Today Heather du Plessis-Allan was joined by Labour’s Ginny Andersen and National’s Mark Mitchell to recap the highs and lows of 2025 on the final Politics Wednesday for the year. 

They also discussed the retail crime numbers, the state of the Government’s books, the need for a social media ban, and the situation with Nicola Willis and Ruth Richardson. 

LISTEN ABOVE 

Today Heather du Plessis-Allan was joined by Labour’s Ginny Andersen and National’s Mark Mitchell to recap the highs and lows of 2025 on the final Politics Wednesday for the year.&nbsp;
They also discussed the retail crime numbers, the state of the Government’s books, the need for a social media ban, and the situation with Nicola Willis and Ruth Richardson.&nbsp;
LISTEN ABOVE&nbsp;

Open your mind to the world with New Zealand’s number one breakfast radio show.

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The sharpest voice and mind in the business, Mike drives strong opinion, delivers the best talent, and always leaves you wanting more.

The Mike Hosking Breakfast always cuts through and delivers the best daily on Newstalk ZB.

Open your mind to the world with New Zealand’s number one breakfast radio show. Without question, as New Zealand’s number one talk host, Mike Hosking sets the day’s agenda. The sharpest voice and mind in the business, Mike drives strong opinion, delivers the best talent, and always leaves you wanting more. The Mike Hosking Breakfast always cuts through and delivers the best daily on Newstalk ZB.

Open your mind to the world with New Zealand’s number one breakfast radio show.Without question, as New Zealand’s number one talk host, Mike Hosking sets the day’s agenda.The sharpest voice and mind in the business, Mike drives strong opinion,...

The Mike Hosking Breakfast

Pollies: Mark Mitchell and Ginny Andersen on retail crime, highs and lows of 2025, Government's books

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/7784f840-c291-422a-924b-ad9000bbad71/clips/0fa059dd-1bd7-4c1d-bb08-b3b5014fd744/transcript

If you want a lesson in how to set up a business properly, then Moana Pasifika is not your guide. 

I wandered through the whole sorry saga in Kate MacNamara's excellent work, which took me back once again into how it all started and how most likely, even then, it was always going to end up the way it has. 

Sports Minister Mark Mitchell has said there is no public money for professional sport, and he is right. 

And yet before he ever arrived with his head screwed on properly, we were run by people who held a different view. 

Sport NZ is owed money. They will never get it back, given it's a loan and payments have already been missed. 

The team and its business case were doomed from the start. 

Ironically, I note the same company that did the business case, Deloittes, also got the job of trying to sell the joint last year. 

The figure of $5 million was bandied about. 

MFAT piled in financially, as in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. So that's political, not really sporting. 

Then you come to the various linked groups involved – Moana Pasifika Limited, Pasifika Medical Association, and Moana Pasifika Charitable Trust, as well as Pasifika Futures. 

The medical association claimed they had plenty of dough to run the thing. Why? Because of a contract Pasifika Futures had. Who was that contract with? Whanau Ora. 

So there's more public money. 

The bit of the contract that Pasifika Futures were clipping could pay for the rugby. They held the contract for over ten years. The last year alone was worth $44 million. 

The rugby team did the usual stuff for money like sponsorship and tickets but none of it covered the bills, far less paid back what was owed. 

And obviously no one is paying $5 million for a team that, to be frank, isn't that good and doesn’t attract a crowd. 

So what actually was it about? Fairies and unicorns. 

The young Pacific kid sees Ardie Savea running round the field and thinks "I can do that. So I'm going to eat well, run hard and be a star”. Or something like that. 

The fact they could look at any other team and see something similar doesn’t seem to have put the handbrake on a very bad business idea from day one. 

So we the taxpayer will lose yet more money from yet more folly. 

It's amazing how good ideas look when it isn't your money you're stumping up with. 

