May 12, 2025 • 10 mins
Tonight on The Huddle, Trish Sherson from Sherson Willis PR and Josie Pagani from Child Fund joined in on a discussion about the following issues of the day - and more!
Andrea Vance's piece in the Sunday Star Times calling female Government MPs the c-word and accusing Nicola Willis of 'girl math' has copped some backlash. What did we think when we read that?
Erica Stanford has been brought on board to figure out how to ban under-16s from social media - what do we make of this?
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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 Southurby's International Realty Find You're.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
One of a kind, Laura. Can you get Ken Turner on? Please? Yeah?
Who's Ken Turner? Is he a counselor?
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Is he?
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Okay? Ken, you're coming on the show mate. You've just
you've been dumped in it by the mayor. The huddle
is with me right now. We've got Trish Shurson Shirson,
Willis pr and Joseph Gani, CEO of child Fun. Hello,
you too, Cureder Hello? Well, what a time have you
ever heard of Ken Turner? There? Trish?
Speaker 3 (00:28):
I just think Ken has just booked a one way
ticket to Brisbane.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Last heard of Ken. Ken's very important. Now he's going
to hide him.
Speaker 4 (00:38):
He's got a bit on apparently.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Yeah. By the sounds of things, jeez, the mayor is busy, Trish,
because he's going to the St Mary's Bay meeting? Did
you I did?
Speaker 4 (00:47):
I did hear that? I did hear that? Because it
wasn't the most energized interview I've heard with the mayor.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
He does always sound like he's about to get really
grumpy with you and tell you to go and do
the dishes.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
I don't Fee. It's not very often we somebody in
public office sort of you know, making a big deal
about the fact that they don't know something. You know,
normally they you know, Well that's his.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Appeal, actually, isn't it that he kind of, you know,
honestly says well, I don't care.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
How that thing happening in Auckland. Don't care. Okay, well,
this is novel. I really appreciate that. Okay, Josie, what
did you make of Andrea Vance calling nikolauillis the sea word?
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
I mean, Andrew Vance is one of our best columnists
in the country. In fact, I think I came runner
up to her as best columnists of the year one
time and announced that to Keir Starmer and the Prime
Minister of Norway when I was doing a column with
them where I had to introduce myself and I said,
I'm New Zealand's second best columnist. So yeah, she's bloody good.
This is weird. I mean, look, the principle of using
(01:44):
gender based language as not a good thing has to
apply both to women and the left and women of
the right right, So it's not okay. When Mark Richardson
suddenly asked New Prime Minister to Sindra A Durn that
you can take time off for a baby when you
don't a man of a similar age if he's going
to take time off your baby, right, So, if it's
not okay for that, it's also not okay for this.
(02:06):
And I think it's a weird thing that Andrew has
done because I think she's making a really important point,
the point she's trying to make.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
No, don't tell me the points she's trying to make,
because I didn't she's trying to make because I got
to the seawood.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
That's the whole point, right, is that now we're talking
about the sea word and whether spreading someone girl Boss
and girl mass is a bit anti woman. But what
I don't I'm not going to rehearse the argument that
because I think she is making a good point about
the getting rid of the gender pay legislation. But she's trying.
What she was trying to do, I think was to
say that when when high paid woman I woman, politicians
(02:40):
attack low paid woman in low paid jobs, it's nastier
than if men did it. I'm not sure that stacks
up as an argument. I think when when womensogynistic, I
think it's just a woman hating a war. That's why
she was trying to position it like that to say, oh,
these high paid female politicians are takeing low paid woman
(03:01):
pay equity. I get the point she's making. I actually
agree with her, but I don't think you get away
with making that and saying, oh, that's not gender based.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yeah, so it's difficult. All right, listen, Trisha, I want
your take, but we'll get it after the break.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
The huddle with New Zealand Southeby's International Realty achieve extraordinary
results with unparallel.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Reach, Trishason, Josepegganni our hudle this evening, right, Trish, what
do you think?
Speaker 4 (03:23):
Well? Go ahead to look back. The only other example
I can find in mainstream media that comes close to
this was way back in twenty eleven where there was
an incident and it was actually an emails between columnist
then for the Sunday Star Time, Steve Braunius, and he
was corresponding over email to a female police prosecutor who
had emailed him about his column, and in his response
(03:47):
he used the C word and that led ultimately to
the termination of his column in the Sunday Star Times. Now,
I am not at all suggesting that in this case.
