PODCAST

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey

Bernard Hickey

Bernard Hickey and friends explore Aotearoa’s political economy together. thekaka.substack.com

news politics

All Episodes

8:46

Willis eyes more tax from banks

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/07/07

Briefly in the news from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, July 7:* Finance Minister Nicola Willis is considering changing the tax settings for banks in Budget 2026, possibly including an Australian-style ‘Major Bank Levy,’ the NZ Herald-$ reports this morning. See more in The Lead below the paywall fold and hear more in the podcast above.* Women in the lower North Island will have to travel to Christchurch for ovarian and cervical cancer surgeries for the

5:52

'Sleeping rough is a lifestyle choice here'

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/07/04

Briefly in the news from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Friday, July 4:* Police Minister Mark Mitchell says people who sleep rough in Rotorua are making ‘a lifestyle choice’ and should be moved away from shopfronts by five new beat cops — ‘for their own safety’. See more in The Lead below the paywall fold and in the podcast above.* A Salvation Army expert on homelessness, who has been to Rotorua to investigate, says there aren’t enough homes and these people, who

8:27

Act forces Willis backdown on policy costings unit

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/07/02

Briefly in the news from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Thursday, July 3:* Deputy PM David Seymour has forced Finance Minister Nicola Willis to back down on her plan for a long-debated policy costings unit to referee disputes over ‘fiscal black holes’ in election campaigns. Seymour says he doesn’t always trust the officials. See more in The Lead below the paywall fold and in the podcast above.* Officials warned against the creation of a new Parent Boost migrant

13:12

Behold, another Quarterly Survey of Business Delusion

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/07/01

Briefly in the news from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Wednesday, July 2:* The NZIER’s QSBO survey published yesterday showed businesses remain stubbornly confident about the wider economy and their own businesses, despite their own ‘experienced activity’ in the June quarter being much, much worse than they had expected just three months ago. See more in The Lead below the paywall fold and in the podcast above.* That ‘delusion gap’ between expectations for the

7:29

So many extreme weather events, but no mention of...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/06/30

Briefly in the news from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Tuesday, July 1:* Extreme floods hit the top of the South Island over the weekend, unleashing a wall of media coverage on the ‘unprecedented’ scale of the disaster, but there was no coverage of modelling showing each degree of climate warming increases the intensity of weather events in the region by 10-20%. See more in The Lead below the paywall fold and in the podcast above.* Worker and employer

62:32

Peter Bale, without Bernard Hickey this week, joins...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/06/26

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-host Peter Bale talking with regular guests Robert Patman and Cathrine Dyer about the week’s news in geopolitics and climate.This week’s Hoon featured special guests:author, historian and a former colleague from Reuters, former Tehran bureau chief Jonathan Lyons;professor of international law Treasa DunworthThe Hoon’s podcast version above was recorded on Thursday night during a live webinar for over

8:01

GDP outlook slashed as fresh cost-of-living shock...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/06/23

Briefly in the news from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Tuesday, June 24:* ANZ economists have slashed their June quarter GDP growth forecast to 0.1% from 0.4% after a range of leading indicators sagged in June, and just ahead of another cost-of-living shock from an oil price surge as Iran finally attacked US bases in the Gulf states overnight. See more in The Lead below the paywall fold.* The Government hopes that higher export receipts from record high dairy

10:00

A housing supply shock in exactly the wrong direction

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/06/22

Morena and glad to be back online after a couple of weeks of leave. Briefly in the news from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, June 23:* Chris Bishop says he wants to unleash a housing supply shock and last week announced the Government would force councils to allow more houses if they kept saying no, adding to a swathe of repeals and reforms he has launched. But it his Government’s own ‘no’ to council requests for funds and ‘no’ to new Kāinga Ora homes that

62:40

Bernard Hickey, Peter Bale, Cathrine Dyer, Robert...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/06/12

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts Bernard Hickey and Peter Bale talking with regular guests Robert Patman and Cathrine Dyer about the week’s news in geopolitics and climate. This week’s Hoon featured special guest New Zealand freelance journalist Andrew Gunn speaking from Kyiv.The Hoon’s podcast version above was recorded on Thursday night during a live webinar for over 200 paying subscribers and was produced and edited by Simon

61:11

Peter Bale, Cathrine Dyer, Robert Patman, Jamie Shea...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/06/05

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-host Peter Bale talking with regular guests Robert Patman and Cathrine Dyer about the week’s news in geopolitics and climate. Bernard couldn’t get on because of technical issues.This week’s Hoon featured special guests Jamie Shea from Chatham House and Auckland Uni’s Treasa Dunworth.Peter mentioned this New Yorker article about Curtis Yarvin. The Hoon’s podcast version above was recorded on Thursday