If you want a lesson in how to set up a business properly, then Moana Pasifika is not your guide.&nbsp;
I wandered through the whole sorry saga in Kate MacNamara's excellent work, which took me back once again into how it all started and how most likely, even then, it was always going to end up the way it has.&nbsp;
Sports Minister Mark Mitchell has said there is no public money for professional sport, and he is right.&nbsp;
And yet before he ever arrived with his head screwed on properly, we were run by people who held a different view.&nbsp;
Sport NZ is owed money. They will never get it back, given it's a loan and payments have already been missed.&nbsp;
The team and its business case were doomed from the start.&nbsp;
Ironically, I note the same company that did the business case, Deloittes, also got the job of trying to sell the joint last year.&nbsp;
The figure of $5 million was bandied about.&nbsp;
MFAT piled in financially, as in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. So that's political, not really sporting.&nbsp;
Then you come to the various linked groups involved – Moana Pasifika Limited, Pasifika Medical Association, and Moana Pasifika Charitable Trust, as well as Pasifika Futures.&nbsp;
The medical association claimed they had plenty of dough to run the thing. Why? Because of a contract Pasifika Futures had. Who was that contract with? Whanau Ora.&nbsp;
So there's more public money.&nbsp;
The bit of the contract that Pasifika Futures were clipping could pay for the rugby. They held the contract for over ten years. The last year alone was worth $44 million.&nbsp;
The rugby team did the usual stuff for money like sponsorship and tickets but none of it covered the bills, far less paid back what was owed.&nbsp;
And obviously no one is paying $5 million for a team that, to be frank, isn't that good and doesn’t attract a crowd.&nbsp;
So what actually was it about? Fairies and unicorns.&nbsp;
The young Pacific kid sees Ardie Savea running round the field and thinks "I can do that. So I'm going to eat well, run hard and be a star”. Or something like that.&nbsp;
The fact they could look at any other team and see something similar doesn’t seem to have put the handbrake on a very bad business idea from day one.&nbsp;
So we the taxpayer will lose yet more money from yet more folly.&nbsp;
It's amazing how good ideas look when it isn't your money you're stumping up with.&nbsp;

Mike's Minute: Moana Pasifika was a bust from the start

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/7784f840-c291-422a-924b-ad9000bbad71/clips/31618630-8740-494c-9b83-b4360179243b/transcript

At the end of each week, Mike Hosking takes you through the big-ticket items and lets you know what he makes of it all. 

 

The India FTA: 8/10 

Got there at last. Todd McClay is signing and Labour's on board. How hard did it ever have to be? 

 

Labour and the FTA: 3/10 

You knew they would blink. But it was either pathetic games or an inability to make a decision, both of which should give you pause for thought this election. 

 

NZ First and the FTA: 2/10 

"Butter chicken tsunami" is low rent. It's base level muck. We deserve better but that’s what you get, and you get it every three years, and some people never learn. 

 

Christopher Luxon: 8/10 

Thomas Coughlan called it well. It was a "baller move" and it paid off. 

 

The Christchurch stadium: 9/10 

A facility that will be used in anger this weekend and a representation of a city that knows what success looks like. 

 

LISTEN ABOVE FOR MIKE HOSKING'S FULL WEEK IN REVIEW 

At the end of each week, Mike Hosking takes you through the big-ticket items and lets you know what he makes of it all.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/nathan-guy-nz-special-agricultural-trade-envoy-and-meat-industry-association-chair-on-the-india-free-trade-agreement-getting-labours-support/">The India FTA: 8/10</a>&nbsp;
Got there at last. Todd McClay is signing and Labour's on board. How hard did it ever have to be?&nbsp;
&nbsp;
Labour and the FTA: 3/10&nbsp;
You knew they would blink. But it was either pathetic games or an inability to make a decision, both of which should give you pause for thought this election.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/pollies-nationals-mark-mitchell-and-labours-ginny-andersen-on-the-india-fta-shane-jones-butter-chicken-comment-national-leadership-saga/">NZ First and the FTA: 2/10</a>&nbsp;
"Butter chicken tsunami" is low rent. It's base level muck. We deserve better but that’s what you get, and you get it every three years, and some people never learn.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
Christopher Luxon: 8/10&nbsp;
Thomas Coughlan called it well. It was a "baller move" and it paid off.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/caroline-harvie-teare-venues-otautahi-ceo-on-the-one-nz-stadium-at-te-kaha-opening-this-weekend/">The Christchurch stadium: 9/10</a>&nbsp;
A facility that will be used in anger this weekend and a representation of a city that knows what success looks like.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
LISTEN ABOVE FOR MIKE HOSKING'S FULL WEEK IN REVIEW&nbsp;

Mark the Week: How hard did the India FTA have to be?

