The government has conceded that soaring house prices are increasing inequality and poverty, and the finance minister wants the Reserve Bank to do something about it. Justin Giovannetti writes from parliament. There’s been an invisible wall down the centre of Bowen Street in Wellington for a generation. On one side is parliament and elected officials, … Read more
Labour has made an extraordinary ascent in the polls and is now clinging to a mostly non-threatening brand of centrism. Hayden Donnell counts the cost of that strategy. Cast your mind back to 2016. As Bill English rolled out his budget, Grant Robertson issued what looked like a criticism. In an article headlined “a Budget … Read more
Do you qualify for the government’s new wage subsidy extension? Here are the essentials. What’s all this then? Last Friday, the government announced Auckland would stay in alert level three – and the rest of New Zealand in alert level two – for another 12 days, as part of its response to the recent Covid-19 … Read more
Jenée Tibshraeny can forgive a genuine, if rather extraordinary, mistake, but the government’s lack of transparency around decision-making creates confusion at a time when we need confidence, she writes in a piece originally published on interest.co.nz. The creator of Veep, The Death of Stalin and In the Loop, Armando Iannucci, could’ve filmed a political satire … Read more
Public service chief executives are now more interested in making their mark than providing government ministers with decent advice – and it’s having disastrous consequences, a former senior Treasury official writes. Sometimes on a Tuesday morning you may hear a low, vaguely rhythmic rumble coming from a Treasury meeting room. A handful of its middle-aged … Read more