July 15, 2026 • 10 mins
THE BEST BITS IN A SILLIER PACKAGE (from Thursday's Mike Hosking Breakfast) So Don't Get Sick/Beltway Beat-Up of the Week/Utes of the Future/Big as RTS/AI Update
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
You're listening to a podcast from News Talk zed B.
Follow this and our wide range of podcasts now on
iHeartRadio The Rewrap.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
I great there and welcome to the Rewrap for Thursday.
All the best that's from the mic asking Breakfast on
Newstalk sed B and a Sillier package. I'm Glen Hart
and today the z Energy story. That's not a story.
What kind of you will we be driving in the future?
Roger tuivasa Check popped in for a chat on his
(00:43):
way out of to leave the country and go on
to other things. And what is the Office of AI
supposed to be for? But before any of that, health
insurance is expensive, wasn't it.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Mike got my partner's medical insurance renewal last night. Twenty
six percent increase, following twenty two percent last year the
year before. Unsustainable. Tell you something about that. We've got
a friend of a friend. He's going in front. I
don't know what you would call. It's not an operation technically,
it's an approach. It's an exploratory thing. Takes an hour
less than an hour. It's day theater. They got the
quote on that it's in and out fourteen grand fourteen
(01:20):
thousand dollars, thank you very very much. So I can't
remember the breakdown, but the surgeon's about two and a
half three, the anethesis is about two and a half three,
theaters about four. The incidentals are about two or three.
And it's like, are you serious. I mean, I'm not
against playing professionals a lot of money and they've studied
in their experts. I get all of that. But you've
got a system in this country, it seems to me,
(01:42):
and this is where the insurance comes in. You've got
a system in this country where the public health servance
is lacking and wanting, and so increasingly people go, well,
I might as well back myself up with a bit
of private medical insurance. But of course the private medical
insurance is going through the root because every time you
go and it's fourteen grand, and then you're paying a
few thousand dollars a year, and the insurance company coming
to you going, well, what about the fourteen grand last year?
(02:02):
That's why you're playing more this year. It's a vicious
It looks increasingly American to me, is what I'm saying.
In the those costs appear to be awfully cost plus.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
I'd like to think that we're a way off from
the American system just yet. Yeah, there are a few
warning bells, an't he the rewrap?
Speaker 1 (02:22):
All right?
Speaker 2 (02:22):
I hadn't even really heard this Zed Energy story. Maybe
it's because it's it's just not a story built way.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
Beat up of the week goes to the seemingly ongoing
fascination over the missing paperwork in the Prime Minister's office.
When it came to a meeting between Z Energy and
their concerns over Mike Smith's court case involving polluters and
climate cost Mike Smith called conspiracy and you don't sadly
need to do a lot more than that in this country.
The get half the media fizzing over a scandal for
the ages. The bit if you've forgotten that made it
(02:51):
look troublesome was twofold. One the Prime Minister's office didn't
have said paperwork, hence it looked shady. And two the
government changed or is going through the process of changing
the law in a way that surprise surprise suits Zed
Energy now accepting lost paperwork is not a good look
in the Prime Minister freely admit it. Weeks ago. We
finally hear this week from a bloke called Lindas Jones,
(03:12):
who runs Z Energy. He produces the document they gave
to the government. Here's the critical point. There's nothing in it.
Nothing they haven't said publicly already. In other words, they
were alarmed that blokes like Smith can fill court time
with fishing expeditions, and that singling out companies like Z
or Fonterra is dangerous and ruinous to business and reputations.
(03:33):
Now they say that funnily enough, because it's true, and
that is why, funnily enough, the government acted to change
the law. The government said, correctly, the government is the
ultimate court, and when it comes to climate policy, the
parliament is the place decisions are made. Now they said that,
not because Zed thinks that, or Fonterra thinks that, or
you and I think that, but because it's true and
(03:56):
it's right, and they would have done it anyway. There
is no skull duggery, There is no clandestine backroom nonsense.