9:06

One way housing supply growth is strangled

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/06/03

News last week that Auckland Council had confirmed plans to charge housing developers $6 billion worth of Development Contributions (DCs) over the next 30 years to partly pay for $19 billion in capital spending on parks, public transport and water infrastructure didn’t get nearly enough attention.Not because it was surprising or unusual or unexpected. It wasn’t. It’s now the standard way for councils to reduce the ‘burden’ of having to pay for at least half the infrastructure costs from population

59:13

Bernard Hickey, Peter Bale, Cathrine Dyer, Robert...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/30

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking with regular guests Robert Patman and Cathrine Dyer about the week’s news in geopolitics and climate. This week’s Hoon featured special guest Janet H Anderson from the podcast Asymmetrical Haircuts, which covers international justice. Peter mentioned these two articles: * Tom Friedman: Will Israel’s War Ever End?" NYT * M Gessen: Beware: We Are Entering a New

6:38

Labour commits to same debt & surplus targets as...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/16

The six key news items from Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate and poverty in the week to Saturday, May 17 were: * Labour committed to the same Government debt and surplus targets as National.* The Greens proposed an alternative budget with $88 billion of new wealth and income taxes to improve publicly-funded incomes, health and housing.* The last major independent electricity retailer was shut and taken over by the most dominant of the big four gentailers that control an

61:01

Bernard Hickey, Peter Bale, Cathrine Dyer, Robert...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/15

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night features co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking about the week’s news with regular and special guests, including:* Cathrine Dyer on news about climate change.* Robert Patman about the latest news from Trump and others on Gaza, Kashmir, Ukraine and much more. This declaration in Dunedin was discussed.* Plus: Bernard & Peter talked with Octopus Energy NZ COO Margaret Cooney in the final quarter of the show to

9:27

ACT’s extreme policies & budget fallacy endanger...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/10

Briefly in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to Sunday, May 11:* PM Christopher Luxon this week allowed ACT’s policies on pay equity and the Treaty of Waitangi to make National less electable in 2026. * He also doubled down on a budget-tightening strategy built on the false premise that the Government faced spiralling interest costs.* An overseas slowdown and that unnecessary tightening has stalled the housing market again and is driving real spending and investment towards another winter

5:28

Carers, teachers & nurses lose up to $17b, to fund...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/07

Briefly, in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Thursday, May 7: * Retrospective legislation rammed through Parliament last night will cost women up to $17 billion of unpaid wages over the next four years, more than paying for $14 billion of tax cuts over the same time.* The Government is looking at selling at least $1.7 billion worth of land under Kāinga Ora homes in Auckland.* Jobs figures show three million fewer hours were worked over the last year, although

13:56

NZ economy sliding into wintry deep freeze

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/05

Briefly, in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Tuesday, May 6:* Growth in our housing-market-with-bits-tacked-on of an economy is stalling and sliding back into a deep freeze as the winter months approach, despite 200 basis points of rate cuts and pledges from PM Christopher Luxon to ‘go for growth.’ (See more in feature article below)* The Government’s ever-tighter spending policies and its investment freeze since early 2024 are combining with fears about the

13:52

Canada & Australia stood up to Trump. When will NZ?

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/04

Briefly, in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate on Monday, May 5:* When will our PM and Foreign Minister stand up to publicly express support for our long-time and close allies Australia and Canada in opposing Donald Trump’s talk of annexing Canada and his tariffs on allies without justification or sense? See more in today’s feature article below.* Christopher Luxon has pledged to more-than-double defence spending to 2% of GDP, setting the scene for more than $20

25:56

Calling b******t on a pro-cyclical tightening of...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/05/04

Briefly, here’s the six big things to note in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy around housing, poverty and climate in the week to Sunday, May 4:* In response to slower global growth and wider deficit forecasts, Nicola Willis signalled another $4.4 billion in spending cuts over the next four years, all to get an uncertain extra 5-10 basis points of cuts in interest rates. See more below* Over 5,500 hospital doctors struck on Thursday against a Health NZ pay offer of 1.5% per year, which would cut

12:29

Interview: Shamubeel Eaqub on an even tighter Budget...

The Kākā by Bernard Hickey ·

2025/04/29

I spoke last night with Simplicity Chief Economist and Head of Policy Shamubeel Eaqub about the Government's latest budget policy tightening, the risks for infrastructure investment and a potential dampening of GDP growth.He points out that the Government has cut capital expenditure so far in the current financial year, rather than operating expenditure, and he worries further restrictions in infrastructure spending by the Government will restrain growth and future attempts to deal with

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