Canterbury Mornings with John MacDonald Newstalk ZB

Resources Minister Shane Jones was full of it when he was on Newstalk ZB this morning, talking about the Government's plan to lift the ban on oil and gas exploration. 

He said you and I have two choices.  

We can either go with the people he calls the "lotus-eaters". These are the people who are outraged that the Government is lifting the ban. People he says have been fed and swallowed the line about climate change, and oil and gas being the baddies. 

Or, he says,  we can go with the Government - which is going all “you can’t stop progress” on it. And I’ll tell you right now - I’m with the lotus eaters. And I’ll tell you why shortly.  

But a bit of background first. You’ll remember how, back in 2018, the former Labour-led government pulled the pin, saying it didn't make sense to crow about tackling climate change and - at the same time - allow the energy companies to keep plundering the natural environment. 

And, before the election last year, noises were made about ditching the ban. And, yesterday, the Government delivered. Or it announced or confirmed its intention to deliver, anyway. 

And the Government reckons it will have it across the line sometime later this year. 

Which has the energy companies delighted, of course. 

Someone who isn't delighted, though, is Megan Woods. She was Energy Minister back in 2018 when the Labour/NZ First coalition government put the kibosh on further exploration. 

Which Shane Jones claimed this morning took him and Winston by surprise. And he doesn’t want to take anyone by surprise this time around. Which is why the ban won't be lifted overnight but (as we say here in New Zealand), it will happen. 

So, as soon as the Government made the announcement yesterday, Megan Woods was on the attack saying the Government is continuing what she called “its mindless charge toward giving fossil fuel companies free reign”. 

She went on to say: “Climate change is the number one issue facing New Zealand, and Minister Jones is hell bent on ignoring options of energy that are future-proofed and up to global standards. 

“New Zealand is being taken backwards. This government is being cruel to future generations, this will take decades to undo – if the damage can be undone at all.” So that was the fiery talk from Megan Woods yesterday. 

Not surprisingly, the Green Party was just as fired up. 

Not that that has Shane Jones worried. He says the chopice is simple. Do you want tpo go with the Government or the lotus-eaters? 

I’m with the lotus eaters which, if you were listening to the conversation we had a few weeks back about extracting more minerals on the West Coast and here in Canterbury, you might think is a bit of a contradiction. 

Because I’m all in favour of us taking a look at what’s under the bonnet when it comes to minerals under the ground, because that’s where the future is. 

So much so, that middle eastern countries want to pour money into mineral extraction in Australia because they know that oil is a dead-end game to be involved in. Long term, anyway. 

And it’s for that very same reason that I think the Government is barking up the wrong tree giving the green light for more oil and gas exploration. It’s only doing it because it was part of the coalition deal. But it’s not going to attract that big investment Shane Jones seems to think it will. 

Because, in three years time, if we have a change of government, the ban will be back in place. And the energy companies will know that - and do you really think they’re going to fall for all the bluster and talk from Shane Jones? Of course, they won’t. 

And I think Shane Jones knows that himself too. But he can’t say it, of course. Because he was talking this morning about wanting to secure long-term contracts with oil and gas companies. Which smells to me like Rio Tinto and the aluminium smelter all over again. 

Because if these companies are going to sign long ter

National’s Vanessa Weenink and Labour’s Reuben Davidson joined John MacDonald to dig into the biggest political stories of the week. 

Nicola Willis believes that it is a politician's job to provide hope for their citizens, do they agree as we head towards next week’s Budget?  

Is mining on the West Coast a good idea to boost the local economy, or does there need to be more consideration of the environmental impact? 

And it looks like the first home buyers grant is set to be axed in favour of funding social housing, are people being let down? 

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Who would think that former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and current Finance Minister Nicola Willis could agree on anything? But it seems they do. 

Both of them think that it’s the job of politicians to give people hope. I think that’s wishful thinking on their part. 

When Grant Robertson gave his valedictory speech two months ago before leaving Parliament to become Vice-Chancellor at the University of Otago, he said: “You’ve got to give them hope”. 

He said: “That is our job in this place: to give people hope. To give hope to those who seek a better tomorrow for their families and communities, to give hope to everyone that they can be who they are and live free of discrimination, and to give hope to those who have none.” 

And then yesterday, in her pre-Budget speech, Nicola Willis said the thing New Zealanders need most right now is "hope that tomorrow will be better".  