No one met in a dark alleyway, No government drag
was dragged into making decisions they would not have already made.
All that happened was a piece of paper got way late,
and Mike Smith stirred up a very gullible media looking
for a bit of fis and a bit of clickbait.
What's required of the media if they're remotely interested in
(04:18):
repairing their battered reputations, is the ability to see real news,
the ability to differentiate between a story and BS, and
to not be so keen to see things that aren't there.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Well, there you go. I've heard Mike explain that twice now,
and I still don't understand what it's about, or if
it's actually about anything I should have planned by news.
That's not news thing, Okay, I just sort of off
the back of talking about z energy. If you take
your ute there to fill up in twenty years time,
will there be any fuel to fill it up with?
Speaker 3 (04:49):
Just that report I was reading this morning. The fun
thing being that we keep utes on the road for
twenty one years and cars on the road for nineteen years,
and you go to a place like America, it's only fifteen, Australia, Japan,
it's only fourteenth anyway. Point being this person who's working
on a sort of a project, nor Vegan. If it matters,
is there name from Chicago. Not that bat matters anyway.
(05:10):
Point they're going, Look the problem you guys have got
here is you keep your cars on the road so
long you're going to have cars on the road and
we're not going to have fuel because they're worried about
the geopolitical uncertainty, big challenge in sourcing feedstock and all
of the stuff going. You know, this is not today,
in next week, next month. There is twenty years down
the track when the world, they argue, has moved on
and everyone's electrified and we're all in the EVS. Good
(05:33):
old New Zealand's going to have twenty one year old
still on the road looking for petrol and there will
be no petrol, is their argument. So what are you
going to do then, which is an interesting thing to ponder.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
It will it be like back back in the days
of LPG and CNNG. The young people won't know what
I'm talking about, But for a while there we were
powering our cars with compressed natural gas and liquid petroleum
gas and it took uh. It was a complicated business too,
(06:03):
and you had these big cylinders and a lot of
you ran on them, these big cylinders and the back
of the year and you know, there was a conversion
process involved with that. Of course, my dad had a
car that ran on I think it ran on C
and G, not LPG one of the gs anyway, So well,
maybe that'll come back. Who knows. We had RTEs in
(06:26):
the studio this morning. Roger two bours a check. It
might be the last time we ever see him in
this country, by the sounds of things.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Mike, what a nice guy, very well spoken. The rugby
boys could take a night now. See, it's interesting we're
talking off here. I alluded to it very briefly. We're
talking off here about funny enough. I don't think i'd
met Roger before. Not as big as you think, which
is different to Bowden, who I saw at the airport
the other day. But I had met before, bigger than
you think, similar positions, but different sizes.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Paul Henry's a bit like that, isn't he. He's taller.
