Full Show Podcast: 31 August 2026

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
You're listening to a podcast from Newstalk ZB. Follow this
and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio. The
big stories, the big issues, the big trends, and everything
in between. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons. Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Very good afternoon to you. Welcome into the show. Great
to have you company and thanks very much for giving
us a listen. Hope you had a great weekend, Matt Heath.

Speaker 3 (00:36):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (00:36):
Hey, hello.

Speaker 5 (00:37):
G'day.

Speaker 6 (00:37):
G'day, mate. You had a fantastic weekend.

Speaker 4 (00:40):
I did have a fantastic weekend. Yes, I did. Yeah,
how good.

Speaker 7 (00:42):
How good.

Speaker 5 (00:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:44):
I definitely really, really gave it a good go this weekend.
You lived life to the fullest. Yes, you should do.
Carpe diem situation all over the city. I'm proud of you, man.

Speaker 2 (00:54):
Hey, just before we get into the show, now I
didn't quite carpe diem this weekend, but just something that
happened this morning. You know, there's a lot of benefits
about being a dog owner, hell of a lot of benefits,
but one of the worst things that you ever have
to do as a dog owner is clean up dog vomit.

Speaker 4 (01:09):
Oh my God, yes, gross.

Speaker 2 (01:10):
So the situation, there's going to be a question attached
to this, but we could see Pepper, our lovely dog,
she was being a bit of a pain in the
ass last night, whining, and she just was.

Speaker 6 (01:19):
Out of sorts.

Speaker 2 (01:19):
So I knew something was a bit wrong, so left
the door open for her. She was going up to
eat grass, sort of coming back in and out and thought, right,
she's just got to do what she's got to do.
And she'll hopefully do that.

Speaker 5 (01:28):
In the garden.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
And when I woke up, everything looked pretty good around
the house. And I thought, you beauty, whatever happened, she
was full of beans again. And she's obviously done what
she needed to do outside. But lo and behold, when
I went into the spare bedroom and there's a whole
bunch of clothes that needed to be folded on top
of the bed. And as I was going through the clothes, I.

Speaker 6 (01:46):
Just saw Little gloops of dog vomit just like scattered.

Speaker 4 (01:50):
In between all of the clothes.

Speaker 2 (01:52):
It's like she tried to bury it because dogs are
really guilty when you catch them throwing up. And they're
not doing anything wrong, but they just generally feel guilty.
So she tried to bury it in all through these clothes.
So everything got washed again.

Speaker 4 (02:05):
Dogs definitely run a better out than in kind of
policy on that kind of thing, don't they?

Speaker 8 (02:08):
Exactly.

Speaker 2 (02:08):
You know, I take my credit off her for trying
to bury it, even though it was in the clothes.
But the question is, some of it got into not
the duvet cover, but on the actual duvet. Like she
dug under the duvet cover and it got onto the
duvet proper. Like, do I just have to throw that
out at this stage?

Speaker 6 (02:24):
Because that's such a pain.

Speaker 9 (02:26):
No.

Speaker 6 (02:26):
It's such a pain.

Speaker 4 (02:27):
In the butt to try and.
The duvet cover or the duvet? The actual duvet.

Speaker 2 (02:32):
So I've got to go down to a commercial operation
now because my washing machine's not big enough to put
that in there. Then you've got to dry it. And
how long does that take? I mean, if you hang
it out on the line here. you've got to leave
it out there for at least a week, and you
know it's going to rain at some stage.

Speaker 4 (02:47):
Yeah, I think you need to basically fill up your
rubbish bin entirely with that thing.

Speaker 6 (02:51):
Well, I was actually thinking, mate, now that you've got
the brazier operation, can I just come around to your
place and we'll set it alight?

Speaker 4 (02:56):
Yeah, yeah, burn it.

Speaker 11 (02:57):
You beauty!

Speaker 1 (02:58):
Perfect, all right.

Speaker 4 (02:58):
When you say brazier, you mean my drum that I'm
running like a homeless person in the backyard to deal
with my rubbish.

Speaker 6 (03:03):
Oh, so you didn't go for the grand brazier, you
went for the full drum.

Speaker 4 (03:07):
I went for the drum, yeah. Yeah, yeah, good times.

Speaker 5 (03:08):
Absolutely.

Speaker 6 (03:09):
All right, we'll sort that out. I'll bring it around
and we'll burn that up.

Speaker 5 (03:11):
Yeah, we'll burn that up.

Speaker 12 (03:11):
No worries.

Speaker 13 (03:12):
Good times.

Speaker 6 (03:12):
No problems. Someone says the laundromat easy, I'll consider that.

Speaker 4 (03:15):
No problem at all. Well, if you don't, yeah, laundromat
or just the 40-gallon drum. Let's go.

Speaker 6 (03:22):
All right, there's some good options there.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
Right, let's get into this. This is a big series
started by the Herald today. So we are getting close
to a staggering number when it comes to New Zealand's debt,
$ 1 trillion. So the Herald launched the series looking at
how we got there. They do this every 10 years.
So if you combine mortgages, consumer debt, business and agricultural borrowing,
plus what the government and councils own, the total is

(03:46):
now $ 937. 5 billion. Back in 2016, That figure was $ 492. 5 billion.
So in just 10 years, our debt has almost doubled,
rising by about 90%. Even once you account for inflation,
that's still up 34%. Government debt won't surprise many people.

(04:06):
That has been a major part of that increase. Core
crown debt has gone from $ 95.

Speaker 4 (04:09):
8 billion.

Speaker 6 (04:11):
In 2016 to $ 250 billion.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
Today, that's more than double. And the biggest chunk overall
was mortgage debt, which now sits at around $ 399 billion.
But there is an interesting trend when it comes to
the mortgage borrowing. It's growing at a much slower rate
than it was. After averaging 4.8% growth a year between
2016 and 2022, the increase over the past year was

(04:36):
just 0.38%. So that is quite a reduction in those
people ramping up the old mortgage borrowing. But when it
comes to borrowing in general, I mean, the question we've
got for you is how freaked out should we be
about this growing debt that we have as a country?

Speaker 11 (04:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (04:53):
I mean, if you look at it quite simply, there's
5 million people and there's nearly a trillion dollars debt.
So that's about $ 200, 000 per person.

Speaker 8 (05:01):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (05:02):
If you look like that. And it is more complicated
than that. But it's... When you consider some of those
people are still in nappies that owe the $ 200, 000, it's
a bit terrifying. And arguably, they'll be the ones that
will be paying it.

Speaker 14 (05:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (05:12):
And that famous figure that we're getting that we're having
to find $ 28 million a day just to service the
debt we've already got. This is government debt. So just
every day, you have to find $ 28 million. So imagine
if the government was announcing a $ 28 million policy every day,
a new $ 28 million piece of expenditure.

Speaker 9 (05:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (05:31):
That would seem like, wow, we're spending a crazy amount
of money. Well, we are spending a crazy amount of
money paying off our debt, $ 1. 2 million an hour.

Speaker 6 (05:37):
Yeah, and on that, I mean, this election, there's already
been a lot of discussion.

Speaker 4 (05:41):
Paying interest on our debt, sorry.

Speaker 2 (05:42):
Yeah, there's already been a lot of discussion this election
over various tax, no taxes, and of course, borrowing as well.
Do we have room to borrow more? And you remember
Chris Hipkins said back in 2024 that he wasn't necessarily
against more borrowing. Here's what he had to say at
the time.

Speaker 15 (05:59):
If you're borrowing to invest in things like infrastructure that
you're paying off over the lifetime of the asset that
you're investing in, then that can be justified.

(06:20):

i.e. the
buildings and the facilities that they operate in, we are
going to have to borrow money to pay for those things.

Speaker 2 (06:33):
So that's what he said back in 2024, and there's
been no evidence that he's changed his thinking when it
comes to borrowing. So to summarise what he said there,
he said there is good borrowing when it comes to
crown debt if you put those things into tangible assets
that are going to pay off in the long term.

Speaker 4 (06:48):
Do you think that's what we're doing? How well are
we spending the money, not just that we taxed? the
tax take of the taxpayer, but what we borrow for.
How well are we spending it? Are we spending it
on productive assets? Because we have pretty low productivity in
terms of the OECD, haven't we? Yeah, and I think

(07:10):
that's a big question to ask. Why is that? Is
that because we're not spending our money well? I mean,
spending $ 100 million on investigating light rail that you never built,
I mean, admittedly, that's only four days of paying back interest.
But $ 100 million, you wouldn't say that that was a
great expenditure of money when you spend $ 100 million and

(07:33):
you get no asset at all.

Speaker 6 (07:35):
That's right.

Speaker 7 (07:36):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (07:36):
I mean, and when you look at that crown debt
increase of $ 95. 8 billion to $ 250 billion today, when you
look at those sort of numbers and whether that has
been invested in assets and infrastructure to make us– more
viable and future-proof going forward i mean i think you
can argue that's not the case because are we not
still having the same debates around bridges around water around

(07:59):
so many other roads infrastructure across the board that we
were having 10 years ago but what do you say
oh 800 80 10 80 should we be more worried
should we be freaking out about the level of debt
that we are facing in this country tell us your
thoughts 9292 is the text number as well it's 14
past one.

Speaker 11 (08:16):
The big stories. The big issues. The big trends.

Speaker 1 (08:19):
And everything in between. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons.
Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 6 (08:24):
17 past 1.

Speaker 2 (08:26):
So how freaked out should we be about our national
debt as it hits $ 937.

Speaker 4 (08:32):
5 billion?

Speaker 2 (08:33):
A new series on The Herald is looking at our
rising debt. So how worried, how freaked out should we
be about this?

Speaker 4 (08:39):
Someone's questioning the entire premise. That $ 1 trillion figure is bollocks.
Where did that come from in the first place? Well,
you said where it came from, didn't you?

Speaker 8 (08:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:47):
Well, let me tell you right now again, dear Texter.
So it combines the latest Reserve Bank figures for private
debt with Treasury numbers for Crown debt and local government
funding agency data on council debt, also inland revenue data
on student loans. So the Reserve Bank figures include housing
debt and student debt. Business debt and agricultural debt to
May 31. These are updated monthly by the central bank
as part of its brief.

Speaker 6 (09:07):
To monitor and maintain financial stability.

Speaker 2 (09:10):
The ground debt figure is taken from the Treasury's interim
financial statements, 11 months to May 31, and is the
figure for Crown borrowings. And the debt figure supplied by
local government funding agency is gross debt for the year
to June 30. It captures all core council activities, water care,
Auckland transport, et cetera. And the student loan debt is
from the IRD statistics to March 2025.

Speaker 8 (09:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (09:30):
So that sounds pretty comprehensive to me.

Speaker 4 (09:32):
Yeah. I think it's a bit cool to say it's bollocks.

Speaker 8 (09:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (09:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (09:36):
Yeah. Some people have spent a lot of time researching
it and come up with that number.

Speaker 10 (09:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (09:41):
Right.

Speaker 4 (09:42):
This text says, I soak, wash, and rinse duvets in
the bath. All right. That's on a different topic.

Speaker 10 (09:48):
Okay.

Speaker 5 (09:48):
All right.

Speaker 6 (09:49):
Instead of burning, I'll try that one.

Speaker 4 (09:50):
We'll go to Trevor. Are we freaking out enough about
our debt as it reaches towards $ 1 trillion?

Speaker 8 (09:56):
Yes.

Speaker 16 (09:58):
Well, it's hard to say for us mere mortals, isn't it?
I mean, it does seem a colossal amount of money and,
you know, probably needs somebody greater brain than mine anyway
to explain it. But what I actually want to say
about this government, look, any government and council actually, I
just get sick of when politicians come on and they
tell us that supermarkets are fleecing our money, banks are

(10:18):
fleecing our money, you know, petrol companies. I reckon the
biggest fleeces of our money are And there's a few
meanings about policing, you know, taking it dishonestly, taking too much,
is without.

Speaker 17 (10:29):
Doubt for government.

Speaker 16 (10:30):
I mean, we just had $ 40 million wasted on a
passport scheme, didn't we?

Speaker 18 (10:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 16 (10:36):
Or a immigration scheme.

Speaker 5 (10:38):
What is it?

Speaker 4 (10:38):
Biometrics scanning that we still don't have and still have
to get. So $ 40 million, government deceived, and no one
held accountable, really, and $ 40 million just gone.

Speaker 8 (10:50):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 16 (10:52):
And you're dead right. You know, I mean, it's very simple,
and I'm probably making it too simplistic, but why didn't
we just copy off a system that works well from overseas?
I mean, why do we have to spend $ 40 million
to save for work in New Zealand?

Speaker 17 (11:05):
What about the cycleway across the harbour? I mean, you know,
if we went through.

Speaker 16 (11:10):
And I can't think of everything, but if we think everything,
I mean, at the moment, I think there's $ 8 billion
of this government that haven't got back from that COVID payment.
They just gave it to people that weren't meant to
get it, and they still haven't got it back. And
if somebody sat down and worked out in the last
10 years the amount of wastage and fleecing of our

(11:33):
money from the government, they would probably be worse than,
as they say, petrol companies, supermarkets, and banks fleecing us.

Speaker 19 (11:41):
They're a disgrace.

Speaker 16 (11:43):
Look, I'll tell you something.

Speaker 17 (11:43):
There's an old saying I was told years ago.

Speaker 16 (11:45):
You give a politician a dollar... I'll turn it into
50 cents. You give a businessman a dollar and they'll
turn it into $ 2. And I just think the government
are just so shocking with money because it's easy come
for them.

Speaker 17 (11:58):
It's easy come, there's just an endless pot. Go and
borrow another billion.

Speaker 16 (12:01):
Let's go borrow another billion. And I just think that,
you know, it's disgusting really. They fleece our money wholesale.

Speaker 4 (12:08):
I think this kind of goes back to the point
of the discussion around this debt because it's such a
huge number of we kind of get used to it
and we get blind to it and we don't really
think about it. And it's kind of politically less damaging
to just borrow some money than it is to cut something.
Cause if you try and cut anything at all, then
it becomes the biggest news story. You're called heartless there. And, and, um,

(12:31):
You pay a political cost, but just borrowing some more,
people go, oh, just have it on the pile, I guess.
It becomes politically less damaging to borrow money than it
is to cut, is really what I'm saying.

Speaker 16 (12:42):
Yeah, look, can I just say one other thing? The
biggest scam coming up is the Labour Party and National.
are not putting excise tasks on petrol. Now, look, you know,
I'm not too sure about your turn. I mean, that's
to help people out.

Speaker 17 (12:56):
With the cost of petrol.

Speaker 16 (12:57):
I mean, do you guys really need to be helped
out with the cost of petrol? Do I need to
be helped out with the cost of petrol? Not really,
but they just say, let's help every single person down
in New Zealand, every billionaire, trillionaire, somebody who owns 10 houses.
We're going to help them out with the cost of
petrol by not putting exhaust pads on. And to me,
that's just, you know, there's no checking on who's getting

(13:19):
the money, and I just think it's disgraceful.

Speaker 2 (13:21):
Well, yeah, I mean, my reading of that, Trevor, and
I get what you're saying on a logical basis, but
my reading of that listening to the Prime Minister this
morning is... that's mainly due to what's happening overseas. And
as soon as that situation changes, they're within their rights
to go back to.

Speaker 4 (13:35):
Business as normal.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
They then start to increase it every year or whatever
it is. So they've still got that mechanism there, but
they haven't ruled it out entirely.

Speaker 16 (13:42):
Yeah, but Tyler, what I'm saying is, so they're doing
that to help the people with the costs. You know,
there's people in New Zealand that don't need that help.
I thought help was, you know, I thought help was
for somebody that needs help. Not just give help to millionaires, billionaires,
and me, maybe.

Speaker 4 (13:58):
Especially if you have to borrow the money to do it.
You know, if you're not targeted, and then you borrow
the money and just splash it around, overheat the economy,
and then we get into the situation that we're in now.
Thanks for your call, Treasurer. Trevor, Treasurer. I'm going to
call him Treasury. Trevor from the Treasury.

Speaker 5 (14:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (14:16):
Going back to that thing and spending money before you
spend money. So on the City Rail Link, it looks
like they probably spent about $ 159 million on planning before
they started the City Rail Link. But how badly do
they still get that wrong?

Speaker 1 (14:28):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (14:29):
Because it came in just so many billions of dollars
over budget.

Speaker 2 (14:35):
To use Trevor's word, I mean, is that a scam?
Because the whole idea of planning is you want to
make sure you're on budget, that you deliver on schedule
and there's going to be no surprises. You spend $ 150
million planning something, you damn well hope that money is
going to mean no blowouts in the future.

Speaker 6 (14:49):
And that's exactly what happened.

