head there. What do you think? - I think well, smaller parties generally form because they've got specific bottom lines. And I think it's really hard to then try and corral them together when they're really rigid on some areas. - Can I also said in a lot of these minor parties are based on external conspiracies, what happens sooner or later is they combust inwards because, you know, they fight amongst themselves. Billy TK and whatever's party, I forget what it was called, was a prime example of this. They won't get any runs on the board. And the other thing is Brian Tamaki has stood in seats before. He stood in Mangere and got less than 300. They got 1,000 in Waiariki. A very high level campaign. He's no campaigner, and I don't think will get any traction. - Right. And just quickly, Poto Williams, we had her on earlier this on the show this week. They announced that quite a substantial amount of funding towards crime, ending crime. What do you make of that, Jason? - Yeah, well, I think that's I mean, it's budget season. We love to call it May Madness down in the press gallery. And so they were always going to have a big law and order package. But what her press conference was dominated by was questions about the ram raids, and the at the time there was no specific funding that went into that. However, you heard her on your interview say that Cabinet will be discussing tomorrow and making decisions this week about any funding for that. And I think that there is a question to be asked about kneejerk, but I think that the government does have an obligation to its constituency to respond to events. And if you have children using cars as battering rams to steal clothes, and that's going to be playing on repeat at the 6:00 news, of course they're going to respond to it. I can see you frothing at the bit to jump in here before we end. Yeah, look I just want to say that let's look at the reality. A lot of this is a newish Tamaki Makaurau that doesn't have the social infrastructure. I can tell you what, I think the best way to deal with this is the way that we've dealt with it locally. And let's get Manukau Urban Maori Authority, let's get some real intervention, let's get some real wraparound services because we're only talking about 30 families. And when I hear, Jason, your platform advocate for borstals and throwing young Maori and Pacific kids in jail, it appals me. We've got to be above this in terms of the issue in the debate. - All right. Unfortunately, we've run out of time. And I thank all three of you for joining us today on Newshub Nation. Tena koutou. U tonu mai e te iwi, stay with us. Erica Stanford feels the heat in The Pitch, and British science writer Mark Lynas on learning to love genetic modification. That's after the break. This week, National's immigration spokesperson Erica Stanford blasts the government's recently unveiled proposals as both nonsensical and sexist. Reporter Finn Hogan started by asking her what her first act would be as minister. - I'd make sure that we had pathways to residence open. At the moment, there is no pathway to residence unless you're on the new green list, and that's really important. Migrants ` it's been proved over the last few months ` will not come to New Zealand unless they know what their pathway is. We've got to get that open. - Well, on the green list and on the Greens, they've called out the government as sexist and racist. Do you think that's fair? - Let's take those two. Firstly, racist. I don't buy that. I think that's a bit of an attention-grabbing headline from the Greens. It's just that that is` those are the skills that we need. It's been based on the long-term skills shortage list. Sexist, I have to tend to agree. - It's a sexist proposal. Absolutely. - So who would be on your priority list? - I would have all of those people on the priority list. There's no reason for that two year list. The minister tried to say, 'Well, we don't want nurses coming in the country 'and then stopping nursing.' A) who does that if you're a trained nurse? But B), what about doctors and engineers? Are you not worried about them coming in the country and not doing what they said they would do? There's an easy workaround for that. You can put conditions on people's residency to make them work for two years in that industry. So actually there's no reason for the two year list. - And we've got a gender pay gap of around 9% in New Zealand. Is there some scope in these proposals to maybe do something about that? Would you consider maybe having a lower wage threshold for women trying to come into the country compared to men in comparable industries? - That's actually a really good point and it's not something I've even considered because you've got to get over certain wage rates. You've got to get over the median wage or two times the median wage, or certain very high wage rates. And that will favour men, so you're absolutely right, and probably something that needs looking at. - You've also called out the government over their ability to process all these visas. Specifically, what would you do differently? - What I would have done differently is make sure that we have people on the ground processing visas. Immigration New Zealand have hired an additional 500 people across the board and yet they still have 100 fewer people processing visas than they did in 2017. Easy fix. Their job is to process visas. Use the staff that they've got to process visas. - With your Education Spokesperson hat on, you've called the government out over a truancy crisis. How much of that, though, is down to COVID and to health concerns and keeping those kids out of class? - Before COVID came along, only 58% of children were attending school regularly. It's gotten` it's gotten slightly better actually, funnily enough. But when you look at the unenrolment