Listen back to features and interviews from 95bFM's daily news and current affairs show. Joel Armstrong, Castor Chacko, Oto Sequeira, and Caeden Tipler focus on the issues of Tāmaki Makaurau and elsewhere in independent-thinking bFM style. Monday-Thursday 12-1pm on 95bFM.
Global Innovator, Matt Hart, joins News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, and Producer Evie in studio to discuss ‘mobility’ and the power that brings to the individual - and the requirement of an economy to support it.
The government has recently removed Relationships and Sexuality Education, or RSE, guidelines in schools without implementing a clear alternative.
The RSE guidelines were changed in 2020, to better support, and include updates to the the 2007 curriculum for primary and secondary school students, on topics such as the prominence of social media, bullying and cyber-bullying, and consent, in an age-appropriate manner.
With the removal of the 2020 guidelines, many educators are wondering how they adequately cover the topics covered in RSE.
As well as this, concerns have been raised about whether a move like this will impact the mental health of students, especially from minority communities, such as the LGBTQIA+ community.
News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, Joel, spoke to the Chief Executive of the Mental Health Foundation New Zealand, Shaun Robinson, about the removal of RSE guidelines without the government clearly indicating to an alternative, and the organisations concerns regarding these developments.
As previously discussed, New Zealand First leader, Winston Peters, has proposed a new member’s bill to be placed in the ballot, aiming to remove diversity, equity, and inclusion, or DEI, targets in the public sector.
This bill would amend the Public Service Act, which Peters, and NZ First, voted for when in a coalition government with the Labour Party in 2020.
DEI refers to frameworks that aim to equitably represent certain individuals and communities not represented as much as other demographics in the country.
The reception for this bill varies between the parties. Senior National MP, Chris Bishop, says if the bill were to be pulled out of the ballot, that the party would consider the bill, as they believe in “meritocracy,” however, would want a “public service that is reflective of modern New Zealand”.
Opposition Leader from the Labour Party, Chris Hipkins, says he would want a public sector that represents all New Zealanders.
News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, Joel, spoke to the National Secretary of the Public Service Association, Fleur Fitzsimons, about Peter’s members bill, and how she believes this will impact the public sector.
They started off by asking how DEI targets work regarding the public sector.
For our weekly catch up with Te Pāti Māori’s Takutai Kemp, News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, Joel, spoke to her about the NZ First Leader, Winston Peter’s anti-DEI members bill, the Infrastructure Investment Summit, and the recent changes regarding Whānau Ora.
For our weekly catch up, Producer Evie spoke to the ACT Party’s Simon Court about one of the key school lunch programme providers going into liquidation, NZ First's anti-DEI members bill and the ACT Party’s critique of University of Auckland TeTiriti Course.
Joel spoke to the National Secretary for the Public Services Association, Fleur Fitzsimons, about Winston Peter’s anti-DEI members bill, and how this will affect the public sector.
Joel also spoke to the Chief Executive of the Mental Health Foundation New Zealand, Shaun Robinson, about the government’s removal of RSE guidelines in schools without implementing a clear alternative.
And Global Innovator, Matt Hart, joins us in studio today to discuss ‘Mobility’ and the power that brings to the individual - and the requirement of an economy to support it.
Labour has announced a caucus reshuffle, giving the Auckland portfolio to Deputy Leader Carmel Sepuloni.
The party has outlined its intention to focus on winning Auckland back in 2026 after a blue wave swept the city in the 2023 election, unseating several Labour MPs in what were thought to be safe seats.
A recent Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll has put Labour up 2.8 points and would mean the centre-right bloc would not be able to form government.
For our weekly catch-up with the Labour Party, Wire Host Caeden spoke to Deputy Leader and new Auckland spokesperson Carmel Sepuloni about these topics.
The United States is seeing a surge in backlash to the Trump administration's policies, particularly those focused on undermining Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion domestically and the administration’s foreign policy position on Palestine.
Wire Host Caeden spoke to University of Waikato Senior Lecturer in history Garritt Van Dyk about the history of boycotts and the resurgence of this protest tactic against Trump.
They then spoke to Andre Fa’aoso from the Yale Daily News for his perspective from the ground on these growing opposition movements, particularly the impact of these movements within Universities.
For our weekly catch-up with the Labour Party, Wire Host Caeden spoke to Deputy Leader Carmel Sepuloni about Labour’s caucus reshuffle and the Taxpayers Union-Curia poll.
For International Desk, they spoke to University of Waikato Senior Lecturer Garritt Van Dyk and Yale Daily News’ Andre Fa’aoso about the emerging protest movements against the Trump administration in the United States.
For City Counselling, Producer Sara spoke to Councillor Julie Fairey about the rise in homelessness in Tamaki, as well as Auckland Council’s recent announcement of an AI digital assistant for customer service support.