Well I tell you what, unless Nicola Willis announces next week that the guy with the thick accent who called her on a crackly line from Nigeria saying he had $200 billion to gift to New Zealand - unless she announces that it wasn’t actually a scam and the money’s already in the bank, then don’t expect me to say today that I’m hopeful about where New Zealand is heading. 

And, as for what Grant Robertson said about it being the job of MPs to give people hope - well, that might be the theory, but we’re deluded if we expect politicians to change our worlds. 

I remember on the night of the 1984 election, and I was just about to drop out of school. I say “drop out” because, now that I look back on it, that’s what I was doing. 

I had scraped through three school certificate subjects, failed two, and the last place I wanted to be was school, especially the school I was at. So, my parents agreed to let me leave and start working at the little shop they ran in Dunedin.  

And I remember on the night of that 1984 election, we were all sitting around the TV watching David Lange make his big victory speech and I remember my mother turning around to me and saying that if Labour hadn’t won, I wouldn’t be leaving school. 

That was the hope she had that the change in government was going to make it a better place. As we know, though, that night in 1984 was the starting point in a time of significant upheaval and turmoil. 

Forty years on from then, here we are in another state of upheaval and turmoil.  

And I think Nicola Willis is dreaming if she expects us to have hope. And I think Grant Robertson was big on theory when he said it’s the job of politicians to give people hope - but he was dreaming too. 

Because what gives people hope is sentiment. Not policies, not slogans, and certainly not politicians. And anyone whose hope level is dictated by the weasel words of politicians is only setting themselves up for disappointment.  

So, on the basis of hope being based on sentiment, you’ve got to say that the sentiment right now in New Zealand is far from hopeful. 

And I’m not just basing that on how things are for me, personally, because I’m actually at a stage in life where we no longer have all the expenses that come with having kids at school. We own a house. The big $400-$500 shops at Pak ‘n’ Save only happen during the university holidays, not all the time. 

Yes, things are blimmin’ expensive and we’ve done what a lot of people seem to have been doing recently and we’ve ditched Netflix and Neon and all those things. But that’s largely because we can - not because we have to. Not because it comes down to Netflix or a loaf of bread. 

So you could say that I have more reasons than a lot of people to be hopeful. 

But I don’t. Because I’m looking at this obsession with government cost-cutting and I’m asking, ‘where’s the thinking behind it, other than simplistic numbers and percentages?”. And the answer to that, is there isn’t. 

I’m not hopeful because I look around

Mining is on the way back. 

That’s the message today from Regional Development and Resources Minister Shane Jones who is on the West coast to announce the Government's proposal to double mining exports (which are already worth $1 billion) by allowing mining in some conservation areas - not just for coal, but other minerals too. 

The Government says one of the big selling points is the number of jobs it would create. About 2,000 new jobs it reckons. And not just on the Coast, either. Because the Government thinks there are opportunities here in Canterbury too, as well as Marlborough. 

Not that the protesters, who are going to be all over this today, are buying that. They don’t want a bar of it. 

Which is the challenge we’re always going to have with something like this, isn’t it? Cover your ears, no-no-no, not interested, mining is bad, blah blah blah. 

But I tell you what, I’m willing to hear the Government out on this one. It’s not like Shane Jones is going to be telling us that it’s all-go from tomorrow, that he'll be sending the trucks in at dawn. 

What he is saying is let’s have a look at this and see if we can make it work. Let’s investigate what we’ve got under the ground and work out if we can make a go of it. And he’ll get no opposition from me on that. 

Not that a few protesters will be an issue for this particular minister. Shane Jones being Shane Jones, he’ll probably be right up for a bit of korero with the anti-mining crew. 

He might even trot out that line he used recently when he said (quote): “If there is a mining opportunity and it's impeded by a blind frog, then goodbye, Freddie.” 

So, what this is all about today isn’t just coal and gold. It’s about all the other minerals under the ground on the Coast, in Canterbury and in Marlborough, that the Government reckons could be a goldmine for the New Zealand economy. 

But, of course, what today will inevitably lead to is a battle of ideologies. It’s probably underway already, actually, which doesn’t help anyone. And it’s something I’ve seen before. 

I remember in 1999 and 2000 when I was working as a journalist and spending a lot of my time on the West Coast reporting on the stoush over the then-Labour government’s move to end native logging on Crown-owned land. 