figure, that's a key figure. In March this year, 8000 children became unenrolled. That is the biggest figure in the last three years. That is a crisis, because once they drop out altogether, it's very, very difficult to get them back in again. - OK. Well, what would your first action be to address that? - Well, the National Party have called for mandatory reporting of truancy figures. At the moment, schools don't have to report and we wanted those figures available in real time. There must be mandatory reporting. There must be a mandatory 90% of students going to school regularly requirement, and if schools drop below that, they need to have plans in place about what they're going to do. They need to be held accountable for that. - If there's a lot of mandatory demands on schools, what does the enforcement mechanism for that look like? - There needs to be someone at the Ministry of Education who actually responsible for that. They employ 5000 staff at the ministry and not a single person is employed to make sure that truancy rates are declining and attendance is going up, so they don't have a focus on it. There's no one there responsible for it and demanding those plans from schools. - But I just wonder what the other side of the mandate looks like. If schools do fail, what` are there punitive measures that're going to come in? What would that look like? - We've already said in our plan last year that, you know, schools that are really dropping down, if their plans aren't working and they're down below 50%, then we need to have a truancy officer employed at that school to bring that up, because 50% is pretty abysmal. - And literacy and numeracy rates continue to fall. The Government has rolled out a plan to address this. What specific parts of that plan do you agree with? What would you keep, and what would you be doing differently? - The numeracy, literacy and communication plan that was rolled out was a giant, waffly document that didn't say anything. It said nothing at all. There was nothing in there about targets, about outcomes, about timeframes, about what science we're actually going to follow and what we're going to do. - Give me one tangible thing that you would be doing, then. - Literacy, for example. The way that we teach literacy in this country has to change. The curriculum needs to change. We need professional development for teachers. We need to change the way that we are` initial teacher education, to make sure that teachers are being taught in` with a science of reading approach, so that they know how to teach children to read. - Would you acknowledge this is a problem that falls at the feet of both parties? Because this has been declining for two decades, at this rate. - We have been doubling down on a failed method of teaching kids to read for 30 or 40 years. That has to change. The evidence is in. The jury` the jury is in. They've delivered their verdict. The way that we teach reading in this country really doesn't help anyone. - Finally, which of these two spokespeople portfolios are you going to be gunning for`? - Don't make me choose. Don't make me choose. Look, I tell you what, if I did have to choose, it would be Education. I think Education is probably one of the single most important portfolios that you can hold. It changes so many lives. It's so important, not only for those children, but actually for the, you know, our future well-being, our future productivity and our future growth, economic growth. - Taihoa e haere. We're back after the break. but is it time for a different approach? British science writer Mark Lynas says yes, he used to oppose GM and even rip crops out of the ground. But now he believes GM is the only way we can feed the world and tackle climate change. Simon Shepherd began by asking him what changed his mind. - Broadly, what changed my mind was understanding the science better. There's as strong a scientific consensus that GMOs are safe and useful as there is that climate change is real and, you know, a present threat. So as someone who campaigning on climate and took science seriously in other areas I didn't feel that I should continue being anti-GMO when basically the science was pushing all in completely the opposite direction. - It was quite a journey for you, though, from somebody who used to go around ripping up crops. - (LAUGHS) Yes, that's true. I mean, I did do my fair share of crop-ripping- up. I mean, that was that was a long time ago. That was way back in, you know, in the late 1990s. And, you know, I guess GMO crops were new at that point. I mean, they've now been on the ground for 30 years and so we have a very long history of safe use, and we know that pretty much the same as any other crops or food. But I mean, I guess at that time, in my defence, it was a novel technology and we thought there might be risks. We now see that there isn't any additional risk. But you know, that was the thing that I felt strongly about. But as you say, I changed my mind. And I think it's important. I mean, it's kind of embarrassing to do a U-turn like that, but I guess it's important if, you know, if the science changes and your understanding changes that you change your mind and you change your behaviour as a result. -= OK, so what do you think of New Zealand's approach to genetic modification? - New Zealand's approach is stuck back in the 1990s, as far as I can tell. It hasn't been updated. It's still based on this idea that there's something risky about some about genetic technologies, which is unfortunate and probably harming the environment because there's a lot that can be done now with genetic modification and all the new technologies of gene editing, which can make farming more sustainable, like reduce pesticide use and all the things which, you know, us environmentalists think are desirable. So, you