He's taller than you think.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
He's way bigger than.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
You see, bigger.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
I just just Paul and I go back a long way,
so he's not a surprise. But you know, when you
don't see people for very long periods of time, he says,
you know you're bigger than I think. It's entirely possible
that my age, I've shrunk, of course, and that I
was once as big as boat in Barretton. Now it's
just I've shrunk, and I was probably bigger than Roger
two barsishik, but I've also shrunk, so therefore I'm just
basically smaller than everybody.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
I don't think you've ever been bigger than Roger.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
I've probably never been bigger than that, certainly not certainly
not faster than Roger. But it was lovely to have me.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
He's always had this strange form of body dysmorphia, the
husk where he thinks he's taller and bigger than he
actually is. I don't know what that's about, but it's
kind of cute and I hope that it never goes away.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
The re wrap.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
We're going to finish up here talking AI, as we
often do, whether or not it's actually a thing. There's
a whole office devoted to it in Australia, now, you know,
in government Elbow.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
I previewed this yesterday. They made such a big deal
of it in Australia and it's sort of got the
full coverage when he came out. This is Albaneze's speech
on AI what essentially came as so no one knew
whether it was going to be here's my broad view
of what's going to happen, versus here's a piece of
law that I'm going to enact. It was the former,
not the latter, essentially when it comes to AI, because
(08:24):
you got massive pushback in Australia at the moment over
data centers. So data centers, as I also explained a
couple of weeks ago on the program, were a thing
until they weren't a thing. So in other words, we
thought all fantastic data center's, lots of jobs and all
that sort of buzz, but then they worked out that
they've got a dreadful hum there aren't actually that many jobs,
and they use a tremendous amount of water. One of
the stats yesterday out of New South Wales alone. Funnily enough,
(08:44):
remember the bloke we had on last week. He was
busy telling us about data centers that used no water
and stuff. I don't know what he was talking about,
because what I was getting yesterday in terms of stats,
currently data centers in New South Wales used one percent
of the water. One in ten years they'll use twenty
five quarter of all the water's going to data centercid,
though I don't know what the hell he was on
about with no water anyway. Point being he opened yesterday
(09:06):
in his speech an office, the office of AI, and
the Office of AI is within the office of alban EASi,
so it's prime Mister's office opening office with an office.
So I don't know what happens there apart from nothing.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
Yeah, Ai, I've just been listening. I was listening to
a great podcast as I was driving into work this
morning about AI on Chapo Trap House. Is one of
my favorite podcasts, Chapo Trap House, and they had a
guest on talking about AI and how completely overhyped it
(09:40):
is and that it's losing money by the billions, and
that it's going to take people like Larry Allison down
with it when it all falls over. So yeah, it's
fun to watch, isn't it. I am Glen Hart. That
was the rewrap And yet we'll see you back here
again tomorrow. If I sound a bit distracted, I'm just
(10:02):
watching replays of the goals in the England Argentina game.
Can't make up on the line where the I feel
sorry for England or I find it the whole thing funny.
See you tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
The Rewrap, the Rerap. For more from News Talks, ed B,
listen live on air or online, and keep our shows
with you wherever you go with our podcasts on iHeartRadio
You're listening to a podcast from News Talk zed B.
Follow this and our wide range of podcasts now on
iHeartRadio The Rewrap.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
I great there and welcome to the Rewrap for Thursday.
All the best that's from the mic asking Breakfast on
Newstalk sed B and a Sillier package. I'm Glen Hart
and today the z Energy story. That's not a story.
What kind of you will we be driving in the future?
Roger tuivasa Check popped in for a chat on his
(00:43):
way out of to leave the country and go on
to other things. And what is the Office of AI
supposed to be for? But before any of that, health
insurance is expensive, wasn't it.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Mike got my partner's medical insurance renewal last night. Twenty
six percent increase, following twenty two percent last year the
year before. Unsustainable. Tell you something about that. We've got
a friend of a friend. He's going in front. I
don't know what you would call. It's not an operation technically,
it's an approach. It's an exploratory thing. Takes an hour
less than an hour. It's day theater. They got the
quote on that it's in and out fourteen grand fourteen
(01:20):
thousand dollars, thank you very very much. So I can't
remember the breakdown, but the surgeon's about two and a
half three, the anethesis is about two and a half three,
theaters about four. The incidentals are about two or three.
And it's like, are you serious. I mean, I'm not
against playing professionals a lot of money and they've studied
in their experts. I get all of that. But you've
got a system in this country, it seems to me,
(01:42):
and this is where the insurance comes in. You've got
a system in this country where the public health servance
is lacking and wanting, and so increasingly people go, well,
I might as well back myself up with a bit
of private medical insurance. But of course the private medical
insurance is going through the root because every time you
go and it's fourteen grand, and then you're paying a
few thousand dollars a year, and the insurance company coming
to you going, well, what about the fourteen grand last year?
(02:02):
That's why you're playing more this year. It's a vicious
It looks increasingly American to me, is what I'm saying.
