Political Roundup: 13 December 2022

Items of interest and importance today

THREE WATERS
Thomas Coughlan (Herald): Nanaia Mahuta’s sage advice – Minister received officials’ views on Green MP’s letter one month before entrenchment vote
Thomas Coughlan (Herald): Three Waters: Officials warn water bills could increase ‘significantly’ without regulation
Will Harvie (Press): Three Waters entity expected to take control of swath of Christchurch red zone

PARLIAMENT
Damien Venuto (Herald): A look back at a tough year in the polls for Labour
Richard Harman: After Hamilton West – the political reset (paywalled)
Jem Traylen (BusinessDesk): Open government partnership not so open for procurement(paywalled)
Thomas Manch (Stuff): Ardern asks Cabinet ministers to consider priorities over summer
RNZ: PM Jacinda Ardern on plans for next year: ‘Making sure the economy is our priority’
Tess McClure (Guardian): Jacinda Ardern vows to ‘focus on economy’ after months of poor polling
Giles Dexter (RNZ): Green Party leaders: 2022 went ‘phenomenally well’

HAMILTON WEST BY-ELECTION
Luke Malpass (Stuff): Hamilton-West by-election good win for National, but low voter turnout limits too many lessons
Tim Dower (Newstalk ZB): What do we read from the by-election itself?
Mana Wikaire-Lewis (Māori TV): Crime the big issue for newly elected Tama Potaka to tackle in Hamilton West
Bryan Gould: Hamilton West

IMMIGRATION, MIGRANT WORKERS
Jane Patterson (RNZ): Immigration changes for nurses, teachers ‘should have happened a year ago’ – National
Glenn McConnell (Stuff): By the numbers: What the latest immigration changes mean
Glenn McConnell
1News: Explainer: Will the Govt’s immigration changes attract more nurses to NZ?
Jenna Lynch (Newshub): Revealed: How many nurses have arrived in NZ under Govt’s controversial visa pathway
Michael Neilson (Herald): Immigration announcement: Sectors ‘welcome’ changes, focus now on improving pay
Glenn McConnell (Stuff): Government changes immigration rules for nurses, teachers and bus drivers
1News: Nurses, midwives added to fast-tracked residency list
RNZ: Nurses eligible for immediate residency under immigration changes
Bernard Hickey (Interest): Govt loosens migration settings again
Brent Edwards (NBR): Government alters immigration settings to target labour shortages(paywalled)
Melanie Carroll (Stuff): NZ’s annual net migration loss continues to shrink, Kiwis still fly the coop
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Irra Lee (1News): Govt: Changes on the way for RSE scheme after damning report
RNZ: RSE worker treatment like ‘slavery’, says Equal Employment Opportunities Commissioner
Kristy Frame (RNZ): Major culture shift needed in treatment of RSE workers, immigration lawyer says
Kate McVicar (NBR): Seeka ‘startled’ by Human Rights Commission suggestions(paywalled)

COVID-19, MIQ ALLOCATION
Amelia Wade (Newshub): Jacinda Ardern doesn’t apologise over MIQ lottery system as documents reveal Govt considered imprisoning Kiwis who used loophole
1News: MBIE acted ‘unreasonably’ over MIQ allocation – Chief Ombudsman
Michael Neilson (Herald): MBIE acted ‘unreasonably’ over MIQ managed isolation allocation – Chief Ombudsman
RNZ: MBIE acted ‘unreasonably’ over managed isolation allocation system – Chief Ombudsman
Sophie Harris (Stuff): Ombudsman’s criticism of MIQ virtual lobby ‘doesn’t go far enough’
Sapeer Mayron (Stuff): Explainer: How many Covid-19 infections really are out there?
Tom Pullar-Strecker (Stuff): What will ‘third wave’ of Covid mean for the economy?
Lee Kenny (Stuff): Are New Zealand’s holiday hotspots ready for an influx of sick people?
Matthew Slaughter (Stuff): Difficult Conversations: What did you think of the Government’s Covid-19 response measures?
Charlie Mitchell (Stuff): Liz Gunn and the ‘purebloods’: How the baby blood donor story unfolded
Sasha Borissenko (Herald): Despite all of life’s suffering, vaccinations have become so polarising for so many (paywalled)
Catrin Owen (Stuff): Police receive suppression complaint regarding baby in donor blood case

