United States President Joe Biden has dropped out of the 2024 Presidential race. This came after repeated calls from supporters, who were worried that they would lose the election if Biden was the Democratic nominee.
The presumed replacement for Biden has been current Vice President Kamala Harris, and supporters have rallied to support her this week.
Wire Host spoke to Senior Lecturer at the University of Auckland’s Dr Timothy Fagden about Biden stepping down and the support shown to Kamala Harris so far.
Last Friday 19 July the International Court of Justice found Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories to be illegal under international law. For the first time it amounted what Israel is doing to apartheid against the Palestinian People.
The Court’s opinion is non-binding but can carry immense weight in the international community. It has added to pressure for Israel to end their siege on Gaza.
Wire Host Caeden spoke to Kate Stone from Justice For Palestine about the ruling and New Zealand’s consequent obligations as a United Nations member state.
Greenpeace says they “are raising the alarm” on Fonterra’s role in derailing international Climate Action.
This comes after the Netherlands-based Changing Markets Foundations released a report last week outlining the actions of 22 of the biggest meat and dairy companies across four continents. The report highlights Fonterra and the New Zealand livestock industry as key players in a strategy to delay regulation of agriculture emissions.
Wire Host Caeden spoke to Greenpeace spokesperson Sinead O’Flynn about the report and Greenpeace’s concerns.
They started by asking about Fonterra’s role in preventing international climate action.’
A recent study has discovered that there is production of oxygen on the bottom of the ocean. Almost eight-hundred marine scientists have signed a petition highlighting the importance of the discovery and for a pause on seafloor mining. The oxygen is produced by metallic nodes underneath the ocean, containing metals which are commonly mined for batteries. This oxygen could potentially support fragile aquatic life.
Sasha spoke with Juressa Lee, a deep sea mining campaigner from Greenpeace about the new discovery, as well as steps that are being taken to reduce ocean floor mining.
Following last week’s major IT outage which caused major disruptions for flights, banking and trading, questions were raised about whether cybersecurity should be concentrated in a few companies’ hands. The power outage highlighted governments’ overreliance on tech companies and concerns surrounding personal online information.
Sasha spoke with Gehan Gunasekara, an associate professor of commercial law from the University of Auckland, to discuss the legal and liability implications that come from last week’s power outage.
Former Green Party MP Darleen Tana has been under investigation and public scrutiny after allegations of migrant worker exploitation emerged at E Cycles, a business owned by Tana’s husband.
After the allegations surfaced, Tana was dismissed from the Green Party, but maintained her innocence, saying she had limited involvement in her husband’s business and that the allegations made against her were false.
In response, an independent investigation into the allegations and Tana’s involvement in her husband’s business was launched, which the Green Party released an executive summary of last week.
For their weekly catch-up, Oto spoke to Green Party MP Ricardo Menéndez-March to discuss the executive summary, it’s findings, as well as Tana’s response.
A recent report detailing complaints to the health and disability commissioner about disability support services revealed that the sector suffered from inadequate care standards, poor management of resources and the abuse of those in care.
One of the suggestions made in the report was that better funding and staffing was needed to improve standards in disability care, based on complaints from workers in the sector that understaffing was impacting their ability to provide adequate care.
Oto spoke to Peter Reynolds, CEO of the New Zealand Disability Support Network to discuss staffing shortages in disability care, and the solutions needed to address it.
95bFM 