Speaker 4 (14:51):
How could you spend $ 159 million to find out to
be that wrong?

Speaker 3 (14:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (14:56):
I mean, you spend $ 150 billion, you expect to be right.

Speaker 1 (14:59):
Exactly.

Speaker 4 (15:00):
$ 150 billion to be completely wrong.

Speaker 3 (15:03):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (15:03):
That's a lot of, that's wasted money.

Speaker 6 (15:04):
It certainly is. What do you say though? Oh, 800, 80, 10, 80.
Should we be more worried about our debt than many
people seem to be? Tell us. 9292 is the text number.
It's 24 past one.

Speaker 11 (15:15):
Fearless.

Speaker 5 (15:16):
Focused.

Speaker 11 (15:17):
Informed. It's the Mike Hosking Breakfast.

Speaker 20 (15:19):
So the election tossed up a couple of party policies,
one of which was the Nats student loan deal. The
compulsory rate would drop from 12% to 10%. Nick Smith
is VC at University of Auckland. What's the role of
debt among students these days?

Speaker 13 (15:32):
It is a factor.

Speaker 9 (15:32):
Ultimately, the most important things for our graduates is having
exciting jobs and careers that they can do and having
them be able to do that in our country.

Speaker 4 (15:41):
Could I suggest to you that they're going to go anyway?
Or am I wrong on that, do you think?

Speaker 9 (15:46):
If we can't retain our young and our talented, then
we're going to end up 10 and 20 years down
the track in a real problem.

Speaker 20 (15:52):
Back tomorrow at 6am, the Mike Hosking Breakfast with Defender Trophy.

Speaker 4 (15:56):
Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 2 (15:59):
It is 27 past one, so the Herald has started
their series Nation of Debt, and they have found out
that our collective debt as a nation now sits at
$ 937. 5 billion. That is up around 90% from 10 years ago,
where the.

Speaker 6 (16:14):
Debt was $ 492 billion. So should we be freaking out
about that level of debt?

Speaker 4 (16:18):
Chris says, hi guys, why does everyone assume that larger
debt is bad? Increasing debt is the necessary evil to
accommodate growth. Without it, everything stalls, including economic growth. Just
make sure... There's no wayward spending like the last Labour
government did, Chris. Yeah, I think everyone agrees if you
increase debt to spend it on something productive such that

(16:38):
you grow the economy and grow the tax base, then
that's probably a good thing.

Speaker 11 (16:43):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (16:44):
But if you borrow money and then waste it, then
that's a terrible thing because you're paying off that money
for a very long time and getting... Nothing. So that's
a lose-lose.

Speaker 6 (16:53):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (16:53):
And that's where my worry comes on when any talk
of this borrowing comes through, is that there's been no
evidence in the past, recent past, of Labour particularly, but
also governments investing that money, that borrowing, into assets that
are going to take us forward. We're continuing to have
the same conversations around roading infrastructure that's falling apart.

Speaker 4 (17:13):
This text says they spent it all on welfare, so
we're just running up debt for welfare now. Well, so
if you look at what we spend money on, health
is $ 34 billion. Social welfare, excluding NZ super, is $ 27 billion.
NZ super is $ 26. 5 billion. This is the budget moment. Education,

(17:34):
$ 22 billion. Interest costs on debt, $ 10. 2 billion. In law
and order, $ 7. 6 billion.

Speaker 2 (17:41):
We are a very generous country when it comes to welfare,
but what do you say? 0800 80 1080 is that
number to call.

Speaker 6 (17:47):
Jan, your thoughts?

Speaker 13 (17:49):
Oh, you just took the steam out of me, Thunder.

Speaker 4 (17:53):
Oh, sorry about that. You might say it better.

Speaker 13 (17:57):
Well, has it gone up to $ 10 billion in interest
that we have to pay every year on the loan?

Speaker 4 (18:05):
Yeah, $ 28 million. What is it? It's $ 28 million a day, Jan.

Speaker 7 (18:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 13 (18:11):
And to the World Bank in Belgium, isn't it? Belgium
and France, the World Bank.

Speaker 4 (18:20):
Debt's across a number of different places, and the way
the government finances debt's quite a... It's a whole conversation itself.

Speaker 13 (18:29):
It's just like, to me, it's like when you win
the lotto, you go slightly crazy. You've got all this money,
and you think, yep, see, you know, we'll just go
on a massive spending spree and flash it around everywhere.
And then suddenly you realise, hello, it's all gone.

Speaker 3 (18:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 13 (18:51):
What did we spend it on?

Speaker 4 (18:53):
Well, it's kind of like also if you look at
your mortgage and you've been paying some mortgage off and
then you notice a gap and then that suddenly appears
to be money that you now have rather than money
that you've paid off and then so you take the
whole family on a massive holiday overseas and end up back.
It's not money that you've got.

Speaker 7 (19:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 13 (19:12):
Yeah, great news.

Speaker 8 (19:14):
Yes.

Speaker 13 (19:14):
You know, I... Put an example in with Winston Peters
and Shane Jones. They go to Ratna, right, once a year.
And Shane Jones said, oh, we'll just throw 24 million
their way. And Winston Peters, who didn't liaise with Shane Jones, said, oh,

(19:39):
we'll just throw 10 million to the Ratna people. And
whose money are they throwing around? It's not their money.
Who did they ask? Who's running the country? Does each
party just dip into the big empty well? and chuck

(19:59):
money around like there's no tomorrow?

Speaker 4 (20:02):
Well, that would be the question, wouldn't it? So if
you are currently paying $ 10. 2 billion on paying interest on
the debt you've already got, then you would Surely we
should freak out to the point where we really, really
think about it before we spend money or extra money, right?

Speaker 21 (20:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (20:24):
Obviously.

Speaker 4 (20:25):
Obviously, you have to decide how you're going to spend
that money a bit more carefully than if you were
just flush. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 6 (20:33):
What do you say, though? 0800 80 1080 is that
number to call, and 9292 is the text number. It
is 29 to 2 headlines with Raylene coming up.

Speaker 11 (20:43):
Newstalk ZB headlines.

Speaker 22 (20:45):
With Your Ride, New Zealand's number one taxi app, download
Your Ride today. Labour's promising to offer every graduate nurse
a job as soon as they pass their exams, if
the party's elected, estimating it'll put 350 more locally trained
nurses into the workforce a year. It's costed the policy
at $ 525 million. Our foreign minister says the Pacific Islands

(21:11):
forum in Palau shouldn't be another talk fest after nations
already failed to reach a shared position on China's ballistic
Pacific missile test in July. Leaders aren't attending from Kiribati, Fiji, Samoa,
Solomon Islands and Vanuatu and potentially others. Teams are gathering
for a major search around Arthur's Pass for a man

(21:33):
swept down Canterbury's Cass River last Thursday while hiking the
Cass Lagoon saddle track. A conservation group and a man
dressed as a bird have presented a 14,000-strong petition opposing
a fast-track application to mine sand at Whangarei's Bream Bay
over 35 years. Warriors player ratings are the NRL's most

(21:55):
hyped rookie impressed in his debut. You can see the
full column at nzherald.co.nz. Back to Matt Heath and Tyler Adams.
Thank you very much, Raylene.

Speaker 2 (22:05):
We're talking about the Herald's Nation of Debt series. Looking
at our total debt as a nation, it is creeping
closer to that $ 1 trillion mark.

Speaker 6 (22:13):
Now sits at $ 937 billion. That's up 90% from 10
years ago.

Speaker 2 (22:18):
So should we be a little bit more worried about
our overall debt?

Speaker 6 (22:22):
Tell us your thoughts. 0800 80 1080 is the number
to call.

Speaker 4 (22:24):
This text to Michael says you need to explain because
I don't think many understand this trillion is total, not
just government debt. Yeah, I think you're making that point
at the start, but it's probably been a while since
you said that. So so the the. New Zealand's combined
gross debt tally has risen from $ 492. 5 billion in 2016

(22:45):
to $ 937. 5 billion in 2026.

Speaker 7 (22:46):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (22:47):
But the amount that is government debt and the amount
that is private debt, because we have a huge amount
of debt on our housing stock and such. Yes, we do.

Speaker 2 (22:57):
So just to break down those figures, so the housing
debt is $ 399 billion. The core crown borrowing is $ 249 billion.
Business is $ 143 billion. Agriculture, $ 63 billion. Local government, $ 44 billion.
Student loans, around $ 16 billion. And consumer debt is around
about $ 14 billion.

Speaker 4 (23:15):
And you have to mention that residential housing stock is,
you know, it also has value. So the value of
the residential housing stock is about $ 1. 64 1.667 billion.

Speaker 8 (23:30):
Yes.

Speaker 11 (23:30):
A trillion, sorry.

Speaker 4 (23:31):
1.667 trillion. But that's kind of an interesting one, isn't it?
Because that's the value internally. So if everyone just sold that,
so we've got a lot of mortgage debt to own
property and that property collectively is earned, is worth $ 1. 6 trillion.

Speaker 10 (23:47):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (23:49):
But you can't really just sell that to regain the asset,
if you see what I'm saying.

Speaker 6 (23:54):
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 4 (23:55):
But it's not like we haven't bought Like we've bought stuff.

Speaker 3 (23:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (23:58):
And then you've got private businesses, hundreds of billions of
dollars in land buildings, machinery, inventory, intellectual property, and financial
assets and stuff. That's in the private businesses. And this
is in terms of assets on the other side of
the ledger, right? Farms, obviously, buildings, livestock, machinery, all those
assets that are involved in farms. Then there's rental properties.

(24:20):
There's shares and business ownership. There's KiwiSaver, superannuation, deposits, managed funds,
and all that kind of stuff, right?

Speaker 11 (24:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (24:26):
So we do have assets on the other side of
the private ledger.

Speaker 6 (24:30):
That's right.

Speaker 4 (24:31):
And then you go into government assets, but that gets
pretty confusing, government assets, because you've got, I mean, a
lot of stuff, but what can you do with it?

Speaker 7 (24:39):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4 (24:40):
Like, I mean, you've got a lot of schools, hospitals,
government buildings, state highways, rail, electricity generation, all the military equipment,
everything like that. I mean, that's a lot of money's
worth of assets. And you've got financial assets and a
bunch of other assets. Hard to sell the schools.

Speaker 6 (25:01):
That's right.

Speaker 23 (25:02):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 6 (25:02):
It gets a little bit more complicated on the government
side of the box.

Speaker 4 (25:04):
If someone decided to sell the schools to pay down debt,
it might get a bit controversial.

Speaker 6 (25:08):
Yeah. What do you say, though? 0800 8010 80 is
the number to call. G'day, Natu.

Speaker 17 (25:13):
Hi there.

Speaker 6 (25:14):
Hi, nice to chat.

Speaker 24 (25:14):
Hey.

Speaker 25 (25:16):
This debt is quite a problem for, as I as
a Kiwik, And I feel collectively we need to do
something in order to bring that down. And I really
like to see a commitment from the government on both
sides of the fence line to have a moratorium, saying
we're going to reduce our debt by some amount every year.

(25:38):
That's a first start. Second is that it's irony that
history repeats. It doesn't repeat, but it rhymes. In 1974,
as a youngster, we had joined the superannuation scheme. In 1975,
when the government changed, they gave it all back to us.

(25:58):
And we were earlier to our superannuation scheme than Australia.
Australia started about a year later. Had we continued on
with that superannuation scheme, which had started, I believe some
of our problem could have been addressed now. And we
really need to think strategically like this generations ahead. so

(26:20):
we don't face these cute issues like we face today.

Speaker 4 (26:22):
Do you think.

Speaker 25 (26:24):
I do feel.

Speaker 6 (26:25):
Sorry, you carry on.

Speaker 8 (26:26):
Yep.

Speaker 25 (26:27):
I do feel that student debt... Yes, we do want
to educate our children, but I think it shouldn't be
the sole responsibility of the government. I do feel that
parents have a stake in that, the students themselves have
a stake in that, and I think government should change
its stance of financing 100% student loans they should look

(26:49):
at a cornerstone, like maybe 50% or something like that,
and the rest should be put in by the parents
and the kids themselves by working. Because that way, it's
a shared responsibility financially as well. And that way, that
could alleviate some of the student debt issues. And look

(27:10):
at the cars. Why do we need hundreds of different
models of cars in this country? We can contain our
costs there, we can't always contain our export earnings because
we're dictated by our currency movement and all that. So
I think it's a reasonable proposition to see where we
can cut our costs without compromising our living standard. And

(27:33):
that's a very important equation to consider. We don't want
to go backwards. And I mean, I'm in business for
45 years. If I ring a bank, my bank is
a BNZ, they take 23 minutes to answer my call.
How do I increase productivity?

Speaker 6 (27:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 23 (27:52):
Three times.

Speaker 25 (27:53):
Three times I rang my bank. First time it took
nine minutes. Second time it took 13 minutes. And third
time it took 23 minutes. You talk about productivity in
a business, as a small business operator, where do I
stand in that equation?

Speaker 6 (28:07):
Fair point, Natu. I mean, I suppose maybe get a
different bank if they're not answering your queries when you're
a customer with them. But some interesting points there.

Speaker 4 (28:15):
So just the same car. Go for the people's car,
the Lada. The Lada? The ultimate people's car.

Speaker 6 (28:21):
I haven't seen a Lada for some time.

Speaker 4 (28:23):
Closely modelled on the Fiat 125.

Speaker 6 (28:25):
I had a mate with a Lada. He kept leaving
it unlocked, hoping someone would take it.

Speaker 8 (28:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (28:29):
But, I mean, the thing is if you have everyone
on the same car, we don't need such flash cars,
then you're losing productivity in terms of dealerships making money
and employing people.

Speaker 6 (28:38):
Yeah, there is that side of it. What do you say?

Speaker 5 (28:41):
Oh, 180, 1080.

Speaker 2 (28:41):
Do you agree with some of the points Natu was
making there?

Speaker 6 (28:46):
9292 is the text number as well. Tell us your thoughts.
It is 18 to 2.

Speaker 1 (28:51):
Matt Heath, Tyler Adams, with you as your afternoon rolls on.
Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons, Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 2 (28:59):
Quarter to two, so we are closing in on $ 1
trillion of debt nationally. That includes housing debt of about
$ 399 billion, core crown borrowings $ 249 billion, business at $ 140 billion,
agriculture at $ 60 billion, local government at $ 30 billion, student
loans at $ 16 billion. consumer at 14. So should we
be worried about that rising debt? Do you care about

(29:20):
your own debt or the government's debt? Oh, 880, 1080
is the number.

Speaker 4 (29:23):
This text says VW is the people's car.

Speaker 11 (29:26):
Is it?

Speaker 4 (29:27):
And not the Lada. Well, that's confusing. I mean, the
literal translation of Volkswagen is people's car in German. And
that was named, it was championed by Adolf Hitler.

Speaker 5 (29:36):
Wasn't it? It was.

Speaker 4 (29:37):
And Nazi German labour front in the 1930s. Volk being people.
Wagon being car, cart kind of situation. But the Lada
was also the people's, like the palace for the people
being the subways that they built in Moscow.

Speaker 22 (29:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (29:56):
And the Lada was seen as the people's car. It
was called, referred to as the people's car.

Speaker 6 (30:00):
The affordable people's car.

Speaker 4 (30:01):
Yeah, the ultimate people's car. It was the only option, really.

Speaker 6 (30:04):
The ultimate Soviet vehicle.

Speaker 4 (30:06):
We used to have to wait quite a long time
to get your larder as well back there. So someone's
saying here, look, guys, car dealerships tend not to make
New Zealand wealthier, and that's probably true because you're importing
cars from overseas. You do employ a bunch of people there,
and that is the economy. I just think that there's
got to be some area between us all driving the

(30:26):
same car.

Speaker 18 (30:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (30:28):
And also keeping our debt under control.

Speaker 6 (30:30):
That's right. There's got to be a middle ground there somewhere.

Speaker 4 (30:33):
I think people used to laugh at New Zealand when
they came to this country back in the 80s about
how old our fleet was and how similar all of
the cars were. I think you want to live in
a society where people can get the car they want
to get. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 6 (30:47):
What do you say, though? 9292 is the text number.

Speaker 8 (30:50):
G'day, Danny.

Speaker 11 (30:51):
Yeah, g'day. How you doing? Good.

Speaker 6 (30:53):
What's your thoughts?

Speaker 26 (30:54):
Oh, back into the car of choice, I remember Mum
and Dad had a Lada on the farm. It was pretty, yeah,
one of those cool cars to drive. There was some
weird deal that we did with Russia around butter and
cars or something.

Speaker 4 (31:05):
Wasn't there? There was something going on.

Speaker 27 (31:07):
And they got butter or something.

