March 9, 2025 • 10 mins
Former Minister Andrew Bayly has escaped the trials and tribulations of Parliament for a hike up Nepal's Mt Everest - but is it frowned upon for an MP to take a holiday while the house is sitting?
Also, a new political poll is due out today. What can we expect?
Newstalk ZB political editor Jason Walls joined Nick Mills for the Beehive Buzz.
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Wellington Mornings podcast with Nick Mills
from news Talk.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Said b.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Direct from news Talk, said be's team at parliaments the
bee Hive buzz.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
As we go to the Beehive, we have news Talk,
said be's political editor. Jason Wall's online morning Jayson.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Oh, good morning Nick. How are you you'd.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Love this text? Right? Can I read this text to you?
Speaker 1 (00:32):
Go on?
Speaker 3 (00:32):
Yeah, yea, absolutely, I love Jason.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
He's the only one that talks any sense from Jill.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Oh, well, it might be Jill. I think that's a
pseudonym that my mum uses when she texts in the show.
So thank you very much Jill for that.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
It's not your mum, and take the compliment. We know
it's not your mom. She doesn't listen to Neuce talks
be she listens to something else.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Duck.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Anyway, a poll coming out today, what are you expecting now?
Can I just add a little blind to that?
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Right?
Speaker 2 (01:05):
I think of the polls show Christopher Luxon popularity dropping again,
I think they'd be even more concern than.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
There is now. Yeah, I mean it would be a
concern for the Prime Minister if he saw his popularity
dropping a little bit more more concern would be if
he saw the party support dropping, because we elect parties,
not presidents over here, so the personal popularity of a
prime minister, while is an important sort of bell weather
for where the party is at, it's not the be
(01:34):
all end all of where they are politically. But we
saw in the last taxpayer union funded Courier poll that
the NATS were about thirty two percent and they were
just ahead of Labor which is on thirty one point three,
so there was only about zero point six percent between them.
The NATS had gone up by about two point three
percentage points, so they were doing better. Remember, the Labor
(01:57):
Party had leap frogged the Nats in the poll previous
to that, So keep an eye on where the Nats
are headed and also Act as well. The school issues
that we've seen over the next couple of days will
be one of the main drivers of this poll. I
think either it will be and we'll see some big
movements between the Nats and Act Party, or there won't
(02:17):
be any movement at all and people will just look
at this and just be like, Okay, we've heard about this,
we don't really care anymore. So we'll have to see
where the pole is sitting on those ones. The Labor
Party over the weekend announced their refreshed lineup going into
twenty twenty six. I just don't think that that's enough
to move the dial from the Labor at this stage,
so we'll be keeping a close eye on it. Of course,
there's the New Zealand First and Tea Party Marti, which
(02:39):
are actually kind of around about the similar levels of support.
The last poll had Tea Party Marty at four point
four and New Zealand First on six point four, so
there's a little bit between them, but not as much
as Winston would be liking.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Jason, I don't think that the X supporters are going
to give a damn a retzas about the school lunches.
I don't think that's going to think their popy. In fact,
that it could grow their popularity of the track that
they're actually doing it. As cut Throats said, I think
the you're missing the point a little bit.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Now.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
I'm not trying to tell you your job, because you're
the best in the world at what you do. But
I think that's the popularity of the Prime Minister that
that everyone gives a damn abount. I mean when I'm
walking down the street. That's all people can talk to
me about.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Yeah, I mean that's why I say that it's a
bit of a bell weather for where the party vote
is at. And you can't really have a very very
unpopular prime minister and a popular party vote. You know,
those two things, as you say, do very much correspond together.
But you know, at the same time, we've seen Christopher Latson,
he has been between twenty and twenty five preferred prime
minister and he hasn't really seen any higher than that.
(03:43):
And National's vote has been relatively sticking around at least
the early thirties to the mid thirties. So there is
a correspondence, but it's not the biggest thing when it
comes to the vote. And I think that, you know,
we'll see what the school lunch is where things hat
are at. And I do agree with you around the
Act Pardy, I mean, they'll just look at this and
just say, you know, and we've heard from the last
(04:03):
couple of days this line that the government has put out.
