Meng Foon, the former Gisborne mayor, has resigned from his role as race relations commissioner after failing to declare a conflict of interest relating to $2m in government funding for emergency housing. Associate justice minister Deborah Russell said Foon resigned after being asked to explain his failure to declare his investments, including being the director of a company that received government funding for providing emergency accommodation.

“The Human Rights Commission conducted an enquiry and produced a report on emergency housing which Meng Foon had been involved in deliberations for, while never adequately declaring his interest,” said Russell. “Off the back of that and a report from the Human Rights Commission Board into his failure to adequately declare these interests which found that he breached his duties under the Act, I sought advice from the Ministry of Justice.”

Russell noted that had Foon not resigned, “it is probable I would have determined his actions represented a serious breach of the Crown Entities Act and I would have taken the next steps to recommend to the governor-general to remove him from his office.”

Meng has been in the role since 2019 and recently made headlines after it was revealed he and his wife Ying Foon donated $1,500 to Allan’s 2020 campaign. The couple also donated to National during that election campaign.

Russell made a point of explaining the reason for Foon’s sudden resignation. “It is critical that all people appointed to public roles comply with their statutory duties. Meng Foon had multiple opportunities to adequately declare these interests and did not do so.

“While he has now chosen to resign I think it’s important the public is aware of the circumstances in which he has made that decision,” she said.

The Fold’s Duncan Greive addresses the fallout from revelations RNZ has for years been running wire copy altered to have pro-Russia and China slants. He also looks at the legacy of departing Stuff CEO Sinead Boucher, and explains why The Fold will be getting a little less time sensitive for the next while.

* This is an excerpt from The Spinoff’s weekly Friday newsletter Rec Room. Sign up for regular instalments here.

With its sixth season landing this week, expect the star-studded new season of dystopian sci-fi series Black Mirror to dominate the pop culture discourse for the next wee while. Creator Charlie Brooker recently told GQ he ripped up the rule book and added more comedy to the show, but ended up with “some of the bleakest stories we’ve ever done”. Surely they can’t hit harder than The National Anthem, from season one? You can find out for yourself: all five episodes are available now.

Elsewhere, Three is heavily promoting two new homegrown comedies: Double Parked stars the suddenly-everywhere Madeleine Sami and Antonia Prebble as a same-sex couple trying for a baby who accidentally both get pregnant at the same time, while Homebound 3.0 follows a struggling writer who returns home to live with his clearly disappointed parents. It’s too soon for reviews but both are playing back-to-back on Three’s new-look Thursday night comedy line-up (love that), as well as streaming on ThreeNow.

As for the rest, Netflix has the second season of its nature doco series Our Planet, Disney+ has commissioned a TV series based on the hit 1997 film The Full Monty featuring the original cast, and TVNZ+ has express episodes of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds straight from the US. It’s a big weekend for Neon with the new Hugo Weaving series Seven Types of Ambiguity landing alongside the seventh season of Outlander (yes, that show is still going). Then, early next week, cult comedy fave The Righteous Gemstones returns for a highly anticipated third season.

The new Pūhoi to Warkworth motorway has been formally opened by prime minister Chris Hipkins today, after multiple construction delays.

Flanked by minister Kiri Allan and MPs Shanan Halbert and Marja Lubeck, Hipkins said the new motorway connection will be “vital” for the North.

“The recent extreme weather events have highlighted how fragile the Auckland to Northland transport corridor can be, so this is a major step forward in ensuring a reliable connecting to the North,” he said.

“This is an exciting day for local communities, Northland and the upper North Island. The completion of such a strategic piece of infrastructure is part of our infrastructure plan to ensure our communities prosper and we are more resilient in the face of climate change and extreme weather.”

National, too, has welcomed the opening of the road. The project was started under ex-prime minister John Key, with Labour at the time criticising the motorway as a “holiday highway”.

Hipkins told media this was the wrong way to categorise the motorway, but said other critiques by Labour at the time were valid. That’s because he believed National should have been funnelling money into both new roading projects and ongoing roading maintenance, rather than focusing on multiple new “roads of national significance”.

But Simeon Brown, the National transport spokesperson, said Labour was taking credit for a project it didn’t even like.

“Prime minister Chris Hipkins and former transport minister Michael Wood were among those opposed to National’s efforts to begin the construction of this important piece of roading infrastructure,” he said. “We welcome the opening of this motorway and the many benefits it will bring to Auckland and Northland commuters.”

The motorway will open for public vehicles in the days ahead.