Speaker 4 (31:08):
There was something going on, and I had a Fiat
125 at one point, and it looked exactly like a Lada,
but it was quite sporty. And people would say, you've
got a Lada, and I'd say, it's a Fiat. And
that Lada was just based on the Fiat.

Speaker 27 (31:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (31:21):
Yeah, anyway.

Speaker 2 (31:22):
Yeah, being on though, Danny, I'll just take a quick look.
So it was during the 1980s. It was part of
a unique butter and mutton barter trade deal between the
New Zealand Dairy Board and the Soviet Union.

Speaker 26 (31:32):
Yeah, something weird.

Speaker 7 (31:33):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 26 (31:33):
It seemed to work well for the Soviets, though, didn't it?

Speaker 8 (31:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (31:36):
A couple of larders for some mutton and butter. Seems
like a pretty good deal at the time.

Speaker 7 (31:40):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 17 (31:41):
Anyway, they're all dead.

Speaker 26 (31:42):
I'm in with that, too. I've got some, obviously, debt
on the home and things. And, yeah, but I'm more
worried about the government debt. Getting rid of it with
the government we've got and the next one, and maybe
the next one after that, I think it's a wee
bit impossible. But, I mean, you could have, I texted
and said you could have a debt day where instead

(32:02):
of it being like Waitangi Day or anything like that,
everybody's wages for the day goes to the government just
to pay off the debt. So CEOs earning $ 5 million,
you divide that by 365 straight after tax day, that
gets added onto their tax. If you're a super annuitant,
same thing, 365 days and just one day of the year,

(32:23):
your money goes straight to the tax man and goes
straight on debt.

Speaker 6 (32:27):
Not a bad idea.

Speaker 4 (32:28):
I think we get results pretty fast. You wouldn't worry
that the government will just then, if they don't decide
themselves to be fiscally prudent, then whatever government of the
day is would just spend that money on something else already.

Speaker 26 (32:42):
You'd have to put it into law that that money did.
I don't know how good that is with the lawyers
that you've got, but you just literally put it into law,
make it that that money has to go on paying
off debt until the debt's gone. If we can get
an extra $ 10 billion a year to spend on the
things not in interest, we're going to go a lot further,

(33:03):
aren't we?

Speaker 4 (33:04):
Debt day. It sounds a bit dodgy, but it's out
of the box, eh? Well, if we decide that it
is an insane, I love the idea. It's a funny concept,
but if we are going to do something and we
decided that it was something we all needed to do,
and as all five million of us went, obviously some
of us can't speak yet because we're little babies, but

(33:24):
we went, we're going to do something about it. We're
going to sort this debt out.

Speaker 11 (33:27):
It's a problem.

Speaker 4 (33:28):
So we have debt day and all our wages for that.
But I'd be interested to see what the productivity would
be like on that. day, Danny? Do you reckon people
would really go hard?

Speaker 28 (33:35):
Yeah, it depends which day you pick.

Speaker 18 (33:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 23 (33:37):
It depends which day you pick, really, isn't it?

Speaker 17 (33:38):
I mean, if you pick a.

Speaker 4 (33:39):
Sunday, it's probably not going to be very good.

Speaker 6 (33:41):
Open it up, yeah.

Speaker 4 (33:42):
Maybe you pick it randomly so people don't know, because
I imagine on debt day there'd be people booking some
long lunches.

Speaker 2 (33:48):
Have a cheeky Friday where you just put it to
the neutral. Danny, interesting idea. Would you be behind a
big debt day to try and get on top of this?
Tell us your thoughts on that one. 0800 80 1080. Right,
keep those tips coming through as well.

Speaker 18 (34:00):
9292.

Speaker 6 (34:01):
It is 10 to 2.

Speaker 4 (34:02):
Back in the day before, you know, the falling of
the Berlin Wall, the Soviet Union, when you wanted to
get a ladder because you had to go on a line,
you know, you had to get in the line, you
had to wait, get on the list to get a ladder,
and it went to people in more politically high positions.
So if you wanted to get the car... then the
secondhand ones were worth much more than new ones. A,

(34:22):
because no changes were made in the design for 30 years.

Speaker 5 (34:25):
Right.

Speaker 4 (34:26):
And B, you could get it straight away if you
bought secondhand ones. The secondhand car market was higher than
the new car market.

Speaker 6 (34:32):
Interesting.

Speaker 4 (34:32):
Not Soviet Union, eh?

Speaker 3 (34:34):
Right.

Speaker 6 (34:34):
It is 10 minutes to 2. We'll be back with
more of your call shortly.

Speaker 4 (34:37):
And there are people that want to go back.

Speaker 11 (34:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (34:39):
People love the latter. People don't want to bring that
kind of system into New Zealand.

Speaker 11 (34:44):
Matt Heath, Tyler Adams, taking your calls on 0800 80 1080.

Speaker 1 (34:47):
It's Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons.

Speaker 11 (34:51):
Newstalk ZV.

Speaker 2 (34:54):
701, so we're talking about our overall debt. The Herald's
crunched the numbers. It's nearing $ 1 trillion. Are you worried
about that, freaking out about it?

Speaker 6 (35:01):
Or is that okay?

Speaker 28 (35:02):
Tell us.

Speaker 6 (35:02):
9292 is the text. Or 0800 80 1080 is the
number to call.

Speaker 4 (35:06):
Karen, your thoughts.

Speaker 3 (35:08):
Yeah. No, I'm just wondering about what modern monetary theory is,
because I'm reading about it and it's suggesting that if
you don't face the same strict financial budget constraints when
you're directly funded like that by... It's a new theory
of money, monetary. And Bulger was an advocate for it.
He said because most of the debt were created... No,

(35:28):
it's by the Reserve Bank, and he said you could–
I don't understand how it works, but I'm wondering if
there's somebody out there who can understand modern monetary theory.
It's to do with you producing your own currency because
you're a sovereign.

Speaker 18 (35:43):
Yeah, I mean, it is all very– I don't know
how that works at all.

Speaker 4 (35:47):
The issuing of bonds and all that kind of stuff,
it all gets pretty confusing, but you can end up
sort of lowering– The value of your currency such that
your whole– the wealth of the nation drops, right? Yeah,
which is not a good thing. So, I mean, there's
some level of debt is good. You know, you need

(36:07):
to have some money in the system so you can
do things and look towards the future. Too much debt
is a bad thing when you're spending all your time
paying off interest on it, right? That's right, yeah. So
there's some level. I mean, looking at this, it has
gotten a little bit better over the last couple of years.

Speaker 12 (36:21):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 4 (36:21):
And some of that is to do with the fact
that we're a bit broke to borrow as much to
buy houses. New Zealanders, we're kind of finally kicking the
property debt habit potentially, but that's just because we can't
borrow the money at the moment.

Speaker 11 (36:36):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 4 (36:36):
Because we're a bit broke.

Speaker 2 (36:37):
Yeah, there's a lot happened in the past five years.
But just on that good debt and bad debt, when
you look at the household, I mean, effectively, the good
debt is something that's going to potentially increase your net worth, right?
And bad debt is borrowing money for something that's going
to depreciate. So with that in mind, buying a new
car that you can't really afford and you've ticked it up.

Speaker 6 (36:54):
Probably bad debt.

Speaker 4 (36:55):
Holiday.

Speaker 6 (36:55):
Yeah, holiday. Probably bad debt. And then when you look
at the government side of things... I mean.

Speaker 4 (37:01):
But then it gets complicated because you might be investing
in your happiness with the holiday. That is, yeah.

Speaker 7 (37:06):
Hi, guys.

Speaker 4 (37:06):
Regular listener. Love your show. I think debt is a
partial statistic. It is the debt to GDP ratio that matters.
If it is less than one, it is fine, unlike USA,
which is more than one. If it should be made
to reduce debt, but we should always think of the ratio.
Countries are like organisations and borrowing money doesn't make it
fundamentally wrong. Cheers. Nitin, thank you for your text on
that one.

Speaker 2 (37:25):
Yes and this text says guys it scares me when
political parties say they will increase taxes the public service
can't spend appropriately now I don't want them to have
more money to use inefficiently and set on fire the
public sector is slow and bloated when I think of
the guy waking up at 3.30am to milk cows for
50 to 60,000 and how hard they work versus what's
acceptable in the private sector it is just not fair

(37:48):
that's what worries me when any political party talks about
borrowing more and taxing more.

Speaker 4 (37:53):
And this Texter, on the other topic we were running,
we used to have a Lada Neva on the farm.
It was pretty good. Yeah, I always thought Lada Nevas
looked cool. They're a cool body shape.

Speaker 15 (38:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (38:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (38:04):
Lada Neva.

Speaker 4 (38:05):
Great name for it. Oh, they're cool cars.

Speaker 8 (38:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (38:07):
I'm not sure about the engine. But they were definitely
more stylish than your standard Lada.

Speaker 2 (38:13):
Seemed to be a lot of Lada love out there.
As soon as you brought that up, the Tex machine
just blew up.

Speaker 4 (38:18):
All right.

Speaker 6 (38:19):
Good times on the Lada.

Speaker 22 (38:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (38:21):
Let's go back to one car for all. Try and
sort out the economy like that. Controversial, but it may
take off. Anything you were going to spend on your Mustang,
that goes on the debt.

Speaker 6 (38:32):
Right, great discussion. Thank you to everyone who gave us
a buzz and text through your thoughts on that. Coming
up after.

Speaker 2 (38:37):
2 o'clock, is it ever justified to take a sickie?
We'll tell you more about that very, very soon. 0800
80 1080 if you want to get in early. And
9292 is that text number. New sport and weather coming
up with Raylene Ramsey.

Speaker 1 (38:51):
Big stories, the big issues, the big trends, and everything
in between. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons.

Speaker 11 (38:59):
Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 2 (39:01):
Very good afternoon to you. Welcome back into the programme.
It is six past two. So for the next 50
minutes or so, we'll have a chat about sickies. This
is after a new survey has found Generation Z workers
are almost twice as likely to take an unnecessary sickie
as their older colleagues. So more than four in five
workers under 25 said they had taken time off in

(39:24):
the past year when they were well enough to work,
compared with 43% of those aged 55 to 64. Nearly
four in 10 young workers also admitted taking at least
five unnecessary sick days with tiredness.

Speaker 6 (39:28):
No surprises there.

Speaker 13 (39:29):
Dirty.

Speaker 2 (39:43):
Yeah, but the weird part about this research, it also
pointed out to what they say is a wider issue,
with young people struggling to find secure entry-level jobs, rising
housing costs, and keeping more of them living with their
parents and other concerns, wider concerns about the economy. Now,
the reason I say that's a weird part is that
if you are worried about those various things, finding an

(40:06):
entry-level job or a good job, you're worried about your rent.

Speaker 4 (40:09):
And then you throw a sickie.

Speaker 6 (40:10):
And then you throw a sickie. I mean, you could
be in line if your boss finds out of losing
the job that you got in the first place.

Speaker 4 (40:16):
It's an interesting one. I guess with all statistics, are
they just more willing to admit? There does seem to
be a vibe of screw the bosses, screw the corporations.
screw everything, I'm in this job for myself. And that
might sort of be, you know, it's a bit of
a different era from when you started at the bottom
of a company and worked all the way at the

(40:38):
top and you were there for your whole life, right?

Speaker 1 (40:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (40:40):
People see themselves as working for five or six different
companies across their life, right? So maybe they don't have
the same loyalty to it. But I would never throw
a sickie.

Speaker 17 (40:49):
Never?

Speaker 4 (40:49):
I've never, like, pretended to be sick and not gone
to work.

Speaker 6 (40:52):
Not once in your life?

Speaker 4 (40:53):
Not once in my entire life.

Speaker 6 (40:57):
You've always turned up, even if you had a massive
night out. When you're at the record store and you
went all night and you didn't get a.

Speaker 4 (41:02):
Wink of sleep. I was once saying to one of
my bosses, I always turn up, and he goes, sometimes
we wish you wouldn't. Some of the states you've turned
up in. Exactly.

Speaker 6 (41:11):
That's why I think, I mean, the question, is a
sickie ever justified? And I think sometimes- Now, let's just
define what a sickie is. A sickie is when you're
pretending to be sick and taking a day off work, right?

Speaker 4 (41:20):
Yep, correct.

Speaker 5 (41:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (41:22):
So you're well enough technically to work and you decide
to pull a sickie because- You know, something has happened.
You've had a massive night. You're too tired, et cetera,
et cetera. So you ring the boss.

Speaker 6 (41:32):
Sorry, boss, I'm too sick to come in.

Speaker 4 (41:35):
I just would never do that. It's too shameful to
lie to someone's face. And the chances of, I mean,
when you're throwing a sickie, can you relax on a sickie?
Aren't you worried you're going to get rumbled?

Speaker 6 (41:46):
You can't leave the house.

Speaker 4 (41:47):
Whenever you tell lies, life gets so complicated because you
have to keep all those things juggling. You know, you
ring up and you say that you're taking a sickie
because you've got this. And then three months later, someone goes, oh,
what do you know about whatever it is, bronchitis? And
you go, I don't know anything about it.

Speaker 3 (42:07):
You go, really?

Speaker 4 (42:07):
Because you took a day off. You know, there's so
many elements of your life you have to keep. It
just gets so complicated remembering all the lies you've told, right?

Speaker 10 (42:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (42:15):
What do you say on this?

Speaker 2 (42:16):
I went 180, 1080. Do you think it's ever justified
to take a sickie? Do you have people within your
own workplace that you know from time to time have
taken a bit of a sickie, and how do you
look at those particular people?

Speaker 6 (42:27):
Look, I'll be honest. I've taken a sickie in my life.

Speaker 4 (42:30):
Have you?

Speaker 2 (42:30):
Yeah, when I was a young fella, had too much
of a big night, and decided to ring up and say, look,
I'm not feeling up to it.

Speaker 6 (42:38):
I've got a bit of a cold.

Speaker 2 (42:41):
And the boss said, okay. Fair enough, but I want
to see you back here tomorrow. So effectively he knew.
He knew that I'd gone a bit hard and maybe
at that point I needed to be truthful and say,
you know what, boss? I'm hungover as all hell. I'm
going to be useless. I'm going to be a liability
if I turn up. Can I please have a day?
And I won't do it again.

Speaker 4 (43:01):
I wonder, though, whether this is just a young person thing,
and as you get older, you become more conscientious, because
it used to be called Millennial Monday, when millennials would
take a mental health day on a Monday, but really
it's because they just went too hard on the weekend, right?

Speaker 29 (43:14):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (43:14):
But now it's you, millennials, as you hit 40, you're
now looking and saying it's the Gen Zs that are–
You know, slack. Because I can't imagine you taking a
sickie now. No.

Speaker 5 (43:25):
I mean, you, no.

Speaker 4 (43:25):
Throwing a sickie, you wouldn't.

Speaker 17 (43:27):
Exactly.

Speaker 6 (43:27):
Both of us, right?

Speaker 2 (43:28):
I don't think either of us have really taken a
sick day, a genuine sick day, since we've been here
because we care about this show. We don't want to
let each other down on the wider team. So there
is that thing in the back of your head that say,
even if we are genuinely sick, feeling a bit under
the weather we will try and make it in unless
it's going to be detrimental to somebody else.

Speaker 4 (43:46):
Yeah and i'm a generous person so if i've got
a lurgy i want to share it with everyone in
the office and thank you mate so i want to
bring it in toughens me up yeah what.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
Do you say oh 880 1080 is it ever justified
to pull a bit of a sickie have you got
someone in your place of work who are constantly pulled
sickies and how do you feel about those people tell
us oh 880 1080 is that number to call and
9292 is the text.

Speaker 1 (44:08):
Your home of afternoon talk. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons.
Call 0800 80 1080.

Speaker 11 (44:13):
Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 2 (44:18):
Fourteen past two. Is it ever justified to pull a sickie?
This on back of research that says Gen Z is
twice as likely to pull a sickie than their older colleagues.
So sickie, as most of us know, would be calling
up the boss and saying that you don't feel well
enough to come in, even though you are feeling entirely healthy.

Speaker 4 (44:35):
Jason says, my boss said if you're hungover, don't come in.
If you run out of sick days, don't come back.

Speaker 6 (44:40):
Oh, yeah, that's a good rule.

Speaker 4 (44:42):
A lot of people don't believe me when I say
I've never took a sick day. No, I've taken a
sick day, but I've never faked an illness to not work.

Speaker 8 (44:52):
Never.

Speaker 5 (44:52):
Okay.

Speaker 6 (44:52):
Well, what about this text, Matt Heath?

Speaker 5 (44:54):
Hmm.

