Politics Central

President Donald Trump will watch Easter come and go this weekend without the nation "raring to go" as a new debate buds over whether May 1 is now the target date of revival.
Instead of joining packed pews at his usual 11 a.m. ET service at the stone Bethesda-by-the-Sea in Palm Beach, Florida, Trump said this week he'll livestream Easter on a laptop from a megachurch in Dallas. And instead of brunch and an egg hunt on the lawn at Mar-a-Lago, Trump is spending the weekend in Washington anxiously looking ahead to the decision he says is the biggest of his presidency.
In late night meetings inside the White House Roosevelt Room, Trump's advisers this week hashed out what might be necessary to declare the country reopen for business in three weeks' time, according to administration officials. Even as coronavirus cases are expected to peak soon in the United States, Trump has begun looking forward to the day he can tell the American people the worst is over.
If the curve is flattening, sources say Trump has asked in meetings, shouldn't some people be allowed back to work? And if the total number of dead is now projected lower, could a reopening happen sooner?
"We're looking at a date," Trump said Friday. "We hope we're going to be able to fulfill a certain date, but we're not doing anything until we know that this country is going to be healthy."
In public, Trump has been coy about offering a specific date for reopening the country after he was forced to back off his initial Easter timetable. But internally officials are pushing to do so by next month and there are specific discussions underway about May 1, a person familiar with the talks said.
It's a date few health experts, including those advising him at the White House, feel comfortable endorsing outright. Privately they have cautioned that it could take longer to get testing up to speed throughout the country, including not only for the tests that determine if someone has coronavirus but those that determine if someone has had it without knowing. Those health officials are being assured by other aides that testing will be on par within weeks, but doubts remain, people familiar with the talks said.
Aides already predict an eventual clash between those who want the economy reopened and those who caution a more gradual approach.
Trump insisted Friday he would give both sides a hearing, even as he claimed that "staying at home leads to death also."
"I will certainly listen. Two sides, remember. I understand the other side of the argument very well," he said when asked whether he would heed the advice of his health team if they tell him May 1 is unrealistic to reopen the country.
Pressed later what metrics he would use, he simply pointed to his head.
"That's my metrics," he said. "I'm going to have to make a decision and I only hope to God that it's the right decision. But I would say without question it's the biggest decision I've ever had to make."
Everyone bending his ear
As conversations intensify in the White House about how and when to give guidance to reopen the country, the President is talking more and more to friends from Wall Street, hedge fund managers and others in the financial world pressuring him to put a specific date on the calendar for when businesses can reopen -- and to do it soon, according to a person familiar with the President's conversations.
Meanwhile, the President's allies in conservative media have begun waging a campaign to discredit some on his team as narrowly focused on charts and models rather than the economic pain inflicted on millions of Americans.
Rush Limbaugh, the conservative radio host whom Trump awarded a surprise Medal of Freedom during this year's State of the Union address, called Dr. Anthony Fauci -- the nation's top infectious disease expert -- a "Clinton sympathizer" on his program this week. Tucker Carlson, whose intervention in early March helped Trump...

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Act leader David Seymour had criticised the Government for carrying on as though business is usual.
The Government is continuing to advance legislation around vaping, tenancy act, and prisoner voting.
Seymour told The Weekend Collective that these issues have been around for years, and could have waited until after the lockdown.
"I think it would be the right thing for the Government to hit pause." 
He says that the public has been asked to stay home, and it is difficult to comprehend why the Government is carrying on with these issues.

