Kia ora everyone and welcome to episode 12 of Rice Speir Radio. For anyone new to the show, we are a Podcast that focuses on all things local government. I’m your host, Nathan Speir, and I am Managing Partner of Rice Speir, a dedicated local government law firm helping councils solve problems all over New Zealand. It's been a big month at Rice Speir, I am very excited to announce that from May Rice Speir will have a physical presence in Hawke’s Bay – an area that we love and do a lot of our work in. We have signed on to a shared space called the Hive and our plan is to have a Rice Speir lawyer in Hawke’s Bay every Wednesday, making us even more accessible to Central Hawke’s Bay, Hastings District, and Napier City Councils. This is the start of something special for Rice Speir in that beautiful part of New Zealand. We have also decided to move on from the offices that we’ve held in Auckland for the past 6 years and have signed on for a new adventure at the Citibank Building in Customs Street from 1 July. On top of all that exciting news, we held an incredible training workshop for the Mainland Cluster of Councils in April – covering a range of hot topics in the building space, from Tiny Homes and Natural Hazards, to notices to fix, swimming pool barriers and preparing a prosecution file. It was all topped off with a hilarious mock trial, where Robert Wright (or should I say Justice Buster) delivered an Oscar-winning performance as Judge of the proceeding. A huge thanks goes out to all those who attended the workshop, we had more than 60 attend from all over the South Island and Selwyn District Council in particular did a stellar job hosting. Thanks also to our team – Fiona, Simon, Laura and Amy for pulling the workshop together. So, in this episode, Helen Rice sits down with Geoff Sharp, a mediator that will be familiar to many of our listeners for a fascinating discussion about mediating in a covid world and plenty off the ball stuff too. Don’t forget to like and subscribe to the podcast, it really does help us get the word out. And a final big thank you to our sponsor Maynard Marks. Without further ado, here’s Helen and Geoff!