The Mike Hosking Breakfast

A New Zealand company is at the forefront of stem cell research.
There are predictions the global market will reach nearly US$15 billion by next year.
ReGen Cellular musculoskeletal specialist Zaid Matti told Mike Yardley 50 per cent of those who suffer from arthritis are of a working age.
He says stem cells are a good alternative to having an operation, which can keep you away from work for weeks.
"You can actually come in, get your treatment, go back to work. A lot of my patients go back to work the same day."
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A group of congressional Democrats introduced legislation Thursday local time to add four seats to the Supreme Court, a long-shot bid designed to counter the court's rightward tilt during the Trump administration and criticised by Republicans as a potential power grab that would reduce the public's trust in the judiciary.
President Joe Biden last week created a commission to spend the next six months examining the politically incendiary issues of expanding the court and instituting term limits for justices.
The fight over the composition of the nine-member court has become increasingly contentious over the past two decades, with fierce battles over nominees and acrimonious debates about the politicisation of the judicial branch.
But the bill's introduction had an inauspicious start. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said she might not bring it up for a vote if it advanced out of committee and Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, was noncommittal as well.
Democratic lawmakers and groups supporting the court expansion bill gathered on the steps of the Supreme Court to make their case.
"Some people say we're packing the court. We're not packing it. We're unpacking it," said the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep, Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y. He said Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and the GOP had "packed the court over the last couple of years. This is a reaction to that. It's a necessary step in the evolution of the court."
Inside the Capitol, Durbin, made clear that he wanted to wait for the White House's 36-member commission to report its findings before deciding on a course of action.
"I'm not ready to sign on yet," Durbin said. "I think this commission of Biden's is the right move. Let's think this through carefully. This is historic."
Pelosi was even more dismissive. The prospect of an expanded Supreme Court is a campaign issue that Republicans will focus on as they target swing districts in their bid to retake the majority. Even before the bill's introduction, state GOP parties were drawing attention to the effort in an attempt to link vulnerable Democratic members to it.
"I have no plans to bring it to the floor," Pelosi told reporters.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Biden would wait for the commission's work to "play out," before taking a position on the matter.
Republicans quickly jumped in to the debate. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said in a SiriusXM radio interview that no matter what issue comes up this Congress, "this has got to be the most important because, remember, it's taking over an entire branch of government."
McConnell quoted the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who warned before her death that adding justices to the Supreme Court would make it appear partisan and that "nine seems to be a good number."
"But the farthest-left activists aren't interested in the common good. They want power," McConnell said.
Supporters of expanding the court say Republicans gained an unfair advantage by blocking President Barack Obama's 2016 nomination of Merrick Garland, a federal appeals judge at the time who is now Biden's attorney general, under the rationale that it was a presidential election year and the voters should decide. McConnell refused to hold hearings on filling the vacancy after Justice Antonin Scalia's death, even though the November election was months away.
Last year, McConnell and the Republican-controlled Senate confirmed President Donald Trump's nominee, Judge Amy Coney Barrett, to fill Ginsburg's seat just days before the presidential election, securing a likely conservative majority for years to come.
In their news conference on the Supreme Court steps, the authors and co-sponsors of the legislation framed the proposed expansion as a necessary progression to keep up with a growing nation and a growing case...

The cricket and rugby commentator Iain Gallaway, known as the Voice of Carisbrook, has died aged 98
Gallaway provided rugby commentaries for 26 years and cricket for 40, until signing off in 1992.
Gallaway was born in Dunedin in 1922 and educated at Christ's College and Otago University.
He began his working life as a cadet reporter on the Otago Daily Times and always said he really wanted to be a journalist but he switched to law after his service in World War II and became a distinguished lawyer. He was an officer in the Otago and New Zealand Law Societies.
He played three first-class matches for Otago as a right-handed batsman and wicketkeeper from 1946 to 1948.
In 1953 he was invited, at short notice, to become a sports broadcaster, beginning a 40-year commentating career and launching the voice which became synonymous with Dunedin's Carisbrook ground - or the House of Pain as it became known.
He initially made his name commentating cricket, but also covered hundreds of rugby matches.
He said he had seen every test match at Carisbrook since 1930 - bar one.
"I missed the 1999 one. I was President of New Zealand Cricket and I was proudly at Lords in the President's Box watching New Zealand beat England for the first and only time."
Iain Gallaway decided to hang up his microphone in 1992 after the Cricket World Cup, fearing his failing eyesight would lead him to make wrong calls. His last-ever commentary at Carisbrook was the match between New Zealand and India as part of the World Cup competition.
He was devastated by the decision to close down his beloved Carisbrook in 2010, in favour of a new Dunedin stadium. Carisbrook hosted its last rugby test on 22 July 2011.
"I first went there as a 7-year-old in 1930 when I saw my first match there. And I've lived and loved on the ground, it's my second home and to me. It's a great tragedy that we're losing it.
"I love Carisbrook. I think it's just the atmosphere and the fact it was a multi-purpose ground. You used to have the New Zealand Highland Pipe Band championships at Carisbrook and that used to stir my heart. It's just got great tradition," he said.
Among his other roles, Gallaway served as president of New Zealand Cricket for three years, was chairman of the Broadcasting Standards Authority and a member of the Broadcasting Corporation.
He was also deeply involved with the Anglican Church and the Halberg Trust for disabled children.
Gallaway's services to sport and the community were recognised by an MBE in 1978 and a QSO in 1986 marked his services to the Anglican church - he was chancellor of the Dunedin Diocese for 25 years.
In 1991 he was presented with the Mobil Radio Award for his outstanding contributions to radio in New Zealand and in 1999 he was given a Halberg award for services to sport.
He has also been an official patron of the Otago Cricket Association.
His autobiography Not A Cloud In The Sky was published in 1997.