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With warmer weather beckoning, Italians are straining against a strict lockdown to halt the coronavirus that is just now showing signs of ebbing at the end of five weeks of mass isolation.
Italy was the first Western democracy to be hit by the virus, and it has been leading the official global death toll with 19,468 victims through Saturday. Now it is likely to set an example of how to lift broad restrictions that have imposed the harshest peacetime limits on personal freedom and shut down all nonessential industry.
Right now, schools are closed and children are not permitted to play in parks. Walks outdoors are limited to a distance of 200 meters (less than a quarter-mile) and any excursion not strictly a matter of necessity risks hefty fines.
The official line is patience with measures that have shown success in slowing the virus spread, until there is a clear decline in the number of new cases. Still, officials have begun grappling with the question of how to manage social distancing on mass transit, re-open ordinary commerce and relaunch manufacturing without risking another peak.
The so-called Phase II is being described as a cautious reopening, as society continues to live alongside the virus until a vaccine can be developed, perhaps in 12 to 18 months.
"We obviously don't want to delude ourselves that everything will change," Premier Giuseppe Conte told Italians this week.
On Friday, Conte extended the nationwide lockdown through May 3. That includes all nonessential industry, after which, "I hope we can start again with caution and gradually — but restart," he said.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. But for others, especially older adults and people with health problems, it can cause severe symptoms like pneumonia.
A technical committee advising the government is working to expand testing for COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus. to get a better picture of how widespread it is in Italy before measures can be eased. Preparations are also underway to launch a mobile app that will allow people to know if they have been near anyone who is positive, something that is expected to take at least a month.
"With this you can allow people to have more freedom of movement," said Walter Ricciardi, a public health expert and member of the World Health Organization board who is advising the Italian government.
The technology for the app already exists, but authorities were working on technical details on how to deploy it.
Experts in Italy are coordinating with their European partners so the tracking can be applied across borders, which have been de facto closed by the virus. The goal is to establish a common technology, which could help in re-establishing freedom of movement among EU nations.
Using the app would be voluntary for anyone wanting to know whether they have come into contact with an infected person that they would have no other way of identifying. Any contacts would be tested, and if positive treated, according to the WHO initiative: trace, test and treat.
Advocates insist that anonymity would be protected and that no personal data would be at risk, likening the app to other widely used applications like Google Maps or TripAdvisor, which help users identify specific data.
Italy's hardest-hit regions in the north are also floating proposals for immunity certificates based on antibody blood tests, which haven't yet proved reliable. Virus experts caution that such documents are a long way off.
"The blood test only tells us if the person has been in contact with the virus," not if the subject is actually immune, said Andrea Crisanti, an expert at the University of Padova who is helping to coordinate the coronavirus response in the northeastern region of Veneto. Significantly, he said, the tests also don't show whether antibodies are active, their quantity or how long they might last.

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The head of the Taxpayer's Unions has admitted it is embarrassing but necessary that they accepted Government money. 
The lobby group, which is focused on lower taxes and better public spending, has always vowed it would never take taxpayer support.
However, it was revealed last week it had received over $60,000 from the wage subsidy scheme. 
Executive Director Jordan Williams told The Weekend Collective that he never thought they would be in this position.
"Like every not for profit around New Zealand, we're totally reliant on the goodwill of New Zealanders supporting us and donating to our work, and the choice was between laying off staff versus swallowing the principles and saving jobs." 
He says that only 15 per cent of their funding last year came from corporate groups. 
He says that before the wage subsidy was released, they had released a report calling for the government to use taxpayer money to support businesses and frontline workers. 
"This is the rainy day. It is right for the government to be supporting and compensating organisations because of this government's mandated lockdown."

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A National MP on the Epidemic Response Committee wants New Zealand to be tougher at the border.
Mark Mitchell told The Weekend Collective that we still haven't got that right, and it's a big risk to tackling Covid-19. 
He says that 4,000 people arriving since Alert Level 4 have been allowed to quarantine at their own homes, and thinks they should have been better monitored. 
"That should be monitored 24/7 quarantine."
Mitchell says the POlice didn't have the capacity to check each of those plans.

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President Donald Trump warned Saturday that the country could be headed into its "toughest" weeks yet as the coronavirus death toll mounts, but at the same time he expressed growing impatience with social distancing guidelines and said he's eager to get the country reopened and its stalled economy back on track.
"There will be a lot of death, unfortunately," Trump said in a somber start to his daily briefing on the pandemic. "There will be death."
Joining Trump were Vice President Mike Pence, virus task force coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, the U.S. government's foremost infection disease expert. Each stood far apart from one another on the small stage.
Trump added a twist on his familiar push for a drug that hasn't been clearly shown to work to stop the virus — he said he may start taking it as a preventative measure after consulting with his doctor, even though there's no evidence to show it works for that, either.
The president initially had suggested the country could reopen by Easter but pulled back seeing projections of a staggering death toll even if restrictive measures remain in place. But just days after extending tough national guidelines through the end of April, staring down historic levels of unemployment and economic standstill, he was talking about reopening as soon as possible, and speaking Saturday with leaders of professional sports leagues about filling arenas again.
"This country was not designed to be closed," he said. "The cure cannot be worse than the problem."
The number of people infected in the U.S. has exceeded 300,000, with the death toll climbing past 8,100; more than 3,500 of those deaths are in the state of New York. For most people, the virus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, and death.
Much of the country is under orders to stay home, including professional sports leagues that were among the first to clamp down in the pandemic. Trump spoke by phone with top leaders including Roger Goodell of the National Football League and the NBA's Adam Silver, telling them he hoped to get people back in seats as soon as possible.
"I want fans back in the arenas," he said. "Whenever we're ready, as soon as we can."
The virus has decimated the sports world with the National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League suspending their seasons indefinitely and Major League Baseball postponing the start of its season. The NCAA basketball tournament was also canceled; so were college spring sports.
A person with knowledge of the call said some of the commissioners weren't quite as optimistic as Trump because of the concerns raised by public health officials but appreciated the president's desire to give people hope and fans a reason to be optimistic. The person requested anonymity to discuss the private call.
California's Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has three NFL teams in his state, was asked if he thought the NFL season would start on time in September. "I'm not anticipating that happening in this state," he said.
Hard-hit states were seeing cases rise. Trump suggested that some states were asking for more medical supplies than they really needed. He said the goal was to stay several days ahead of critical medical needs in each state.
"The fears of the shortages have led to inflated requests," he said.
Louisiana officials have said New Orleans is on track to run out of ventilators by next week. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose state is at the epicenter of the national pandemic with over 113,700 confirmed cases as of Saturday morning, has pleaded for ventilators for days. New York is poised to get more than 1,100 ventilators from China and Oregon.
Health officials did offer some hope that social distance measures were...