Throughout many Pacific island nations, the belief in sorcery and black magic as the cause of disease, death and other forms of misfortune is a major contributor to violence amongst a number of families and communities.
Despite outreach from community leaders, church groups and government officials, many say that sorcery-related violent incidents are increasing in bopth rural and urban areas in countries such as Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, with many of the victims being women.
Oto spoke to Post-Doctoral Fellow in Pacific Studies Dr Kerryn Sogha Galokale, who is from the Solomon Islands, about the prevalence of sorcery related violence in the west pacific, it’s impacts and what community groups are doing to address it.
It seems that the United States continues to be a hot topic for many people and journalists following Trump’s inauguration. This is not only because of his intense challenging of the pre-established international order or his strong determination to turn the world into his view, but also with his alliances with prominent billionaires and tech entrepreneurs.
While he has been successful in his establishment of chaos to rouse the public while quietly enacting new policies fundamentally but slowly changing the country, questions arise around his right-hand man, Elon Musk, and his own personal agenda. It seems as though pretending to be a man of the internet and “i am become meme” archetype has not worked out for him, and he has shown his true colours much like other people in great positions of power and money.
Sasha spoke to Chris Ogden, Associate Professor from The University of Auckland about Elon Musk’s comments about the United States leaving the UN, the potential implications and stability of the world order shifting towards a multipolar governance.
For their weekly catch up with the Green Party, Oto spoke to Ricardo Menendez March about Health Minister Simeon Brown’s major overhaul to New Zealand’s public healthcare system, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s favorability falling below Labour Leader Chris Hipkins in the latest Taxpayers’ union Curia poll and The Greens petition calling on the Government to extend visa-free travel to visitors from Pacific Island nations.
He spoke to Dr Sarah Kapeli, A lecturer in the school of psychology at the University of Auckland, about a study she and a team of researchers did on the wellbeing of students from minority communities at the University of Auckland.
And he speak to Dr Kerryn Galokale, a PHD Graduate in Pacific Studies at the University of Auckland, about the prevalence of Sorcery Related Violence in the Solomon Islands.
Today, Sasha spoke with Chris Ogden, Associate Professor in Global Studies at the University of Auckland about the United States potential decision of leaving the United Nations and the implications this may have for global order.
And, to kick off Green Desk for 2025, Producer Leilani speaks to Paul Geraets, New Zealand’s most prolific rammed earth designer and builder, about the benefits and history of these sustainable houses, as well as his related upcoming event for EcoFest 2025 - a month-long celebration of our unique environment and sustainable living across Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland!
Last week, Libelle, one of the three providers of the school lunch programme went into liquidation. The company provided around 125,000 lunches daily.
Compass Group, one of the other key providers of the programme stepped in on Friday to acquire and take over Libelle’s operations.
Despite this save, Compass group has been no stranger to issues since the programme was launched. With repeated incidents of late or no delivery, melted plastic in food, frozen food, food so hot it burnt children and ham being given to halal students - to name a few.
For our weekly catch up with the ACT Party Producer Evie spoke to Simon Court about how the liquidation may affect the already controversial programme.
They also discussed NZ First’s Members Bill looking to scrap Diversity, Equity and Inclusion targets… as well as the ACT Party’s continued critiques of the University of Auckland’s compulsory Te Tiriti o Waitangi course.
Recently, New Zealand First leader, Winston Peters, proposed a new member’s bill to be placed in the ballot, which aims to remove diversity, equity, and inclusion targets in the public sector.
This bill would amend the Public Service Act, which Peter, and NZ First, voted for when in a coalition government with the Labour Party in 2020.
Peters aims with this bill is to remove what he refers to as "woke left-wing social engineering and diversity targets in the public sector".
For our weekly catchup with Te Pāti Māori’s Takutai Kemp, News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, Joel, spoke to her about this bill, and what the party thinks of this bill.
We also spoke about the recent Infrastructure Investment Summit, as well as three of the original Whānau Ora commissioners losing their contracts.
However, I started off by asking her why Peter's has switched up his stances on DEI in the public sector, as he, and NZ First, when in a coalition government with the Labour Party, voted for the Public Service Act in 2020.
The United States is seeing a surge in backlash to the Trump administration's policies, particularly those focused on undermining Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion domestically and the administration’s foreign policy position on Palestine.
Wire Host Caeden spoke to University of Waikato Senior Lecturer in history Garritt Van Dyk about the history of boycotts and the resurgence of this protest tactic against Trump.
They then spoke to Andre Fa’aoso from the Yale Daily News for his perspective from the ground on these growing opposition movements, particularly the impact of these movements within Universities.
Labour has announced a caucus reshuffle, giving the Auckland portfolio to Deputy Leader Carmel Sepuloni.
The party has outlined its intention to focus on winning Auckland back in 2026 after a blue wave swept the city in the 2023 election, unseating several Labour MPs in what were thought to be safe seats.