MEDIA
RNZ: National’s Nicola Willis says PM has sounded ‘death knell’ for $370m public media merger
Tom Pullar Strecker (Stuff): ‘Good chance’ TVNZ-RNZ merger will be shelved, says economist
Gavin Ellis: By Dickens, what a year it has been
Duncan Greive (Spinoff): Willie Jackson on that Q+A interview – and what his media reforms are really about
David Farrar: NZ journalists lean heavily left

LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Simon Wilson (Herald): The art gallery, the budget and the tough-guy mayor (paywalled)
Todd Niall (Stuff): Auckland’s council budget: The tug of war between dollars and values
Todd Niall (Stuff): Auckland port company questions mayor’s plan for it to be gone by 2040
Oliver Lewis (BusinessDesk): Wayne Brown sets timeline for returning Ports of Auckland land (paywalled)
NBR: Unions reject ‘attack’ on port workers in Chch council report (paywalled)
Nicholas Boyack (Stuff): United Hutt funding remains unclear, even after disclosure deadline
Debbie Jamieson (Stuff): Losing Queenstown Lakes mayoral campaigns funded by rich-listers
Janine Rankin (Stuff): Sitting councillors claim vote-for-change election message was unfair

ECONOMY, TRADE
Cameron Bagrie (BusinessDesk): Why we’ll get lollies when we need a lentil diet(paywalled)
David Hargreaves (Interest): GDP figures looking solid – the gloom and doom can wait
Susan Edmunds (Stuff): Is the time right for tax cuts?
David Hargreaves (Interest): Economists sharply mark down their view of the NZ economy – in three years’ time
Jonathan Mitchell (NBR): Glass half full: consumer spending inched up in November(paywalled)
Sam Sachdeva (Newsroom): MPs lash officials over ‘misleading’ trade analysis

BUSINESS
Pattrick Smellie (BusinessDesk): What Rio Tinto is really saying about the Tiwai Pt smelter? (paywalled)
Pattrick Smellie (BusinessDesk): Tiwai Point smelter ‘very unlikely to generate material value’: Rio Tinto (paywalled)
Pattrick Smellie (BusinessDesk): Vic Crone’s legal threat as Indigo saga escalates(paywalled)
Ian Llewellyn (BusinessDesk): Critical minerals list coming too late, says Straterra(paywalled)

HEALTH
Aaron Dahmen (Newstalk ZB): Exclusive: British American Tobacco threatens legal action over Government vaping review (paywalled)
Wilhelmina Shrimpton (Today FM): People will always take drugs, so why not make it safe for them?
Duncan Garner (NBR): Vape crisis makes a mockery of Smokefree NZ 2025 (paywalled)
Frances Chin (Stuff): Understaffed healthforce pushes hospice to take only urgent referrals
Michael Fallow (Stuff): Healthcare system ‘collapsing’, says quitting Southland ED nurse
Hannah Martin (Stuff): Lead absorption still a ‘significant issue’: Older men, Pacific peoples most affected
Denzel Chung (Newsroom): What the data doesn’t show about Asian health
Ripu Bhatia (Stuff): Alcohol harm high among rainbow students, study finds
Emma Hatton (Newsroom): Pharmacy ownership changes could creep into new legislation
Brittany Keogh (Stuff): Postcode lottery: Some new mums wait months for mental health help
Kate Green (RNZ): Hospital quake standards: More than 100 buildings rate below the threshold
Joanne Naish (Stuff): 13% of Government health care facilities deemed earthquake prone

