Instagram’s new Twitter copy Threads is all the rage right now – but will it last? I wrote up my first glance reactions to the platform yesterday and this afternoon joined RNZ’s Jesse Mulligan to talk all about it.
The prime minister says his approach to foreign affairs doesn’t differ that much from how he tackles issues back home – and that means “bread and butter”.
Chris Hipkins jets off to Brussels later today to sign a free trade deal with the European Union. From there, he’ll head to Stockholm and to a Nato summit in Lithuania.
In an address at parliament today, Hipkins said he deals with the international sphere by getting back to the basics and “dealing with bread and butter issues”.
“In foreign policy terms it means making sure that we have greater economic resilience across our trade markets in a time of global uncertainty,” Hipkins said.
“The longer I’ve been in the role the more I’ve seen first-hand the enormous benefits of our independent foreign policy, our role as an honest broker, and the importance of our close relationships in enhancing our prosperity and security.”
New Zealand, he said, would not remain “neutral” despite holding an independent view on policy. “As a country, we may be small, but we are not bystanders. We chart our own course, with decisions that are in our national interest.”
This included recent reports of a “robust” conversation between the foreign minister Nanaia Mahuta and her counterpart in China. “You might have noticed we didn’t deny that,” Hipkins said. “Our approach has always been that we are consistent in asserting our interests, we are predictable as we advance our values and we are respectful as we engage in our relationship with China.
“A strong, mature and complex relationship means we will have those tough conversations, just as I also raised areas of disagreement with the Chinese leadership when I was in Beijing.”
He added: “But I think it’s better to be talking than not. Dialogue delivers greater security.”
During his speech, Hipkins canvassed his foreign policy agenda – including recent trips to Australia, Papua New Guinea and China. He said trade remained at the forefront of that agenda. “Expanding trade opportunities for New Zealand exporters is central to the Government’s economic recovery plan,” said Hipkins.
Under the headling of “enhancing defence and security capabilities”, Hipkins added that New Zealand cannot be “passive” and we need to continue our investment in these area. The government will be releasing an interrelated set of strategic policy documents and assessments, he said, spanning across New Zealand’s national security, defence, and foreign policy. It will include a new National Security Strategy. “Taken together, these represent an important step in how we will protect our national security and advance our national interests in a more contested and difficult world,” said Hipkins.
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It is the Imax tantrum to end all Imax tantrums. Tom Cruise didn’t like it that Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, due for release on July 20, would replace Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One in Imax theatres. So, with weeks to go, he made some calls and changed up Mission: Impossible’s release date. That’s why, this weekend, Cruise’s action-packed new movie makes a rare Saturday night debut – and in Aotearoa first. From 6pm, it’s out. Is it any good? Advance reviews are HYPE.
(The brave films debuting in theatres alongside Mission: Impossible are horror film Insidious: The Red Door, the pastry chef comedy Sugar and Stars, Odesza’s The Last Goodbye concert film and the road trip comedy Joy Ride. Good luck to them all.)
On streaming, your best bet seems to be The Horror of Delores Roach, a Prime Video adaptation of Gimlet’s hit podcast about a masseuse released from prison after 16 years into a very different world from the one she left. The Guardian calls it a “darkly comic thriller” and if you still need to be swayed, check out the trailer.
Elsewhere, Netflix has a well-received documentary about George Michael’s 80s pop group Wham! (“Goofy and entertaining,” says the San Francisco Chronicle) as well as the deepfake reality show Deep Fake Love. TVNZ+ has the mini-series Then You Run, a drama about London teens on a getaway in Rotterdam when things take a twist. Neon has season three of the action series Warrior.
If you need some laughs, you’re in luck. Prime Video’s Robots posits a Black Mirror-type future in which everyone has doppelganger robots; one couple accidentally sends theirs on a date together and they fall in love. Meanwhile, Neon has Everyone Else Burns, a UK comedy about a religious Manchester family who believe the world will soon end. Netflix film The Out-Laws is a heist movie meshed with a rom-com that has a promising premise but poor early reviews (“Leaden,” says MovieWeb).
Don’t forget: if you need some school holiday content and Elemental doesn’t light your world on fire, Marcel the Shell with Shoes On is a delightful family-friendly film available for streaming for free on Neon for the first time. It’s too cute. You’ll love it.
An investigation into the deaths of two firefighters caught in a landslide during the Auckland anniversary weekend floods has recommended emergency procedures be improved.
The Muriwai firefighters were killed after a house collapsed due to a landslide on February 13.