A recent Taxpayers’ Union-Curia poll has put Labour up 2.8 points and would mean the centre-right bloc would not be able to form government.
For our weekly catch-up with the Labour Party, Wire Host Caeden spoke to Deputy Leader and new Auckland spokesperson Carmel Sepuloni about these topics.
Auckland Council’s Community Committee has sent a ‘please help’ letter to the government after reports from their Community Impact team showed a 53% rise in the number of people sleeping rough over the past four months.
This follows changes last year by the Ministry of Social Development to the rules surrounding emergency housing, introducing stricter entry criteria and new requirements which make it difficult to stay.
While Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, earlier this week, denied that these changes have led to an increase in homelessness, Housing First Auckland programme manager Rami Alrudani said that outreach workers have been stretched thin, dealing with “more and more homelessness every day”.
Producer Sara spoke with Councillor Julie Fairey about the rise in homelessness in Tāmaki Makaurau.
As well, Auckland Council are trialling an AI digital assistant to help improve their customer support services.
The ‘Ask Auckland Council’ pilot, presented at February’s Revenue, Expenditure and Value Committee, is being funded by Google Cloud at no cost to ratepayers.
Auckland Council receives 1.5 million calls every year and coordinates region-wide services across multiple platforms. The new system is designed to bridge the gap between Aucklanders and digital services, reducing the effort required to seek out information
Starting on the topic of homelessness, Sara asked Julie if she was surprised to see a stark increase in the latest data around the number of people sleeping rough.
Last Friday, Health Minister Simeon Brown announced a major overhaul to New Zealand’s public healthcare system.
Among the changes he announced were reinstating a board for Te Whatu Ora - Health NZ and partnering with the private sector to reduce the number of people on the backlog for elective surgeries, which would also see an additional investment of $50 million dollars between now and the end of June.
Earlier this week, the latest Taxpayers’ union Curia poll was released, showing that, for the first time since the general election, public favorability of Labour leader Chris Hipkins was higher than that of the Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s.
And in this same period of time, The Greens recently launched a petition calling on the Government to extend visa-free travel to visitors from Pacific Island nations.
For their weekly catch up, Oto spoke to the Green Party’s Ricardo Menendez-March for the party’s take on all of these issues.
You’ve heard of houses made of straw, sticks, and bricks, but what about earth, chalk, and lime? The piggies have announced – rammed-earth houses are in!
To kick off Green Desk for 2025, Producer Leilani speaks to Paul Geraets, New Zealand’s most prolific rammed earth designer and builder, about the benefits and history of these sustainable houses.
You can catch Geraets' upcoming event, 'Hands on With Rammed Earth Building' as a part of EcoFest 2025; a month-long celebration of our unique environment and sustainable living across Tāmaki Makaurau from the 22nd of March to the 22nd of April. Thanks EcoFest!
Last week, Health Minister Simeon Brown announced a series of changes to Aotearoa's health system following years of delays, understaffing, and overcrowding. Brown particularly highlighted a need for public-private partnerships to reduce wait times.
Also in politics this past week, NZ First leader Winston Peters has been raising complaints about Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) measures in Aotearoa. His concerns echo those in the United States, where recently elected president Donald Trump has enacted policies removing DEI measures from federal agencies.
In our weekly catchup with the National Party’s Tom Rutherford, Wire Host Castor asked about each of these issues, starting with the health sector overhaul.
This week on Dear Science our expert Professor Allan Blackman chatted with us about the world's oldest meteorite crater, healing the hole in the ozone, and high-fat diets impacting memory.
Thanks to MOTAT, the museum inspiring the innovators of tomorrow!
The coalition government’s free school lunch programme has faced significant criticism from various groups and individuals.
This follows the remodelling of the previous programme, the Ka Ora Ka Ako programme, to, in what ACT Party Leader David Seymour says, save taxpayers over $100 million and fix food wastage.
However, this current model has resulted lunches arriving significantly late, plastic having been found melted into food, and students describing the food as “bland,” and looking like “prison food”.
Responding to the criticisms facing the current model of the free school lunch programme, in an interview with Newstalk ZB, Prime Minister, Christopher Luxon, says those complaining should “make a Marmite sandwich and put an apple in the bag.”
For our first weekly catch with Te Pāti Māori for the year, News and Editorial Director and Monday Wire Host, Joel, spoke to Takutai Kemp about how she is viewing the lunch programme, and her opinions on Luxon’s recent remarks regarding the model.
We also spoke about the Land Transport Management (Time of Use Charging) Amendment Bill first reading in Parliament, and Te Pāti Māori being the only party not to support the Bill, and the changes to free bowel cancer screenings by changing the age from 60 to 58, which would result in scrapping the pilot programme that would have allowed Māori and Pacific people free screenings from age 50.
But first, they started off by asking her about how the party is feeling about the current state of the government’s free school lunch programme.
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