In the those costs appear to be awfully cost plus.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
I'd like to think that we're a way off from
the American system just yet. Yeah, there are a few
warning bells, an't he the rewrap?
Speaker 1 (02:22):
All right?
Speaker 2 (02:22):
I hadn't even really heard this Zed Energy story. Maybe
it's because it's it's just not a story built way.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
Beat up of the week goes to the seemingly ongoing
fascination over the missing paperwork in the Prime Minister's office.
When it came to a meeting between Z Energy and
their concerns over Mike Smith's court case involving polluters and
climate cost Mike Smith called conspiracy and you don't sadly
need to do a lot more than that in this country.
The get half the media fizzing over a scandal for
the ages. The bit if you've forgotten that made it
(02:51):
look troublesome was twofold. One the Prime Minister's office didn't
have said paperwork, hence it looked shady. And two the
government changed or is going through the process of changing
the law in a way that surprise surprise suits Zed
Energy now accepting lost paperwork is not a good look
in the Prime Minister freely admit it. Weeks ago. We
finally hear this week from a bloke called Lindas Jones,
(03:12):
who runs Z Energy. He produces the document they gave
to the government. Here's the critical point. There's nothing in it.
Nothing they haven't said publicly already. In other words, they
were alarmed that blokes like Smith can fill court time
with fishing expeditions, and that singling out companies like Z
or Fonterra is dangerous and ruinous to business and reputations.
(03:33):
Now they say that funnily enough, because it's true, and
that is why, funnily enough, the government acted to change
the law. The government said, correctly, the government is the
ultimate court, and when it comes to climate policy, the
parliament is the place decisions are made. Now they said that,
not because Zed thinks that, or Fonterra thinks that, or
you and I think that, but because it's true and
(03:56):
it's right, and they would have done it anyway. There
is no skull duggery, There is no clandestine backroom nonsense.
No one met in a dark alleyway, No government drag
was dragged into making decisions they would not have already made.
All that happened was a piece of paper got way late,
and Mike Smith stirred up a very gullible media looking
for a bit of fis and a bit of clickbait.
What's required of the media if they're remotely interested in
(04:18):
repairing their battered reputations, is the ability to see real news,
the ability to differentiate between a story and BS, and
to not be so keen to see things that aren't there.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Well, there you go. I've heard Mike explain that twice now,
and I still don't understand what it's about, or if
it's actually about anything I should have planned by news.
That's not news thing, Okay, I just sort of off
the back of talking about z energy. If you take
your ute there to fill up in twenty years time,
will there be any fuel to fill it up with?
Speaker 3 (04:49):
Just that report I was reading this morning. The fun
thing being that we keep utes on the road for
twenty one years and cars on the road for nineteen years,
and you go to a place like America, it's only fifteen, Australia, Japan,
it's only fourteenth anyway. Point being this person who's working
on a sort of a project, nor Vegan. If it matters,
is there name from Chicago. Not that bat matters anyway.
(05:10):
Point they're going, Look the problem you guys have got
here is you keep your cars on the road so
long you're going to have cars on the road and
we're not going to have fuel because they're worried about
the geopolitical uncertainty, big challenge in sourcing feedstock and all
of the stuff going. You know, this is not today,
in next week, next month. There is twenty years down
the track when the world, they argue, has moved on
and everyone's electrified and we're all in the EVS. Good
(05:33):
old New Zealand's going to have twenty one year old
still on the road looking for petrol and there will
be no petrol, is their argument. So what are you
going to do then, which is an interesting thing to ponder.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
It will it be like back back in the days
of LPG and CNNG. The young people won't know what
I'm talking about, But for a while there we were
powering our cars with compressed natural gas and liquid petroleum
gas and it took uh. It was a complicated business too,
(06:03):
and you had these big cylinders and a lot of
you ran on them, these big cylinders and the back
of the year and you know, there was a conversion
process involved with that. Of course, my dad had a
car that ran on I think it ran on C
and G, not LPG one of the gs anyway, So well,
maybe that'll come back. Who knows. We had RTEs in
(06:26):
the studio this morning. Roger two bours a check. It
might be the last time we ever see him in
this country, by the sounds of things.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Mike, what a nice guy, very well spoken. The rugby
boys could take a night now. See, it's interesting we're
talking off here. I alluded to it very briefly. We're
talking off here about funny enough. I don't think i'd
met Roger before. Not as big as you think, which
is different to Bowden, who I saw at the airport
the other day. But I had met before, bigger than
you think, similar positions, but different sizes.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Paul Henry's a bit like that, isn't he. He's taller.
