The Mike Hosking Breakfast

Another bruising Super Rugby Aotearoa season culminates in the final game tomorrow night in Christchurch.
Standing in the way of the crusaders grabbing a fifth consecutive title are the Chiefs, who started the season poorly and then roared back to life, thanks in large part to the clutch boot of Damien McKenzie.
So how does this one play out? Newstalk ZB and Gold rugby commentators Nigel Yalden and Brian Ashby gave Mike Hosking the run-down.
“Clearly they [the Crusaders] go in as favourites with that record.”
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The wool industry is getting a makeover and companies are on board for it.
After a report last year which described the industry's problems as grim amidst a record low price, a new national wool standards programme was developed.
Basically, this programme guarantees high standards across the board for a variety of factors such as traceability, sustainability and animal welfare.
National Council of New Zealand Wool Interests Chairman Craig Smith spoke with Mike Hosking.
“I’m really excited about the future going forward.”
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Redevelopment work is set to start on Auckland's Queen St on Monday, much to the disappointment of one central business group.
The High Court has declined an interim injunction to stop the works, requested by the Save Queen Street Society.
The society believes the 1.1 million dollar makeover to the existing temporary works is unlawful and harmful to businesses.
Heart of the City chief executive Vic Beck told Mike Hosking the court decision is disappointing, but not surprising, and they're going back to court.
“There’s a hearing booked for 20th of July, we certainly hope common sense will prevail and we can actually get an outcome from talking to Auckland council and Transport, that’s certainly the hope and we’ve been trying to do that.”
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New Zealand is pausing its travel bubble with New South Wales, out of an abundance of caution.
Quarantine-free travel from Sydney was paused at midnight, for 48 hours.
Ashley Bloomfield says our Government is waiting for health officials there to work out the "missing link" between Sydney's latest community cases, and a returning traveller from the United States.
The Director General of Health says told Mike Hosking  the two-day pause will be a chance to get more information.
“My advice, on balance, was line call but paused for the next 48 hours while we watch and see what these further results are that come out of Sydney from the further testing they’re doing.”
Air New Zealand is cancelling flights between Sydney and New Zealand until the pause ends.
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The Tourism Minister hopes a 200 million dollar cash injection is enough to get operators through the Covid-19 era.
Stuart Nash is today visiting Queenstown, Arrowtown and Cromwell, a day after making the funding announcement in Christchurch
He says told Mike Hosking these towns, reliant on overseas tourists, are vulnerable.
“If a tourism business falls down in Auckland, it’s not going to bring down the economy and there’s a chance that that operator will get a job elsewhere. But, if a business falls down in Te Anau or Milford or the glaciers then that runs the risk of bringing down the whole community.”
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THE BEST BITS IN A SILLIER PACKAGE (from Friday's Mike Hosking Breakfast) Well, Guess We Know Where the Hosk Stands/Mark the Week/Look Who's Assaulting/Rocket Groupies/Queen Street Buses

It’s been two months since Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern cancelled her weekly slot on the Mike Hosking Breakfast, bringing an end to a 30 year tradition dating back to Paul Holmes and David Lange.
At the time, she said it was so she could reach different audiences on new networks – which ended up mainly being music radio stations.
So the Breakfast team has checked in to see the sorts of topics the PM is talking about now – and if there’s any scrutiny in between asking about TradeMe, being stopped on the street, and her wedding date.
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It’s not often you get to speak to a world champion.
Snooker aficionados will know the name, Mark Selby, who this week won his 20th major ranking title and fourth World Snooker Championship by beating out Shaun Murphy.
It puts him equal fifth for world titles won, and Mark Selby spoke with Mike Hosking out of the UK.
“It’s not really sunk it yet, it probably won’t for a few weeks.”
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A lesson in why it’s wise to see surveys essentially for what they are.
The headline was that we don’t trust our media as much as we did. The research is from the AUT Research Centre for Journalism Media and Democracy, and it found all news brands in the country have been hit in the trust department.
So on the surface you’re supposed to go ‘oooh, that’s a bit of a worry’,
But here’s the thing: when you ask broad questions, you get broad answers.
Asking do you trust the media is like asking do you trust the power industry, do you trust the government, do you trust the police. You can’t answer it properly.
As it stands, I don’t trust the media and I’m in it, but I trust bits and in that is the key.
Trust requires work. The media as a whole in this country is in a parlous and decaying state. Journalism sadly is frequented by too many inexperienced people, naïve people, thick people, and people on band wagons.
Not that that hasn’t always been the case. But the not surprising bit is, like so many industries, media has been hit hard in recent years.
Journalism isn’t what it was, it’s not valued as it has been, it’s not all that well paid, and as a result you end up with a fairly ordinary collective.
But if you want to, there is still plenty of gold left. There is plenty of brain power, experience, insight and cleverness.
You just have to be interested enough to dig for it.
The biggest scam in modern media and this is why the figures have fallen also, is too many still claim to be neutral, still claim that time honoured stance of no fear no favour, when I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt as a 40 year veteran of this game that they’re lying to you.
The last election campaign exposed some shocking bias, dressed up as neutrality.  So in a lot of respects they have no one to blame but themselves
But there is light and hope. New Zealand’s number is 48 – as in 52 percent don’t trust the media. In Australia its 38, in the UK its 28, so it could be a lot worse, and given that, there is hope.
Hope for a few people who need to tidy their act up and turn the tide.
 

As Scotland holds an election Thursday that could be a stepping stone to the breakup of the United Kingdom, the seafood wholesaler has more urgent things on his mind. Britain's exit from the European Union and the coronavirus pandemic has caused economic upheaval, and he says it's not the right time to gamble on independence.
The question of independence overshadows the election for the 129-seat Scottish Parliament. The Scottish National Party, which has led a minority government since 2016, says a big victory will give it the moral right and the political momentum to hold a referendum on whether Scotland should end its three-century union with England.
Scotland voted to remain part of the U.K. in a 2014 independence referendum that was billed at the time as a once-in-a-generation decision. But SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon argues that Brexit has fundamentally changed the situation by dragging Scotland out of the European Union against its will. The U.K. as a whole voted narrowly in 2016 to leave the bloc, but a majority of Scottish voters wanted to remain in the EU.
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