They're the Prime Minister, the Finance Minister, David Seymour about
the marl mite sandwiches of the apple and basically the
idea behind that is to just change the narrative a
bit and say that parents are the ones responsible for
bringing it food to school for their kids, not the state.
And we're just a bit of a backup. And so
it'd be interesting on these numbers to see if that
(04:24):
line has actually moved the dial.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Now, you see, I'm also really concerned because I look
at things a little bit differently than what most people do.
Is why, because I'm a businessman, right, why would Winston
Peters not even phone Christopher Luxan telling me he's about
to figue Phil Goff not even phone them. Now, it's
his decision. I get all that, and he's got control
(04:47):
over it. But does that say there's a breakdown in communication?
Does that actually tell us he's an issue?
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Well, I mean I do have a little bit of
sympathy for the two leaders on this one, because we
do know that their officers told each other. So it
didn't happen in a complete vacuum. Phil Golf that the
Prime Minister's office wasn't like what the heck happened. They
were told ahead of time. It was sort of a
chief of staff chief of staff sort of conversation, which
is usual for things down here. What isn't usual is
when Winston Peters said, I made him the prime Minister.
(05:15):
And yes it's true, but it's not the sort of
thing that you say in front of a press pack,
because that is going to be the thing that people
prance leap upon when they're doing their commentary and they're
doing their articles, because it sounds like it's pretty undermining,
no matter what the Prime Minister says about it, and
he says that he's not quite bothered. In fact, he said, well,
I made him foreign minister. So there is a little
(05:36):
bit of a tip for tat going on there. But
it just I don't think from Winston's perspective, it was
the best thing for him to say.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
I think he doesn't like being questioned. As soon as
you question him, he goes, he goes whiter than me,
and he gets angry. He does not as Winston Winston
Peters does not like being questioned.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
I can tell you what was somebody that's been questioning
him for about nine years now. I can agree with that.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yeah, So why isn't it I mean, you know you
can bring me up and question me, Jose, I'd always
answer you anyway. What the Hick's going on with then sorry,
tell me who that polls? Who's that poll by before
we move on to the next object.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
It's a career pole funded by Taxpayers Union, so that
should be out within the next couple of hours according
to Jordan Williams, who's me tweeting about it.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
And that's real. That's a real one. That's like one
that people take notice of, and that's real.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
I mean, what's happened to within the last couple of
years is we're seeing a downfall of public polling from
the mainstream media outlets such as news Hub did one
and one News does one very sporadically. The Courier Pole,
which is funded by the tax Payer Union, comes out
every month and it's one that we put a lot
of stock into because it's quite a credible poll. So
now it is almost our mean bellweather of tracking where
(06:45):
political parties are at.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
That's what's showing our generation gap. That's what I meant
by real, real, real, and my generation is something that
we take seriously and we do. Got anyway, what the
Hicks Andrew Bailey doing, I mean, who does he think
he is.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
When he's a former minister scorned? I mean he's he's
According to The Post, Andrew Advance, who is one of
the best reporters working in the country, now reports that
he was climbing Mount Everest. Or he is climbing Mount Everest,
which you know, it's pretty on brand for someone like
Andrew Bailey. He is quite an adventuress. Like a few
years ago he tracked the movements of Lawrence of Arabia
(07:20):
back in the day. He's gone to the South Pole.
So for him to go off and climb Mount Everest
isn't really that unexpected. It is a bit unexpected because
it's during the house sitting time. Now he hasn't got
portfolios to worry about, per se, so it's not really
letting the ball drop on that one. But still, he's
a minister, or he was a minister. He's a member
of Parliament and you shouldn't really be taking leave when
(07:44):
the house is sitting. I mean, it's okay for things
like if your child has a wedding or the death
and the family and the parliamentary whips keep close note
of that. But what we're seeing is and it's not
so much the NATS. This is one of the isolated
incidents that you'll see a nat away on non official business.
But what we're seeing across the House is more members
(08:05):
actually being away where the house is sitting, I mean
Tee Pati Marti for example. They're not really there all
that often, and we don't actually have an attendance or
role call about how often the MP's are there. But
there's some days where none of them or maybe even
one of them show up to question time. And we
saw Debbie nadi Wa Packers. She was off in Avaratoga
(08:26):
celebrating her and her husband's thirtieth wedding anniversary, which is nice.