I'm just saying this is how bar I had to
look back to find something similar. I agree with all
the points you've made, and in particular, I think it's
(04:08):
just that the shock value outweighs and dilutes the message
that was you know that Andrea was trying to put
forward in the article. So it is. It is unprecedented
in my view, to have been put in this way,
and I think what it does also do is call
into question really where the bar is shifting between you know,
(04:32):
what you might expect an online comment, which is pretty loose,
and what you would expect in the mainstream media, and
I would expect them to uphold higher standards. I think
the other thing that I had a look at that's
just interesting. On Saturday I read the column on this
from Thomas Coglin in The Herald and it was a
(04:53):
very useful piece in my view of political analysis on this.
It was uner motive and essentially it pulled out a
couple of interesting points, one of which was the fact
that a male Prime minister had left the House on Wednesday,
didn't take questions on this in the House, and in
fact had left his female deputy leader and Nicola Willis
(05:15):
not only to front on this, but then Willis popped
up in a surprise move and gave a speech on
the bill during I think its third reading, and his
analysis on that was about the fact that this has
been very difficult for National Party backbenches. It was landed
on them under urgency and they're the ones facing their
(05:35):
heat in the electrics. So when I weigh up the
two as an interested person interested in politics, I got
more out of Thomas's piece than I did out of Andrews,
because when I read the sea word, and I have
to admit I don't live a life of blameless excellence.
I do use the sea word from time to time,
but that stopped me from really getting to the.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
I, which is that my eyes did those little emoji
circle things and then I just kind of went across.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
So we're not going about the issue, you know, which
is that you're absolutely right, Trish. The problem here is
that it's been rushed through an urgency without any kind
of consultation or regulatory analysis because they've got to get
the billions of dollars out of the budget before Budget
Day next week. That's what's really happened, and so you know,
Andrew is making absolutely the right point. But we're all
(06:24):
talking about girl Boss and girl Maths and you know
which is patronizing.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Really, Look, do you know what I think the worst
bit about it is that we all complain about how
social media is just so icky. It's just not nice
to see our newspapers go into the same place, right,
I just want us to be a little bit more
grown up really quickly. What did you think, Josie of
the social media thing? Did that launched that charity on Sunday?
Did that go some way to explaining why National had
(06:50):
had announced that really weird little members bill earlier in
the week.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
And I heard Erica Stamford say, no, no, we've got it.
We had an emotion, and I probably did, because you
think about it, they went into the election campaign.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
And then they announced it because they knew the thing
was coming. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I think that. I think banning stuff is easy. And
we used to say that about labor government banning things
that don't like, and I think the same is true here.
It feels like a quick fix and you go, yep,
I'm a parent, I want to ban it. But actually
the bigger problem is social media generally, right, And there's
a lot of things you can do about social media.
You can remove anonymity for a start. You have to
(07:26):
be a real person to register. Then you can be
you know, you know, have a handle of girl Boss
if you want. But you but you've got to prove
you're a real person. And I think that that's regardless
of age. Actually, So there's a whole bunch of things
that we can do to make for everyone, to make
it better for everybody. Yeah, I mean, I just think
you know, if you're trying to go ban it, you're
going to ban Spotify.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
Do you have a problem with the ban on kids
under eighteen smoking SIGI?
Speaker 3 (07:51):
So smoking cigarettes?
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (07:53):
But that But are you going to say, then, Heather,
that YouTube, Spotify where kids are sharing playlists, YouTube whether
actually learning a lot of stuff, and YouTube manages not
to do the All.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Of these are social media. You have to be clear
about what a social media perform.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
So that's what you've got to do. Cigarettes, right, that's
the number of it. Yeah, because if you're if you're
defining social.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Media, is define social media. Jonathan Haate has defined social
media in his book.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Yea But but Does it also include Spotify? Does it YouTube?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
No? I don't think it includes YouTube.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
Yes, So that's what you have to clarify first. That's
I think the point David Seymour was trying to make.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Thank God for interpreting that robot to me.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
I think that if you look at political bands, often
they are thrown up as great headlines. As Josie said,
think of the oil and gas band, think of the
foreign home by a band. They're thrown up as great headlines.
But in this instance, I do think that Seymour has
(08:52):
a point about legislation that is not properly where their
problem statement is not properly defined, and that means that
the solution is not members bill.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
The members bill is crappy, but that doesn't mean that
the idea is crappy. Does it true?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
No? No, and I And that's exactly my point. So
I think, you know, when the members bill popped up
on Wednesday, I actually thought that it was a little
bit disingenuous of Luxen and the government making a big
deal of it because it's a member's bill. It was
in the hat. Who knew if anything was going to happen.
If they are really serious about this there is a
(09:27):
huge amount of work to get this done and make
sure it's effective.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
You have to be so fast, I know.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Can I make one real question, Yeah, that social media
is protected by a thing called Section two thirty protection.