ENVIRONMENT
Marc Daalder (Newsroom): Lower bar for subsidies for carbon polluters
Andrea Vance (Stuff): The Māui dolphin seafood ban is a rare win for conservationists – but just how significant is it?
Mildred Armah (Stuff): 74 tonnes of airborne microplastic dropping on Auckland every year, study finds
Rod Oram (Newsroom): NZ needs to show same leadership in biodiversity as climate crisis
Vaneesa Bellew (Newsroom): Cruising for a bruising: $$$s v nature in Milford Sound

TREATY OF WAITANGI, LAND CONFISCATION
Te Aniwa Hurihanganui (1News): Govt to block Wairarapa Māori from having power station returned – report
No Right Turn: Bad faith all the way down
RNZ: Otuihu pā site sold to Crown with expectation it’s returned to Ngāti Manu
Kelvin McDonald (Whakaata Māori): Ngāti Manu celebrate major step in return of Otuihu Pā after 177 years
Morgan Godfery (Spinoff): Do the English and Māori texts of The Treaty of Waitangi actually reconcile?
Herald: Tiriti and trade – it’s ‘Māori business’

CRIME, JUSTICE, CORRECTIONS
Thomas Coughlan (Herald): Labour, Greens and Act join up to save legal aid from ‘collapse’ (paywalled)
Joseph Los’e (Herald): Labour MP and Government minister Aupito William Sio hits back at National leader Christopher Luxon’s South Auckland garage comment
1News: Ardern says Luxon ‘stereotyped generation’ with garage comment
Ema Tavola (Spinoff): In celebration of my South Auckland garage
1News: NZ needs to get tough on causes of youth crime – judge
Tess McClure (Guardian): ‘The community is 100% scared’: shop owners of Auckland’s Little India at centre of national crime debate
Aaron Hendry (Herald): Why Christopher Luxon is right on youth crime, and also wrong(paywalled)
Kirsty Johnston (Stuff): How cogs are being tossed into the already clunky wheels of justice
Emma Hatton (Newsroom): Police roll out changes for rural staff

CHILD WELFARE
Katie Doyle (Stuff): Report reveals ‘dangerously low’ staffing levels, ‘pecking order’ at Oranga Tamariki residence
Jacqui Southey: Now is the time to stop NZ’s horrific child abuse legacy (paywalled)

EDUCATION
Katy Jones (Stuff): Teaching will ‘look quite different’ next year as education reforms introduced
Jenny Ritchie (Newsroom): Climate change education needed to better engage pupils
Gabrielle McCulloch (Stuff): Graduate teachers hit by $460 fee before starting work: ‘It’s a strain’

HOUSING
RNZ: Average house price drops more than $100k this year, latest figures show
1News: House prices down 19% in major city in 2022

ENERGY
Tom Pullar Strecker (Stuff): Ministers push back next call on Lake Onslow power scheme until the new year
Ian Llewellyn (BusinessDesk): Onslow pumped hydro decision delayed (paywalled)

TRANSPORT
Todd Niall (Stuff): Roading is writ large in Wayne Brown’s plans for Auckland Transport
Emma Vitz (Spinoff): Auckland rail closures will waste more than a million hours of commuters’ time in 2023

OTHER
Chris Trotter (Interest): It would be wrong to think that the triumph of misinformation and disinformation is a new thing
Josephine Varghese (Democracy Project): What the media did not pick up in the Ardern-Marin press conference
Oliver Lewis (BusinessDesk): Jacinda Ardern approves intelligence law review extension(paywalled)
Gordon Campbell: On steps to reduce the racing industry’s cruelty
Martyn Bradbury (Daily Blog): The Daily Blog 2022 New Zealander of the Year – Police Commissioner Andrew Coster
Susan Wardell and Fairleigh Gilmour (Newsroom): Social media admins on the frontlines of hate speech
Manawatū Standard: Massey reveals best quotes of the year
Kelvin McDonald (Whakaata Māori):  Erebus Memorial: Local board orders removal of security fences
Holly Thorpe (Spinoff): What Sport NZ’s new transgender guidelines say, and why they matter
Nevil Gibson (NBR): Bill Andersen’s impossible dream (paywalled)