The best-selling books at the two best bookstores in the North Island. AUCKLAND UNITY 1 Strangers Arrive: Emigres and the Arts in New Zealand by Leonard Bell (Auckland University Press, $75) Once were intellectuals. Publisher’s blurbology: “From the 1930s through the 1950s, a substantial number of forced migrants arrived in New Zealand from Europe. Among them … Read more
A review into government innovation agency Callaghan Innovation published last year found weaknesses with its management, but its Māori economy unit was singled out for praise. Rebecca Stevenson caught up with Callaghan’s Hēmi Rolleston to find out how it’s helping Māori entrepreneurs build export-ready businesses. It has a mission that is mammoth. Callaghan Innovation aims … Read more
Listen to Alex Casey, Leonie Hayden and Michele A’Court tackle the age-old conundrum: how do you cope with Christmas without exploding? As we roll into December on a one horse open sleigh, the Christmas stress is beginning to set in. So we asked our listeners for their own festive conundrums, tips and gift ideas, in … Read more
As New Zealand faces pressure to cool its overheated housing market, top-earning Airbnb hosts in two of our hardest-squeezed cities are raking in million-dollar fortunes. Talia Shadwell investigates. In tourist playground Queenstown, one Airbnb host made $2.9 million in the year to October accommodating short-term stays across 19 properties, according to new figures from research … Read more
Leonie Hayden presents Kaupapa On The Couch, a six-part webseries looking at interesting issues and events in te ao Māori. In this episode Leonie explains what happened at Parihaka on the 5th of November 1881 when a pacifist settlement in Taranaki was invaded by 1600 volunteer and Armed Constabulary troops. But most importantly, she explains … Read more
In our video series Kiwis of Snapchat, comedian Tom Sainsbury sources exclusive Snapchat footage of Kiwi citizens and luminaries making the news. Today, Patricia wants you to know that this silly season is getting ridiculous. Click here for all our Kiwis of Snapchat videos
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand, with the interview available as both audio and a transcribed excerpt. Today Simon talks to tech investor Rowan Simpson. Rowan Simpson has made his … Read more
While you are reading this a mother somewhere in the country is making the heartbreaking decision to terminate a wanted pregnancy. Continuing our series of real stories of abortion, one mother shares what it’s like to have a termination for medical reasons. This post discusses abortion of a wanted pregnancy – there is support available … Read more
Māori historian Dr Danny Keenan explains why it is highly unlikely William Hobson ever made his famous ‘pledge’. Great play has been made by anti-Māori Pākehā on a statement attributed to Lieutenant Governor Hobson at the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, that new settlers and Māori ‘were now one people’. But did Hobson ever … Read more
Duncan McLean is a writer and publisher living on the Orkney Islands in Scotland. He travelled to New Zealand, drawn by the books of Frank Sargeson – and discovered the forgotten man of New Zealand writing, Craig Marriner. I first encountered Frank Sargeson in Jane Campion’s film An Angel at my Table. It was quite a hit on the … Read more
She’s written some of your favourite songs – and you don’t even know it. Sam Brooks talks to one of the biggest songwriters of the decade who’s about to become one of the biggest popstars in the world. “I wrote it in the midst of my last break up, it’s a song about whether you’re … Read more
Is it 1.4%, 2.5%, 6.2%, 9% or something else? Simon Wilson explains how much Auckland rates are really going to rise under the mayor’s new proposal – and wonders why some of the reporting has been so confusing. This afternoon Auckland Council debates the draft 10-year budget proposed by mayor Phil Goff. They may have … Read more
Tara Ward falls in crazy, stupid love with Young Hercules, the bizarre 90s classic made in New Zealand and starring a young Ryan Gosling. Once upon a time, in a land far away called 1990s New Zealand, someone made the greatest television show in the history of the universe. Alas, I’m not talking about Face the … Read more
In 2015 Alex Casey interviewed Greg Sestero, star of The Room and author of The Disaster Artist, about his book about a movie that’s now a movie of its own. I remember sitting next to a middle-aged couple who had innocently wandered into a late-night screening of The Room at The Academy cinema one fateful … Read more
Western Bay of Plenty district council already voted in favour of Māori wards, but one councillor, the partner of Hobson’s Pledge head honcho Don Brash, is demanding a rate-payers’ poll. Let’s vote for progress, writes Graham Cameron. In our balmy autumn months in Tauranga Moana, during the commemorations for Te Weranga (the 1867 Tauranga Bush … Read more
