Cross Party Lines

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines goes live at the Hannah Playhouse in Wellington — sold out in a week — with a very special guest: Tracey Martin, former deputy leader of New Zealand First, former Minister for Seniors and Children, and current CEO of the Aged Care Association.

An episode that moves from the psychodrama of National’s leadership crisis to the slow-motion crisis in aged care &...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines goes live at Q Theatre in Auckland — with a very special guest: the Right Honourable Helen Clark, former Prime Minister, former UNDP Administrator and member of The Elders.

An episode that moves from a government having a terrible week to the West Bank, and doesn’t pull a single punch along the way.

All thanks to Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi Owned Insuranc...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns with an episode that opens on Winston Peters telling a Green MP to go back to his own country and calling China’s leaders liars — and asks why the Prime Minister is applying a different standard to racism than he did to sexism.

Proudly brought to you by Frank Risk Management, the 100% kiwi-owned insurance brokerage. Find out more at frankrisk.co.nz.

In thi...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns to a week that generated more podcast fallout than any episode before it — the Stuart Nash story broke on this show — and moves through Trump’s forced labour tariffs, the Iran quagmire and a parliamentary endgame that Phil and Chris think is being handled badly.

All thanks to our foundational partner, Frank Risk Management - the 100% Kiwi owned insu...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns with a week so packed it barely fits into an hour — Paul Henry joins ACT, Andy Burnham becomes Britain’s fourth Prime Minister in five years, Farage faces a comedian with a bin on his head, and back home, the government’s RMA and consent law moves prompt one of Chris’s angriest moments yet.

Thanks to Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi Owned ...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines opens with a tribute to Sam Neill — actor, environmentalist and proud New Zealander. Then it’s into a packed episode that moves from Modi’s visit to Pacific power plays, and closes with a verdict on the Roads of National Significance that is not kind.

Thanks to our Foundational Partner, Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this ...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines opens with breaking news — a Chinese missile test heading for the South Pacific — before working through a packed episode that moves from America at 250 to Brexit at 10, and closes with a forensic dissection of New Zealand Firsts increasingly chaotic behaviour inside the coalition.

Thanks to our foundational partner Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi-owned insu...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines goes fully domestic this week — a weekend of wall-to-wall policy announcements gives the panel plenty to work with, a centrist party is suddenly polling close to the threshold, and a government that spent three years going hard on conservation and fisheries has quietly started walking backwards.

All thanks to Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi Owned Insurance Brokera...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns for a policy-heavy episode — a weekend of conference announcements, party platforms and pre-election positioning gives Phil and Chris more material than they can get through in an hour, and they try anyway.

All thanks to Frank Risk Management, our foundational partner and the 100% kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this episode:

* $32 million, nothing to show and...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns for an episode that moves from the Iran peace deal to the election campaign taking shape around them.

And all thanks to our foundational partner, Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi Owned Insurance Brokerage.

In this episode:

* The Iran deal — incomplete, expensive and Trump’s to own — A purported peace deal between the US, Israel and Iran arrived as...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines welcomes Phil back from China with a packed episode that moves from the streets of Beijing to the corridors of Parliament — and closes with a sharp verdict on American politicians who can’t stop telling other countries what to do.

Thanks to our foundational partner, Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this episode:

* Phil’s Chin...

Hosted by Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines welcomes a familiar face from across the Tasman, special guest co-host Annette King — beaming in from Sydney while Phil is in China.

All thanks to our foundational partner, Frank Risk Management. The 100% kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

🎟 Live shows — Auckland 8 August, Wellington 12 August. Podcast listeners get pre-sale access. Head to tapliveevents.com and use code CPL26 (a...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines dive into a budget week episode that is almost entirely domestic: 8,700 public service jobs cut, state house rents going up, culture war bills clogging Parliament, and a defence announcement both men broadly welcome but want to interrogate.

Cross Party Lines is made possible by Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this episode:

* 8,700 jobs &mdash...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns — fresh off the stage at Featherston — for an episode that opens with a tribute to one of New Zealand’s greatest legal minds and moves through a week of elections, populist tremors and an education debate that has been going around in circles since the 1990s.

Thanks to Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this episode:

* ...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, this is a special bonus episode of Cross Party Lines — the live Q&A from the Featherston Booktown Festival, released separately so nothing from that remarkable afternoon gets left on the cutting room floor.

Before the questions, Sam takes the temperature of the 400-strong room with four quick audience polls.

The audience then takes over:

* Could the Opportunity Party break Winston Pe...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines goes live for the first time — recorded on stage at the Featherston Booktown Festival, with Sam Collins moderating one final time before he heads to the campaign trail as Labour’s North Shore candidate.

All thanks to our foundational partner Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this episode:

* Council amalgamation — good idea, te...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns with an episode that moves from a coalition-shaking email leak to the demographic time bomb nobody in government wants to defuse — and closes with a verdict on King Charles III’s Washington masterclass. All thanks to our foundational partner, Frank Risk Management, the 100% Kiwi-owned insurance brokerage.

In this episode:

* The Peters email — deliber...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns with an episode that moves from caucus chaos to media warfare — and lands on the most delicate diplomatic mission of the year: King Charles III heading to Washington to deal with Trump.

Thanks to our foundational partner, Frank Risk Management. The 100% Kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this episode:

* Luxon’s confidence vote — solved or deferred? &m...

Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson, Cross Party Lines returns without Sam for the first time — and the boys don’t miss a beat. In a wide-ranging Anzac week episode, they move from wartime gallantry to National Party treachery, and from All Blacks in Parliament to the politics of immigration dog-whistling. All thanks to our foundational partner Frank Risk Management, the 100% kiwi owned insurance brokerage.

In this e...