Speaker 2 (44:55):
I knew this would catch up with you one day,
Matt Heath. You threw a sickie with me years ago.
I had booked you to DJ at a venue in Auckland,
which you had been doing for a few months. A
couple of days before you were due to appear as
our guest DJ, you rang me and said that you
weren't feeling well and couldn't make it. And I believed
you until I spoke to the radio station advertising rep
and she told me that it was the night of

(45:16):
the Hauraki Christmas party.

Speaker 6 (45:17):
So there you go. I guess it's your one and
only sickie. Or maybe we'll hear from some other people
out there.

Speaker 4 (45:23):
Well, no, but see, the thing is, because I mean,
I'd be more likely to throw a sickie from having
to go to the Radio Hauraki Christmas party than this
DJ gig if I was getting paid.

Speaker 6 (45:31):
Would have been good money.

Speaker 4 (45:32):
I've never been a huge fan of the Radio Hauraki
Christmas party.

Speaker 7 (45:35):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (45:36):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (45:36):
So you're almost rumbled? You're questioning it.

Speaker 4 (45:40):
I just have no memory of that.

Speaker 2 (45:43):
Stuart, if you can provide some sort of evidence for that,
by all means, text, phone call transcriptions, just send them through.

Speaker 6 (45:49):
We'll do some investigating on this.

Speaker 4 (45:50):
G'day, Peter.

Speaker 8 (45:52):
G'day.

Speaker 11 (45:53):
Hi, mate.

Speaker 2 (45:53):
So what's your view when it comes to sickies? Can
you spot the employees that take too.

Speaker 4 (45:59):
Many of them?

Speaker 28 (46:00):
Yep, there's about three of them.

Speaker 27 (46:03):
Okay.

Speaker 29 (46:03):
Three of my main wee young employees, Gen Z's, and
every payday they have the day off and then it's
a Friday and then they got the audacity to have
the Monday off too. That's a whole week.

Speaker 6 (46:18):
Oh, they did a double whammy on you, I mean.

Speaker 7 (46:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (46:21):
That can't be sustainable for too long, Peter.

Speaker 17 (46:25):
No.

Speaker 28 (46:26):
So it's been happening for about the last six months.

Speaker 9 (46:29):
Right.

Speaker 11 (46:29):
Since July.

Speaker 6 (46:31):
What sort of work do they do?

Speaker 28 (46:33):
Water blasting.

Speaker 27 (46:34):
Oh, okay.

Speaker 29 (46:36):
Right.

Speaker 28 (46:36):
Yeah, water blasting, you know, lawn mowing and rubbish removal,
all of that sort of work.

Speaker 6 (46:42):
So you reckon they get in their payday, then they
go in on a massive bender over the weekend and Friday,
and then a two crook to come in on Monday.

Speaker 29 (46:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 28 (46:49):
Yep, that's right. They don't want to work the Saturday
or the Monday or the Friday.

Speaker 4 (46:55):
Have you had to let a few go, Peter?

Speaker 2 (46:56):
Have you had to say to them, right, you get
one chance, you're one sickie, you do that again, you're
out of here?

Speaker 24 (47:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 28 (47:03):
Yeah, well, I've let them off a few times. It's
just getting to the point. Come on, guys. I can
see it in your eyes. I can see it on
your dry lips.

Speaker 6 (47:13):
Telltale sign.

Speaker 4 (47:16):
Your dry lips.

Speaker 16 (47:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 28 (47:21):
So we're going to have to let a couple of
the boys go, unfortunately. But, look, we're going to have
a meeting about this next week.

Speaker 6 (47:29):
Oh, so it hasn't happened yet?

Speaker 28 (47:30):
All fingers crossed for the boys.

Speaker 5 (47:32):
All right, Peter.

Speaker 2 (47:33):
Can I just say, Peter, boys will be boys sometimes,
you know. Treat them kindly, as kindly as you can.
I know you've got a business to run.

Speaker 4 (47:39):
But how does this equate with, as you say, Tyler,
that other side of things?

Speaker 5 (47:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (47:45):
Gen Z are more worried about losing their jobs and
finding it harder to get, apparently, are more concerned about
losing their jobs and the security of their jobs and
the entry-level jobs and stuff. How does that equate with
they're also stat saying that they're throwing sickies all over
the place?

Speaker 2 (47:57):
That's what I can't get my head around, and the
research doesn't delve into that. But have you got any
thoughts on that, 0800 80 1080?

Speaker 4 (48:02):
Employees, says this texter, are entitled to 10 days sick
leave per year and should take all the entitlements they can.
Show me a business that doesn't take every single entitlement
they are due. You won't find one as they all
take everything they can get. But as a sick day,
like 10 days sickness is an entitlement, it's a, what's

(48:23):
the word? It's a very generous offer.

Speaker 6 (48:26):
A safety net, a buffer.

Speaker 7 (48:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (48:28):
That if you generally get that sick.

Speaker 4 (48:29):
That you need that. It's a piece of compassion that
is offered to people just in case they are the
type of person that gets sick for two weeks a year.
Then it's not an entitlement. You're looking at it, I
would say you're looking at it around the wrong way.
It's a safety valve.

Speaker 6 (48:44):
I think it would be very suspicious.

Speaker 2 (48:45):
Any employee that rides those 10 days sick leave right
to the letter, I think many people would be looking
at them saying, I don't know.

Speaker 4 (48:51):
Well, here's someone from HR. I work in HR. 10
days sick leave per year is a lot for a
business to carry, especially as so many people use those
days as extra annual leave days. Maybe one on a
blue moon is a sickie is okay, but so many people,
and yes, the younger generations, will take all they are given.

Speaker 23 (49:11):
All right, Scott.

Speaker 4 (49:12):
I mean, it depends if you're going to work to
kick ass and move life forward. And there's different jobs, right?

Speaker 8 (49:18):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (49:19):
But some jobs, you know, you're chomping at the bit
to be there. Champing at the bit, sorry, to be there.
And some jobs, you're like, someone else. will have the
burgers out the window.

Speaker 6 (49:29):
Yeah, they're not going to miss me. They're not going
to miss me.

Speaker 4 (49:31):
What do you reckon?

Speaker 2 (49:32):
9292 is the text number. 0800 80 1080 is the
number to call. And just on that point, a 28-year-old
has just texted in his thoughts on that. So we'll
get to that very shortly. It is 20 past 2.
You're listening to Matt and Tyler.

Speaker 4 (49:45):
I need more details from the steward for this allegation.
I'm going to ring him in the air break. I
throw a DJing sickie.

Speaker 6 (49:50):
I'm going to find some evidence on this, mate. All right,
that's coming up.

Speaker 11 (49:53):
The big stories. The big issues.

Speaker 1 (49:56):
The big trends. And everything in between. Matt Heath and
Tyler Adams Afternoons.

Speaker 11 (50:01):
Newstalk ZB. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons.

Speaker 1 (50:08):
Call 0800 80 1080 on Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 6 (50:11):
22 past two.

Speaker 2 (50:12):
Now, just quickly, Stuart, who texts before saying, I knew
one day this would catch up with you, Matt Heath.
You threw a sickie many years ago. It was a
DJ operation. But you called him and said you were sick.
and then you took off to the Hauraki party, allegedly.

Speaker 8 (50:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 11 (50:26):
Allegedly.

Speaker 2 (50:27):
So he's come back with some more evidence, and we'll
read that out after the headlines, I think.

Speaker 11 (50:32):
Right.

Speaker 2 (50:32):
Because there's some more questions to ask here. Because you
said before you didn't even DJ. You've never DJed.

Speaker 4 (50:36):
Yeah, that's wrong. Actually, I did used to DJ at
the hangar, but I don't have DJ quite a bit.

Speaker 5 (50:39):
Okay, right.

Speaker 4 (50:40):
But, yeah, now I'm thinking about things.

Speaker 10 (50:42):
Okay.

Speaker 6 (50:43):
Well, we'll save that text. We'll save the extra evidence. But, Stuart,
keep those texts coming through, mate.

Speaker 4 (50:47):
Evidence is building up against me from Stuart here. But
I just, okay, anyway.

Speaker 10 (50:52):
All right.

Speaker 2 (50:53):
We'll see whether he's rumbled or not, but we'll get
to that text shortly. But taking your calls on sickies,
are they ever justified?

Speaker 4 (50:58):
Use all your sick leaves, says this texter. Your bosses
screw you. Screw them back as hard as you can.
I'm not sure if we might have to get HR
involved in that text as well. Phil, welcome.

Speaker 10 (51:09):
Yeah, g'day, guys. How you doing?

Speaker 23 (51:11):
Good, mate.

Speaker 4 (51:11):
What's your thoughts?

Speaker 10 (51:13):
A couple of things. One is just on that last comment. Yeah,
I mean, there's some comments that you guys are passing
about loyalty to the employer. Well, I think these days,
I think a lot of employees are not seeing the
loyalty coming back the other way. So what they might
have done in the past, turning up on a day
when perhaps they weren't that flash, they're no longer doing

(51:35):
to that. I just had an employer on this talking
about he's had three people there who regularly take off
the Friday and the Monday, and he knows who they
are and might have to let them go. Well, if
he knows who they are and they're taking off a
Friday and a Monday, why is he not asking them
to provide a medical certificate, which he's entitled to under
the Holidays Act? Okay, that's the first thing, because it's

(51:56):
more than three consecutive calendar days, so Saturday and Sunday count,
assuming that they're Monday to Friday workers.

Speaker 14 (52:02):
The other thing.

Speaker 10 (52:05):
Again, you two were talking about whether or not the
10 days per year is an entitlement. Well, yes, it
is an entitlement. It's one that's enshrined in the Holidays Act. However,
that's predicated on people actually being.

Speaker 4 (52:17):
Yeah, I mean, it's an entitlement if you're sick. It's
not an entitlement to use it no matter what, like
it's your holiday days.

Speaker 10 (52:25):
I'm not saying that at all.

Speaker 4 (52:27):
Just clarifying what we were saying, Phil.

Speaker 28 (52:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (52:32):
If you're unwell and you're not fit to turn up
for work, you should not be at work. The only
thing then is do you have leave that you're entitled
to to be paid for it?

Speaker 30 (52:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (52:42):
There's a lot of nonsense gets talked about. And unfortunately,
employers often grizzle about workers not doing the right things,
whereas they actually don't do the right things themselves. So
there's a balance in there.

Speaker 6 (52:54):
No, no, I think there is a balance.

Speaker 2 (52:55):
But on that loyalty one, I mean, that is something
that I struggle with a bit, Phil. I know for
some people out there, they might get dicked around by
their particular employer. But by and large, when you're offered
a job that gives you a salary to be able
to pay your rent and get food and all the
rest of it, you know, shouldn't the balance sort of
of thankfulness be on the employee anyway and to not

(53:17):
take the mick by using sickies and think, you know,
they're lucky I'm here. It should be the reverse that
I'm lucky that I've got a position.

Speaker 17 (53:25):
Well, it goes both ways.

Speaker 10 (53:28):
The employer has not offered them a job just out
of the goodness of their heart or the benevolence. They've
got them there because there's work for them to do
that they are deemed capable of doing, and they get
an appropriate employment package to suit. Yeah, both parties have
to play the game. There's no doubt about that. And
what does that mean in the context of this conversation?

(53:49):
If you're not unwell, you go to work. However, the
other thing is, and a lot of HR people will
tell you this too, if there is a high level
of sick leave being used in a business and anecdotally
it's not all being used genuinely, that's often indicative of
a relatively unhealthy culture in the workplace. People just don't

(54:10):
want to go to work. So, again, there's more than
one way to look at these things.

Speaker 4 (54:15):
Yeah, I mean, in the perfect situation, you've got an
employer who gets a lot of value out of their
employee and as a result feels grateful both ways. That's
the ideal thing, you know, if that can happen. But
you're absolutely right, Phil, that doesn't always happen. I mean,
the thing is that it doubled from five days to

(54:36):
10 days in 2021, the number of sick days, right?

Speaker 11 (54:39):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (54:41):
And that was around the whole COVID hysteria, right?

Speaker 8 (54:43):
Correct.

Speaker 23 (54:44):
Correct.

Speaker 4 (54:45):
So couldn't you argue that now that we're back to
normal and we're all past all that stuff, that it
should go back to five? The thing is you never
go back the other way, do you?

Speaker 6 (54:59):
That's right.

Speaker 4 (54:59):
Because coming up to election– National War doesn't want to
put up their hand and go, we're taking away five
sick days from your people. Political suicide.

Speaker 6 (55:08):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 (55:09):
Once it gets changed, then it's no going back. But
I think on a logical point of view, yeah, you're right.

Speaker 4 (55:14):
Because back in the day, it was Michael Woods, I believe,
was the minister. And he said COVID had highlighted the
importance of workers being able to stay at home when
they're sick. So is that the idea that because we
went so mental over, crazy over COVID, that now we're like,
You know, we're totally into you with the soldiering on
and piling into work if you're not well, which was

(55:36):
something that was admired for a very long time.

Speaker 11 (55:38):
Look at that.

Speaker 4 (55:38):
He just soldiers on. He just comes in even though
he's sick and he battles through and he gets it done.
Is that no longer something we respect?

Speaker 6 (55:45):
Interesting. I don't know. What do you say to that?
0800 80 10 80 9292 is the text number. The
pseudo is back as well.

Speaker 17 (55:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (55:52):
That's part of it. A bit of pseudo-effort around us,
soldier on.

Speaker 4 (55:55):
Soldier on, soldier on.

Speaker 6 (55:57):
Can be good stuff.

Speaker 4 (55:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (55:58):
Right, 28 past two headlines coming up, but taking your
thoughts on sickies. Are they ever justified in your view?
Tell us about it.

Speaker 4 (56:04):
Back in a moment.

Speaker 11 (56:06):
Newstalk ZB headlines.

Speaker 22 (56:08):
With Your Ride, New Zealand's number one taxi app, download
Your Ride today. Labour's promising to offer every graduate nurse
a job as soon as they pass their exams, if
it gets into power, putting about 350 more nurses into
the workforce each year. It's costed the policy at $ 525 million.

(56:30):
Police haven't laid any charges over two deaths in South
Auckland's Wattle Downs last week, being investigated as homicides. They
want to hear from anyone who saw anything or who
has CCTV footage. Hope's Genesis' new Leaston solar farm in
Canterbury is just the beginning, with a need to more

(56:50):
than double generation. By 2028, it could power almost 14,000 households.
State Highway 1 north of Dunedin's just reopened following this
morning's snow closure and but Highway 87 between Outram and
Middlemarch will stay closed overnight. Escorted convoys will run on
State Highway 6 between central Otago's Makorora and Lake Hawia,

(57:14):
closed by slip since Friday. Heavy rain is again forecast
from Wednesday. Not particularly a conspiracy theorist. Inside Wellington's water
charges revolt, See more at nzherald.co.nz. Now back to Matt
Heath and Tyler Adams.

Speaker 2 (57:31):
Thank you very much, Raylene. It is 28 to 3,
and we're talking about sickies. So new research shows that
Generation Z takes sickies twice as often as their older colleagues.
So is a sickie ever justified? 0800 80 1080 is
that number to call.

Speaker 5 (57:45):
Hi, guys.

Speaker 4 (57:45):
As an employee, if an employee uses all their sick
days that you know are not genuine, then that's all
they will get. I have other long-term employees that hardly
take a sick leave, but if they get really sick,
I'd pay them extra days, weeks, and months. Cheers, man. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah,
it's interesting, eh, because some people see their work, you know,
the employer-employee relationship as adversarial. But different workplaces, you're all

(58:12):
in it together. The boss is trying to work. things
out for you and you're trying to work things out
for the boss and it's just all beautiful and sunshine
and rainbows exactly uh we have a company of 50
staff half migrant workers uh visa people and 20 nz
citizens slash locals it's quite surprising to see the migrant
workers only take one to three sick days per year
and the other 20 staff uh goes in minus at

(58:35):
the end of the year with their sick leave all
right is.

Speaker 2 (58:37):
There something to that 9292 keep those texts coming through
chris your thoughts.

Speaker 21 (58:43):
My experience is, like, if you're in a small business,
don't call a fakie unless you personally find cover for
your shift. And if you do, find some cover, like
another one that can cover you so the boss at
least sees you're trying to cover and help him out. So,

(59:04):
you know, you've still got that good relationship. If you
work at a company... That doesn't necessarily need you on
that particular day. Don't do it on the Monday or
the Friday. Do two days in a row. midweek, and
that way it looks like it's not just a sitting
for one day. It's either still not feeling right. So

(59:26):
you get that little bit of a question mark gray
area wiggle room.

Speaker 18 (59:31):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 4 (59:33):
It's a strategy out there for the young players. It's
a sniff of legitimacy.

Speaker 11 (59:36):
Yeah, I'm looking up young guys.

