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Second show of the year! 😎 Whakarongo mai!

Public consultation on the use of puberty blockers in Aotearoa closes on the 20th January 2025; asking the public if further precautions or restrictions are needed, and what impacts these could have on young people.

Leading transgender health professionals have expressed concern over the government directing the Ministry to consult the public over gender affirming healthcare, questioning the appropriateness of opening consultation on a medical matter that has become highly politicised and subject to misinformation. 

Producer Sofia spoke to President of the Professional Association for Transgender Health Aotearoa (PATHA), Jennifer Shields.

If you want to make a submission, you can email [email protected]

💚 Gentle beginnings lead to less-gentle endings. 

Eccentric Track of the Week: Fairuz - Ma Kedert Neseet

Playlist is also available here for streaming on spotify and updates weekly. (But if you listen and like, please consider supporting on bandcamp / otherwise <3)

See you beautiful creatures next week, thank you always for supporting bFM 💚

As part of its submission on a Local Government New Zealand issues paper exploring electoral reform, Auckland Council has expressed its support for a four-year electoral term. 

In exploring local government reform, the LGNZ paper also looks at public understanding of local government, public awareness of candidates and policies, and voting methods for local elections, raising questions about who’s responsible for improving these areas and what the future of local government voting might look like. 

For the first interview of 2025, producer Sofia spoke to Councillor Julie Fairey about Council’s LGNZ submission as well as Council’s general plans for 2025. 

Featuring an interview with Ash Sales and the Aural Emporium. Whakarongo mai nei!

Featuring: 

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The 95bFM Top Ten counts down the best tunes from the bFM playlist as chosen by you!

Submissions on the controversial Treaty Principles Bill were set to close last week, when on the final few days of submissions the portal to submit suffered technical difficulties. 

Due to this, many people were unable to send in their submissions on time. Parliament made the decision to extend the submission period to make up for the issue. With thousands also handing their submissions in person. 

The bill is estimated to have had more than 300,000 submissions prior to the original deadline, making it the most highly submitted on bill in history. 

For the weekly catchup with the Green Party Evie spoke to Ricardo Menendez March about the submission process. 

They also talked about the contested Regulatory Standards Bill which has also recently come into the spotlight. 

The recent social security amendment bill is an extension of the government’s agenda to cut those on benefits by 50,000. While this may seem like a strategic move by the government, it is important to consider that they are not creating any new jobs and unemployment is at 4.8 percent as of September 2024.

The proposed changes aim to make it harder for those struggling to receive the benefit, additionally introducing 'money management' schemes, which splits the MSD payment onto a card which can only be used at specific locations. These changes are unrealistic, because many people already pay more than half of their income for rent.

Anti-Poverty groups have spoken out about this amendment and are aiming to raise awareness around this. These groups want the government to move away from using sanctions against people who need income support.

Sasha spoke to the Child Poverty Action Group’s Executive Officer, Sarita Divis about the social security bill amendment, and potential consequences for those seeking support.

This week on the Wednesday Wire... 

For our weekly catch up with the Green Party Evie speaks to Ricardo Menendez March about the Treaty Principles Bill submissions and the Regulatory Standards Bill. 

Sasha speaks with Sarita Divis, Executive Officer of the Child Poverty Action Group about the recent social security bill amendment and its implications for New Zealand’s human rights.

And Evie also speaks to  the University of Waikato’s Joe Ulatowski about Meta deciding to ditch its third party fact checkers, and the risk of disinformation on social media as a result. 

Whakarongo mai!