Ellesse Andrews celebrates winning the Women’s Sprint (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

The BulletinAugust 12, 2024

A glorious and historic Olympics campaign comes to an end

The Bulletin editor

Ellesse Andrews celebrates winning the Women’s Sprint (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

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New Zealand’s medal haul crept up by two overnight as the Paris games close, writes Stewart Sowman-Lund in today’s extract from The Bulletin.

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Don’t cry because it’s over

The problem with choosing to travel to America at the start of August was that it meant visiting a part of the world that had an even more inconvenient time difference for watching the Olympics than here in New Zealand – at least for medal events we were involved in. Joel MacManus valiantly argued in favour of solitary 4am sport watching, but, while on holiday, I just didn’t have it in me. Nevertheless, from the moment I returned home I’ve been engrossed in the final weekend of the sporting action, from a monumental effort by Maddi Wesche in the women’s shot put (with a final throw that briefly perplexed even the commentators, as The Spinoff’s Madeleine Chapman explained) to the incredible Australian breakdancer Raygun who has rightfully taken over my Twitter feed. Since my return on Saturday, the front pages of all our national news sites have been a flurry of Olympic recaps, interviews and general celebration (with a side dose of Lotto fever). With the closing ceremony about to kick off, let’s farewell the 2024 Olympic Games.

Our golden games

Overnight, another two medals were added to New Zealand’s tally which now sits at 20. Ellesse Andrews won her second gold at the velodrome, followed by Ally Wollaston’s bronze in the women’s omnium. It makes this our most successful Olympics ever, equalling Tokyo for total medals but ahead of 1984’s Los Angeles campaign for gold medals with 10. Shortly, the closing ceremony will take place with Lisa Carrington and Finn Butcher named as New Zealand’s flag bearers. On the medal table, we end our campaign in 11th place (undoubtedly higher if you get into the whole “per capita” thing).

1News has looked back at all of our big wins in Paris, which will be remembered most for an exciting surge in gold medals on Saturday night when we picked up three – Lisa Carrington earned her eighth, for the K1 500m, Lydia Ko scored in the women’s golf and Hamish Kerr pulled off a dramatic victory in the high jump. Kerr explained his decision not to split the gold, as had been done in 2021, in this interview with 1News. As the Herald’s Cameron McMillan noted, the triple-gold was even more impressive given that between 1988 and 2008, New Zealand didn’t win more than three gold medals at a single Olympics, let alone on a single day.

Our greatest Olympian becomes even greater

Lisa Carrington was already our best performing Olympic athlete, but her three medals in Paris pushes her closer to being one of the greatest Olympians of all time. She’s technically ranked 44th when it comes to overall medals, but rises considerably closer to the top when measured by her eight golds. That’s equal footing with Usain Bolt and more than US gymnast Simone Biles. Dylan Cleaver at The Bounce pointed out on Friday that, mind bogglingly, Carrington’s medal wins amount to 11% of all golds ever won by New Zealand at the games (since her latest win, it’s more like 12%). The success of Carrington is not to diminish the efforts of our other athletes on the water, notably Aimee Fisher who, while missing out on a medal, contributed to what commentators dubbed the “race of the century”. The Herald’s Michael Burgess wrote a nice feature on Fisher and her friendly rivalry with Carrington, acknowledging that while the pair are not “close friends” there is “immense mutual respect”. Burgess also has a great behind the scenes look at the training routine of our Olympic canoeists.

Many highs, but some lows too

Some of the biggest highlights from Paris have been off the water. Few had predicted Maddi Wesche’s podium placement in the shot put, for example. As Dylan Cleaver reflected, her silver highlighted why the Olympics is often so exhilarating: “someone will almost always surprise you”. The games have not been without disappointment – think most of our swimming hopefuls from week one. But for me, the most confounding moments have been unrelated to our athletes.

The illness-inducing Seine, for example, which has similarities to our own polluted waterways, as The Spinoff’s Shanti Mathias examined. A comment on the article wryly pointed out that, perhaps, the Paris river had inadvertently become the best marketing campaign for cleaning up our own. Arguably less significant, though absolutely worthy of this searing Spinoff takedown by Madeleine Chapman, the state of New Zealand’s Olympics uniforms. Given how often our athletes have popped up on the podium this year, we can only hope things have improved in the clothing department come 2028.