Speaker 17 (59:38):
Don't do it Monday to Friday.

Speaker 4 (59:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (59:41):
I mean, the problem with the young fellas doing it,
and young girls, for that matter, doing it on a Friday,
is that if you were genuinely sick on a Friday,
instantly you're on the back foot, aren't you?

Speaker 6 (59:49):
Saying, honestly, boss, I'm really sick. I'm not just having
a bender.

Speaker 4 (59:54):
What about one of those ones where you get that
sort of, they call it the bridge. What is that?

Speaker 8 (59:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:00:00):
In France where there's a public holiday and then there's
a day or whatever. There's ways you can make it
that it's a whole week and then you just happen
to be sick in those two days that extend it out.
That gets controversial. Highly suspicious, yeah.

Speaker 21 (01:00:13):
We do have the same thing occur at our company
here in Australia where you know there's this particular guy
that he knows if it's a public holiday on a
Monday or a Friday, he will make it a four-day weekend.
And I talk to him because I do some scheduling
and I was like, just tell me that you want
a day off so I can wiggle room this. So

(01:00:34):
he was honest with me, so that's what we do,
just to alleviate the problem. But, yeah, I mean, not
too many people are honest about their own personal, you know,
needs and desires, but we've solved that problem. But it's
quite funny, you know, when people think to do the four-day,

(01:00:55):
they don't realise that the boss... really looks at you
and goes, really? How convenient.

Speaker 17 (01:01:03):
You've got to be smart about it.

Speaker 21 (01:01:05):
Like I said, do two days midweek. Turn up not
very well. Pretend you've got a cough and then you
have your two days off afterwards. Make it five days.

Speaker 4 (01:01:14):
But as soon as you do the dishonesty thing, Chris,
what happens is you can very easily get rumbled. And
then that's freaking humiliating and then you've lost all trust forever.
So if you're running the sickie Do you just have
to stay in your house the whole day? How much
are you really enjoying the Siki if the Siki has

(01:01:36):
to be on lockdown? It has to be no chance
of getting rumbled. Is that a great usage of a Siki?

Speaker 21 (01:01:45):
See, and that's the thing. Hopefully you're not friends on
social media with your other colleagues. and posting photos from
a pub having a Yahoo.

Speaker 11 (01:01:55):
You know?

Speaker 6 (01:01:56):
You'd be an idiot if you did that.

Speaker 17 (01:01:58):
I've seen it.

Speaker 4 (01:01:59):
And that must be difficult for Generation Z because they
can't do anything without taking a photo of it. Yeah.
The French expression is called Fais le pont. Fais le pont? Yeah,
which means making the bridge. So it's taking an extra
day off work to connect a public holiday to the
weekend for a long break. So yeah, fais le pont.
But over there it's respected. Everyone's like, why wouldn't you

(01:02:20):
fais le pont?

Speaker 6 (01:02:21):
Not surprised. The French love putting it into neutral. Keep
those texts coming through on 9292-0880-1080.

Speaker 2 (01:02:27):
Is it ever justified to take a sickie? What do
you do if you've got people in your workplace who
take multiple sickies? How do you feel about those guys?

Speaker 4 (01:02:34):
And are you suspicious of those people that are throwing
a sickie in, running a bit of a filet-pont?

Speaker 11 (01:02:40):
It happens.

Speaker 4 (01:02:41):
It must, but it also does happen that people are
sick on those days that just happen to be convenient days.
Not convenient if you're really sick because you're having a
miserable time. 23 to 3.

Speaker 11 (01:02:51):
Have a chat with the lads on 0800 80 1080.

Speaker 1 (01:02:54):
Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons.

Speaker 11 (01:02:57):
Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 6 (01:02:58):
It is 20 to 3.

Speaker 4 (01:03:00):
I've been regaling Tyler with my impersonations during the break.
I've been doing a series of impersonations.

Speaker 6 (01:03:06):
And I would say, I mean, it was a monologue
featuring two characters.

Speaker 3 (01:03:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:03:10):
One character absolutely nailed. The other character, maybe a.

Speaker 4 (01:03:13):
Little bit of work, but pretty good, mate.

Speaker 5 (01:03:15):
Pretty good.

Speaker 27 (01:03:15):
Thank you.

Speaker 4 (01:03:17):
Brenda, welcome to the show.

Speaker 3 (01:03:20):
Hi.

Speaker 7 (01:03:20):
Hi.

Speaker 31 (01:03:21):
I just thought I'd ring because I've got the other
end of the spectrum. I actually had the boss that
was taking the days off.

Speaker 5 (01:03:29):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:03:30):
Who polices the boss?

Speaker 31 (01:03:33):
Well, there was another manager, but he seemed to, because
this one could talk the talk, and when he was there,
he did perform.

Speaker 3 (01:03:42):
He kind of turned a blind eye to it, but
we all knew.

Speaker 4 (01:03:46):
And what kind of sick, were these sickies where he
was ringing in sick and not coming in, or was
it just going out long lunch?

Speaker 31 (01:03:53):
Oh, it was the whole game, but it was the
obvious Mondays.

Speaker 32 (01:03:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 31 (01:03:59):
There were every excuse under the sun. Every Uber he
got into had an accident, and he was hurt, or
his dog died. I don't know how many dogs he had.

Speaker 8 (01:04:09):
Yeah, right.

Speaker 31 (01:04:10):
And for all the family members, and it was just,
it was, and it was, Really difficult because, you know,
it leaves you in a position where, you know, you're
doing all the work. And oftentimes, you know, the other
thing he would do is he would come in for
a bit, but then he would disappear.

Speaker 5 (01:04:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 31 (01:04:30):
And so in the end, I mean, it went on
and on and on for years. And if they had
done a, you know, on a swipe card, if they'd
actually measured how many times he'd actually come into the office,
out of the whole year, I think sometimes you'd probably
be only getting about three months, you know?

Speaker 29 (01:04:52):
Wow.

Speaker 5 (01:04:52):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (01:04:53):
And so with this boss, though, so you say that
when he was at work, he was very productive.

Speaker 11 (01:04:58):
He was good.

Speaker 4 (01:04:59):
Yeah, right.

Speaker 31 (01:05:00):
He taught the talk. Yeah, and very good at charming everyone.

Speaker 4 (01:05:04):
I've had bosses before where everyone's quite stoked when they're
not there, you know, when they see them head off
for lunch and don't come back or they– Throw a
sticky and you're like, okay, we can actually get some
stuff down. We don't have the Michael Scott or the
David Brent hanging around causing problems.

Speaker 31 (01:05:19):
Well, true, but then it sort of sets an example
that then you sort of think, well, can I be
bothered either? So then, you know, I suppose there would
be more people scouting off because we knew that nobody
else was bothered.

Speaker 3 (01:05:32):
Doing anything about it, Tim.

Speaker 4 (01:05:33):
Or it's a big motivation to rise through the ranks
so you can get a position where you can thrive.

Speaker 6 (01:05:37):
You've got something going on.

Speaker 2 (01:05:38):
Thank you for your call, Brenda. I mean, you've got
to be suspicious. Anyone that uses pet bereavement, then you've
got to start counting. How many dogs and cats does
that person own? That's a massive red flag.

Speaker 4 (01:05:47):
Tom, welcome to the show.

Speaker 11 (01:05:48):
Hello.

Speaker 5 (01:05:51):
Hello, Tom.

Speaker 4 (01:05:51):
Are you there?

Speaker 17 (01:05:52):
Yeah, g'day.

Speaker 16 (01:05:53):
How are you?

Speaker 4 (01:05:54):
Very good, mate.

Speaker 17 (01:05:57):
Now, many years ago, I worked at a place that
my old man worked there too, you see?

Speaker 16 (01:06:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 17 (01:06:04):
And I used to take the fly sickies, which I'm
not greatly proud of. But the thing is, he never
sparked me. But the thing is, he used to have
me after work getting stuck into me for taking sickies, right?

Speaker 13 (01:06:18):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 17 (01:06:19):
But on the other hand, when he was gummed up
with the flu or colds and that, he'd go to...
Just to self-promote himself, he'd say, it takes more than
the flu or the cold to keep me away from
the work.

Speaker 4 (01:06:31):
Yeah, old school.

Speaker 17 (01:06:32):
I said to him one day, I said, if I
was in charge, I would sack you on the spot.

Speaker 5 (01:06:38):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (01:06:38):
And how'd that go down?

Speaker 17 (01:06:39):
Because I said to him, what you're doing, what happens
when three or four or five of the staff go
down with the same flu that you brought into work, right?

Speaker 3 (01:06:48):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 4 (01:06:49):
But by bringing in different flus into work, are you
just increasing the natural immunity of the office such that
they get more robust over time, Tom?

Speaker 17 (01:07:00):
Well, if you're a clinician, you could probably say a
bit more about that. But the thing is that I
reckon on both ends of the scale, what I was
doing was wrong, right?

Speaker 33 (01:07:11):
But what he was doing was quite wrong.

Speaker 17 (01:07:13):
But But he used it as a tool to self-promote, right?

Speaker 4 (01:07:16):
Yeah, I see what you're saying, yeah. He was saying
he was a superstar because he would come into work
no matter the state he was in. And I think
that did used to be admired. Definitely, yeah. But I
think we might have gone way too far the other
way because, you know, we do have to build up
our immunities to, you know, Because look how bad after COVID,

(01:07:41):
how bad everyone got hit with the flu the next
time around, because not only had we been avoiding each
other around COVID, we'd also been avoiding each other around
other diseases, so we weren't ready for the common cold again.

Speaker 23 (01:07:52):
That's right.

Speaker 4 (01:07:53):
And people were getting smashed up really badly by it.

Speaker 10 (01:07:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:07:55):
And you kind of need to have those diseases circling
around all the time so we were able to deal
with them.

Speaker 2 (01:08:00):
Well, there was a couple of winters not long ago
where everybody was getting taken out. It was after COVID,
to your point. And, you know, the show must go on.
You've got to keep things running in the particular business.

Speaker 4 (01:08:10):
We're in radio.

Speaker 6 (01:08:11):
Someone's got to be here to, you know, we can't
just switch the radio off and say, sorry, everybody's sick.
But the amount of pressure that put on everybody who
fronted up to say, might be a little bit under
the weather, but I'm going to isolate myself and get
on with the job because I'm still well enough to work.
I think that was more beneficial than the people that said, look,
I've got a bit of a sniffle, but I've got
to stay home for another week. So the amount of

(01:08:32):
pressure that puts on everybody else, and then that resentment
starts to build up and say, come on, are we
a team here?

Speaker 2 (01:08:37):
Are we got a good culture? Are you in it
for the team and for us, what we're doing here?
Or are you putting it into neutral and saying, you
know what, I can't be bothered. I'm just going to
stay home because I just care about myself.

Speaker 4 (01:08:50):
There was a high as in zero people that took
the piss, right, with the new heightened paranoia about illness.
So as soon as someone, you know, had sneezed because
the sun's come out, they were off for two weeks.

Speaker 6 (01:09:04):
There was a lot of that, right. Oh, 180, 1080
is the number to call. Was a sickie ever justified? Uh, Ian,
what's your thoughts on this?

Speaker 4 (01:09:12):
Ian, welcome to the show.

Speaker 22 (01:09:15):
Hello.

Speaker 4 (01:09:15):
Hello.

Speaker 23 (01:09:15):
Hi, I just, I've, we used to call it a
Mondayitis and still do. Um, I'm a, an older generation. Um,
Definitely at my work, you see the Mondays taken off
quite regularly. The other side of the coin is I
had a situation where I wanted to take a couple

(01:09:38):
of days off without pay, so I didn't use up
my leave. And the company said, no, you can't do that.
You actually have to, we will pay you a couple
of your.

Speaker 21 (01:09:52):
Sick days leave.

Speaker 18 (01:09:54):
Oh, right, right.

Speaker 4 (01:09:56):
What was that?

Speaker 23 (01:09:57):
Here I am, an older person who's used to working
and never had many sick days in my whole life,
wanting to save them some money by taking a couple
of days off without pay.

Speaker 5 (01:10:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 23 (01:10:09):
But they refused that and wanted to actually pay me
sick days for those two days.

Speaker 5 (01:10:14):
Right.

Speaker 23 (01:10:14):
So how does that.

Speaker 4 (01:10:18):
I don't understand that because, you know, like holiday days
stay on the books, but are sick days a liability
for an employer?

Speaker 23 (01:10:25):
Yes, it was at a stage where I was at
a period where my holiday pay was used up, but
I had an extra couple of days I wanted to
take off. So I was quite happy to take them
without pay.

Speaker 4 (01:10:35):
Well, I tell you what, you would have won the
honesty battle because you've come in and you said this
to them rather than throwing the sickies and they go, well.
We're giving him the sickies because he was very honest.
That's right, yeah.

Speaker 23 (01:10:45):
And that's the difference between the older worker and the
younger worker is that the younger worker doesn't care.

Speaker 28 (01:10:50):
They'll just ring in sick when they're not sick.

Speaker 4 (01:10:52):
And you talk about Monday-itis, and I was saying to
Tyler before it used to be called Millennial Monday, but
that's sort of changing now. And I think when you
say older, I think that it's not generations. I think
it's age. I think as people get older— they get
more conscientious. I think that's the way. So every generation
is saying that the young people, and it's been happening
since Roman times, you can find old writing where they're
saying how lazy and inconsiderate and rude the young generation is.

(01:11:17):
It's just that they're young, right? So I guarantee these
Gen Z that are now being accused in the study
of taking more sick days than older people, millennials and
Gen X and boomers. They will be, just you wait
till they hit 35.

Speaker 6 (01:11:32):
They'll be turning on the alpha.

Speaker 4 (01:11:33):
They'll be turning on the alpha and saying that they're
useless and take too many sickies and aren't dedicated.

Speaker 2 (01:11:38):
There's a lot of evidence for that. 0800 80 1080
is the number to call. Is it ever justified to
take a sickie?

Speaker 6 (01:11:44):
Tell us. It is 12 to 3.

Speaker 4 (01:11:45):
The issues that.

Speaker 1 (01:11:47):
Affect you and a bit of fun along the way.

Speaker 11 (01:11:52):
Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 2 (01:11:54):
Newstalk ZB, it is 9 to 3.

Speaker 6 (01:11:57):
So we've been talking about sickies.

Speaker 2 (01:11:58):
Are they ever justified after research shows Gen Z take
about double the sickies as.

Speaker 6 (01:12:03):
Their older colleagues? So 9292 is the text and 0800
80 1080 is the number.

Speaker 4 (01:12:07):
This text has said my boss was having an affair.
That's a different unrelated issue, isn't it?

Speaker 6 (01:12:11):
I don't know if that's quite a sickie. I mean,
if they were taking sickies to have the affair.

Speaker 4 (01:12:14):
Yeah, if you start noticing that two people at work
are taking sickies at the same time, then... And they're
always off at the same time.

Speaker 29 (01:12:21):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:12:22):
Suspicious. Well, I guess you just have to trust people.

Speaker 8 (01:12:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:12:26):
This text says taking a sickie is a lie and
liars never prosper. Well, I think liars do prosper, but
I think it's a better policy in life to not
tell lies, right?

Speaker 2 (01:12:36):
You're saying that the house of cards you've got to
build when you lie, that it gets shakier and shakier.

Speaker 3 (01:12:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:12:41):
And then the chances are you're going to get rumbled.

Speaker 4 (01:12:43):
And the amount that you lose... from being rumbled for lying,
if you catch someone outright lying to you, then that
person's kind of done in terms of trust, right?

Speaker 7 (01:12:55):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:12:56):
Yeah, huge thing.

Speaker 8 (01:12:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (01:12:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:12:58):
Jennifer, what's your view on this?

Speaker 32 (01:13:01):
Hi, thanks for taking my call. I had an interesting experience.
Workforce planning requires you to frequently submit a leave application
up to two months in advance of actually taking your leave. So,
for example, you want to leave in December, you know,
children are no longer at school on holiday, you have

(01:13:22):
to apply two months in advance. The thing is, frequently
you have something that comes up, especially with children at
school-going age, that requires leave to be submitted maybe only
a week in advance. And then it just simply declined.
And I had a discussion with the HR department, and

(01:13:46):
I said that it's considered leave entitlement. And I was
beginning to feel like it was more like.

Speaker 3 (01:13:53):
A leave lottery.

Speaker 32 (01:13:55):
And the off-the-cuff remark was, well, you know, you do
have your sick leave. So if you've got an emergency,
and it doesn't even have to be an emergency, if
you can't get leave, people take sick leave. So there
feels to me like there's a systemic issue.

Speaker 4 (01:14:12):
So they were condoning it. They were condoning it.