They should absolutely do it, but questions have been asked
around if it should be done during sitting time. And
then she showed up at some protests about the Cook
Islands deal with China. So you know, I think Andrew
Bailey is obviously upset. He's obviously sad. And where do
you want to go if you want to get MAXI
(08:47):
amount of maximum amount of distance between you and Chris Luxon,
I'd say Mount Everest is probably a pretty good bet.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Well, they act nice, say Edmund Hillary is he well? Anyway,
we move on. Taught me through the proposed changes very quickly,
so lady got a minute and a half of the
public work things. What does that mean? They mean they
can write the chick and you're just going to take
it or you're going to have a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
To fight it.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Well, well, I mean essentially it's more of a carrot
than has stick. The legislation includes incentive payments grow up
to one hundred and fifty thousand dollars or capped at
fifteen percent of the property value, whichever comes first. If
you're looking at recognition payment, if your house or your
property is on a piece of land that has been
(09:26):
like sort of a national significant road, so if they
want to build a road or something like that, you
can get this nice little check. So it's something that
Chris Bishop, he's been talking about for a while. He's
as basically, as a country, we've accepted too many reasons
to say no, and the result has been a drawn
out legal battle over land acquisitions that have cost time, money,
and livelihood. So hopefully he says, this puts all that
(09:47):
to bed.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
So basically speaking, they're going to give you a bigger
check than they were originally. You know, like if they
said your property's worth a million, they're going to give
you one point three. You take it or leave it.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
If you say yes before the time comes where you
have to go to court or you have to have
the notice period.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
So yeah, it's an insensitive to try and get you
to get out of it quickly.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
It's a big old carrot, a little.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Big old check, buddy, na ain't about the carrot. It
ain't about the check. Show me the money. Always a pleasure.
Great to have you on the show, joining us, as
he does every week when he's available. When he's not
flying around the world with the Prime Minister, he comes
on our show. Sometimes he actually calls us when he
is around the world with the Prime Minister. Jason was
one of the good guys of our industry. He is
(10:32):
News Talks at Beast political editor.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
For more from Wellington Mornings with Nick Mills, listen live
to News Talks There'd Be Wellington from nine am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.
You're listening to the Wellington Mornings podcast with Nick Mills
from news Talk.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Said b.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Direct from news Talk, said be's team at parliaments the
bee Hive buzz.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
As we go to the Beehive, we have news Talk,
said be's political editor. Jason Wall's online morning Jayson.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Oh, good morning Nick. How are you you'd.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Love this text? Right? Can I read this text to you?
Speaker 1 (00:32):
Go on?
Speaker 3 (00:32):
Yeah, yea, absolutely, I love Jason.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
He's the only one that talks any sense from Jill.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Oh, well, it might be Jill. I think that's a
pseudonym that my mum uses when she texts in the show.
So thank you very much Jill for that.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
It's not your mum, and take the compliment. We know
it's not your mom. She doesn't listen to Neuce talks
be she listens to something else.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Duck.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Anyway, a poll coming out today, what are you expecting now?
Can I just add a little blind to that?
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Right?
Speaker 2 (01:05):
I think of the polls show Christopher Luxon popularity dropping again,
I think they'd be even more concern than.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
There is now. Yeah, I mean it would be a
concern for the Prime Minister if he saw his popularity
dropping a little bit more more concern would be if
he saw the party support dropping, because we elect parties,
not presidents over here, so the personal popularity of a
prime minister, while is an important sort of bell weather
for where the party is at, it's not the be
(01:34):
all end all of where they are politically. But we
saw in the last taxpayer union funded Courier poll that
the NATS were about thirty two percent and they were
just ahead of Labor which is on thirty one point three,
so there was only about zero point six percent between them.