know, it's kind of` What's the word, antediluvian. New Zealand still have this prohibition era regime on GMOs, which is a bit like saying we won't ever take the COVID vaccine because that too is genetically engineered. So it's time to time to get into the 21st century New Zealand. - Well, why? I mean, you've studied this. Why do you think there are countries like New Zealand which have this approach still to GM? - I think it's a matter of PR essentially. I mean, there's this sort of mental image of GMOs as being bad for the environment, And so countries like New Zealand, or Tasmania is one as well, in Australia they say they want to, you know, be clean and green and actually Scotland's the same in the United Kingdom. But it's just a matter of image, it's not a matter of science, and there's never any science that can use to justify that. And in fact, it's harmful to the environment that they maintain this this kind of restrictive regime against new science. But they do it because they think it's going to help their exports, so it just helps their image, or just basically they're just out of date. - Right. So you say that GM food can help us through climate change. How is that possible? - Yeah. I mean, it's basically genetic modification allows you new traits in plants and animals, basically. So, for example, in Africa at the moment, there's drought tolerant maize, you know, corn, as they call it in the United States, which can obviously help smallholder farmers produce a better harvest when the rains don't come, that's a climate change adaptation measure, because climates are affecting rainfall patterns and making it drier in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa. So if these countries turn around say we don't want GM, then they can't use that technology and the farmers get less harvest, and that, you know, worsens food insecurity. So, you know, that's just one example. But there's many others, of course. - Okay. But there are groups like Greenpeace who are still anti-GMO because they believe that it's linked with increased pesticide and chemical use. Is that true? - It's complicated because it depends on which chemicals you're talking about. So the first generation of GM crops were bred to be tolerant of Roundup, otherwise known as glyphosate, which is which is a weed killer. So it's a herbicide. So basically the idea was a farmers sprayed that in the fields. It got rid of the weeds, you know, it made it much easier for them to cultivate, but that was increasing the use of that particular chemical. Most other GM crops use insect resistant technology, so they've got genes in there, which mean that it kills the insects, then you don't need to spray insecticides, which` Most tend to be much more harmful chemicals. So on balance, GM crops have reduced the use of the most harmful synthetic chemicals. And that's, I think, why Greenpeace decided to drop that campaign. I mean, you won't see, certainly not in the UK, many other countries, Greenpeace campaigning against this because I think they also realise that the world's moved on. - Okay. There is this concern that big agriculture could end up controlling the technology and therefore they could control the world food supply. Is that the situation in terms of the big companies being able to just say we own these kinds of technologies? Well, you know, the world we're living in is big companies own just about everything that they impact, and including most of the food that we buy and eat every day. And, you know, that's say, that's the world we're living in and it goes for organic seeds and everything else as well, by the by the way. So it's not something which is unique to genetic technology. And in fact, you know, there are lots of small start-ups who use the technology doing open source. As I say, also for sub-Saharan Africa, for small-holding farmers in many developing countries. So it's a technology that can be used in different ways by different actors. And there's nothing inherent about it, which means that it helps the companies. - Okay, just finally, whakapapa or genealogy is a key concept for some of those indigenous people that you're talking about. Does genetic modification present a challenge to those kind of cultural beliefs? - You know, I think it may well do. I mean, it's a challenge to our ethics and our understanding of the world, knowing what we do know now about genomics and and genes in general and genetics. And it gives us the power ` I mean, if you look at synthetic biology ` we have the power to create some novel forms of life from synthetic, well, just from inanimate elements, if you like. You know, and this is a power that humans haven't had before. We have the power to genetically alter all the plants and animals, including ourselves. So we need to update our ethics about this. And yes, it does, I think it does challenge our understanding of the world and what nature means, what that actually means, including to indigenous peoples. And don't I think that means we have to block it, but it does mean that we need to think seriously and deeply about these things and what they mean to all of us. - Mark Lynas in Wales, thank you so much for your time. - Thank you. - Mark Lynas there. It's a public health emergency that could put modern medicine back by 100 years. Microbiologist Dr. Siouxsie Wiles is raising the alarm over antibiotic resistance. Kairipoata Finn Hagen started by asking her what effects we're already seeing? - We are basically losing these medicines that really without them, we wouldn't have modern medicine. Like the only reason somebody can have cancer treatment is because we're able to give them, you know, these terrible drugs that, you know, will impact on their immune system but we can stop them from getting infected by giving them antibiotics as well. The same