Speaker 3 (01:14:15):
But unofficially.

Speaker 32 (01:14:17):
And it was purely because of workforce planning and the
disconnect between workforce planning.

Speaker 4 (01:14:21):
Yeah, so they've made a system which doesn't really work
because of how long out people have to pick their holidays.
And so to solve that problem, they've seen just throw
a sickie. It seems structurally unsound to me.

Speaker 17 (01:14:35):
Completely.

Speaker 34 (01:14:36):
I mean, they talk about false logic. So I said, well,
why don't we check with workforce planning? It's just a
case of that, I don't know, there's no, call it
political will to want to change the system.

Speaker 32 (01:14:50):
That's how it's done. So that's how it's going to be.

Speaker 17 (01:14:54):
But it really does feel like a systemic issue.

Speaker 2 (01:14:57):
So do you think that leads to more people taking
the sickies, Jennifer, because it's illogical the way that it's
mapped out?

Speaker 4 (01:15:04):
Well, especially if they're even suggesting it.

Speaker 13 (01:15:07):
Of course.

Speaker 32 (01:15:08):
I mean, that is also compounded by the kind of
tall poppy syndrome. So a case of if you don't
take sick leave, well, you know, that's also problematic. I
just find the whole thing bizarre.

Speaker 4 (01:15:19):
You mean, oh, look at this la-di-da that never takes
any sick days, thinks they're better than the rest of us,
that kind of thing.

Speaker 16 (01:15:24):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 8 (01:15:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 12 (01:15:25):
Wow.

Speaker 32 (01:15:26):
It's very interesting. Very interesting dynamic.

Speaker 4 (01:15:29):
Well, that's a productivity issue.

Speaker 6 (01:15:31):
That is, absolutely. Thank you very much for that, Jennifer.

Speaker 4 (01:15:34):
So you're a soldier at war and you pull a sickie.
Bet that doesn't happen ever.

Speaker 11 (01:15:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:15:39):
I mean, if you're in the trenches, someone goes, actually,
I've got a bit of a sniffle.

Speaker 2 (01:15:44):
I think I'll... Just going to try and shoot into
these makeshift barracks that we've dug out and just have
a lie down.

Speaker 4 (01:15:50):
I wonder how many people were trying to throw a
sickie before they went over the top. LAUGHTER Right, we're
going over the top. The letters are coming out. Actually,
I think I might have.

Speaker 23 (01:15:59):
Sorry, sir.

Speaker 4 (01:16:00):
Yeah, I think it could be. I need a lie down.
I think it could be the vid.

Speaker 6 (01:16:04):
A couple more texts before we've got to wrap this
one up.

Speaker 12 (01:16:06):
G'day, guys.

Speaker 2 (01:16:06):
I was appointed in my role three months ago to
clean up the business due to being poorly managed. The
part owner starts at 9 a.m. and finishes at 3 p.m.

Speaker 4 (01:16:14):
On the regular.

Speaker 2 (01:16:15):
I did not report to him and referred back to
my boss. Not surprised the company was failing. And when
it comes to sickies, that was rife as well.

Speaker 4 (01:16:22):
I always stay in bed for a few minutes thinking
about being sick. Then I get up and go to work.

Speaker 17 (01:16:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:16:28):
So there's a lot of people that debate that, don't they?
They go, oh, God, I just feel terrible. I could
throw a sickie today. I can't quite face it. But
then you just go.

Speaker 6 (01:16:37):
Most of us do.

Speaker 5 (01:16:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:16:39):
And if you don't feel like it, just be honest.
Ring your boss and say... I'm not feeling it.

Speaker 4 (01:16:44):
Well, what's compounded things even more and made it more
complex is the idea of a mental health day.

Speaker 7 (01:16:48):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:16:49):
So you can't really argue with someone, if you allow
mental health days, they just go, I need a mental
health day. That's right.

Speaker 2 (01:16:54):
You can't question it. You've got to allow them to
do it. You can't say, what do you need it for?

Speaker 4 (01:16:58):
You don't even have to fake a cough or tell
them that it's coming out both ends or anything. You're
just like, I need a mental health day.

Speaker 10 (01:17:03):
Yep.

Speaker 6 (01:17:04):
Adds more complication into the mix.

Speaker 4 (01:17:05):
But does that make you seem less robust for promotion?

Speaker 6 (01:17:09):
I'd never ask for one.

Speaker 7 (01:17:10):
No.

Speaker 34 (01:17:10):
No.

Speaker 3 (01:17:10):
No.

Speaker 6 (01:17:12):
But if you do, good on you. Take it, enjoy it.
You've got to look after your mental health sometimes.

Speaker 4 (01:17:18):
Well, I might have a mental health hour now and
go home early.

Speaker 6 (01:17:22):
You deserve it, mate. You deserve it. Right, great discussion.
Thank you very much.

Speaker 2 (01:17:25):
Coming up very shortly, should men in a relationship always pay?
We'll tell you more about that very, very soon. 9292
is the text number if you want to get in early. News,
sport and weather with Raylene Ramsey.

Speaker 6 (01:17:38):
Coming up, you're listening to Matt Heath and Tyler Adams.

Speaker 1 (01:17:41):
The big stories, the big issues, the big trends and
everything in between. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons. Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 6 (01:17:51):
Very good afternoon to you. Welcome back into the show.

Speaker 2 (01:17:54):
It is six past three and great to have your
company this afternoon.

Speaker 4 (01:17:58):
Hope you enjoy it.

Speaker 2 (01:17:59):
Having a good day so far. This is going to
be an interesting conversation. Should men in a relationship always pay?
This was on the back of a conversation with political
commentator and talk show host Bill Maher and author and
academic Scott Galloway. It was on the wildly popular podcast
Club Random with Bill Maher.

Speaker 6 (01:18:18):
But have a listen.

Speaker 27 (01:18:19):
I think men should always pay for everything.

Speaker 24 (01:18:22):
I could not agree more and I always do. And
by the way, you're talking about signalling money. I swear
to God, I've never done this because I was signaling.
I only did this because I was a lucky person,
worked for a generous network. I have no expensive hobbies
or tastes, so I've accumulated enough money that I.

Speaker 5 (01:18:40):
Can tip really well. And when girls see you tip.

Speaker 24 (01:18:45):
with 50s and 100s to doormen and valets and waitresses.

Speaker 5 (01:18:50):
It's very impressive.

Speaker 14 (01:18:51):
A woman's fertility window is about 25 years.

Speaker 27 (01:18:55):
A man's is 55 years. Her time is more valuable. Also,
it's not paying for her.

Speaker 14 (01:19:01):
It's compensating because for her to walk in the door
cost her 300 bucks between Sephora and waxing.

Speaker 27 (01:19:07):
And the clothes she has to buy.

Speaker 14 (01:19:09):
In addition, the downside of sex, which most men are
hoping is part of the dating process, is much greater
for women than for men. Her time is more valuable.
It costs her more to show up. I've said to
my son, my 18-year-old son, who's just started dating, he's like, dad,
that's so boomer. I'm like, you pay for everything when
you're in the company of a woman. I don't care
what any woman says. Don't ever expect to kiss anyone
who you let pay.

Speaker 24 (01:19:30):
I could not agree more. And it should be that way.
I'll tell you why that is actually intellectually defensible and appropriate.
You should pay because there's much higher chance that that
the person in this relationship who's going to be a
rat is the man.

Speaker 5 (01:19:46):
The person in this relationship who's.

Speaker 24 (01:19:48):
Going to be a scumbag, it could be the woman,
but it's much more likely going to be the man.

Speaker 5 (01:19:54):
And that's why the men should pay.

Speaker 27 (01:19:56):
So you're apologizing up front?

Speaker 5 (01:19:58):
I'm not apologizing. I'm just stating a fact.

Speaker 24 (01:20:01):
Men do worse things to women than women do to
men in the aggregate.

Speaker 5 (01:20:04):
They just do.

Speaker 24 (01:20:06):
So I am not against the fact that men should pay.
And again, it just is, it's human nature. Don't make
a political mess.

Speaker 5 (01:20:15):
Out of everything. It just is, get on with the
next thing.

Speaker 14 (01:20:19):
Yeah, and if a woman asks a man out and
you want to pay, how about it? But I think
generally speaking, it just makes sense to show some chivalry,
demonstrate valor, and say, I appreciate your time.

Speaker 27 (01:20:30):
I want to pay for that.

Speaker 11 (01:20:31):
There you go.

Speaker 4 (01:20:32):
Great chat. What do you reckon?

Speaker 6 (01:20:34):
Controversial.

Speaker 4 (01:20:34):
Well, that podcast, it's a great podcast actually, Club Random.
There's a lot of drinking going on in it. They're
always on the whiskeys.

Speaker 8 (01:20:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:20:42):
And there's cigars. Mm-hmm. And there's a lot of pontificating
going on from smart people. Yeah. Bill Mayer, a lot
of political stuff. He loves a good time, though.

Speaker 6 (01:20:49):
Loves a stoogey.

Speaker 4 (01:20:50):
Yep. A big sort of, they're both a couple of
left-wing dudes, though, Democrats.

Speaker 1 (01:20:56):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:20:56):
So, you know, it's coming from that side of the
political spectrum.

Speaker 16 (01:21:01):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 4 (01:21:02):
But they say, both of them, that the man should
always pay for the woman.

Speaker 7 (01:21:07):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 4 (01:21:09):
What do you think about this, Tyler?

Speaker 2 (01:21:11):
We'll put it out to the audience, 0800 80 1080. Look,
I want to disagree with some of the things that
they're saying, but if I look at my actions when
trying to court.

Speaker 6 (01:21:22):
Maeve, I would never let her pay.

Speaker 4 (01:21:24):
Not once.

Speaker 2 (01:21:25):
When we were going through dating, and even to this day,
I still do not allow her to pay. If it's
just me and her going out for dinner, no way.
No way is, I mean, we've got combined money, but
she's using my card. And I've got to say, I mean,
what went through my head as a young fella, if
I don't pay for the dates and for Maeve's drinks,
then I'm never going to get anywhere with this relationship.

Speaker 6 (01:21:46):
That was generally just what I thought as a young fella.

Speaker 7 (01:21:48):
Oh, yeah?

Speaker 4 (01:21:48):
Okay, interesting. Well, I've got my thoughts coming too, and
I'd love to hear your thoughts out there, 0800 80
10 80. The bit at the end where they're talking
about men essentially having to pay reparations because some men
are bad to women. I mean, only the men that
are bad to women, really. Like, we're not all responsible
as a sex for everything everyone in our sex does.

Speaker 11 (01:22:11):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (01:22:12):
I mean, women wouldn't expect that, would they? They're not
responsible for everything that women do.

Speaker 2 (01:22:17):
Do we have to pay reparations for bad men? Tell
us your thoughts. 9292 is the text number.

Speaker 6 (01:22:22):
It's 11 past 3.

Speaker 4 (01:22:24):
I've watched so many angles of that flyover. It was
so great.

Speaker 5 (01:22:29):
Airlink.

Speaker 8 (01:22:29):
Hmm.

Speaker 4 (01:22:30):
I mean, there's angles. Everyone freaks out about it, but
there's good angles on it. They knew what they were doing,
and it was very, very cool. And we should celebrate
people doing cool and exciting things rather than crying about it.
They were a bit close.

Speaker 6 (01:22:42):
Yeah, that was sweet.

Speaker 4 (01:22:43):
It was awesome.

Speaker 2 (01:22:44):
Well, can you imagine that ever getting across the line
in New Zealand? I mean, that was the beauty of
South Africa, that they signed that off, and it was spectacular.

Speaker 6 (01:22:51):
Everybody loved it. Did they get a little bit close?

Speaker 1 (01:22:52):
Maybe.

Speaker 2 (01:22:53):
I mean, how cool would it have been if they
skidded off the top of that stadium?

Speaker 5 (01:22:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:22:58):
Well, it's 12 metres.

Speaker 8 (01:22:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:22:59):
I mean, it's huge.

Speaker 6 (01:23:00):
That's a couple of stories.

Speaker 18 (01:23:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:23:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:23:03):
More of that sort of stuff. I mean, it just
means if you're looking up at it, it looks quite crazy.
But if you're back from it, there's so many different
angles of it because everyone's got a phone out these days.
But there's ones that are further away from the stadium.
And it looks cool. And it would have been so
awesome to be. in the stadium for it.

Speaker 2 (01:23:18):
Yeah and everybody's talking about it right so yeah go
then uh right back to our discussion about should men
always pay this was on the back of a conversation
uh between well-known political commentator and talk show host bill
maher and author and academic scott galloway who said absolutely
the man should always pay no ifs no buts if
you want to have a relationship with a female what

(01:23:38):
do you say about that oh 880 1080 is the
number alex how are you.

Speaker 17 (01:23:42):
Hey, look, I'm good, guys.

Speaker 35 (01:23:44):
Thanks for the conversation. I'm a boomer. That's my disclaimer.
And I think, you know, I started off that way.
But in all honesty, if you're in a real relationship,
as you mentioned, it's both your money. And it's just
kind of courtesy, not so much even if you're paying
with both your money, just to undergo the process. They
can check out if they're ready to leave the date,

(01:24:06):
the restaurant or whatever, and you give them time. So, yeah,
I'm for it.

Speaker 27 (01:24:11):
Easy.

Speaker 4 (01:24:12):
Yeah, I think you're right. It does become interesting if
you're married, doesn't it? Because you're not paying for it.
The combined money of the relationship is paying for it.
But yeah, that's another side of it, Alex, is the
actual getting up and sorting out that part of it.
It's a polite thing to do.

Speaker 35 (01:24:29):
Yep, like opening a door and letting them go first
and treating them well. Because the guys probably have the
stats right that men are overrepresented in in doing bad
things to women. So, you know, while we don't have
to pay for the bad men, nice to show some respect.

Speaker 4 (01:24:49):
Well, what about, do you think, and I'll be interested
to know if there is anyone offended by that, whether
someone would be offended if you opened the car door
for them and opened the door for them. If there's
any females out there who will go, don't do that
for me. Because.

Speaker 35 (01:25:04):
Yeah, look, there'll always be people that will take the
other side. I think in the main... it's a nice gesture.
And if they're, you know, going to say, no, no,
don't open the door for me. Then you, you know,
where you stand up front.

Speaker 22 (01:25:19):
Hmm.

Speaker 2 (01:25:20):
What about if the reverse was a situation, Alex, where
there's a relationship and the, the female was bringing in
far more money than the fella. Do you think in
that situation has times changed? That'll be okay for, uh,
the female in question. She's a breadwinner to, to step
up and pay.

Speaker 35 (01:25:37):
Ooh, that, that is a tough call. Um, And it
depends on where you come from and how comfortable they
are talking about things. But in the main, they're going
to be together for reasons other than money. So I'm
sure they're going to be able to have a discussion
and say, oh, look, I'll get it this time. The
relationship's in an early stage. If it's serious, then it's

(01:26:01):
probably all combined and they don't look at it from
that perspective. He might be looking after the kids.

Speaker 8 (01:26:07):
She might be.

Speaker 35 (01:26:08):
you know, the breadwinner of the family. It's, you know,
as you go, analyze it, that kind of world.

Speaker 4 (01:26:16):
Thank you for your call, Alex. If I was in
a restaurant, right, and I was out with my mates,
and the woman, like his partner went up and paid,
what would I think?

Speaker 6 (01:26:26):
Yeah, what would you think?

Speaker 4 (01:26:27):
I might not even notice or care. But for you.

Speaker 6 (01:26:30):
Personally, if you're ever in that situation, that your partner.

Speaker 4 (01:26:34):
Is the breadwinner, Sometimes Tracy will attempt to bum rush
the cafe counter in pay.

Speaker 1 (01:26:40):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:26:41):
And I always try and just, I'll dive across the
room to try and get my pay wave underneath her
pay wave.

Speaker 6 (01:26:49):
You do feel strongly about it.

Speaker 2 (01:26:53):
What about that she was treating you for your birthday,
for example?

Speaker 6 (01:26:57):
That was the one night out a year.

Speaker 2 (01:27:00):
Matt, I've got something really nice for you planned.

Speaker 6 (01:27:02):
I don't want you to spend anything. This is coming
from me.

Speaker 4 (01:27:07):
Is that allowable?

Speaker 12 (01:27:08):
No.

Speaker 4 (01:27:08):
Jesus, mate. It's my birthday. I want to feel comfortable,
and I'll feel uncomfortable if someone else is paying.

Speaker 23 (01:27:14):
All right.

Speaker 6 (01:27:15):
Do you agree with Matt Heath? 0800 8010 80 is
that number.