The NATS had gone up by about two point three
percentage points, so they were doing better. Remember, the Labor
(01:57):
Party had leap frogged the Nats in the poll previous
to that, So keep an eye on where the Nats
are headed and also Act as well. The school issues
that we've seen over the next couple of days will
be one of the main drivers of this poll. I
think either it will be and we'll see some big
movements between the Nats and Act Party, or there won't
(02:17):
be any movement at all and people will just look
at this and just be like, Okay, we've heard about this,
we don't really care anymore. So we'll have to see
where the pole is sitting on those ones. The Labor
Party over the weekend announced their refreshed lineup going into
twenty twenty six. I just don't think that that's enough
to move the dial from the Labor at this stage,
so we'll be keeping a close eye on it. Of course,
there's the New Zealand First and Tea Party Marti, which
(02:39):
are actually kind of around about the similar levels of support.
The last poll had Tea Party Marty at four point
four and New Zealand First on six point four, so
there's a little bit between them, but not as much
as Winston would be liking.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Jason, I don't think that the X supporters are going
to give a damn a retzas about the school lunches.
I don't think that's going to think their popy. In fact,
that it could grow their popularity of the track that
they're actually doing it. As cut Throats said, I think
the you're missing the point a little bit.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Now.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
I'm not trying to tell you your job, because you're
the best in the world at what you do. But
I think that's the popularity of the Prime Minister that
that everyone gives a damn abount. I mean when I'm
walking down the street. That's all people can talk to
me about.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Yeah, I mean that's why I say that it's a
bit of a bell weather for where the party vote
is at. And you can't really have a very very
unpopular prime minister and a popular party vote. You know,
those two things, as you say, do very much correspond together.
But you know, at the same time, we've seen Christopher Latson,
he has been between twenty and twenty five preferred prime
minister and he hasn't really seen any higher than that.
(03:43):
And National's vote has been relatively sticking around at least
the early thirties to the mid thirties. So there is
a correspondence, but it's not the biggest thing when it
comes to the vote. And I think that, you know,
we'll see what the school lunch is where things hat
are at. And I do agree with you around the
Act Pardy, I mean, they'll just look at this and
just say, you know, and we've heard from the last
(04:03):
couple of days this line that the government has put out.
They're the Prime Minister, the Finance Minister, David Seymour about
the marl mite sandwiches of the apple and basically the
idea behind that is to just change the narrative a
bit and say that parents are the ones responsible for
bringing it food to school for their kids, not the state.
And we're just a bit of a backup. And so
it'd be interesting on these numbers to see if that
(04:24):
line has actually moved the dial.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Now, you see, I'm also really concerned because I look
at things a little bit differently than what most people do.
Is why, because I'm a businessman, right, why would Winston
Peters not even phone Christopher Luxan telling me he's about
to figue Phil Goff not even phone them. Now, it's
his decision. I get all that, and he's got control
(04:47):
over it. But does that say there's a breakdown in communication?
Does that actually tell us he's an issue?
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Well, I mean I do have a little bit of
sympathy for the two leaders on this one, because we
do know that their officers told each other. So it
didn't happen in a complete vacuum. Phil Golf that the
Prime Minister's office wasn't like what the heck happened. They
were told ahead of time. It was sort of a
chief of staff chief of staff sort of conversation, which
is usual for things down here. What isn't usual is
when Winston Peters said, I made him the prime Minister.
(05:15):
And yes it's true, but it's not the sort of
thing that you say in front of a press pack,
because that is going to be the thing that people
prance leap upon when they're doing their commentary and they're
doing their articles, because it sounds like it's pretty undermining,
no matter what the Prime Minister says about it, and
he says that he's not quite bothered. In fact, he said, well,
I made him foreign minister. So there is a little
(05:36):
bit of a tip for tat going on there. But
it just I don't think from Winston's perspective, it was
the best thing for him to say.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
I think he doesn't like being questioned. As soon as
you question him, he goes, he goes whiter than me,
and he gets angry. He does not as Winston Winston
Peters does not like being questioned.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
I can tell you what was somebody that's been questioning
him for about nine years now. I can agree with that.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yeah, So why isn't it I mean, you know you
can bring me up and question me, Jose, I'd always
answer you anyway. What the Hick's going on with then sorry,
tell me who that polls? Who's that poll by before
we move on to the next object.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
It's a career pole funded by Taxpayers Union, so that
should be out within the next couple of hours according
to Jordan Williams, who's me tweeting about it.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
And that's real. That's a real one. That's like one
that people take notice of, and that's real.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:23):
I mean, what's happened to within the last couple of
years is we're seeing a downfall of public polling from
the mainstream media outlets such as news Hub did one
and one News does one very sporadically. The Courier Pole,
which is funded by the tax Payer Union, comes out
every month and it's one that we put a lot
of stock into because it's quite a credible poll. So
now it is almost our mean bellweather of tracking where
(06:45):
political parties are at.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
That's what's showing our generation gap. That's what I meant
by real, real, real, and my generation is something that
we take seriously and we do. Got anyway, what the
Hicks Andrew Bailey doing, I mean, who does he think
he is.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
When he's a former minister scorned? I mean he's he's
According to The Post, Andrew Advance, who is one of
the best reporters working in the country, now reports that
he was climbing Mount Everest. Or he is climbing Mount Everest,
which you know, it's pretty on brand for someone like
Andrew Bailey. He is quite an adventuress. Like a few
years ago he tracked the movements of Lawrence of Arabia
(07:20):
back in the day. He's gone to the South Pole.