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Until three weeks ago, Auckland bar owner Jane* had never imagined lining up for a benefit.
Covid-19 changed her life quickly. Her landlord increased her rent - before a national rent increase freeze was introduced - then the business closed because of the Government-imposed lockdown. Her income evaporated overnight, and she is now seeking help just to put food on the table.
"I don't even know where to start," she said. "This is so far removed that it's really foreign to me.
"I feel this deep sense of shame. Even though I know it shouldn't be there. There's this stigma and shame attached to the fact that I can't provide for my family or my kids."
Jane worked full-time at the bar, and her husband worked part-time. After it closed, they applied for the Government's wage subsidy. They received $691, just enough to cover the $650 rent at their Avondale home where they live with three children.
They have been forced to apply for a hardship grant from the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) to pay for groceries. The grants are only available to people who have zero cash in their bank account, which Jane expected to be in two or three weeks.
"This is just unforeseeable," she said. "Nobody was prepared for it. We're not. And without some sort of help from Winz we won't get through it."
Her family is among thousands who are now lining up for help from Work and Income because of the Covid-19 outbreak. For many of them, it is their first experience of the welfare system.
"A lot of people that have never had to struggle and never had to learn their rights are going to really struggle at this time," said Chloe Ann-King, a hospitality worker and welfare advocate.
"If you don't know how to navigate Winz already, it is going to be quite tricky."
New applicants were often surprised at how low the payments were, Ann-King said - even after the Government lifted payments by $25 a week this month.
"Some people will be horrified, and say how am I meant to live?"
People who had worked their whole lives in one sector might find themselves obliged to work in a completely new industry - and risk getting their benefit cut if they refused.
"It can be a shock," King said.
UNDER PRESSURE
New Zealand's unemployment rate is expected to rise from 4 per cent in December to as high as double digits - as bad as the Great Depression. That would mean at least 100,000 more people on benefits.
The surge in jobless numbers and people seeking the wage subsidy is already putting MSD under huge pressure.
"I know a lot of people are trying to get hold of us," said Vic Rickard, deputy chief executive of service delivery in a video on the ministry's Facebook page this week. "I'm really sorry it's taken so long to get hold of our lines."
MSD's call centre is getting 20,000 calls a day, twice its usual workload. The average wait time is 34 minutes, though many are waiting up to 90 minutes. Others said they had waited longer.
"Been trying to get through for a week," one person wrote below Rickard's video.
Social Development Minister Carmel Sepuloni said changes were being considered to make it faster and easier to receive financial assistance.
Some obligations, like work seminars, have also been deferred for six months because of the lockdown. A stand-down period for people who have been made redundant has also been removed. As well as a lift to core benefits, winter power subsidies have been doubled.
Welfare advocates believe the public health crisis warrants wholesale changes, starting with a doubling of core benefits. They note that Australia's more conservative government has already doubled baseline payments in response to the economic shock of Covid-19.
Auckland Action Against Poverty co-ordinator Ricardo Menendez said lifting core benefits in New Zealand would reduce the need for beneficiaries to continuously apply for hardship grants.