The people on the Coast went berserk because they saw jobs and businesses going at the expense of Labour’s ideology which said taking trees away was bad. Which also put a lot of the locals up against the environmental crowd, who thought no tree should be touched. 

What kind of got lost in that row was the fact that the trees weren’t being felled with chainsaws, they were being pulled out of the ground using helicopters in a way designed to let new trees grow and to allow the forests to keep regenerating. 

But Helen Clark and Michael Cullen got their way and the native logging on Crown land came to a halt.  

What I learned from that experience is how limiting ideologies can be and I hope we don’t repeat the same mistake this time around. Because I say ‘let’s take a look, let’s see if we can get a slice of the minerals pie that Shane Jones is talking about’.  

Because who wants to be saying coulda, woulda, shoulda in a few years time about another billion dollars in earnings for our mining sector? I don’t. Do you? 
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So, it looks like the Government is going to ditch the First Home Buyers Scheme which gives people up to $10,000 to help get them into their first home.  

All up, it costs the Government $60 million a year. It seems that money’s going to go into social housing instead. 

And it’s tick, tick, tick from me. That’s because, even though I think there is a place for government involvement in helping people get ahead in life, buying assets is not one of them. 

I was talking to someone who was saying that the First Home Buyers Scheme can be one of the only bits of government help some people get - over and above the usual public services. That would be aside from the pension, too, of course. 

And that’s government with a small g. This person wasn’t talking about the current government. They were about the government, in general. Or taxpayer support, to put it another way. 

But what I say to that is, just because you might never be on ACC, or you might never be on the unemployment benefit, or you might never need a sickness benefit, that doesn’t mean you're owed anything. 

And you’re certainly not owed anything to help you buy your first home. 

But, of course, there will be people who will be outraged that the scheme is going. Yes, they’ll be unhappy. And that’s because home ownership has come to be seen as something of a basic human right. When it’s not. 

Having a roof over your head is a basic human right. Owning that roof, isn’t. 

Interestingly, it was a National government in the 1950s which had the thinking that living in a state house should only be for people who needed it, and not for everyone. 

So, what it did is it set an income limit and told all the so-called middle-class people that they could forget about getting a state house and started championing home ownership, instead, saying that was what New Zealand aspired to. 

And so, it did a couple of things. It said to state house tenants that if they wanted to buy the house they were in, they could. And it increased the availability of what were known as state-advanced loans to help people get into their first homes. 

Which meant, within a very short time, 34% of all home loans were from the state. And, of course, what happened was demand outstripped supply and the real estate merry-go-’round got going. 

Over the years, it wasn't just National that fuelled this obsession with home ownership. The Labour government that came in after National in 1959 allowed low-income families to have their Family Benefit paid in advance, to help them get a deposit together for a house. 

Fast-forward to 1984, and things changed a bit under David Lange’s Labour government. It deregulated the banking sector which brought more competition into banking, stopped the scheme that allowed people to put their Family Benefit towards a deposit, and started introducing market rental rates for state houses.  

And, by that time, the horse had well-and-truly bolted and home ownership was the be-all and end-all for a lot of people. As it still is today. 

But even though we have a relatively long history of governments helping people out financially if they want to buy a home —to varying degrees, certainly— it’s not a reason to keep doing it. 

And the obsession with home ownership certainly isn’t a reason to keep giving taxpayer money to people to buy houses. 

And good on the Government —or National anyway— for being true to its word and, in relation to this anyway - being true to its word and basing its housing support on need. 

Because no one needs to buy a house. They might want to, but they don’t need to. 

Unlike someone on the bones of their backside and on the edge of society, who does actually have a need. They need a roof over their head. And, if the Government is sitting there trying to work out the best way to spend $60 million - then, as far as I’m concerned, that $60 million has to go towards addressing people’s

John MacDonald was joined this morning by Chris Hipkins for their regular catchup. 

Labour's leader is warning the Government it shouldn't can a grant for first home buyers.  

An inquiry led by former PM Sir Bill English has found Kainga Ora needs to find significant savings to be financially viable.  

The Housing Minister says every programme the state housing provider runs will be checked for cost value.  

Chris Bishop won't rule out dropping first home buyer grants. 

Chris Hipkins told John MacDonald that it would be the wrong move. 

He says the scheme is a modest contribution to people being able to buy a first home and is not a big chunk of money in the budget process. 

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