March 27, 2025 • 10 mins
Tonight on The Huddle, CTU chief economist Craig Rennie and Tim Wilson from the Maxim Institute joined in on a discussion about the following issues of the day - and more!
Eden Park has won the Auckland stadium battle, with Auckland Council overwhelmingly voted to endorse the Park as the city's main stadium over a new site near the waterfront. Do we agree with this?
Has Tamatha Paul done damage to the Greens' election chances with her comments on the police? Or is she playing to her voters?
Judith Collins has exceeded her target for consultant cuts, almost doubling the original cuts. Does this not prove the Government's point that there was plenty of fat to cut in the public service?
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The huddle with New Zealand Southeby's International Realty find your
what of a Kind?
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Tim Wilson from the Maximum Institutes on the huddle tonight,
Hey Tim, good afternoon, welcome back. Good to have you back.
And Craig Rennie is here as well, chief economist at
the c TOU, the Council of Trade Union's Craig good
evening to you. Thanks having me on, Great to have
you on. Can I just quickly get your reaction to
both of you to the fact that Auckland Council has
voted for eden Park two point one. I mean it
(00:28):
doesn't mean anything, like Tim doesn't mean anything because you
know they no one's putting any money in that they.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Yeah, yeah, and that's that's that's where you know the
money will explain just how much this is actually meaningful.
But I just want to push back against people complaining
about the seats at eden Park. You don't go to
eden Park to sit down. You get within a meter
and a half of the stage and you rock out.
If you're going to do something else, just go home.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, but what if you're watching cricket, Because we know
cricket can go on and on and on anyway, you.
Speaker 4 (00:58):
Just started speaking another language, Ryan, Sorry.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Craig, Craig, what about you? I mean from a from
a funding point of view, it's a lot of money,
and you've got government doing phase one and then you've
got a PPT PPP doing Phase two and three.
Speaker 5 (01:12):
And that's the real question is whether or not in
the PPP will be asked to put back even more
money in the future, and where any real guarantees for that,
and who fundamentally is going to pay it, because if
you're going to pay it, because the ticket prices start
to rise, because we have to pay for the venue,
it starts to become uneconomic really quickly. So, as Tim
has said, the proof will be in the pudding and
whether or not we can bring the pipeline of events
(01:35):
and guests and things to really pay for the program
that's actually being put up there.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Actually ticket price is pretty expensive or really, Chris Staple
for them five hundred bucks to stand.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Up, really to stand up, Yeah, to stand on the Yeah,
I'm not even sitting down on those g yeah ga,
you know, sloshing in the mosha. There's a lot of money.
Tim and Craig will be back in just a moment
on the huddle, the huddle with.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
New Zealand Southeby's international realty, the ones with local and
global reach like you.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Again fourteen away from sexties Tooks. He'd bet Tim Wilson
and Craig Rennie on the huddle. This is what's his name? Stapleton?
Chris Stapleton, who Tim you said played at Eden Park?
Apparently he was at Spark.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
I even said that explicitly. I just said ticket prices
were high.
Speaker 4 (02:30):
You think I could run for Do you think I
could run for something?
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Here?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Donald Trump, you could run for anything. Someone also says
Bollocks telled him it's two hundred and fifty five for
Chris Stapleton. I was standing. But that doesn't mean that
also doesn't mean that you're wrong, because there could have
been different prices, you know what I mean, depending on
when you bought them.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
So just now keep telling me off Ryan it was
two fifty. It was two fifty for Luke Comb standing
up at Eden Park.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Yeah, that was was a good gig though. Hey, hey,
I've had a couple of texts just in the last
minute saying for actually like a lot, saying you didn't
ask about the roof on the stadium. So just to
clarify the roof, So stage one is your seating for
Eden Park, Stage two is your accommodation. Stage three is
your roof. So you've got to get the PPP to
(03:22):
get your roof. That's the deal now, Tamitha, Paul Craig,
what's your feeling. I mean, obviously Hepkins feels like this
is just toxic, so he's running a country mile from
her putting the boot in. What's your feeling about how
it might affect the vote on the left.
Speaker 5 (03:41):
I don't think it's going to affect the Green vault
anytime soon. I mean, it's clearly bringing some really unfortunate
news and publicity for the Green Party, but I don't
think in the long run it's going to make any
real meaningful difference to the Green Party voard. And I
don't think anyone, including Tamitha, is really suggesting that we're
really going to defunding the police. This is being used
(04:03):
by the government essentially to help, you know, look away
from a lot of the challenges that they have in
this space, because they like to talk a great game
about law and order. You know, they've promised five hundred
more police at the election and we're currently manus seventy
one on that scale. So they've got a really, really
difficult set of challenges in that space, and this has
just been seized by them as just a as a
(04:24):
means of distracting attention from a whole bunch of statistics
that they don't really want to talk about in crime right.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Now, Tim, then how do you explain Chris Hipkins' response?