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From questioning community newspapers decisions to police pulling over drivers, the opposition leader says he’s on the case in his new role.Simon Bridges is chairing the Epidemic Response Committee, which allows the Opposition to scrutinise the Government’s COVID-19 response while Parliament’s not in session during lockdown.He says the Government’s all in this together, but he’ll be asking the questions Kiwis want answered and helping solve problems.Bridges says questions include potential finger print testing, truck drivers not being able to use public toilets and young mums worried their partner can't come to hospital when they give birth.

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The Government is keeping close tabs on the nation's supermarket duopoly through the national lockdown, and ministers will tomorrow discuss a range of topics facing the grocery chains.
Pricing, staffing and stock levels are among issues that will be discussed before Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern gives a more general update on supermarkets, she said at today's daily media briefing.
"It is something that we're keeping a very watchful eye on every element - the amount of stock that people are seeing, the ability of supermarkets to restock, and any pricing issues," she said.
Supermarkets faced unprecedented demand in the lead-up to the lockdown, with record sales as people stocked up before hunkering down for a month.
That's led to claims of some price hikes and Ardern said Commerce Minister Kris Faafoi had been quick to contact supermarket bosses over those accusations.
Last week, Faafoi directed the Commerce Commission to adopt a looser interpretation of competition laws to recognise the national emergency. However, price gouging or hoarding won't be tolerated.
Ministers will also discuss whether to let supermarkets trade through the Good Friday and Easter Sunday holiday – two days on which most retailers are prohibited from opening.
Ardern said the Government was in frequent contact with the chief executives of the supermarket chains and would raise the Easter trading issue with them as well.
A decision would need to be made soon, she said.
"But I would like to talk to the leadership within the chains just because of workforce issues and so on."
Ardern said she was also getting advice from Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Iain Lees-Galloway about reports that some supermarket operators were requiring at-risk staff – those over 70 or with compromised immunity – to take annual and unpaid leave.
Sick leave subsidies have been rolled into the wider wage support package, which can only be accessed by firms hit by Covid-19.
Ardern said that meant supermarkets were in a an unusual position in that they hadn't experienced a downturn from Covid-19, and she was seeking more advice on the matter.
New Zealand registered its first death from the Covid-19 outbreak – a West Coast woman in her seventies with underlying health issues.
There were another 63 confirmed and probable cases, taking the country's total to 514. Of that, there have been 56 recoveries.
Ardern said it was too early to draw any conclusions from the number of new cases so far."We must remember that there is a considerable lag time in any of our results. That's one important thing to keep in mind," she said.
"We all need to be vigilant. No-one can be complacent and no-one's willing to draw any conclusions yet."

Covid19.govt.nz: The Government's official Covid-19 advisory website

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US President Trump tweeted on Saturday night (US time) that he has asked the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention to issue a "strong Travel Advisory" but that a quarantine on the New York region "will not be necessary."
Earlier in the day Trump had said that he might order a quarantine for the area, a possibility that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) called "preposterous".
The decision was made at the recommendation of the White House coronavirus task force and in consultation with the governors of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, Trump said.
He said the travel advisory would be administered by governors "in consultation with the federal government." Full details will be released by the CDC later on Saturday, he added.
New York has become the epicentre of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States, with New York reporting more than 50,000 confirmed coronavirus cases and more than 700 deaths Saturday. New York City alone has seen 200-plus deaths in the last 24 hours, according to local officials.
But Cuomo had questioned the legality of the strict new measure Trump floated to contain the outbreak in the region.
"This would be a declaration of war on states, a federal declaration of war, and it wouldn't just be New York, New Jersey, Connecticut," Cuomo said earlier Saturday. "Next week it would be Louisiana with New Orleans, and the week after that it would be Detroit and Michigan, and it would run across the nation."
Meanwhile, confirmed US coronavirus-related deaths doubled in two days, hitting 2,000 on Saturday evening, based on reporting from state health departments. Also, the United States has gone over 20,000 officially announced new cases in one day for the first time.
It took about a month from the first confirmed death for the United States to record 1,000, but the toll has risen rapidly, and officials say the worst is yet to come. The earliest death was announced in Washington state on February 29.
For the first time, more than 20,000 new infections were announced in a day, pushing the nation's total past 120,000.
• Covid19.govt.nz: The Government's official Covid-19 advisory website
The sharp rise in confirmed cases and fatalities comes as the pandemic's epicentre has shifted to the United States and as health professionals and officials countrywide sound alarms that hospitals are not prepared for an influx of coronavirus patients.
Globally, confirmed cases now exceed 650,000, according to a Johns Hopkins University tracker.

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