Speaker 4 (01:27:18):
I've always paid for my wife everywhere we go and
have done since we were dating, but it was never
expected of me, and I think that's what I disagree
with here. I disagree with the idea that men are
inherently violent too, so they should be punished and have
to always carry the weight of the bill. Have we
not fought for fair and equal society over the last
10 years? Plus, Bill Maher is a tool. Of course,

(01:27:38):
he is a bit of a tool, but he's an
entertaining tool.

Speaker 6 (01:27:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:27:42):
Keep those texts coming through on 9292. Now, coming up
after the break, I'm just going to read the start
of this text message, and I'll finish it off once
we play some messages.

Speaker 4 (01:27:51):
G'day, guys.

Speaker 2 (01:27:51):
I'm a confident professional woman in a man's world. And
then goes on to state. what she actually feels when
men pay for everything.

Speaker 4 (01:27:58):
Okay.

Speaker 6 (01:27:59):
All right, so that's coming up next.

Speaker 4 (01:28:00):
Well, do you open Maeve's car door for her? I don't.

Speaker 2 (01:28:06):
So when we pull up to the supermarket, what I've
got to get out, go all the way around the car,
open up the door and say, there you go.

Speaker 8 (01:28:13):
My lady.

Speaker 4 (01:28:14):
Well, maybe, no, but getting into an Uber or a taxi.

Speaker 6 (01:28:16):
Yes, I will.

Speaker 8 (01:28:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:28:17):
And I will walk on the side of the road
closest to the car. That's the other thing that a
man's supposed to do is walk, yeah, in the dangerous
side of the road.

Speaker 8 (01:28:24):
Yep.

Speaker 6 (01:28:25):
Yeah, always do that. I mean, are you with us?
0800 80 1080 is that number. It's 20 past three.

Speaker 11 (01:28:34):

Speaker 1 (01:28:36):
Call 0800 80 1080 on Newstalk ZV.

Speaker 2 (01:28:40):
22 past three. Should a man always pay for everything
in a relationship?

Speaker 4 (01:28:44):
Hey chap, should we be following advice from Bill Mayer
who gave a completely heart and inconsiderate tribute to Dolly
Parton last week? He's an absolute head. Wow, really? I
didn't see his thing with Dolly Parton. But the thing
about Bill Maher, right, is sometimes he's right, sometimes he's wrong.
He's definitely a blowhard. But he's always interesting, and he's

(01:29:04):
not scared to ask anyone the questions. And I think
a lot of people on the left, who he's clearly
on the left, he's a paid-up Democrat, all that kind
of stuff. But he isn't afraid to ask questions of
his side as well, which … is considered basically in
a social media era where it's all binary, one for one,
you know, either whatever. There's no room for nuance.

Speaker 8 (01:29:28):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:29:28):
People get really angry about that.

Speaker 8 (01:29:29):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (01:29:30):
People either agree with you 100% on everything or you
hate them.

Speaker 6 (01:29:33):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (01:29:34):
He gets it from both sides, which is a brave
position to be in. Now, I mentioned before at the
start of this text, and here it is in its entirety.

Speaker 4 (01:29:41):
G'day, guys.

Speaker 6 (01:29:42):
I'm a confident professional woman.

Speaker 2 (01:29:43):
In a man's world, love my independence, but I can
tell you there is nothing sexier than a gentleman in chivalry.
Complete turn on. Yes, the man should always pay. Do
you agree with that?

Speaker 6 (01:29:54):
180, 1080. and keep those texts coming through on 9292
as well.

Speaker 2 (01:30:00):
This one says, G'day, guys. Yes, the man should always pay.
Me and my husband have been together 40 years, and
he's always paid. If it was ever a situation where
he asked for me to pay instead, I think I
may leave him.

Speaker 5 (01:30:14):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (01:30:15):
This text says, I would never pay for a woman
because I'm not sexist. Would never pay. I mean, if
you're at least 50-50. I mean, the position is either
All the time or 50-50, right?

Speaker 29 (01:30:28):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:30:29):
I'll never pay. I refuse to pay because it would
be sexist. It's a strange position to take. It's a
strange take on it, yeah. Josh, what's your thoughts?

Speaker 21 (01:30:42):
Yeah, hey, boys.

Speaker 18 (01:30:43):
Yeah, good yarns, good yarns. Hey, yeah, that's rule number one.
Don't take advice off a single man who has no children.

Speaker 5 (01:30:51):
That's rule number one.

Speaker 18 (01:30:54):
I mean, geez, what are we in for? But hey,
keep it traditional on the first date, I say, and
then sort of figure out the landscape there of what
you're sort of negotiating with, so to speak. What is
that person's expectations? Because people are all different. We shouldn't

(01:31:15):
generalize that every lady is going to have the same expectations,
so I would keep it real traditional on the first date.
It's usually the most expensive operation of them all. Yeah,
and then sort of lay it out. Like, see, I'm
a bit of a fool, eh? Like, I'm on a
date with this girl. We're at a fancy restaurant. It's

(01:31:37):
the first time we've met each other. Meanwhile, as the
night progresses, I start to inquire about, you know, thoughts
and feelings about the world and all this and try
and figure out who she is. And also ascertain what
are her values in regards to who pays for what

(01:31:58):
and what's, you know, an acceptable sort of date, et cetera.
Because those first dates are expensive, man. And you can't
really maintain, well, personally, I couldn't maintain that. So I'm like, hey, look,
I know this is cool and we had a good time,

(01:32:19):
but next time would you like to come, say, roller
skating with me, you know, or get coffee or do
something fun together that's not necessarily an expensive exercise?

Speaker 4 (01:32:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 18 (01:32:34):
If her attitude is, hell no, I'm not doing no...
sunset walk up a beach and eating fish and chips,
then I'm probably not going to be in for that.

Speaker 5 (01:32:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:32:47):
Well, exactly. And just because it's an expensive, flashy night out,
they're generally speaking not the most meaningful ones either, is it?
That sunset walk with the fish and chips is something
that you will remember. And it's thoughtful because you may
not be spending a lot of money, but you're being thoughtful.

Speaker 8 (01:33:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 18 (01:33:06):
I'm actually quite an efficient cook. So my excuse is
I can cook four times as much at home for
a quarter of the price. So I don't know. I've
brought women round to my studio flat here and just
blown them away. And they're like, wow, that was similar

(01:33:27):
to what I had at some place last week. And
I said, yeah, that's what you get. That's what you'll
be getting.

Speaker 4 (01:33:35):
That's part of the deal. I reckon, I reckon, you know,
on a date, I reckon on a date, if you,
if you, you know, think about it, you're thoughtful and
you've spent some time thinking about what you're going to
cook for them or that kind of stuff. Definitely. Then that's,
but that's, I think that's going to win you some points. But,

(01:33:55):
But whatever, at the end of it, you say, by
the way, we're going halves on the ingredients.

Speaker 6 (01:33:59):
Yeah, yeah. Can you help me with the mints?

Speaker 4 (01:34:00):
It was a bit expensive. And I spent actually three
hours on that. So let's go halves on my wages.

Speaker 6 (01:34:07):
What do you reckon about what Josh had to say?
Is it ever appropriate to go 50-50? If you're dating
at the moment, I mean, it's a fair point that
it is pretty expensive if you pay for every date,
regardless of whether it works out or not.

Speaker 4 (01:34:18):
Woman wanted equal rights, 50-50, and they got them. My
partner and I, she gets one meal, I get the next. Okay,
all right.

Speaker 6 (01:34:28):
Are you with that, Texter?

Speaker 2 (01:34:30):
Tell us, 0800 80 1080, or do you think the
man should always pay in a relationship?

Speaker 6 (01:34:35):
Tell us your thoughts. It is 28 past three. Headlines
coming up.

Speaker 11 (01:34:39):
Newstalk ZB Headlines.

Speaker 22 (01:34:41):
With your ride. New Zealand's number one taxi app. Download
your ride today. The government's officially called off next year's
scheduled hikes to fuel tax and road user charges equivalent
to 12 cents a litre. They'll instead phase in from
2028 at 5 cents a litre. Labour's promising to offer

(01:35:02):
all nurse graduates a job if it prevails in November's
election and isn't worried they'll be lost to higher pay overseas.
It would mean about 200 more hospital nurses each year
and 100 in primary care. The Child Poverty Action Group
slamming a new law that became law on Friday that
reduces support for older teens looking for work. It cuts

(01:35:26):
off the JobSeeker benefit to 18 to 19-year-olds whose parents
earn more than $ 67, 225. A ski has been flown to
Dunedin Hospital, reportedly after going off a cliff at Wanaka's
Treble Cone. Four-day therapy trialled in Auckland. Changes lives for

(01:35:46):
Kiwis battling with obsessive-compulsive disorder. You can find out more
at nzherald.co.nz. Now back to Matt Heath and Tyler Adams.

Speaker 2 (01:35:56):
Thank you very much, Raylene. It is 28 to 4.
So should men in a relationship always pay? This is
on the back of a conversation with very well-known political
commentator and talk show host Bill Maher and author and
academic Scott Galloway.

Speaker 6 (01:36:08):
Here's a little bit of that.

Speaker 27 (01:36:09):
I think men should always pay for everything.

Speaker 24 (01:36:11):
I could not agree more and I always do. And
by the way, you're talking about signalling. I swear to God,
I've never done this Because I was signaling. I only
did this because I was a lucky person, worked for
a generous network. I have no expensive hobbies or tastes,
so I've accumulated enough money that I.

Speaker 5 (01:36:30):
Can tip really well.

Speaker 24 (01:36:32):
And when girls see you tip with 50s and 100s
to doormen and valets and waitresses, it's very impressive.

Speaker 27 (01:36:41):
A woman's fertility window?

Speaker 4 (01:36:43):
I wonder, yeah, his point that he's making there that
a woman's fertility window is 25 years, whereas men's like
55 years or something. So their time is more valuable
in terms of their courtship time. And he also claims
that women spend more money getting ready for the date
than you do. So they're already in a hole financially.

Speaker 6 (01:36:58):
I think there's a lot of truth to that.

Speaker 2 (01:37:00):
When you look at the price of makeup, and I've
been out of the game for a wee while, but
I think that's pretty expensive. He mentions some personal grooming.
that the fairer sex do rather than the males.

Speaker 4 (01:37:10):
I think if you were in New Zealand and you
started tipping everyone 50s and 100s, I think your partner
would think you were some kind of drug dealer and
it might work against you.

Speaker 6 (01:37:17):
Yeah, all right for Bill Maher, multi-million dollar talk show host.

Speaker 4 (01:37:21):
Oh, he owns part of the Mets. He's worth hundreds
and hundreds of millions of dollars, so it's actually nothing
for him to throw around 50s. Yeah, but what do
you reckon?

Speaker 6 (01:37:28):
Oh, 880-1080 is the number to call in 9292 if
you want to send a text. G'day, Joanne. Hi, guys.

Speaker 16 (01:37:35):
Hi.

Speaker 7 (01:37:35):
I'm just sitting here. thinking this is a hilarious conversation
in the 21st century that you're expecting men to pay
for everything and I thought I'd just tell you about
my experience going out with my now husband of nearly
50 years back in the 1970s where it was all

(01:37:56):
cash and we would go to the movies or to
other places and he wouldn't have any cash so I
used to pay and it didn't occur to me to
leave him and I'm glad I didn't.

Speaker 4 (01:38:08):
So let's talk about the very first date. Who paid
on the very first date, Joanne?

Speaker 7 (01:38:13):
Oh, I'm sure he paid on the very first date.

Speaker 4 (01:38:15):
Nice. So how quickly did it become more even Stevens?

Speaker 7 (01:38:20):
It's a long time ago. I can't quite remember. And
it wasn't really even Stevens. But actually, no, and we
must have been well into the relationship because the reason
he then didn't have any cash was because he was
buying a section for us to build a house.

Speaker 11 (01:38:31):
Oh, right.

Speaker 5 (01:38:32):
Okay.

Speaker 7 (01:38:32):
So that was his, I'm buying a section. Have you
got any money?

Speaker 8 (01:38:36):
Yeah, right.

Speaker 4 (01:38:36):
I see. But do you think it be risky, even
in modern times, in 2026, it'd be risky for a
gentleman to not pay on the first date? Because maybe
you have someone that's very open-minded, but there's a good
chance that they might just go, oh, that's a bit
of a statement, isn't it, early on?

Speaker 7 (01:38:56):
Yeah, I would have thought on the first date. Although,
I mean, these days aren't girls allowed to ask boys out,
so therefore should she pay?

Speaker 4 (01:39:05):
Well, that's what people are saying. A lot of people
text me through it. So who asks the person out? Yeah.
Who suggests the date or the dinner or whatever should pay?

Speaker 2 (01:39:15):
And I'll be okay with that, I think, in that
circumstance because if they ask you and you're maybe, oh,
I don't know, I don't know if you're my type, but.

Speaker 6 (01:39:21):
Let's give it a go. If you pay for the dinner,
let's see if it works out. I mean, Matt Heath,
you'd be okay with that?

Speaker 1 (01:39:28):
No.

Speaker 6 (01:39:28):
You'd still pay?

Speaker 22 (01:39:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:39:30):
If you said yes, you would still pay?

Speaker 8 (01:39:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (01:39:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:39:32):
Okay.

Speaker 7 (01:39:33):
Oh, well.

Speaker 11 (01:39:34):
I would.

Speaker 7 (01:39:34):
It's interesting how things come right around full circle.

Speaker 6 (01:39:37):
Yeah, it is, yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:39:39):
Well, congratulations on 50 years with what sounds like a
great gentleman, sounds like you've got a great relationship, and
he was buying some land, and you paid for the movies,
and it all worked out great.

Speaker 5 (01:39:48):
It's brilliant.

Speaker 13 (01:39:49):
And it did work out well.

Speaker 5 (01:39:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:39:51):
Thanks, guys.

Speaker 4 (01:39:52):
Thanks, Joanne.

Speaker 6 (01:39:53):
Very interesting, 0800 80 1080, it's the number to call.
Tell you what, I mean.

Speaker 4 (01:39:57):
A man will always drink and eat more on a
night out, so it would be really unfair for the
woman to pay. I don't know, like, is that true? Because,
you know, it depends what you... I don't know if
that's strictly true.

Speaker 6 (01:40:10):
I've never thought about that for me.

Speaker 4 (01:40:11):
You both get entrees, you both get mains, you both
get a couple of drinks. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (01:40:18):
I've never decided right now I'm just going to drink
myself silly and order as much as I can on
a date. That would backfire on you, surely. 9292 is
the text. There's some great ones coming through. This one says, G'day, lads.

Speaker 4 (01:40:29):
I'm 33.

Speaker 2 (01:40:30):
I've been single for six years now. I've given up
chasing women. They lead you on very strong. Then once
you take them out and treat them to a nice meal, etc.,
they teach you a couple of days later and cut
you off, saying they need to work on themselves.

Speaker 6 (01:40:42):
They are not ready for a relationship, etc.

Speaker 2 (01:40:44):
Yes, life is lonely now, but what is a man
to do?

Speaker 6 (01:40:48):
And is that really true? Because that's where it backfires, right?

Speaker 2 (01:40:52):
That if you are going out on dates and you
want to pay for it, whether it's going to work
or not. And when I was in the dating game,
I was in that situation that I'd ask someone out
on a date. and it quickly, as the night wore on,
realised it wasn't compatible, usually from her side.

Speaker 6 (01:41:07):
She said, look, thank you for this. It's been lovely,
but there's not going to be a second date. I
would still pay for that meal, no strings attached, because
it was the right thing to do. I took the chance.
It didn't quite work out.

Speaker 4 (01:41:17):
If you're paying because you expect something, then you lose
all moral high ground.

Speaker 7 (01:41:21):
Aye, yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:41:22):
If there is a moral high ground to be had here.

Speaker 7 (01:41:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:41:25):
I mean, you're just paying because it's the thing that
you do. It's the right thing you do, right?

Speaker 5 (01:41:28):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:41:29):
On the other side of that, there might be the
bonus part that someone might think it's nice and it's
a good gesture, right?

Speaker 21 (01:41:37):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:41:38):
But you can't go, right, I've paid, so second date,
let's go. Where are we going now? I paid for dinner.

Speaker 3 (01:41:44):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:41:45):
That doesn't work exactly but sometimes it got awkward that
she you know it was a couple of times that
they said hey let me pay half because this isn't
going anywhere but i still said no but that's the
confusion right is that some of them might say well
that you just want something out of this and say
no i generally don't we'll just pay for the meal
because it's the right thing to do and we'll never
see each other.

Speaker 4 (01:42:02):
Again joe hey how are you good.

Speaker 2 (01:42:09):
What's your thoughts mate who who pays Well, at.

