Thomas Coughlan: NZ Herald Political Editor on Sir Bob Jones' passing, politicians' responses

Politicians are among those paying tribute to prominent businessman, author, and former politician Sir Bob Jones.  

The 85-year-old, who launched the New Zealand Party in the 1980s, has died peacefully at his Wellington home.  

Labour Leader Chris Hipkins described him as a colourful character, saying there’s no doubt he impacted the political landscape, while Christopher Luxon described him as a legend, and paid tribute to him as a businessman. 

NZ Herald Political Editor Thomas Coughlan joined Heather du Plessis-Allan to break down the responses to Jones’ death. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thomas Coglan, the Herald's political editors with us Hey, Thomas
Thomas listen, have we had any political reaction to the
news that Sir Bob has passed away?

Speaker 2 (00:07):
Yes? Yes, so. The Prime Minister Christopher Luxon paid tribute
to Jones. He's in Terneden today. Luxon described him as
a as a living legend, which was a bit of
a slight faux power I think on Luckson's part, but
did pay pay tribute to him as a as a
as a businessman and even even Chris Sipkins obviously Jones
and his later later years no fan of of of

(00:30):
the labor government uh in several ways, but described him
as he said there was no doubt that Jones left
an indentation on the political political landscape and described him
as a colorful character, never short of an opinion. And
actually Luckson as well praised, praise the acerbic wit that
Jones had and and and yes he certainly hadn't acerbic wit.
I enjoyed reading his blog for my part.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Did you read no punches pulled?

Speaker 2 (00:54):
I didn't know. I didn't know. I read not the
book I did that. I think that was also the name. Yeah,
are you reading this, Thomas, it was a while ago.
I don't think it's been updated very recently as well.
I started, this is the thing.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
This is what shocks me is I went to have
a look at it today and the most recent posting
was something like mid April, so recently.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yeah, as recently as.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
About two and a half weeks ago. He was still
And the latest one which tickled me, pink was the
working from home rackets by public servants. I thought, I've
got hive mind with sir Bob. I agree with him entirely.
Now Chris Hopkins doesn't want to have the sea beard mining.
What's going on here?

Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah? Interesting this one. I mean labors. Labor's in a
bit of a bind on some of these fast track issues.
Obviously one of these, one of the fast track issues
is a sea bed mining proposal. It's in a bind
because you've they have big spending ambitions, big economic growth ambitions,
and eventually the money has to come from somewhere. Sea
bead mining is one of these areas where there could

(01:51):
be could be a lot of benefit and it's the
New Zealand. But obviously Labour's environmental kind of base as
very opposed to it. Greenpeace was to get Chris Sipkins
and Labor to take a position on it, and they
did that today with with Hepkins saying I think it
actually a New Plymouth that that label was against it.
It's an interesting one obviously New Plymouth. I think for

(02:13):
maybe ten or fifteen years, New Plymouth had one of
the highest regional GDPs in New Zealand per capita because
of the oil and gas industry and it was very,
very prosperous thanks to that, and obviously has had an
impact with the oil and Gas Exploration Band that they
did last time they were in government. Labor does risk

(02:34):
making that mistake again if it says no to all
of these environmentally you know, admittedly you know, not not
environmentally great projects, but they are they do bring a
lot of wealth creation and a lot of jobs to
regional New Zealand. So they're definitely going to bind there.
It will be interesting to see whether there's any blowback
from this decision.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
Is the point of this basically to scare away the investment?

Speaker 2 (02:57):
I mean, I wouldn't there is, I think I'm not.
I couldn't speak for Labor on that. I do remember
the Greens have said and the Malori Party. You've said
that fast track projects that have gone through the fast
track scheme if if they do not agree with the
way that they have been fast tracked, if they do

(03:18):
not agree with the decision, then they could they could
use their own sort of anti fast track to revoke
those consents via parliament, and that obviously would that would
scare away investment because if you're an investor wanting to
put money somewhere and an alternative government is sitting in
Parliament saying well, look, if you get your consents, we're
just going to pass the bill and get rid of them.
Then you're not Then you're not going to do it,
are you. I'm not sure about labor, but certainly the

(03:41):
Marori Party and the Greens have have raised the specter
of this.

Speaker 1 (03:44):
So making it hard to invest in this country. Hey, Thomas,
thank you very much. Well, we'll read the political week
that was with you about called past six. Thomas Coglan,
the Herald's political editor. For more from Hither Duplessy Alan Drive,
listen live to news talks. It'd be from four pm weekdays,
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