with, you know, going in for surgery. We want to prevent you from getting an infection during that surgery, so we give you antibiotics. And the really worrying thing is that these organisms are becoming resistant to those drugs. And so it's making those kind of things like, you know, just routine surgeries, knees, hips, as well as things like childbirth, you know, cancer, chemotherapy, it's making all those things more risky. - There are people dying from this now. I mean, I saw a study in The Lancet estimating up to 5 million people died from illness AMR played a part in 2019, but of those 1.27 million with a direct result of AMR. And I mean, those numbers are shocking? - Obviously, people like me have been yelling about this this crisis for a while. It's obviously life threatening already for some people, as you said, by those numbers. There was another report done a few years later in the UK and they, you know, estimated again, millions of people would die if we didn't start taking drastic action, and unfortunately, drastic action hasn't been taken, but then we've had a pandemic, and while that has very much focussed attention on infectious diseases, it's kind of focussed them on one particular organism. I guess antimicrobial resistance is just such a bigger problem because when we think about COVID, we're talking about one virus, right? And very quickly, that virus was sequenced. We knew exactly how it, you know, how it infected its cells, so you knew exactly what the target was. With antimicrobial resistance, it's just this huge thing where it's lots of different types of bacteria and they behave in lots of different ways and some of them live in people without causing any infection, and so it's just it's just one of these big wicked problems. - It's sort of analogous, in some ways, to climate change, I suppose. Right? It's this long running, very serious issue. But since it's a bit more diffuse, it's harder to focus people directly on, and they might not, in their everyday life, experience the consequences, but it's something that affects everyone. - And I think that we can just watch our inaction towards climate change and` I mean, I've got goosebumps, actually, now, just thinking of that, right? That it just` It doesn't bode very well when we know that there is a huge crisis that will require global attention to stop, or at least to limit just how bad it's going to be, and we don't behave that way. - Can we just talk a little bit about, what are the main factors driving this resistance? - We're using antibiotics a lot, right? And I mean this kind of globally. So they are very important medicines. We use them in humans, as I talked about, you know, for preventing infection in people needing to go into hospital and stuff. We use them to treat common infections, whether it's a urinary tract infection or an ear infection. And we use them in our plants and animals. You know, if you remember back to the Psa, the kiwifruit canker ` it's a bacterial disease. You know, we treat kiwifruit with antibiotics. So a lot of the effort is actually around how do we slow this natural process down, how do we use these antibiotics more wisely? Right? How do we ensure that we're not just putting them into the soil and into the water? Because every antibiotic that goes into you or me or a cow, well, ultimately end up in the environment, right? Through the sewage, you know, through poop on land. And that's where it then exposes those organisms in the soil and the environment. - So to dumb it down, fundamentally, we pump too many` The more antibiotics in the environment, the more resistance we'll get. So we need to be more responsible with our use of antibiotics across the board. - Absolutely. But we also need` You know, we have to remember that they are critical drugs. Right? And so we obviously want people to access them when they need them. - To put it in a local context, how responsive has New Zealand been to this issue, in your experience? - (CHUCKLES DERISIVELY) - That's not a good sign. - No. So, we` So, after that World Health Organisation report in 2014, the, um, I think it was the United Nations, that they basically asked countries to put together a plan and New Zealand put together a plan ` I can't even remember what year this was now ` and nothing really happened. It was a plan to make a plan. Obviously, the pandemic has just, you know, both brought the attention on to infectious diseases, but also very much taken the money for COVID. - Could you just sort of make it vivid for people what it would be like if we no longer had this tool in our toolkit? - So it feels a bit like we'd be turning the clock back, sort of, 100 years, where people had much shorter lives and people died of common infections. You know, if you stubbed your toe and you got some nasty bacteria in your bloodstream, for many people, that was kind of the end of it. So that's` that is the worry, that we're going to kind of, you know, move back to that sort of day. Antibiotics have been this very short period of our history. And so we may well` or, people in the future may well look back on this period and go, 'Gosh, they, you know, they lived to like 80 years old. Can you imagine it?' Right? That might be... This might just be this golden age for us. - That's ending, if we don't do anything. - Yeah. - Ko e ranga korero a Newshub Nation. That's our show for the week. Thank you for joining us. Tune in this Thursday at 2 pm for our hour long special as the government announces its budget. We'll have all the political leaders live in Parliament and reporters fresh from the Treasury lockup. But for now, noho ora mai. Captions by Able. Captions were made with the support of NZ On Air. www.able.co.nz Copyright Able 2022 - This show was brought to you by the New Zealand On Air Public Interest Journalism Fund.