Banks are protected by the same thing. I they're not
responsible for how the money was acquired. That's in their
bank vaults. Same with social media. They're not legally responsible
if you do harmful contents. On the point is maybe
we need to remove that protection.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
I love that. Thank you guys, appreciate it. That's hort
all this evening.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
For more from Heather duplessy Ellen Drive, listen live to
news talks it'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
The huddle with New Zealand Southurby's International Realty Find You're.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
One of a kind, Laura. Can you get Ken Turner on? Please? Yeah?
Who's Ken Turner? Is he a counselor?
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Is he?
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Okay? Ken, you're coming on the show mate. You've just
you've been dumped in it by the mayor. The huddle
is with me right now. We've got Trish Shurson Shirson,
Willis pr and Joseph Gani, CEO of child Fun. Hello,
you too, Cureder Hello? Well, what a time have you
ever heard of Ken Turner? There? Trish?
Speaker 3 (00:28):
I just think Ken has just booked a one way
ticket to Brisbane.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Last heard of Ken. Ken's very important. Now he's going
to hide him.
Speaker 4 (00:38):
He's got a bit on apparently.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Yeah. By the sounds of things, jeez, the mayor is busy, Trish,
because he's going to the St Mary's Bay meeting? Did
you I did?
Speaker 4 (00:47):
I did hear that? I did hear that? Because it
wasn't the most energized interview I've heard with the mayor.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
He does always sound like he's about to get really
grumpy with you and tell you to go and do
the dishes.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
I don't Fee. It's not very often we somebody in
public office sort of you know, making a big deal
about the fact that they don't know something. You know,
normally they you know, Well that's his.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Appeal, actually, isn't it that he kind of, you know,
honestly says well, I don't care.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
How that thing happening in Auckland. Don't care. Okay, well,
this is novel. I really appreciate that. Okay, Josie, what
did you make of Andrea Vance calling nikolauillis the sea word?
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
I mean, Andrew Vance is one of our best columnists
in the country. In fact, I think I came runner
up to her as best columnists of the year one
time and announced that to Keir Starmer and the Prime
Minister of Norway when I was doing a column with
them where I had to introduce myself and I said,
I'm New Zealand's second best columnist. So yeah, she's bloody good.
This is weird. I mean, look, the principle of using
(01:44):
gender based language as not a good thing has to
apply both to women and the left and women of
the right right, So it's not okay. When Mark Richardson
suddenly asked New Prime Minister to Sindra A Durn that
you can take time off for a baby when you
don't a man of a similar age if he's going
to take time off your baby, right, So, if it's
not okay for that, it's also not okay for this.
(02:06):
And I think it's a weird thing that Andrew has
done because I think she's making a really important point,
the point she's trying to make.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
No, don't tell me the points she's trying to make,
because I didn't she's trying to make because I got
to the seawood.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
That's the whole point, right, is that now we're talking
about the sea word and whether spreading someone girl Boss
and girl mass is a bit anti woman. But what
I don't I'm not going to rehearse the argument that
because I think she is making a good point about
the getting rid of the gender pay legislation. But she's trying.
What she was trying to do, I think was to
say that when when high paid woman I woman, politicians
(02:40):
attack low paid woman in low paid jobs, it's nastier
than if men did it. I'm not sure that stacks
up as an argument. I think when when womensogynistic, I
think it's just a woman hating a war. That's why
she was trying to position it like that to say, oh,
these high paid female politicians are takeing low paid woman
(03:01):
pay equity. I get the point she's making. I actually
agree with her, but I don't think you get away
with making that and saying, oh, that's not gender based.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yeah, so it's difficult. All right, listen, Trisha, I want
your take, but we'll get it after the break.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
The huddle with New Zealand Southeby's International Realty achieve extraordinary
results with unparallel.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Reach, Trishason, Josepegganni our hudle this evening, right, Trish, what
do you think?
Speaker 4 (03:23):
Well? Go ahead to look back. The only other example
I can find in mainstream media that comes close to
this was way back in twenty eleven where there was
an incident and it was actually an emails between columnist
then for the Sunday Star Time, Steve Braunius, and he
was corresponding over email to a female police prosecutor who
had emailed him about his column, and in his response
(03:47):
he used the C word and that led ultimately to
the termination of his column in the Sunday Star Times. Now,
I am not at all suggesting that in this case.
I'm just saying this is how bar I had to
look back to find something similar. I agree with all
the points you've made, and in particular, I think it's
(04:08):
just that the shock value outweighs and dilutes the message
that was you know that Andrea was trying to put
forward in the article. So it is. It is unprecedented
in my view, to have been put in this way,
and I think what it does also do is call
into question really where the bar is shifting between you know,
(04:32):
what you might expect an online comment, which is pretty loose,
and what you would expect in the mainstream media, and
I would expect them to uphold higher standards. I think
the other thing that I had a look at that's
just interesting. On Saturday I read the column on this
from Thomas Coglin in The Herald and it was a
(04:53):
very useful piece in my view of political analysis on this.