He's taller than you think.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
He's way bigger than.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
You see, bigger.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
I just just Paul and I go back a long way,
so he's not a surprise. But you know, when you
don't see people for very long periods of time, he says,
you know you're bigger than I think. It's entirely possible
that my age, I've shrunk, of course, and that I
was once as big as boat in Barretton. Now it's
just I've shrunk, and I was probably bigger than Roger
two barsishik, but I've also shrunk, so therefore I'm just
basically smaller than everybody.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
I don't think you've ever been bigger than Roger.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
I've probably never been bigger than that, certainly not certainly
not faster than Roger. But it was lovely to have me.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
He's always had this strange form of body dysmorphia, the
husk where he thinks he's taller and bigger than he
actually is. I don't know what that's about, but it's
kind of cute and I hope that it never goes away.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
The re wrap.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
We're going to finish up here talking AI, as we
often do, whether or not it's actually a thing. There's
a whole office devoted to it in Australia, now, you know,
in government Elbow.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
I previewed this yesterday. They made such a big deal
of it in Australia and it's sort of got the
full coverage when he came out. This is Albaneze's speech
on AI what essentially came as so no one knew
whether it was going to be here's my broad view
of what's going to happen, versus here's a piece of
law that I'm going to enact. It was the former,
not the latter, essentially when it comes to AI, because
(08:24):
you got massive pushback in Australia at the moment over
data centers. So data centers, as I also explained a
couple of weeks ago on the program, were a thing
until they weren't a thing. So in other words, we
thought all fantastic data center's, lots of jobs and all
that sort of buzz, but then they worked out that
they've got a dreadful hum there aren't actually that many jobs,
and they use a tremendous amount of water. One of
the stats yesterday out of New South Wales alone. Funnily enough,
(08:44):
remember the bloke we had on last week. He was
busy telling us about data centers that used no water
and stuff. I don't know what he was talking about,
because what I was getting yesterday in terms of stats,
currently data centers in New South Wales used one percent
of the water. One in ten years they'll use twenty
five quarter of all the water's going to data centercid,
though I don't know what the hell he was on
about with no water anyway. Point being he opened yesterday
(09:06):
in his speech an office, the office of AI, and
the Office of AI is within the office of alban EASi,
so it's prime Mister's office opening office with an office.
So I don't know what happens there apart from nothing.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
Yeah, Ai, I've just been listening. I was listening to
a great podcast as I was driving into work this
morning about AI on Chapo Trap House. Is one of
my favorite podcasts, Chapo Trap House, and they had a
guest on talking about AI and how completely overhyped it
(09:40):
is and that it's losing money by the billions, and
that it's going to take people like Larry Allison down
with it when it all falls over. So yeah, it's
fun to watch, isn't it. I am Glen Hart. That
was the rewrap And yet we'll see you back here
again tomorrow. If I sound a bit distracted, I'm just
(10:02):
watching replays of the goals in the England Argentina game.
Can't make up on the line where the I feel
sorry for England or I find it the whole thing funny.
See you tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
The Rewrap, the Rerap. For more from News Talks, ed B,
listen live on air or online, and keep our shows
with you wherever you go with our podcasts on iHeartRadio
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