Daily News Roundup – 31 March 2021

Housing crisis
Claire Robinson (The Guardian): Backlash to Labour’s housing policy has exposed signs of internal party disarray
Graham Adams (Democracy Project): Housing – Ardern’s divide-and-rule tactics
Thomas Coughlan (Stuff): National’s failure on housing risks making the party irrelevant
Henry Cooke (Stuff): Public housing waitlist hits new record of 22,803 as new builds slow in January
Zane Small (Newshub): Have rents ‘tended to mirror wage growth’ as Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern claims?
Richard Prebble (Herald): Labour’s housing package a loss of credibility moment (paywalled)
Tamsyn Parker (Herald): Government should underwrite bank lending to developers to speed up house building, property financier urges (paywalled)
Dan Satherley (Newshub): Housing crisis: Landlord tax changes are ‘bad policy’ – economist
Juha Saarinen (Herald): We have the tools to rein in runaway housing market (paywalled)
Keith Rankin: Solving the housing crisis: making homes
Pattrick Smellie (BusinessDesk): Strings attached to new $3.8b housing infrastructure fund (paywalled)
John Tamihere (Stuff): Unlike the squealers, I know I need to pay my way
Jamie Ensor (Newshub): Housing: National average asking house price up $100k over last year, 13 regions see record highs in February
Miriam Bell (Newshub): Housing consents dropped in February but the home building boom is powering on
Priscilla Dickinson (Newshub): Mortgage borrowers warned interest rate hikes likely in next couple of years
Tina Morrison (Stuff): High house prices are the biggest barrier to social mobility and need to come down, says tech leader
RNZ: Widespread implications to wood shortage – industry leader

Economy and work
Bernard Hickey (Stuff): NZ Inc’s ‘yeah nah’ Government
Dileepa Fonseka (Stuff): The Covid-19 reset: What now for business in the ‘nice, kind, hermit kingdom’?
Gareth Kiernan (Stuff): Economic forecasting’s spectacular Covid failure
Jarrod Kerr (Stuff): Here’s what our economy needs to reset
Tina Morrison (Stuff): Rob Campbell: Humans are in collision with nature
Grant Robertson (Stuff): Looking towards recovery after an ‘extraordinary’ year of Covid-19

Local Government
Felix Desmarais (Stuff): The black hole of transparency: Secret council workshops
Jean Bell (RNZ): Tauranga Council commissioners spell out reality of infrastructure underinvestment
Bernard Hickey: Council funding review eyed
Mike Mather (Stuff): Decision time nigh for Hamilton City Council on whether to introduce Maori wards
Jono Galuszka (Stuff): North Island mayors expect bulk of climate change mitigation work to fall on councils
Harry Lock (Stuff): Wellington councils warned over risks around spending big on water infrastructure
Georgina Campbell (Herald): Chain stores are not killing Wellington’s Cuba Street (paywalled)

Transport
Thomas Coughlan (Stuff): Light rail: the hard part is done, now get ready for the hard part
Brent Melville (BusinessDesk): Politics scuttled light rail in Auckland before, will it happen again? (paywalled)
Phil Pennington (RNZ): Auckland mechanic witnessed ‘threat’ over truck certification process
Matthew Hutching (RNZ): Onehunga low traffic trial sees quiet streets but some loud critics
Harry Lock (RNZ): NZ transport system contributing to distress – study

Prominent businessman trial
Alison Mau (Stuff): Destiny Church leaders fled lockdown for me, witness in businessman’s trial says
Sam Hurley (Herald): Inside story: The PR firm hired to do a rich-lister’s dirty work (paywalled)
Sam Hurley (Stuff): Kiwi entertainer Mika X sentenced to home detention for attempts to derail rich-lister’s trial
David Farrier: Jevan Goulter, a special kind of creature

Parliament
Sharon BrettKelly (RNZ): The Speaker row – should Trevor Mallard step down?
Henry Cooke (Stuff): National MPs agree on ‘compromise’ on water fluoridation which could see them support Government’s centralisation push

Health
Rachel Sadler (Newshub): NZ Medical Association says Government ‘failing’ to help Kiwis get primary care treatment
Hannah Martin (Stuff): ‘Unacceptable’ under-representation of Maori and Pacific GPs, ‘staggering’ gender pay gap
Danielle Clent (Stuff): Free consults at clinics as Auckland’s Middlemore Hospital experiences heavy demand

International relations
Mackenzie Smith (RNZ): MFAT approved military equipment export permits to UAE Land Forces
Thomas Manch (Stuff): ‘Yes, he did say that’: Diplomats scramble to contain fallout of Damien O’Connor’s Australia-China comments
Jamie Ensor (Newshub): New Zealand will continue to raise concern with China over Uighur human rights issues in Xinjiang – Jacinda Ardern

Covid
Stuff: Editorial – Vaccination targets? Fair enough, but there’s a difference between focus and tunnel vision
Derek Cheng (Herald): Covid-19 coronavirus: More planning, less ‘policy on the hop’: Review findings into Govt response to August cluster
Jamie Morton (Herald): Covid 19 coronavirus: Five ways NZ can beef up its border
Derek Cheng (Herald): Health ministers to receive first vaccine dose in next 2 weeks

Justice
Derek Cheng (Herald): Will overhaul of rape trials see more innocent Maori men in jail? (paywalled)
Teuila Fuatai (Herald): The irony in the Police Ten 7 racial stereotyping debate (paywalled)

Media
Jamie Ensor (Newshub): Media Freedom Coalition: New Zealand joins group of countries advocating for journalists
Melanie Carroll (Stuff): Stuff launches The Monitor, measuring the pulse of corporate New Zealand

Other
Guyon Espiner (RNZ): Euthanasia: What happens if the drugs don’t work?
Teuila Fuatai (Re News): Benefits are going up, but only marginally
Kerre McIvor (Newstalk ZB): Who’s going to pay for the country we want to live in?
Tova O’Brien (Newshub): Government’s refusal to go further into Pike River mine a broken promise to some families
Tom Hunt (Stuff): Former NZ premier Richard Seddon’s memorial removed after fears bronze statue may fall on Wellington home
Eloise Gibson and Olivia Wannan (Stuff): Government may pay twice for carbon credits