It was uner motive and essentially it pulled out a
couple of interesting points, one of which was the fact
that a male Prime minister had left the House on Wednesday,
didn't take questions on this in the House, and in
fact had left his female deputy leader and Nicola Willis
(05:15):
not only to front on this, but then Willis popped
up in a surprise move and gave a speech on
the bill during I think its third reading, and his
analysis on that was about the fact that this has
been very difficult for National Party backbenches. It was landed
on them under urgency and they're the ones facing their
(05:35):
heat in the electrics. So when I weigh up the
two as an interested person interested in politics, I got
more out of Thomas's piece than I did out of Andrews,
because when I read the sea word, and I have
to admit I don't live a life of blameless excellence.
I do use the sea word from time to time,
but that stopped me from really getting to the.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
I, which is that my eyes did those little emoji
circle things and then I just kind of went across.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
So we're not going about the issue, you know, which
is that you're absolutely right, Trish. The problem here is
that it's been rushed through an urgency without any kind
of consultation or regulatory analysis because they've got to get
the billions of dollars out of the budget before Budget
Day next week. That's what's really happened, and so you know,
Andrew is making absolutely the right point. But we're all
(06:24):
talking about girl Boss and girl Maths and you know
which is patronizing.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Really, Look, do you know what I think the worst
bit about it is that we all complain about how
social media is just so icky. It's just not nice
to see our newspapers go into the same place, right,
I just want us to be a little bit more
grown up really quickly. What did you think, Josie of
the social media thing? Did that launched that charity on Sunday?
Did that go some way to explaining why National had
(06:50):
had announced that really weird little members bill earlier in
the week.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
And I heard Erica Stamford say, no, no, we've got it.
We had an emotion, and I probably did, because you
think about it, they went into the election campaign.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
And then they announced it because they knew the thing
was coming. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I think that. I think banning stuff is easy. And
we used to say that about labor government banning things
that don't like, and I think the same is true here.
It feels like a quick fix and you go, yep,
I'm a parent, I want to ban it. But actually
the bigger problem is social media generally, right, And there's
a lot of things you can do about social media.
You can remove anonymity for a start. You have to
(07:26):
be a real person to register. Then you can be
you know, you know, have a handle of girl Boss
if you want. But you but you've got to prove
you're a real person. And I think that that's regardless
of age. Actually, So there's a whole bunch of things
that we can do to make for everyone, to make
it better for everybody. Yeah, I mean, I just think
you know, if you're trying to go ban it, you're
going to ban Spotify.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
Do you have a problem with the ban on kids
under eighteen smoking SIGI?
Speaker 3 (07:51):
So smoking cigarettes?
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (07:53):
But that But are you going to say, then, Heather,
that YouTube, Spotify where kids are sharing playlists, YouTube whether
actually learning a lot of stuff, and YouTube manages not
to do the All.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Of these are social media. You have to be clear
about what a social media perform.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
So that's what you've got to do. Cigarettes, right, that's
the number of it. Yeah, because if you're if you're
defining social.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Media, is define social media. Jonathan Haate has defined social
media in his book.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
Yea But but Does it also include Spotify? Does it YouTube?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
No? I don't think it includes YouTube.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
Yes, So that's what you have to clarify first. That's
I think the point David Seymour was trying to make.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Thank God for interpreting that robot to me.
Speaker 4 (08:31):
I think that if you look at political bands, often
they are thrown up as great headlines. As Josie said,
think of the oil and gas band, think of the
foreign home by a band. They're thrown up as great headlines.
But in this instance, I do think that Seymour has
(08:52):
a point about legislation that is not properly where their
problem statement is not properly defined, and that means that
the solution is not members bill.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
The members bill is crappy, but that doesn't mean that
the idea is crappy. Does it true?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
No? No, and I And that's exactly my point. So
I think, you know, when the members bill popped up
on Wednesday, I actually thought that it was a little
bit disingenuous of Luxen and the government making a big
deal of it because it's a member's bill. It was
in the hat. Who knew if anything was going to happen.
If they are really serious about this there is a
(09:27):
huge amount of work to get this done and make
sure it's effective.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
You have to be so fast, I know.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Can I make one real question, Yeah, that social media
is protected by a thing called Section two thirty protection.
Banks are protected by the same thing. I they're not
responsible for how the money was acquired. That's in their
bank vaults. Same with social media. They're not legally responsible
if you do harmful contents. On the point is maybe
we need to remove that protection.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
I love that. Thank you guys, appreciate it. That's hort
all this evening.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
For more from Heather duplessy Ellen Drive, listen live to
news talks it'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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