The full list of medal winners:

Black Ferns Sevens: rugby sevens, women’s tournament (GOLD)
Lucy Spoors, Brooke Francis: rowing, women’s double sculls (GOLD)
Finn Butcher: canoe slalom, men’s kayak cross (GOLD)
Lisa Carrington, Alicia Hoskin, Olivia Brett, Tara Vaughan: canoe sprint, women’s K4 500 (GOLD)
Ellesse Andrews: cycling, women’s keirin (GOLD)
Lisa Carrington, Alicia Hoskin: canoe sprint, women’s K2 500 (GOLD)
Lisa Carrington: canoe sprint, women’s K1 500 (GOLD)
Lydia Ko: golf, women’s tournament (GOLD)
Hamish Kerr: athletics, men’s high jump (GOLD)
Ellesse Andrews: cycling, women’s individual sprint (GOLD)
Hayden Wilde: triathlon, men’s individual (SILVER)
Matt Macdonald, Tom Murray, Logan Ullrich, Oliver Maclean: rowing, men’s coxless four (SILVER)
Isaac McHardie, Will McKenzie: sailing, men’s 49er (SILVER)
Emma Twigg: rowing, women’s single sculls (SILVER)
Rebecca Petch, Shaane Fulton, Ellesse Andrews: cycling, women’s team sprint (SILVER)
Bryony Botha, Emily Shearman, Nicole Shields, Ally Wollaston: cycling, women’s team pursuit (SILVER)
Maddi Wesche: athletics, women’s shot put (SILVER)
Kerri Williams, Davina Waddy, Phoebe Spoors, Jackie Gowler: rowing, women’s coxless four (BRONZE)
Micah Wilkinson, Erica Dawson: sailing, mixed multihull (BRONZE)
Ally Wollaston: cycling, women’s omnium (BRONZE)

Keep going!

The BulletinAugust 9, 2024

The new way New Zealanders will get their water

Catherine McGregor

Contributing writer

Joining forces on water services will be ‘optional’ for councils – but the government’s retaining the right to make them partner up, writes Catherine McGregor in today’s extract from The Bulletin.

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Forced amalgamation on the table

Councils could be forced to amalgamate their water services under new legislation previewed by ministers Simeon Brown and Andrew Bayly on Thursday. The initial outline of the government’s plan for a Three Waters replacement was first revealed in February, and now the details have been filled in. As already established, neighbouring councils will be able to join forces to create a multi-council-owned water service provider, or go it alone if they wish. However, as Thomas Manch notes in The Post, “there has been concern that some councils might be left in the cold, as larger neighbours decide against combining water services with them”. Brown says the legislation will include a “backstop” to allow forced amalgamation, but has refused to say what might cause the government to step in. Once the law passes in the coming weeks, councils will have 12 months to finalise their plans.

The government is also tweaking some water quality standards which it says have hampered the ability of the Water Services Authority, Taumata Arowai, to do its job.

Controversy over CCO budgets continues

Three Waters stipulated “balance sheet separation”, which would have divided the accounts of the new council-controlled organisations (CCOs) from those of the councils themselves. Under National’s plan, however, councils will own the water entities and fund debt through “ringfenced” revenue – “most likely from charges obtained for water usage, measured by water meters, but this will be determined by councils”, explains Manch. The debt required to fund desperately needed new infrastructure will be supplied at below-market rates by the Local Government Funding Agency, reports RNZ. The new water entities will be able to borrow five times their revenue – much more than other CCOs – subject to “prudent credit criteria”.

Brown says the new funding plan will allow the water entities to source the funding they need “while minimising costs on ratepayers”. However Labour local government spokesperson Kieran McAnulty says the government’s plan doesn’t stack up. “There’s a clear reason why this wasn’t pursued [under Labour]. It’s because the credit rating agencies made it very clear that unless there was balance sheet separation, the savings that are required wouldn’t be found.” With councils ultimately responsible for the debt, the result would be “ongoing rates increases” for householders, he said.

Wellington Water chief executive out

After months of damaging news stories about her leadership, Wellington Water CEO Tonia Haskell has announced her resignation. In May it was revealed that the agency had made a $51 million dollar mistake in its budget, forcing the five Wellington councils to find up to $20 million extra in their long-term plans. In late July, an independent review of the circumstances that led to the error was scathing about the agency’s performance, finding “a lack of strategic leadership at the highest levels of the organisation, and wider problems of organisational culture”. Wellington Water board chair Nick Leggett said uncertainty over the government’s water plans could have contributed to the problems. “The anticipation of imminent water reforms may have made Wellington Water too timid in addressing much needed change in its organisation.” Following news of Haskell’s resignation, Upper Hutt mayor Wayne Guppy, whose council was hardest hit by the budget blunder, said he thought Wellington Water would struggle to find a short term replacement for her, given the government’s announcement that a new entity is imminent.

Councillors walk out over road project downsizing

Staying with local government in the capital, on Thursday three Wellington councillors walked out of a committee meeting, having refused to vote on a plan to downsize the controversial Thorndon Quay roadworks project. The committee had been asked to vote on reducing the number of raised pedestrian crossings on the street from five to two, after the project lost funding from Waka Kotahi. Councillor Ben McNulty said he didn’t want to make a snap decision based on “reckons” not evidence, reports RNZ. “I just feel fundamentally uncomfortable about playing the role of traffic engineer here, so I’m going to leave the room,” McNulty said. After councillors Diane Calvert and Nureddin Abdurahman followed him out the door, the vote passed. One commentator who will be happy about the downsizing is The Spinoff’s Joel MacManus, who wrote last month that “the proposed design goes way overboard. It’s a big-budget, gold standard approach, but it goes against the primary aim of the project. Raised crossings and excessive traffic lights will make bus and bike access worse, not better.”