Both farmers and environmentalists fear Aotearoa becoming a sea-to-sea swathe of permanent Pinus radiata plantations that collect billions of dollars of carbon sequestration credits for investors, but few create long-term jobs and become deserts for native flora and fauna to thrive. But it doesn’t have to be that way. In this week’s episode of When the Facts Change, forestry consultant and carbon-farming veteran Mark Belton explains why a lot of farms just aren’t economic and how plantations don’t have to be just pine.

Listen below or wherever you get your pods

Immigration NZ is spending huge sums on deportations amid claims that airlines are rorting the system, Emma Hatton reports for Newsroom. Earlier this year the government spent $65,287, a record amount, on a deportation that required a single one-way flight to South Africa for the deportee and return flights for three airline security escorts. “The airlines say, yeah sure we’ll carry that person but we’re wanting three people to accompany [them] and this is our bill and Immigration just signs it off,” says immigration lawyer Aaron Martin, whose own client was recently deported over a drink-drive conviction at a cost of $57,000. “It was just the biggest load of bullshit I’ve ever seen in my life,” he says.

Immigration NZ says “some costs relating to custodial deportations are unavoidable and outside of INZ’s control”.

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Correspondence between Stuart Nash and his donors over a five year period has been released this morning alongside a cabinet report into the former minister. It’s revealed there were no further issues related to Nash and his donors, but one issue pertaining to a conflict of interest that was managed appropriately has been unearthed.

The 23-page review was ordered after revelations Nash had informed donors of sensitive cabinet information. This came just days after he’d admitted calling the police commissioner to discuss a court decision. Nash was subsequently sacked from cabinet.

Prime minister Chris Hipkins, who will address the report at an 11am press conference, said he was “pleased” the report found no further instances where confidential information was shared with donors.

“Stuart Nash has already paid the ultimate price for his actions by being removed as a minister. He is also retiring from politics at the upcoming election,” said Nash.

On the conflict of interest issue, Hipkins said the report concluded that Nash should have declared his interest, but “in fairness to Stuart he did take actions to manage the conflict. It’s a helpful reminder of the importance of Ministers making sure their conflicts are fully managed”. The government’s facing another ongoing conflict of interest debacle over minister Michael Wood and his (now sold) airport shares.

Nash, meanwhile, said it was his “ultimate privilege” to have served in the cabinets of both Hipkins and Jacinda Ardern. “I always took my ministerial roles and responsibilities very seriously and prided myself on being incredibly solution-focussed when faced with some of the most daunting issues any New Zealand government has ever had to deal with,” he said in a statement.

“Whilst never shying away from accepting responsibility for the actions that led to my ministerial demise, I am now hopeful that the cabinet office report will draw a line under this issue. It’s thorough and does not identify any further instances in which I shared information with declared donors in a manner inconsistent with the cabinet manual.”

Nash said he was now looking forward to building a post-political career and wished Hipkins and the Labour Party all the best for the election.

The unstoppable Media Insider Shayne Currie has revealed this morning that RNZ host Karyn Hay resigned from the broadcaster following an employment issue with a producer.

It’s been reported that Hay, a broadcasting icon who had been host of RNZ’s Nights show, was facing a complaint by a producer over her alleged behaviour. Hay’s extended absence from RNZ had gone largely unacknowledged by RNZ. After questions by The Spinoff earlier in the year, a spokesperson simply said Hay was on “leave” and, for privacy reasons, further information could not be provided.

An investigation into Hay’s behaviour reportedly focused on complaints she spoke negatively about others, including fellow staff, behaved aggressively and had allegedly “undermined colleagues” in the studio environment.

In May, The Spinoff had asked RNZ for details of any workplace bullying investigations under way. A spokesperson said “releasing any information with respect to any investigation would go to identifying the parties involved so is withheld”.

The investigation comes as RNZ continues to audit hundreds of stories following revelations a digital journalist for the outlet had been subtly inserting pro-Russian content into international wire copy.

The report into former minister Stuart Nash’s donors will be released at 9am this morning.

It was triggered by revelations that Nash had called the police commissioner about a court judgement, which he boasted about during an interview on Newstalk ZB. It later came to light that Nash had given details of cabinet decisions to donors, which prompted his immediate sacking from cabinet.

While the full report, which has looked at years worth of correspondence between Nash and donors, won’t be out until later this morning, Newshub’s Jenna Lynch has had an early look. She’s reported this morning that a further issue was found involving a friend of Nash’s that was appointed to a government advisory board. However, Lynch also reported that a senior minister defended Nash and claimed any potential conflict was well managed.

Prime minister Chris Hipkins is in Auckland today to formally open the Puhoi to Warkworth motorway, a project launched by the former National government (and, as noted by the Herald’s Bernard Orsman, a project Labour once mocked as a “holiday highway”). Hipkins will speak to the Nash report at about 11am.