THE BEST BITS IN A SILLIER PACKAGE (from Monday's Mike Hosking Breakfast) We Want to Fly Away/Someone Watched It/Cricket Cancelled/Olympic Condom Questions/Putting the Ham Back Into Burgers

There are fresh warnings that the country could be heading towards another leaky home crisis.
It comes as the shortage of building materials grows - it now includes everything from timber, to paints and ladders.
That means some builders are getting desperate and are getting their hands on any product they can.
It has led to calls to strengthen up our materials certification system - known as CodeMark  - to protect consumers.
NZ Building Industry Federation chief executive Julien Leys told Mike Yardley the voluntary process has been around for some time, and means that any building material products can be certified as meeting the requirements of the New Zealand Building Code.
"The issue is, particularly with the need for new products in the market, it's just way too slow."
He says there are four product certification bodies, but two were taken off the scheme, and there is a lack of specialist people to run the process. 
"The process can take up to a year, almost longer, and it's expensive as well. We need to get a much more streamlined certification process in place." 
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Staff at a Sydney quarantine hotel are self-isolating and undergoing testing after three Covid-19 cases first thought to have been acquired overseas were found to have instead been acquired in hotel quarantine.
NSW Health officials said on Sunday the three cases in the one family of returned travellers were previously reported as overseas acquired, but have now been reclassified to locally acquired, following transmission in hotel quarantine.
No local cases were reported in the state overnight, however NSW Health said the three people from the same family are believed to have been infected with COVID-19 by a family of four staying in an adjacent room in the Adina Apartment Hotel Town Hall in Sydney.
The families arrived in Australia on different days, from different countries.
It is believed the family of four were infectious at the Adina hotel between Thursday, April 8 and Sunday, April 11.
The family of four was moved to Specialist Health Accomodation on April 11.
Contact tracers confirmed the two families were diagnosed with the same viral sequence.
It has prompted NSW Health to investigate how the transmission occurred between adjacent rooms while all staff who worked on level 12 have been put in self-isolation and are undergoing testing.
All guests staying on the floor 12 were retested and returned negative results.
Both families have been taken to Special Health Accommodation to be treated until they are no longer infectious.
Meanwhile, there were 550 Covid-19 vaccines administered in New South Wales overnight, bringing the state's total to 173,852.
There are 67 active cases of coronavirus, including one person who who is seriously unwell in the intensive care unit.