The report, released today by fire and emergency, said risk management system did not identify landslides as a hazard.
“The Muriwai firefighters knew about Muriwai’s general susceptibility to landslides but did not recognise the warning signs that indicated an imminent landslide threat,” the report said, according to 1News.
The report concluded that FENZ should update its policy and procedures around landslides and, in particular, the warning signs.
Criticism has been levelled at the appointment of Alastair Carruthers as TVNZ’s new chair, with opponents saying it conflicts with his role as chair at the New Zealand Film Commission. A new report by BusinessDesk outlines those criticisms without naming those criticising him.
Carruthers was appointed chair of the NZFC in October. Then, two weeks ago, broadcasting minister Willie Jackson confirmed him as the new TVNZ chair.
A review into potential conflicts is under way, BusinessDesk reports, and expected to be completed before Carruthers’ first board meeting with TVNZ.
The conflict of interest claims basically boil down to this: the Film Commission administers the Screen Production Rebate; to be eligible for the rebate, shows must have a local broadcaster. As chair of the Film Commission, and as chair at TVNZ, Carruthers would have a foot in both camps.
Carruthers told BusinessDesk “we are not setting out to do the wrong thing” and he believed the core purposes off each organisation were different. “The core business of the Film Commission is to commission films, and the core business of TVNZ is to broadcast TV,” he said. Carruthers is also on the board of Screen Auckland, reported NZ Herald’s Media Insider column.
But one industry commentator, who didn’t want to be named, told The Spinoff the situation was “a mess” – especially following last year’s incident with David Strong, who left the Film Commission following a conflict of interest saga in a story broken by The Spinoff.
Spada, the Screen Producers Guild, said it didn’t want to comment until it had more clarity from the ministries involved.
Earlier in the week, The Spinoff’s Alex Casey exposed the Polite Plumbers – the plumbing firm that drive around in vans that look, from a distance, suspiciously like police vans.
The story spread like crazy and before long the plumbers had made it to RNZ’s The Panel and TV3’s The Project.
But there’s been one development since we first reported on Polite Plumbers. When Casey approached the police, they said they wouldn’t be commenting.
However, in the days since they’ve obviously worked out where they stand on the issue of Polite Plumbers. And it seems like good news for the Auckland company. “This is the first we’ve heard of this company and while it seems a bit cheeky, it’s important to flush away the notion they are in any way associated with police,” a spokesperson told The Project.
In 2021, the Reserve Bank told us that house prices were unsustainably high and would likely fall by around 15%. That has proven to be the case and the market is now considered sustainable. Yet, house price-to-income ratios are still two to three times higher than they were 20 years ago, and most people with regular incomes still struggle to buy homes. In the latest episode of When the Facts Change, Bernard Hickey talks to Reserve Bank researcher Dr Andrew Coleman about his research measuring house price sustainability and why house prices remain unaffordable, despite hitting sustainable levels.
The government has around 60 million rapid antigen tests (RATs) still in stock, worth $531 million, the NZ Herald’s Derek Cheng reports. As reported by Cheng last week, about 30% of these stocks, worth $158m, have already expired or will expire by the end of July, and are set to be wasted if Te Whatu Ora – Health New Zealand doesn’t find a way to re-purpose or recycle them. Act’s deputy leader Brooke van Velden, who got the figures from a parliamentary question, says ordering so many RATs shows a “mind-boggling level of mismanagement”, noting that $531m is half of Pharmac’s annual budget.
Health minister Ayesha Verrall has defended the stock levels. “We made the decision to be as prepared for the ongoing pandemic as possible, and stock was purchased to prepare us in the face of significant risk and uncertainty.”
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Countdown has added in manual checks on its price promotions after The Spinoff revealed the supermarket had hiked prices on two products it had pledged to keep cheap.
The Great Price for Winter campaign saw 300 essential products price frozen over the colder months.
But on Tuesday we reported that two items had been increased in price during the promotion period, with a supermarket spokesperson saying these had been “mistakenly processed”.
At the time, Countdown said it had introduced further processes to make sure this wouldn’t happen again, but didn’t provide information on what exactly that meant. But overnight, a spokesperson responded to our request for comment. “We’ve reminded our buying team of our processes and requirements around pricing changes, especially during Great Price for Winter and other promotions like this,” the spokesperson said. “We have also added a regular manual check on every product on these types of promotions to ensure that no unexpected or accidental changes have been made.”
Anyone mistakenly overcharged can contact Countdown’s customer service team for a refund.
