As it happened: Christopher Luxon’s first post-cabinet press conference as PM

Believe me, we won’t be live blogging every post-cabinet press conference. But you only get your first once, and this is Christopher Luxon’s first post-cabinet presser.

The other reason is that this has been a tumultuous first 48 hours for the new PM, though most of it has been what he hasn’t said rather than what he has. It’s been deputy prime minister Winston Peters that has grabbed most of the media attention, with Luxon largely avoiding any question about the New Zealand First leader.

That will change at 4pm today – you cannot avoid questions at a post-cab (well, I don’t think you can anyway).

We’ll have rolling coverage from 4pm – tune in!

To kick things off, the new prime minister has unveiled his government’s 100-day plan. Get your countdowns started, because March 8, 2024 is when the following things are set to be completed:

• Introducing legislation to remove the Auckland Regional Fuel Tax
• Repealing the Clean Car Discount scheme, also known as the ‘Ute Tax’
• Introducing legislation to refocus the Reserve Bank on a single mandate of price stabilityRepealing the Fair Pay Agreement legislation
• Stopping blanket speed limit reductions
• Starting work to establish a new regulation agency to improve the quality of regulation
• Repealing the Water Services Entities Act, also known as Three Waters
• Introducing legislation to ban gang patches
• Requiring primary and intermediate schools to teach an hour of reading, writing and maths per day starting in 2024
• Banning the use of cellphones in schools
• Setting five major targets for the health system, including for wait times and cancer treatment
• Introducing legislation to disestablish the Maori Health Authority
• Begin work to repeal the Therapeutics Products Act 2023
• Repealing amendments to the Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products Act 1990 and regulations.

Those are just some of the 49 things included on the list.

Even though this is clearly the focus of today’s post-cabinet press conference for the new government, the reporters in the Beehive theatrette are probably going to ask more than 100 questions about Winston Peters.

“The last few years have been incredibly tough for so many New Zealanders. People have put their trust in National, Act and NZ First to steer them towards a better, more prosperous future,” said Christopher Luxon.

“New Zealanders voted not only for a change of government, but for a change of policies and a change of approach – and our coalition government is ready to deliver that change.”

There are 49 points in the new government’s 100-day plan. Some are very specific promises to cancel various projects or introduce new legislation, but others are hilariously vague:

• “Begin work on delivering better public services and strengthening democracy.”
• “Start work to improve the quality of regulation.”
• “Begin work to crack down on serious youth offending.”

And if you think that one is hazy, check out this highly contentious point from the National-NZ First coalition deal:

“Lower inflation and grow the economy to ease the cost of living and create better paying jobs.”

Christopher Luxon must have spent hours trying to bend Winston Peters around to that one. However, the same line conspicuously does not appear in the National-Act agreement.

Before we get onto questions, leader of the house Chris Bishop has laid out how the first week of parliament will operate.

Parliament will be formally opened next Tuesday with the election of a speaker – National will be nominating Gerry Brownlee to take on this role.

The state opening will take place on Wednesday with the speech from the throne by the governor general. The first debate will take place at 2pm. Expect fireworks.

If you’re a big question time head, that won’t be back until 2pm next Thursday.

There will also be a number of maiden speeches beginning next week and running into the new year. There are 48 new MPs in this parliament. Bishop said the government plans to utilise urgency – meaning extended sitting hours – to pass through new legislation this side of Christmas. This will include returning the Reserve Bank to its single mandate, removing fair pay legislation (or “so-called” fair pay, as Bishop said) and repealing the “ute tax”.

Parliament will conclude for the year just before the Christmas break, and Luxon has made it clear he wants it to reopen earlier in the new year than is traditional.

Luxon said he expected this government would achieve a lot more in its first 100 days than the Labour government did in six years. “We are hitting the country with a lot more intensity than we’ve seen in the last six years,” he said, sounding like the CEO he was for many years.

Christopher Luxon has been asked to address the Winston Peters-shaped elephant in the cabinet room, namely his deputy prime minister’s remarks about perceived media bias.

“It’s not the way I would describe but I also don’t support the [Public Interest Journalism] fund either, as would many of New Zealanders,” Luxon said.

“We are now in a coalition government, we have three parties in this government, there will be different personalities…”

Luxon said he and Peters talk “many times a day” but didn’t say if he had specifically spoken to the deputy PM about his media remarks. “We’re going to say things in different ways as different leaders, that’s acceptable.”

The fund created “perceptions of bias” surrounding the media, said Luxon, “rightly or wrongly” and that was why he personally disapproved of it as well.

Asked about remarks today by Chris Hipkins that the PM needed to rein in his deputy, Luxon reverted to his tried and true campaign line: “No disrespect, I’m not taking any lectures from Chris Hipkins.”

“Chris Hipkins is a guy that had the biggest majority in the post-MMP environment, had a terrible election result… [and] lost four ministers in four months,” Luxon said. “He’s a desperate man at the moment.”

Christopher Luxon has made a big pitch to New Zealanders: “Our message is to not smoke.”

That’s despite winding back proposed legislation that was targeted at curbing smoking rates in New Zealand.

The prime minister said his government’s decision was to stick with the “status quo”, but still made it clear he wanted to see “smoking rates decline”.

Asked about his links to the tobacco industry and whether that may have had a part in ditching the smokefree regulations, Chris Bishop said: “it’s just nonsense”. He said that, despite being part of National’s post-election negotiating team, he had nothing to do with the removal of the smokefree rules.

Luxon said that the health minister Shane Reti would be working through what this decision would mean for smoking rates, but denied putting profits before people. “We don’t believe [the proposed policy] was the right prescription,” he said.

“It’s essentially saying we disagreed with those policies… Just buying or believing that the Labour approach was the only approach is just wrong.”

Read more: Want to guarantee your tax cut? Take up smoking

Is Winston Peters undermining Christopher Luxon? “Not at all,” the new PM said. “Winston’s allowed to make his remarks in the way that he chooses.”

The new government was “united”, said Luxon.

When not attacking the media, Peters is now both the deputy prime minister and the foreign affairs minister. “Winston Peters and I have had a number of conversations in the past 48 hours about foreign affairs, his insights have been excellent,” Luxon said.

Act Party leader and future deputy prime minister David Seymour has celebrated a number of policy wins in the government’s 100-day plan.

“The Act Party’s coalition commitments will form a core part of the government’s first 100 days of office,” said Seymour.

“This is a mammoth agenda but Act’s ministers are up for the challenge. We’ve heard from people who are sick of red tape and regulation making it too hard to get on with business, from business owners who find overzealous workplace rules are making it too hard to make a profit, from law-abiding firearms owners who are concerned safe areas like clubs and ranges will be driven out of business, from farmers who are sick of their property rights being trampled over, and from New Zealanders who are sick of their taxes going towards schemes that are not providing a benefit to taxpayers.”

Keeping with his approach to campaigning, Christopher Luxon has wandered away from post cab as press gallery reporters continued to yell questions at him.

Luxon faced criticism on the campaign trail after ditching press conferences before answering every reporter question.

This is just Luxon’s first of dozens of post-cab appearances, so he may change his approach across the term. However, it’s in stark contrast to the approach taken by the likes of John Key, Jacinda Ardern and Chris Hipkins who would routinely spend an hour-plus fronting questions.