I mean, is he trying to distract from something too?
Speaker 3 (04:37):
Yeah, Look, I think I think it shows the sort
of labor issue, which is how do you be a
centrist party? So yeah, I think Craig is absolutely right
about the Greens, particularly the non mainstream aspect. And if
you think about you go back to what was it
late last year in Pea Green and Peak kaharrang Ikata
was saying in the house that most people would feel
(04:59):
more comfor the ball alone with the patch gang member
then police. So I think ten of the Paul's comments
on that spectrum they're actually pretty benign. I think it
does highlight though, an issue where Okay, so Chris Hopkins
is now sort of on song with the government since
and it might present some issues when Craig apparently is
(05:19):
going to run for the Wellington Central seat as predicted
by Audrey Young, Could you clarify that, Craig, I.
Speaker 5 (05:27):
Can clarify Audrey is entitled to her opinion in that space.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
But I'm here, is this an announcement?
Speaker 5 (05:37):
It is definitely not an announcement. What I would say
is that you know, of course, the of course Chris
Hoppins is going to support the police and their space,
and I think that Labor Party's ever not supported the
police in the space and you know, and there were
regular increases to police funding and regular support for the
police are in the last government. So I don't think,
you know, Chris is seeing anything other than he would
(05:58):
have said if he was Prime Minister or if he
was anywhere else. All Right, it's a really unfortunate statement.
It's just being dragged and used for a different purpose.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Now, Craig, we were going to get to this, but
seen as you didn't quite answer the question would you
rule out running for Wellington Central? I mean, there's this
total bogus.
Speaker 5 (06:16):
I'm not ruling running out for anywhere, are ruling in
running from anywhere? There's there's what there's eighteen months to
an election. It's not long now, it's it's five hundred
and eighty one days from memory.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
And if you know it that accurately, you are differently
running are counting.
Speaker 5 (06:35):
I know it that accurately because we have to spend
every day campaigning between now and then in order to
meet show people know what this governments do it.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Come on, all right, let's move on. Judith Collins, she
actually this will be up. You're really too Craig, but
term Judith Collins was on the show tonight saying the
consultant spend is coming right down, but she's saying brace
for impact because we're going to do something about the
number ofblic servants that they're not the teachers and doctors,
but bureaucracy as well.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:06):
Yeah, And look because at the moment it's been a
wound back to the levels that were six months before
the last election. So the public service size at the
moment is about the same time or about the same
levels as when Jacinda Don was Prime Minister. So there's
clearly work to be done. Just to note that eight
hundred pud million dollars that was saved will service a
(07:28):
month and a week of debt servicing for the government debts.
So let's let's say that's that's pretty good going.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
God, that's a lot of money, isn't it. And I
mean it's not just our government to be fair. Governments
all over the world post COVID are dealing with a
huge increase in servicing costs because of the money that
we've borrowed. But that is something to behold. A one
month and one week will get you the eight hundred
million dollars. Craig, what do you make of the Judith
Collins saying she's going to basically do some more cutting.
Speaker 5 (07:58):
Well, it's not surprising because they have and being able
to make any of their accounts add up. You know,
during the election campaign we said that they couldn't afford
the tax promises that they had made at the time,
and lo and behold, they borrowed more money at the
budget in order to pay for the taxes that they'd
promised to deliver. So they're going to keep cutting. The
budget policy statement from the government said that they were
(08:18):
going to keep cutting. The key thing for me is
you say you're going to get rid of eight hundred
million dollars of consultants. Fine, does that mean that you're
expecting public servants to do that work or does that
just mean you're not doing work who's doing the work
of government? Or are you just trying to do less?
And we know there are no shortage of problems, So
the real question is where are the consultants coming from.
(08:39):
Are they coming from the building of units of housing,
of infrastructure the kinds of things we want to see,
or are they coming from somewhere else? And Judith's been
a bit quiet about actually where those consultants are coming
from and importantly what those savings are being used for,
because right now they're being used to deliver the tax
cuts that were delivered at the last budget. They're going
(08:59):
to have to keep cutting in the next budget if
they want to deliver more tax cuts, as their look
they seem to want to do on May twenty second.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Craig, it's a well polished it's a well polished pitch
for the Wellington Central voters. I have to say, well done.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
The question the question with the public services is a
bigger public service, a better public service, and that's the
other question that we need to engage with absolutely.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Tim, thank you very much for coming on. Tim Wilson
Maxim Institute and to you Craig as well Craig A
and E chief economists at the councilor Trade Unions and
of course soon to be laboring peak well labor candidate.
Let's not give them that yet.
