As part of its submission on a Local Government New Zealand issues paper exploring electoral reform, Auckland Council has expressed its support for a four-year electoral term.
In exploring local government reform, the LGNZ paper also looks at public understanding of local government, public awareness of candidates and policies, and voting methods for local elections, raising questions about who’s responsible for improving these areas and what the future of local government voting might look like.
For the first interview of 2025, producer Sofia spoke to Councillor Julie Fairey about Council’s LGNZ submission as well as Council’s general plans for 2025.
Public consultation on the use of puberty blockers in Aotearoa closes on the 20th January 2025; asking the public if further precautions or restrictions are needed, and what impacts these could have on young people.
Leading transgender health professionals have expressed concern over the government directing the Ministry to consult the public over gender affirming healthcare, questioning the appropriateness of opening consultation on a medical matter that has become highly politicised and subject to misinformation.
Producer Sofia spoke to President of the Professional Association for Transgender Health Aotearoa (PATHA), Jennifer Shields.
If you want to make a submission, you can email pbconsultation@health.govt.nz
The Eaton and Palisades fires, the two major fires making up the Los Angeles fires, are now the two most destructive wildfires in Southern California history.
The fires have sparked significant debate about insurance in high-risk natural disaster areas as thousands of Californians lost their home insurance not long before the fires.
And president-elect Donald Trump has returned to the centre stage of United States foreign policy in the weeks leading up to his inauguration.
Trump has threatened to annex Greenland and Canada as well as reclaim the Panama Canal for the United States.
For States of the States this week Wire Host Caeden spoke to Andre Fa’aoso from the Yale Daily News about both of these topics.
The Eaton and Palisades fires, the two major fires making up the Los Angeles fires, are now the two most destructive wildfires in Southern California history.
The fires have sparked significant debate about insurance in high-risk natural disaster areas as thousands of Californians lost their home insurance not long before the fires.
And president-elect Donald Trump has returned to the centre stage of United States foreign policy in the weeks leading up to his inauguration.
Trump has threatened to annex Greenland and Canada as well as reclaim the Panama Canal for the United States.
For States of the States this week Wire Host Caeden spoke to Andre Fa’aoso from the Yale Daily News about both of these topics.
For our weekly catch-up with the Labour Party Wire Host Caeden speaks to Labour’s Shanan Halbert about the Treaty Principles Bill submissions, Regulatory Standards Bill, and Labour’s plans for 2025.
For State of the States this week they speak to Andre Fa’aoso from the Yale Daily News about the devastating Los Angeles Fires and president-elect Donald Trump’s threat to annex Greenland and Canada and take back the sovereign Panama Canal for the United States.
For City Counselling this week producer Sofia speaks to Councillor Julie Fairey about Council’s submission on the Local Government New Zealand issues paper exploring electoral reform and Auckland Council’s plans for 2025.
She also speaks to President of PATHA - the Professional Association for Transgender Health Aotearoa - Jennifer Shields, about public consultation on puberty blockers closing next week.
Global Innovator, Matt Hart, joins News and Editorial Director, and Monday Wire Host, Joel, and Producer Evie in studio to discuss working part time or summer jobs while managing studying full time!
The recent social security amendment bill is an extension of the government’s agenda to cut those on benefits by 50,000. While this may seem like a strategic move by the government, it is important to consider that they are not creating any new jobs and unemployment is at 4.8 percent as of September 2024.
The proposed changes aim to make it harder for those struggling to receive the benefit, additionally introducing 'money management' schemes, which splits the MSD payment onto a card which can only be used at specific locations. These changes are unrealistic, because many people already pay more than half of their income for rent.
Anti-Poverty groups have spoken out about this amendment and are aiming to raise awareness around this. These groups want the government to move away from using sanctions against people who need income support.
Sasha spoke to the Child Poverty Action Group’s Executive Officer, Sarita Divis about the social security bill amendment, and potential consequences for those seeking support.
Submissions on the controversial Treaty Principles Bill were set to close last week, when on the final few days of submissions the portal to submit suffered technical difficulties.
Due to this, many people were unable to send in their submissions on time. Parliament made the decision to extend the submission period to make up for the issue. With thousands also handing their submissions in person.
The bill is estimated to have had more than 300,000 submissions prior to the original deadline, making it the most highly submitted on bill in history.
For the weekly catchup with the Green Party Evie spoke to Ricardo Menendez March about the submission process.
They also talked about the contested Regulatory Standards Bill which has also recently come into the spotlight.
Last week Meta made an announcement that it was going to ditch its third party fact checkers, and replace them with a ‘community notes’ system similar to X.
This means all content would be moderated and fact checked by its own users. The move has received a large amount of backlash amid concerns that it will cause a rise in hate speech, disinformation and fraud. The move has also been slated as catering to Donald Trump’s attitude to online moderation, ahead of him taking office as President next week.
Shortly after this announcement, Meta also announced it was ditching its Diversity, Inclusion and Equity program.
Evie spoke to the University of Waikato’s Joe Ulatowski about these changes, what he thinks it means for the future of misinformation on social media, and what impact it may have in Aotearoa.
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