The Mike Hosking Breakfast Newstalk ZB

One small step for peanut butter, one giant leap for New Zealand foods. 

Kiwi nut butter brand Fix & Fogg has launched 50 pouches of various products into space for astronauts aboard the International Space Station. 

Fix & Fogg Chief Executive Roman Jewell told Mike Hosking that it also has wider implications for New Zealand food products. 

He says it proves to NASA kiwi producers can be trusted to work with. 

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A New Zealand Initiative report details potential hidden risks in China's Belt and Road Initiative. 

The pro-free-market think-tank points to potential implications for our foreign policy, independence, and development.  

Director Oliver Hartwich says it's not just about infrastructure investment. 

He told Mike Hosking that we need to be wary about China trying to draw New Zealand into its sphere of influence.  

Hartwich says when you have to do something political in return, you are no longer the client of the project but the product. 

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Kiwis have had enough of being on hold after more than 22 million hours on the phone for customer service. 

ServiceNow commissioned research surveyed more than a thousand people, finding wait-times rose for the second year in a row. 

On average it takes businesses six days to solve a customer's issue despite more than half of Kiwis saying they won't wait longer than three. 

ServiceNow Country Manager Kate Tulp told Mike Hosking that the current economy has inflated the issue. 

She says customers' expectations have continued to rise, while our dollar hasn't. 

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On the Mike Hosking Breakfast Full Show Podcast for Thursday 2nd of May, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters joined to dig into AUKUS and the likelihood of New Zealand joining. 

Two Green MPs were in the news last night, for very different reasons. Mike reviewed James Shaw's valedictory speech and Julie Anne Genter's moment of madness in the House. 

Heath ‘Chopper’ Franklin joined Mike in studio to talk about his New Zealand tour and how long his iconic character can last. 

Get the Mike Hosking Breakfast Full Show Podcast every weekday morning on iHeartRadio, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

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One of New Zealand’s favourite comedians, Heath ‘Chopper’ Franklin is back from his break. 

The Australian comic is returning from his three year break with a bang, back in New Zealand with fifteen shows as well as his set in the International Comedy Festival. 

His tour kicks off today, as Chopper's 'Not Here To F*ck Spiders', the name of his tour setting the tone for the show.

His iconic persona ‘Chopper’ was based off the real life criminal in the 2000 movie by the same name, his career taking off from there. 

“I watched it when I was... early twenties, and you know, like a lot of the movies you watch when you get to that age, you just sort of watch it and then you absorb it slowly.” 

Franklin recounts hanging out with friends at parties and, prompted by friends going off to sleep early, doing an impression of the character. He then brought this through into the sketch comedy shows he was doing at the time. 


The movie came out in the 2000s, and Franklin told Mike Hosking that there’s a level of freedom in people no longer knowing the original story. 

“I find the thing that kind of weighs me down the most is, especially when I go to Melbourne where they’re quite parochial and proud of even, you know, even the violence of their criminals, that yeah. You know, there’s a constant kind of reference between what I do and what he would have done.” 

“So I really love coming to New Zealand where I kind of get to define what the character does, and I get to kind of step out of that shadow.” 

He was never trying to be a biographer, he told Hosking. 

“I was just a guy who liked a movie and made a dumb sketch.” 

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Winston Peters says Julie Anne Genter should face consequences for confronting a minister in the House. 

The Green MP has apologised in Parliament and could face further disciplinary action after a complaint was made of intimidatory behaviour toward Minister Matthew Doocey on Wednesday night. 

Genter walked across the debating chamber to Doocey, waved a booklet and spoke angrily to him while getting close to his face. 

The incident happened at about 8pm, while Labour’s Nelson MP Rachel Boyack was speaking and followed some interjections between Doocey and Genter. It was visible in the background of the footage on Parliament TV. 

“Miss Genter. Miss Genter, please resume your seat,” demanded the chair at the time, Barbara Kuriger. 

“It’s not appropriate to get out of one’s seat to go and have an argument with somebody on the other side.” 

Speaker Gerry Brownlee had to be recalled to the debating chamber to deal with the issue after National’s whip Scott Simpson asked Kuriger to do so. 

Simpson said in Parliament that he had never seen anything like it, describing it as a “serious, intimidatory physical attack upon another member”. 

The Deputy Prime Minister told Mike Hosking that Genter appeared to, quote, "lose the plot". 

He says there are processes to discipline someone like that, and just apologising to Doocey for making him feel unsafe doesn't cut it. 

Also last night, Peters gave a speech regarding AUKUS Pillar 2, and has said the details are still fairly new to him. 

The Foreign Minister has outlined New Zealand's position to the Institute of International Affairs at Parliament. 

He says we should be open to exploring the technology leg of the nuclear-powered submarine pact and what that could look like for us. 

Peters told Hosking that he's still trying to find out exactly what Pillar 2 would entail.  

He says in the middle of public discussions, all sorts of people are rushing to judgement without having been remotely briefed on the matter. 

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