A new survey has found that not everyone's jumping on board with modern technology.
Around 700,000 New Zealand adults don't have the vital expertise for modern life, according to a new BNZ digital skills report shows.
That's roughly 20 per cent of adults. 
Digital Inclusion Alliance Aotearoa director Laurence Zwimpfer told Mike Yardley this figure is not new.
"It seems to always hover around that 20 percent of that population who are missing out because the technology keeps changing, so there's always new challenges being added almost every day in the digital world." 
these people don't have the confidence to do things such as online banking or book an Uber.
"It's not the first of these reports but we need to keep it in front of our politicians and all New Zealanders to know there is a big divide out there."
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As the trans-Tasman bubble kicks off, Auckland Airport chief executive Adrian Littlewood said it's an important day that has taken a long time to get to.
"It's great to see Tasman going again, something that used to be about as uneventful as going to the supermarket, so it's certainly an exciting thing to get back to normal."
He said the trans-Tasman bubble has taken longer than anticipated. "I think the path has been a bit unclear as we've all lived through the realities of Covid, and there's no straight-shot out of it either, there's always risks of things changing as we look ahead.
"The tourism industry and all travellers will be waiting to see how people feel about travelling again internationally, but I think it will gradually come back."
Littlewood told Newstalk ZB's Mike Yardley there were 32 return flights scheduled today. Last week there were 36 flights to Australia across the entire week.
"We've got a range of ports across Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, as well as Gold Coast coming in. Later this week we'll have Hobart for the first time. So all up, nine ports across Australia."
Littlewood said Australia was Auckland Airport's biggest market and the Tasman connection was critical to the bottom line.
"It's major for us, and for the tourism industry. Trans-Tasman was about 40 percent of our international business, so to get that back really is the next step in the slow recovery of our business."
Duty free shops would slowly be reopening at the terminal, along with food and beverage outlets, but Littlewood said the others will take time as the passenger market recovers.
"You've got to remember these shops have been shut for over a year, they've de-stocked, they've let staff go, so to bring that back does take some time."
He said discussions about a travel bubble with the Cook Islands were ongoing, with many touting "summer in May" as a target date, but that was a decision for the Government.
Littlewood says he's completely confident in the airport's ability to accommodate quarantine-free travel, with multiple checks and audits from the organisations involved, but said there may be some bumps along the way.
"We're bringing a lot of staff back in and they'll have to get used to the new covid routines at the airport if they haven't been around for a year or so."

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison is urgently asking medical experts to formulate a plan on how vaccinated Aussies can travel overseas and skip hotel quarantine upon return.
The PM said the country’s “main goal” was vaccinating the most vulnerable parts of the population, but said an international travel plan was “what I’d like to see happen next”.
“This is what I’ve tasked the medical experts with, is ensuring that we can know when an Australian is vaccinated here with their two doses, is able to travel overseas and return without having to go through hotel quarantine,” he told 6PR Perth Radio.
“I think we’re still some time away from that. The states, at this stage, I’m sure wouldn’t be agreeing to relaxing those hotel quarantine arrangements for those circumstances at this point in time.
“But what we need to know from the health advisers is what does make that safe and what does make that possible.”
Mr Morrison warned reopening the international borders now could result in more than 1000 cases of coronavirus a week.
“Vaccinations are not a silver bullet. We’ve never said they are,” he said.
“Australians have become very used to the fact … of having zero case numbers and zero community transmission.
“I don’t think Australians … would welcome restrictions and closures and borders shutting and all of those things, again, out of states concerned about the rising numbers of case numbers.
“So everyone needs to get on the same page with that. And so they’re the important threshold issues we’ve got to work together through as a national cabinet.
“And that’s why I’m calling them back together again to work on that same operational tempo that we were during the pandemic, because these are the challenges we need to solve together now.”
Minister for Defence Peter Dutton backed the PM’s plan and said he hoped for a home quarantine setup for vaccinated Aussie travellers “soon rather than later”.
“As quickly as we can and as the Prime Minister pointed out, if people have had properly recognised the vaccine, if they are living in London or the United States or anywhere else in the world and they want to come back home and see family or see their grandparents, bring their newborn grandchild back home, then we want to facilitate that as quickly as possible,” he told the Today show on Friday morning.
“But we just need to do it in a safe way.
“And if we are having a situation where people are coming back and bringing the virus back with them, then we will see community transmission - So again it is trying to get that balance right.
“But if we can get people away from hotel quarantine into home quarantine and people do the right thing, then you can scale up the numbers obviously much more significantly than if we are just relying on hotels.”
But Federal Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese said Australians should have been home already.
“There are more than 40,000 Australians still stranded overseas,” Mr Albanese said.
“Scott Morrison said that Australians would be home by Christmas; that‘s Christmas 2020.”
Australia slammed its borders shut in March last year when the global coronavirus pandemic first began to unravel.
Just two weeks ago, Australia entered into an agreement with New Zealand allowing travel between the two countries.
Mr Morrison hinted at a travel bubble agreement with more countries ahead of the trans-Tasman travel arrangement’s official start on April 19.
“I think I can see a future where we could be in a similar arrangement with Singapore and we’re working on that now,” he said.
“Other Pacific countries, that’s possible. But when you’re talking about countries, you know, for example, like Indonesia or India or Papua New Guinea or countries where we know that the virus is in a very strong form, including in Europe and even still the United Kingdom, the United States. Australians, I don’t think would...

The fashion world looks to be entering into the early stages of a new denim cycle.
The boss of Levi's Jeans says they're noticing more consumers opting for loose-fitting denim over the tighter fit.
Mike Hosking is joined by Tim Wilson and Kate Hawkesby to discuss the changing world of fashion, along with wrapping the rest of the week in news. 
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