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/7784f840-c291-422a-924b-ad9000bbad71/clips/acededdd-8391-44b4-9e74-b435017caeee/transcript

Disappointment of the week for me has been the gargantuan mess Formula 1 has got itself into in the name of climate change. 

They want to be net zero by 2030. The question you can quite rightly ask as of this week, or as of the 2026 rules changes, is, at what cost? 

In looking to save the planet not everything has to be ruined. 

Christmas tinsel is up 40% because of the war and all the plastic bits that go through the Strait of Hormuz. 

I'd rather go without Christmas tinsel than ruin F1. 

Max Verstappen turns out to be 100% right: this isn't racing. And that is the most dagger in the heart-ish thing you can say to a motorsport fan. 

"This isn't racing." 

There's nothing wrong with moving with the times. When cars used to crash, they sometimes blew up and killed people. They decided that needed to change. 

The halo had some pushback with its introduction, but ultimately it was the right call. But if you read the changes made this week to the cars and their power modes, and please don’t because its farcical, you would need a degree and you see just how out of hand and "unracing" all this is. 

From qualifying, to racing, to starts, to tyre blankets, from kilojoules to megawatts, the changes are dizzying and depressing. 

Where once a guy like Verstappen would ring the bejeezus out of an engine and get a car to defy physics, these days it's all batteries and who-knows-what other jiggery-pokery. 

The drivers don’t like it. It's so complicated that some of the cars don’t even work. All in the name of net zero. 

F1 is one of the greatest sports stories of the modern age. It's spectacular, it's massive, it's successful, it's global and it's growing It is everything you could ever want a sport, or business, to be. 

Until it isn't. 

It’s a golden goose and a battery is wrecking it. The more battery, the more wreckage. 

The more questions, the more upset. 

The more unpredictability, the more risk to the brand. 

Speed, skill, risk, and an engine – that’s motorsport. 

Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth. 

Disappointment of the week for me has been the gargantuan mess Formula 1 has got itself into in the name of climate change.&nbsp;
They want to be net zero by 2030. The question you can quite rightly ask as of this week, or as of the 2026 rules changes, is, at what cost?&nbsp;
In looking to save the planet not everything has to be ruined.&nbsp;
Christmas tinsel is up 40% because of the war and all the plastic bits that go through the Strait of Hormuz.&nbsp;
I'd rather go without Christmas tinsel than ruin F1.&nbsp;
Max Verstappen turns out to be 100% right: this isn't racing. And that is the most dagger in the heart-ish thing you can say to a motorsport fan.&nbsp;
"This isn't racing."&nbsp;
There's nothing wrong with moving with the times. When cars used to crash, they sometimes blew up and killed people. They decided that needed to change.&nbsp;
The halo had some pushback with its introduction, but ultimately it was the right call. But if you read the changes made this week to the cars and their power modes, and please don’t because its farcical, you would need a degree and you see just how out of hand and "unracing" all this is.&nbsp;
From qualifying, to racing, to starts, to tyre blankets, from kilojoules to megawatts, the changes are dizzying and depressing.&nbsp;
Where once a guy like Verstappen would ring the bejeezus out of an engine and get a car to defy physics, these days it's all batteries and who-knows-what other jiggery-pokery.&nbsp;
The drivers don’t like it. It's so complicated that some of the cars don’t even work. All in the name of net zero.&nbsp;
F1 is one of the greatest sports stories of the modern age. It's spectacular, it's massive, it's successful, it's global and it's growing It is everything you could ever want a sport, or business, to be.&nbsp;
Until it isn't.&nbsp;
It’s a golden goose and a battery is wrecking it. The more battery, the more wreckage.&nbsp;
The more questions, the more upset.&nbsp;
The more unpredictability, the more risk to the brand.&nbsp;
Speed, skill, risk, and an engine – that’s motorsport.&nbsp;
Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth.&nbsp;

Mike's Minute: My disappointment of the week

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/7784f840-c291-422a-924b-ad9000bbad71/clips/35f75f0f-19d7-481e-82f5-b435017b206b/transcript

Pollies: Mark Mitchell and Ginny Andersen on retail crime, highs and lows of 2025, Government's books

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