So for him to go off and climb Mount Everest
isn't really that unexpected. It is a bit unexpected because
it's during the house sitting time. Now he hasn't got
portfolios to worry about, per se, so it's not really
letting the ball drop on that one. But still, he's
a minister, or he was a minister. He's a member
of Parliament and you shouldn't really be taking leave when
(07:44):
the house is sitting. I mean, it's okay for things
like if your child has a wedding or the death
and the family and the parliamentary whips keep close note
of that. But what we're seeing is and it's not
so much the NATS. This is one of the isolated
incidents that you'll see a nat away on non official business.
But what we're seeing across the House is more members
(08:05):
actually being away where the house is sitting, I mean
Tee Pati Marti for example. They're not really there all
that often, and we don't actually have an attendance or
role call about how often the MP's are there. But
there's some days where none of them or maybe even
one of them show up to question time. And we
saw Debbie nadi Wa Packers. She was off in Avaratoga
(08:26):
celebrating her and her husband's thirtieth wedding anniversary, which is nice.
They should absolutely do it, but questions have been asked
around if it should be done during sitting time. And
then she showed up at some protests about the Cook
Islands deal with China. So you know, I think Andrew
Bailey is obviously upset. He's obviously sad. And where do
you want to go if you want to get MAXI
(08:47):
amount of maximum amount of distance between you and Chris Luxon,
I'd say Mount Everest is probably a pretty good bet.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Well, they act nice, say Edmund Hillary is he well? Anyway,
we move on. Taught me through the proposed changes very quickly,
so lady got a minute and a half of the
public work things. What does that mean? They mean they
can write the chick and you're just going to take
it or you're going to have a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
To fight it.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Well, well, I mean essentially it's more of a carrot
than has stick. The legislation includes incentive payments grow up
to one hundred and fifty thousand dollars or capped at
fifteen percent of the property value, whichever comes first. If
you're looking at recognition payment, if your house or your
property is on a piece of land that has been
(09:26):
like sort of a national significant road, so if they
want to build a road or something like that, you
can get this nice little check. So it's something that
Chris Bishop, he's been talking about for a while. He's
as basically, as a country, we've accepted too many reasons
to say no, and the result has been a drawn
out legal battle over land acquisitions that have cost time, money,
and livelihood. So hopefully he says, this puts all that
(09:47):
to bed.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
So basically speaking, they're going to give you a bigger
check than they were originally. You know, like if they
said your property's worth a million, they're going to give
you one point three. You take it or leave it.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
If you say yes before the time comes where you
have to go to court or you have to have
the notice period.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
So yeah, it's an insensitive to try and get you
to get out of it quickly.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
It's a big old carrot, a little.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
Big old check, buddy, na ain't about the carrot. It
ain't about the check. Show me the money. Always a pleasure.
Great to have you on the show, joining us, as
he does every week when he's available. When he's not
flying around the world with the Prime Minister, he comes
on our show. Sometimes he actually calls us when he
is around the world with the Prime Minister. Jason was
one of the good guys of our industry. He is
(10:32):
News Talks at Beast political editor.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
For more from Wellington Mornings with Nick Mills, listen live
to News Talks There'd Be Wellington from nine am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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