Speaker 6 (09:34):
It's found from Grafton Gully. It's also heavy bit easy
on the southwest and southbound between Wolvesey and Massi and
again from but then slower times from Perfanui and northbound
is heavy massas Coronation and it's easing on the Northern
Motorway northbound between Spighetty junction and tristram av Andy Harward
for times have a traffack.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
If you're driving one of the two hundred thousand light
commercial views.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
For more from Hither Duplicy Alan Drive, listen live to
news talks it'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio
The huddle with New Zealand Southeby's International Realty find your
what of a Kind?
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Tim Wilson from the Maximum Institutes on the huddle tonight,
Hey Tim, good afternoon, welcome back. Good to have you back.
And Craig Rennie is here as well, chief economist at
the c TOU, the Council of Trade Union's Craig good
evening to you. Thanks having me on, Great to have
you on. Can I just quickly get your reaction to
both of you to the fact that Auckland Council has
voted for eden Park two point one. I mean it
(00:28):
doesn't mean anything, like Tim doesn't mean anything because you
know they no one's putting any money in that they.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Yeah, yeah, and that's that's that's where you know the
money will explain just how much this is actually meaningful.
But I just want to push back against people complaining
about the seats at eden Park. You don't go to
eden Park to sit down. You get within a meter
and a half of the stage and you rock out.
If you're going to do something else, just go home.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, but what if you're watching cricket, Because we know
cricket can go on and on and on anyway, you.
Speaker 4 (00:58):
Just started speaking another language, Ryan, Sorry.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Craig, Craig, what about you? I mean from a from
a funding point of view, it's a lot of money,
and you've got government doing phase one and then you've
got a PPT PPP doing Phase two and three.
Speaker 5 (01:12):
And that's the real question is whether or not in
the PPP will be asked to put back even more
money in the future, and where any real guarantees for that,
and who fundamentally is going to pay it, because if
you're going to pay it, because the ticket prices start
to rise, because we have to pay for the venue,
it starts to become uneconomic really quickly. So, as Tim
has said, the proof will be in the pudding and
whether or not we can bring the pipeline of events
(01:35):
and guests and things to really pay for the program
that's actually being put up there.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Actually ticket price is pretty expensive or really, Chris Staple
for them five hundred bucks to stand.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Up, really to stand up, Yeah, to stand on the Yeah,
I'm not even sitting down on those g yeah ga,
you know, sloshing in the mosha. There's a lot of money.
Tim and Craig will be back in just a moment
on the huddle, the huddle with.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
New Zealand Southeby's international realty, the ones with local and
global reach like you.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Again fourteen away from sexties Tooks. He'd bet Tim Wilson
and Craig Rennie on the huddle. This is what's his name? Stapleton?
Chris Stapleton, who Tim you said played at Eden Park?
Apparently he was at Spark.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
I even said that explicitly. I just said ticket prices
were high.
Speaker 4 (02:30):
You think I could run for Do you think I
could run for something?
Speaker 3 (02:33):
Here?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Donald Trump, you could run for anything. Someone also says
Bollocks telled him it's two hundred and fifty five for
Chris Stapleton. I was standing. But that doesn't mean that
also doesn't mean that you're wrong, because there could have
been different prices, you know what I mean, depending on
when you bought them.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
So just now keep telling me off Ryan it was
two fifty. It was two fifty for Luke Comb standing
up at Eden Park.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Yeah, that was was a good gig though. Hey, hey,
I've had a couple of texts just in the last
minute saying for actually like a lot, saying you didn't
ask about the roof on the stadium. So just to
clarify the roof, So stage one is your seating for
Eden Park, Stage two is your accommodation. Stage three is
your roof. So you've got to get the PPP to
(03:22):
get your roof. That's the deal now, Tamitha, Paul Craig,
what's your feeling. I mean, obviously Hepkins feels like this
is just toxic, so he's running a country mile from
her putting the boot in. What's your feeling about how
it might affect the vote on the left.
Speaker 5 (03:41):
I don't think it's going to affect the Green vault
anytime soon. I mean, it's clearly bringing some really unfortunate
news and publicity for the Green Party, but I don't
think in the long run it's going to make any
real meaningful difference to the Green Party voard. And I
don't think anyone, including Tamitha, is really suggesting that we're
really going to defunding the police. This is being used
(04:03):
by the government essentially to help, you know, look away
from a lot of the challenges that they have in
this space, because they like to talk a great game
about law and order. You know, they've promised five hundred
more police at the election and we're currently manus seventy
one on that scale. So they've got a really, really
difficult set of challenges in that space, and this has
just been seized by them as just a as a
(04:24):
means of distracting attention from a whole bunch of statistics
that they don't really want to talk about in crime right.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Now, Tim, then how do you explain Chris Hipkins' response?
I mean, is he trying to distract from something too?