Speaker 33 (01:42:12):
The moment, you know, me and my wife have been
married 10 years and been together 23. Congratulations. So right
now it's the race to the counter to see who
pays because it all comes out of the same account.
It's just which car that gets charged to. But when
we were dating and stuff, it was, you know, four

(01:42:32):
of us. You know, she had two kids and I
came along on the scene and that was just split 50-50.
when we were dating, you know? Yeah, we would all
go out together and stuff. It was a package deal,
you know?

Speaker 4 (01:42:48):
Right, that's an interesting one. Like, if you go out
with the kids, do you pay for all of it?
I mean, it'd be a pretty powerful gesture to pay
for everyone.

Speaker 33 (01:42:56):
Oh, yeah, but we just split it 50-50, you know?
When we first started dating, I was living in Auckland,
she was living in Palmerston North, so, you know, I
would travel... leave work at 4 o'clock, maybe 2 o'clock
in the afternoon on a Friday night and drive all
the way down there and then drive all the way
back up on a Sunday night for work. So we

(01:43:18):
just split everything 50-50 when I was down.

Speaker 2 (01:43:24):
And clearly that worked out long term, Joe. I mean,
you never felt bad about paying 50-50. It was just
the deal that you made up front and.

Speaker 4 (01:43:31):
There was no awkwardness.

Speaker 8 (01:43:32):
Yeah, exactly. No awkwardness.

Speaker 33 (01:43:35):
The long distance thing, what would have started in September
and finished in April when she moved to Auckland.

Speaker 4 (01:43:41):
So, hey.

Speaker 21 (01:43:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:43:44):
Fair enough too, Joe, and glad it worked out for you.

Speaker 2 (01:43:46):
I mean, that seems to be pretty common for modern
dating that, you know, the 50-50 is not quite as
awkward as it used to be.

Speaker 4 (01:43:53):
Well, but the point is, and a point these guys
are trying to make is, sure, it might not be,
but you're risking it, seeming It's risking a bad look.
Because maybe they claim, these two guys claim, Professor Scott
Galloway and Bill Mark plain, that whatever people say, they

(01:44:19):
may say, you may be able to interview them, do
a survey, whatever, and a woman will say, yep, no, 50-50,
I don't want it. But that might not be true.

Speaker 6 (01:44:30):
It's a little test.

Speaker 4 (01:44:31):
Yeah, because you would say that, wouldn't you? Like if
you were asked, you'd think that was the right thing
to say. But part of you would be like, you know,
that was good. He went up and paid. It was
a really nice gesture. He is signaling to me that
he likes me. It's a way that he can suggest that,
you know, that, I don't know. It's, you know, sometimes men,

(01:44:54):
and especially on early dates, it's hard to come up
with the right words. But going up and paying and saying, hey,
I like you and I enjoyed my time with you
and I'll take care of this.

Speaker 6 (01:45:03):
A respectful thing.

Speaker 7 (01:45:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:45:04):
Is that still true out there? 0800 80 1080.

Speaker 2 (01:45:06):
Is that the subtext when you get into dating? Even
if you say, let's go 50-50. Is there a part
of you that's really thinking, I really hope he pays
for this because that would go a long way?

Speaker 4 (01:45:16):
The sexist is the reason why men work on the
outside is from chamber pots back in the day. But
that wouldn't make sense because the chamber pots would be
on the inside. So back in the day when chivalry
was being invented, people would just huff their crap out
the window when they were finished with it out of
the pot. So the man would walk closest to the houses.
But now you're supposed to walk closer to the road.

Speaker 20 (01:45:38):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:45:39):
And is that to protect from, I don't know, cars
flying off the road or splashing or whatever?

Speaker 2 (01:45:43):
That's what I was always told. I'd take a car
over a chamber pot. Would you take a chamber pot
for Tracy? I don't actually think I'd do that.

Speaker 4 (01:45:52):
Well, take a chamber pot.

Speaker 5 (01:45:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:45:54):
I'd rather get hit by a car than take a
chamber pot full of God knows what.

Speaker 4 (01:46:00):
She's probably put more effort into how she looks before
she goes out. I could probably still go to the restaurant.
Wearing most of a chamber pot. Bit of a hosing
and you'd be right.

Speaker 6 (01:46:09):
Keep those teats coming through. It is 18 to 4.

Speaker 1 (01:46:12):
A fresh take on Talkback. It's Matt Heath and Tyler Adams' afternoons.
Have your say on 0800 80 1080.

Speaker 2 (01:46:20):
Very good afternoon to you. It is a quarter to 4.
So should a man always pay for things in a relationship?
On the back of a podcast discussion between Scott Galloway,
well-known academic and author, and Bill Maher, well-known talk show host.

Speaker 6 (01:46:33):
Is that still true?

Speaker 2 (01:46:35):
Whether or not it's about money, is it just the
gesture of pain, whether you're dating or whether you're in
the relationship?

Speaker 6 (01:46:41):
0800 80 1080 is that number to call.

Speaker 2 (01:46:43):
A couple of texts here. This one says, guys, this
is silly. My wife earns way more than me. She
looks after me. We've been together 15 years. Still madly
in love. Seems to work pretty well.

Speaker 27 (01:46:53):
Okay.

Speaker 6 (01:46:55):
Good on you.

Speaker 4 (01:46:55):
Good on you.

Speaker 18 (01:46:56):
Well done.

Speaker 4 (01:46:57):
Chris, welcome to the show.

Speaker 8 (01:46:59):
Hi.

Speaker 4 (01:46:59):
How are you?

Speaker 8 (01:46:59):
Hi.

Speaker 21 (01:47:00):
Good, thank you.

Speaker 6 (01:47:01):
You want to talk about walking on the footpath?

Speaker 16 (01:47:04):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (01:47:05):
The reason why the woman is on the right is
so that the man has got his right hand free
to draw his sword if she needs to be protected.

Speaker 24 (01:47:13):
Oh.

Speaker 27 (01:47:13):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (01:47:14):
I see. Yeah.

Speaker 9 (01:47:16):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:47:17):
And that's the same thing as your right-hand man.

Speaker 21 (01:47:20):
Well, that's right.

Speaker 8 (01:47:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 13 (01:47:21):
Because your sword is always on your left.

Speaker 4 (01:47:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 13 (01:47:25):
So you draw it with your right hand.

Speaker 6 (01:47:27):
Oh, I got you.

Speaker 4 (01:47:28):
You reach over.

Speaker 27 (01:47:28):
Yes, of course.

Speaker 4 (01:47:30):
Yeah. Oh, that's an interesting one, because they always, you know,
I heard this thing, and I'm not sure if it's true,
that the reason why they drive on the road on
the left in England was to do with hacking people
with the sword coming past that way. But by the
time it got to being in the States, they're on
the right, and you had the guy in the shotgun seat,

(01:47:50):
and he needed to be positioned that way to shoot across.

Speaker 27 (01:47:53):
Right, right.

Speaker 4 (01:47:54):
You see?

Speaker 23 (01:47:55):
I've never heard of that.

Speaker 4 (01:47:56):
Sounds legitimate.

Speaker 11 (01:47:57):
That's a new one on me.

Speaker 4 (01:47:59):
Okay, so it's got nothing to do with the chamber
pots and it's got nothing to do with now, because
I thought now you walk on that side to protect
the woman from her dress being splashed by a car
or something such.

Speaker 7 (01:48:10):
Well, that's the more modern version, but the.

Speaker 23 (01:48:13):
Original version was to protect.

Speaker 10 (01:48:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 17 (01:48:17):
Keep your sword hands free.

Speaker 4 (01:48:19):
Because you see, Chris, I'm not going out with a
sword these days as much.

Speaker 17 (01:48:22):
Oh, you should be.

Speaker 27 (01:48:23):
Yeah, I think I should get a sword.

Speaker 4 (01:48:24):
Yeah, exactly. Got to bring it to work, mate. I
didn't go out on a second date with him.

Speaker 5 (01:48:30):
Why?

Speaker 4 (01:48:30):
He didn't have a sword. You got to dust off
that sword. He didn't even bother bringing a sword.

Speaker 6 (01:48:35):
Craig, how are you, mate?

Speaker 19 (01:48:36):
Hey, guys. Hey, I think you've got to start as
you mean to go on. So if you're a tight
ass and you don't want to pay for dates and
that kind of thing, don't pay. Because why leave somebody
on And then months down the track, they figure out
who we are.

Speaker 4 (01:48:50):
It's dishonest.

Speaker 29 (01:48:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:48:52):
You know? With my wife, I asked her out. We
went out. I paid for the restaurant, nice restaurant.

Speaker 19 (01:49:00):
And the second date, she said, oh, she'll pay. But
that's not important to me. I said, well, why don't
you cook dinner at home? And I wanted to know
if she could cook. And if she couldn't cook, there'd
be no future with me.

Speaker 4 (01:49:16):
All right. So did she know that she was on
some kind of cooking show trial to see how good
she was?

Speaker 19 (01:49:22):
No, she said, during the dinner, she said, why did
you want to eat at my house?

Speaker 8 (01:49:27):
I said, to be honest, I wanted to know whether
you're a good cook or not.

Speaker 4 (01:49:30):
What did she make?

Speaker 8 (01:49:33):
She made a nice roast dinner.

Speaker 24 (01:49:34):
Oh, yeah?

Speaker 6 (01:49:35):
Oh, lovely. Chicken or beef?

Speaker 8 (01:49:38):
No, beef. York to Ponds.

Speaker 4 (01:49:40):
Oh, good woman. Gravy?

Speaker 30 (01:49:42):
In the middle of winter, absolutely. But I think don't
be who you're not because that's just going to end
in tears anyway.

Speaker 4 (01:49:53):
But I wonder how far do you take that, Craig,
nowadays with people on the apps, right? You're trying to
meet someone on an app, do you write tight ass
won't pay as part of your profile?

Speaker 19 (01:50:03):
Well, the thing is, Well, I mean, I've never used apps,
you know. But it's just a thing that if you,
you know, if you meet a nice lady and you
take her out and the first half dozen dates you're
paying for everything and then suddenly the wallet goes away,
it ain't going to last very long, is it?

Speaker 4 (01:50:21):
Yeah, but with some people who won't even get to
the second date if you don't get the wallet out.
Because maybe on the second date you can charm them, Craig.
Maybe you've got good banter. And they never would have
got enough time with you to appreciate you, how funny
and charming you were.

Speaker 19 (01:50:39):
Well, I think you've got to just be yourself and
no crap, you know?

Speaker 8 (01:50:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 19 (01:50:44):
And they're the ones that.

Speaker 8 (01:50:45):
Tend to work.

Speaker 4 (01:50:46):
Yeah, there you go.

Speaker 6 (01:50:47):
All right, if you're a tight ass, just be up front.
I'm a tight ass, and you're paying for everything here.

Speaker 4 (01:50:52):
You go to your first date with Maeve. You go, hi, Maeve,
I'm Tyler. I'm a bit of a tight ass.

Speaker 14 (01:50:57):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (01:50:58):
I'm not going to play any games with you.

Speaker 7 (01:51:00):
Mm-hmm.

Speaker 4 (01:51:01):
I won't be I won't be protecting you From the
chamber pots And I won't I don't have a sword
And I won't be opening any doors Just so you
know This is how it's going to continue I don't
want to have any False pretenses here I won't be
paying for anything And I won't be doing anything How
about a second date? Yeah And How are you placed
for next Saturday?

Speaker 6 (01:51:20):
Yeah, do you want to come home?

Speaker 2 (01:51:21):
0800 80 10 80 is the number to call. So
what do you reckon about men always paying for things
in a relationship? Is that an old school tradition that's
coming back? Or do you think times have moved on
in 9292 if you want to send a text?

Speaker 4 (01:51:33):
That's the reason why traditional spiral staircases, says this text,
go the way they do, is that the person coming
up the staircase to charge, the fortress has to have
their sword in their left hand as they come up
around the corner. where the person coming down the stairs
defending can have their sword in the right hand.

Speaker 6 (01:51:47):
That's some clever thinking.

Speaker 4 (01:51:49):
Who knew that so much of our existence was based
around swords? Yeah, I've got to dust off my sword.

Speaker 6 (01:51:55):
Right, keep those texts coming through on 9292.

Speaker 4 (01:51:57):
It is 10 to 4.

Speaker 6 (01:51:58):
Beg your pardon.

Speaker 11 (01:52:01):
The big stories. The big issues. The big trends. And
everything in between. Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons. Newstalk ZB.

Speaker 2 (01:52:11):
It is seven minutes to four. Should a man always
pay for everything in a relationship? 9292 is the text.
Interesting text here.

Speaker 6 (01:52:18):
G'day, guys.

Speaker 2 (01:52:19):
My husband took me to Macca's for an ice cream
on our first date. He nearly didn't get a second one,
but then he confessed he was struggling with a huge
debt and was trying to get back on his feet.
I supported him for the first couple of years, and
now I'm a stay-at-home mum, and he pays for everything.
It was a risky move, but I think it did
pay off pretty well.

Speaker 4 (01:52:36):
Well done. To Macca's. Did they dine in?

Speaker 6 (01:52:40):
It looks like they did.

Speaker 4 (01:52:41):
Took me to Macca's for an ice cream.

Speaker 6 (01:52:42):
Just an ice cream, not even a burger.

Speaker 4 (01:52:44):
Just an ice cream.

Speaker 9 (01:52:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:52:44):
Because if you do a drive-through and then go somewhere romantic, then,
you know, maybe that's even better than going to a
fancy pants restaurant. A couple more brownie points. Hey, lads,
a mate of mine has been dating in Auckland. He
recently went on a date where she openly said at
the start of dinner that she is only there for
the free meal and does this multiple times a week
just for a free meal. She sounds nice.

Speaker 11 (01:53:06):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:53:07):
Sure she's going to do well out of life. This
one says, G'day, guys. When I was dating, we were
in university. Nobody had money, so any dates tended to
be experiences that cost very little, i.e. a walk at
the beach, grabbing a coffee at the park, meeting at
the uni bar, etc., or the sneaky study date. Dollars
was never an issue and managed to do pretty well
for myself.

Speaker 4 (01:53:26):
Yeah, very good. All right, okay. So lots of stuff
coming through here, but I think we're still yet to
have someone that, whilst they may not expect it... We're
still yet to hear from all the hundreds and hundreds
of texts and calls. We haven't heard from anyone that
would be offended by you paying.

Speaker 8 (01:53:45):
No.

Speaker 4 (01:53:46):
Which goes to the point that it's maybe risky not
to pay on the first date. That's what I reckon.

Speaker 2 (01:53:50):
Chivalry's coming back, maybe. But great discussion, and thank you
to everyone who gave us a buzz and.

Speaker 4 (01:53:56):
Text through on that.

Speaker 6 (01:53:58):
Really enjoyed that discussion.

Speaker 4 (01:53:59):
All right, that brings us to the end of another
edition of Matt Heath and Tyler Adams Afternoons on Newstalk ZB.
The great and powerful Heather Duplessy-Allen is up next. And
after 4pm, the Government's Chief Victims Advisor reckons we should
drop the jury system for sexual assault cases. Heather talks
to an advocate who's been through the process about if

(01:54:19):
this would work in practice. What, just huffing out the
old jury system, eh? Bold. But right now, Tyler, my
good friend, why am I playing the song Flagpole Sitter
by the American rock band Harvey Danger from their 1997
debut album? Don't look it up.

Speaker 6 (01:54:38):
Flagpole Sitter is the name of the song.

Speaker 18 (01:54:42):
Oh, mate.

Speaker 6 (01:54:43):
I really backed myself because Andrew was saying, I'm never
going to get it. You were laughing away there. And
I said, you just wait. I've got no idea.

Speaker 4 (01:54:50):
Because the lyrics are, I'm not sick, but I'm not well.
And I'm so hot because I'm in hell. And we
were talking about Gen Zers throwing a lot more sickies
than older generations.

Speaker 6 (01:55:06):
Well done.

Speaker 2 (01:55:06):
I should have got that one. I definitely should have
got that one. What a tune, though.

Speaker 4 (01:55:09):
I haven't heard this for ages. All right, you seem busy.
We'll let you go. Bless, bless, bless. I'm Matt Heath.
That's Tyler Adams. And we'll be back live on your
radio and iHeart, on your radio and your iHeartRadio app
tomorrow afternoon. Until then, have a great week.

Speaker 12 (01:55:39):
I'm not dead, but I'm not well. And it's a
sin to.

Speaker 28 (01:55:58):
Live this way.

Speaker 27 (01:55:59):
We could be nice to each other.

Speaker 11 (01:56:10):
For more from Newstalk ZB, listen live, on air, or online.

Speaker 1 (01:56:14):
And keep our shows with you wherever you go with
our podcasts on iHeartRadio.

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