The Hoon: On the China Tightrope; Cycleways vs drivers

This week’s hoon included Wellington City Councillor Tamatha Paul on the politics of Lets Get Wellington Moving and the great battle for the Thorndon Quay cycle way. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The Kākā

TLDR: The week’s news in Aotearoa’s political economy I covered via The Kākā for subscribers included:

• The Labour Government’s announcement it would share the costs with councils and insurers of buying back about 700 now-uninhabitable homes (~$1 billion) and protecting another 10,000 at-risk homes (un-estimated) from extreme climate events after Cyclones Hale and Gabrielle, but couldn’t say how much it would or could pay, and how much it expected or would force councils and insurers to pay; Friday’s email

• Data this week from CoreLogic, Realestate.co.nz and Barfoot and Thompson showed a bottoming out of an 18-month slide in house values in a tightening market, with listings at a 16-year low in May and sales in Auckland up 53%; Thursday’s email

• I argued a clear victory for National/ACT in the October 14 election could unleash an immediate 10-20% bounce in house prices in auctions and open homes in late October and November; Wednesday’s email

• NIMBY groups were cock-a-hoop this week, calling on councils and the Government to completely abandon the MDRS housing densification rules in the wake of National’s backflip on a bipartisan deal once seen as the hope of a generation; Tuesday’s email

• Chris Bishop detailed National’s new housing policy for Election 2023 that confirms a National Government would not force councils to allow the building of three three-storey townhouses on a regular section without a resource consent — known as MDRS; Monday’s email

What we talked about on ‘The Hoon’ last night

In this week’s podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers at 5pm on Friday night, I talked with special guests:

• 5.10 pm - 5.20 pm - University of Otago Professor

  Robert Patman
  on drone attacks on Moscow and Kyiv and Turkey’s election result;

• 5.25 pm-5.35 pm - Newsroom National Affairs Editor Sam Sachdeva on his just-published book ‘The China Tightrope;

• Wellington City Councillor Tamatha Paul on the politics of Lets Get Wellington Moving and the great battle for the Thorndon Quay cycle way; and,

• 5.45 pm to 5.55 pm - Christchurch City Councilor Sara Templeton on the politics of the Park Terrace cycleway drama.

The Hoon’s podcast version above was produced by Simon Josey.

Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, I’m able to spread the work from my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction around in other public venues. I’d love you to join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments.

Other places I’ve appeared this week

My podcast for The Spinoff this week

How big does Chris Bishop want us to be? - National’s Housing Spokesman Chris Bishop wants councils to zone enough land with enough pipes and roads to house 30 years worth of population growth, but not all through densification. I interviewed Chris for my weekly When The Facts Change podcast about how big he wants Aotearoa to be, and who will pay for all the extra infrastructure needed when that growth is on green fields, given National is less keen on brownfields medium density development.

Chat thread of the week

I also host regular discussions on the Chat section of The Kākā for paying subscribers.

Here’s one of the most commented ones this week, which was open to free subscribers too. Almost all are only open to paying subscribers and I’m thrilled at high level, depth and collegiality of the conversations we now have there as a community.

Ka kite ano

Bernard