Speaker 3 (04:37):
Yeah, Look, I think I think it shows the sort
of labor issue, which is how do you be a
centrist party? So yeah, I think Craig is absolutely right
about the Greens, particularly the non mainstream aspect. And if
you think about you go back to what was it
late last year in Pea Green and Peak kaharrang Ikata
was saying in the house that most people would feel
(04:59):
more comfor the ball alone with the patch gang member
then police. So I think ten of the Paul's comments
on that spectrum they're actually pretty benign. I think it
does highlight though, an issue where Okay, so Chris Hopkins
is now sort of on song with the government since
and it might present some issues when Craig apparently is
(05:19):
going to run for the Wellington Central seat as predicted
by Audrey Young, Could you clarify that, Craig, I.
Speaker 5 (05:27):
Can clarify Audrey is entitled to her opinion in that space.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
But I'm here, is this an announcement?
Speaker 5 (05:37):
It is definitely not an announcement. What I would say
is that you know, of course, the of course Chris
Hoppins is going to support the police and their space,
and I think that Labor Party's ever not supported the
police in the space and you know, and there were
regular increases to police funding and regular support for the
police are in the last government. So I don't think,
you know, Chris is seeing anything other than he would
(05:58):
have said if he was Prime Minister or if he
was anywhere else. All Right, it's a really unfortunate statement.
It's just being dragged and used for a different purpose.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Now, Craig, we were going to get to this, but
seen as you didn't quite answer the question would you
rule out running for Wellington Central? I mean, there's this
total bogus.
Speaker 5 (06:16):
I'm not ruling running out for anywhere, are ruling in
running from anywhere? There's there's what there's eighteen months to
an election. It's not long now, it's it's five hundred
and eighty one days from memory.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
And if you know it that accurately, you are differently
running are counting.
Speaker 5 (06:35):
I know it that accurately because we have to spend
every day campaigning between now and then in order to
meet show people know what this governments do it.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Come on, all right, let's move on. Judith Collins, she
actually this will be up. You're really too Craig, but
term Judith Collins was on the show tonight saying the
consultant spend is coming right down, but she's saying brace
for impact because we're going to do something about the
number ofblic servants that they're not the teachers and doctors,
but bureaucracy as well.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:06):
Yeah, And look because at the moment it's been a
wound back to the levels that were six months before
the last election. So the public service size at the
moment is about the same time or about the same
levels as when Jacinda Don was Prime Minister. So there's
clearly work to be done. Just to note that eight
hundred pud million dollars that was saved will service a
(07:28):
month and a week of debt servicing for the government debts.
So let's let's say that's that's pretty good going.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
God, that's a lot of money, isn't it. And I
mean it's not just our government to be fair. Governments
all over the world post COVID are dealing with a
huge increase in servicing costs because of the money that
we've borrowed. But that is something to behold. A one
month and one week will get you the eight hundred
million dollars. Craig, what do you make of the Judith
Collins saying she's going to basically do some more cutting.
Speaker 5 (07:58):
Well, it's not surprising because they have and being able
to make any of their accounts add up. You know,
during the election campaign we said that they couldn't afford
the tax promises that they had made at the time,
and lo and behold, they borrowed more money at the
budget in order to pay for the taxes that they'd
promised to deliver. So they're going to keep cutting. The
budget policy statement from the government said that they were
(08:18):
going to keep cutting. The key thing for me is
you say you're going to get rid of eight hundred
million dollars of consultants. Fine, does that mean that you're
expecting public servants to do that work or does that
just mean you're not doing work who's doing the work
of government? Or are you just trying to do less?
And we know there are no shortage of problems, So
the real question is where are the consultants coming from.
(08:39):
Are they coming from the building of units of housing,
of infrastructure the kinds of things we want to see,
or are they coming from somewhere else? And Judith's been
a bit quiet about actually where those consultants are coming
from and importantly what those savings are being used for,
because right now they're being used to deliver the tax
cuts that were delivered at the last budget. They're going
(08:59):
to have to keep cutting in the next budget if
they want to deliver more tax cuts, as their look
they seem to want to do on May twenty second.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Craig, it's a well polished it's a well polished pitch
for the Wellington Central voters. I have to say, well done.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
The question the question with the public services is a
bigger public service, a better public service, and that's the
other question that we need to engage with absolutely.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Tim, thank you very much for coming on. Tim Wilson
Maxim Institute and to you Craig as well Craig A
and E chief economists at the councilor Trade Unions and
of course soon to be laboring peak well labor candidate.
Let's not give them that yet.
Speaker 6 (09:34):
It's found from Grafton Gully. It's also heavy bit easy
on the southwest and southbound between Wolvesey and Massi and
again from but then slower times from Perfanui and northbound
is heavy massas Coronation and it's easing on the Northern
Motorway northbound between Spighetty junction and tristram av Andy Harward
for times have a traffack.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
If you're driving one of the two hundred thousand light
commercial views.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
For more from Hither Duplicy Alan Drive, listen live to
news talks it'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio
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