bCasts

For their regular catch-up, Oto spoke to the Green Party’s Ricardo Menéndez March about former MP Darleen Tana’s removal from Parliament, updates to the Three Strikes Law and the government’s changes to freshwater protections.

He spoke to Sinead O’Flynn from Greenpeace Aotearoa for a follow-up conversation about the changes to freshwater policy.

And he spoke to Dr Steffen Albrecht, Research Fellow at the School of Computer Science at the University of Auckland, to discuss about a study of his analysing the use of A.I in predicting respiratory disease outbreaks during flu seasons.

Sasha spoke to Honorary Senior Lecturer in Nutrition Rashjiri Roy from the University of Sydney about her recent research linking poor body image with social media use

And he spoke to Kelly Garton, Policy Researcher from the University of Auckland and spokesperson for Health Coalition Aotearoa about cuts to funding for school lunches.

As of yesterday, former Green party MP, Darleen Tana, has been removed from parliament after the greens agreed to invoke the Waka jumping legislation at their last general meeting.

The removal of Darleen Tana from parliament concludes a lengthy saga following her eviction from the Green Party amidst allegations of migrant worker exploitation at her husband’s business.

Despite invoking the Waka Jumping Law in the end, the Greens continued to reach out to Tana and insist that she voluntarily resign instead. Tana refused to do so, as she still maintains her innocence even after numerous investigations into her involvement in the allegations.

For their weekly catch up, I spoke to Green Party MP Ricardo Menendez-March about the removal of Darleen Tana from Parliament and the party’s decision to invoke the Waka jumping law.

They also talked about recent updates to the three strikes legislation, as well as changes to the resource management act that would restrict the ability of local councils to manage their freshwater policy.

Recently, a study was conducted at the university of Auckland analysing the use of A.I in predicting the prevalence of respiratory disease outbreaks during flu seasons in Aotearoa.

Forecasting models are essential for hospitals in predicting admissions and subsequently allocating resources and beds.

However, during peak flu periods, and, most notably the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, hospitals across Aotearoa have been largely underprepared for respiratory disease outbreaks, hence why experts have called for improvements to be made to traditional forecasting models. 

Oto spoke to Dr Steffen Albrecht, a Research Fellow at the School of Computer Science at the University of Auckland and author of the study, to talk about the study and how A.I could help disease forecasting models in hospitals across Aotearoa. 

Oto reached out to Sinead O’Flynn, the agriculture campaigner at Greenpeace Aotearoa, for the organisation’s take on the government’s recent changes to Freshwater management policy.

This was after a number of ministers announced a new amendment to the Resource Management Amendment Bill covering Freshwater and Other Matters that would prevent local councils from notifying their freshwater plans until the Government replaces the National Policy Statement on Freshwater Management.

Advocates and local government spokespeople have criticised the move, saying that it will strip power away from local councils and that the current freshwater management policy statement isn’t sufficient enough to protect Aotearoa’s water resources.