It’s ridesharing app versus ridesharing app as global juggernaut Uber and local upstart Zoomy go head to head. Which one is fastest, cheapest and easiest to use? Jihee Junn enlisted Don Rowe to help find out. Going up against Uber is no easy feat. Just ask Lyft, which has long played second fiddle to Uber’s … Read more
A mother who became a parent later in life shares the ups and downs, the fears and the pleasures, of coming to parenthood in your late thirties. I had my first daughter a couple of months before my thirty-seventh birthday. Until my kids came along, I was pretty ambivalent about pregnancy and motherhood. But at … Read more
The Black Ferns recognition as the World Rugby Team of the Year is a big deal for women athletes around the world. Let’s just say it out loud for those in the back of the room: World Rugby, the body charged with running the game of rugby union around the globe, just handed its Team … Read more
A startling story that appears to contradict John Key’s 2014 account of the abandonment of a surveillance scheme is a bombshell – and a depressing object lesson in delay tactics and attention spans, writes Toby Manhire. So the saying goes, three years, two months and a couple of weeks is a long time in politics. Back … Read more
Danyl McLauchlan celebrates the latest Jack Reacher masterpiece by Lee Child. About 15 years ago I was having a drink with an old friend, and ‘Romeo and Juliet’ by Dire Straits started playing on the bar’s stereo. My friend had very elevated taste in music and I wanted to impress him so I said, “Oh god … Read more
Kera Sherwood-O’Regan (Kāi Tahu) is an Aotearoa Youth Leadership Institute delegate to COP23, the United Nations Climate Talks in Bonn, Germany, reporting over the three-week conference. This week: COP23 is finally over, but what did it achieve? This is Kara Sherwood-O’Regan’s third report on the COP23 climate change talks and their outcomes for indigenous people. Read … Read more
Duncan Greive watches Australian Ninja Warrior and makes a serious pitch for the return of New Zealand’s own ’90s multi-sport extravaganza. Australian Ninja Warrior already contains a number of ingredients which suggest a deeply problematic show: the co-option in name only of an ancient Japanese culture for reality TV; a blonde breakout star running in … Read more
The Financial Markets Authority has launched an interactive tool that let’s you access, and compare, basic fund information. Rebecca Stevenson extracts herself from KiwiSaver ennui to take a look at the numbers. I have a confession. I have a KiwiSaver, and yet for the first two years or so I didn’t realise I had it. … Read more
Growing up disconnected from her father and his side of her family, Tamsyn Matchett never understood her Tongan identity. On Saturday at Mt Smart stadium she sang the Tongan national anthem for the first time, surrounded by her Tongan brothers and sisters. I grew up not completely sure how Tongan I was. Actually, I wasn’t … Read more
Greater Auckland’s Matt Lowrie looks at the hidden benefits of rail outlined in a 2016 NZTA report released just this week, which transport minister Phil Tywford says was intentionally sat on by the previous government. For the last few decades, we’ve treated rail in New Zealand quite differently to the way we treat roads. Rail has been considered … Read more
Building magnate Sir William Gallagher’s recent comments calling the Treaty of Waitangi a ‘fraud’ have been roundly condemned. But he’s not the first to believe it, writes Scott Hamilton. Sir William Gallagher knows a lot about fences. He joined his father’s fencing business in 1962, and has turned it into a multinational company that he … Read more
This week Jane, Duncan and Alex (and fill in recordist Don Rowe) really lean into this whole post-MAFS life. Pray for them. This week’s #realpod starts, like all should, with an apology. To Polly, and to Grant. We implied that they were no longer surfing the airwaves. We were wrong – they are rockin’ More … Read more
After moving to New Zealand to study, Julia Soares returned to her New Caledonia home eight years later with her Wellington band in tow, ready to show them ‘an island that vibrates with music’. You can hear the joy in Julia Soares voice as she recounts her homecoming set at New Caledonia’s once-in-a-lifetime music festival … Read more
Sir William Gallagher has been called a massive, massive racist… but what if all the people saying that are wrong? As the country enjoyed the clement spring weather this past weekend, word broke that manufacturing magnate Sir William Gallagher had addressed a group of Hamilton business people in a somewhat controversial manner. As well as … Read more