The Mike Hosking Breakfast

Britain’s slow but steady march out of a three-month lockdown remains on track even as coronavirus cases surge elsewhere in Europe, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced Monday, as he confirmed that businesses from barbers to bookstores will be allowed to reopen next week.
Johnson said it’s too soon to decide, however, whether U.K. residents will be able to have summer trips abroad. He confirmed that the government will test out a contentious “vaccine passport” system — a way for people to offer proof they have protection from COVID-19 — as a tool to help travel and large events return safely.
Four weeks after England took its first step out of lockdown by reopening schools, Johnson said Britain’s vaccination program was proceeding well and infections were falling. He said the next step would come as planned on April 12, with the reopening of hairdressers, beauty salons, gyms, nonessential shops and bar and restaurant patios.
“We set out our road map and we’re sticking to it,” Johnson said during a news conference.
But, he added, “We can’t be complacent. We can see the waves of sickness afflicting other countries, and we’ve seen how this story goes.”
A ban on overnight stays away from home in England will also be lifted April 12, and outdoor venues such as zoos and drive-in cinemas can operate again.
Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are following similar but slightly different paths out of lockdown.
Britain has recorded almost 127,000 coronavirus deaths, the highest toll in Europe. But infections and deaths both have fallen sharply during the current lockdown and since the start of a vaccination campaign that has given a first dose to more than 31 million people, or six in 10 adults.
The government aims to give all adults at least one shot of vaccine by July, and hopes that a combination of vaccination and mass testing will allow indoor socializing and large-scale events to return.
It says all adults and children in England will be encouraged to have routine coronavirus tests twice a week as a way to stamp out new outbreaks. The government said free lateral flow tests will be available free starting Friday by mail, from pharmacies and in workplaces.
Lateral flow tests give results in minutes but are less accurate than the PCR swab tests used to officially confirm cases of COVID-19. But the government insists they are reliable and will help find people who contract the virus but don't have symptoms.
Britons are currently banned by law from going on holiday abroad under the extraordinary powers Parliament has given the government to fight the pandemic. The government said Monday it won’t lift the travel ban before May 17 — and maybe later.
“The government hopes people will be able to travel to and from the U.K. to take a summer holiday this year, but it is still too soon to know what is possible,” it said in an official update.
Once travel resumes, Britain will rank countries on a traffic-light system as green, yellow or red based on their level of vaccinations, infections and worrying new virus variants. People arriving from “green” countries will have to be tested but won’t face quarantine.
The government also is testing a system of “COVID-status certification” — often dubbed “vaccine passports” — that would allow people seeking to travel or attend events to show they either have received a coronavirus vaccine, tested negative for the virus, or recently had COVID-19 and therefore have some immunity.
A series of events will start this month, including soccer matches, comedy shows and marathon races. The government said the first events will rely only on testing, “but in later pilots vaccination and acquired immunity are expected to be alternative ways to demonstrate status.”
The issue of vaccine passports has been hotly debated around the world, raising questions about how much governments, employers and venues have a right to know about a...

A West Coast tourism business is eagerly awaiting the opening of a travel bubble with Australia.
The Cabinet is meeting today to sign off a starting date, which Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern will reveal in a press conference this afternoon.
Fox Glacier Guiding chief Rob Jewell told Mike Hosking on Newstalk ZB that pre-Covid, Australians made up about 32 per cent of his business.
"If it's Australians only and obviously they've got nowhere else to go we are certainly hoping we can increase that 32 per cent and it will be a game-changer"
Jewell said it'll be a big boost to business and would help them significantly as they start to rebuild.
The Australian reported this morning that the bubble was expected to begin next Monday, April 12, or the following Monday, April 19, according to the newspaper's federal government and industry sources.
Airlines and airports stressed yesterday that they were ready to go, and Air NZ is planning to operate quarantine-free flights from April 12 from Auckland to Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.
But that date, the Herald has been told, is not necessarily an indication of where Cabinet will land for a starting date, which won't be today but is still expected to be before the end of the month.
Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry tourism chief John Hart told the Australian "the 19th was pretty much definite".
"That's what the airlines have been told and they've already started bookings."

I listened in despair as, yet again, we waded our way through the Easter trading rules. We're a small village run by idiots stuck in a time warp refusing to deal with the modern world.
Led, as it always is, by the unions who every time they open their mouths around Easter, remind us why they are in the perilous state they are.
This year's poster child was a Wanaka supermarket who had the temerity to open on Good Friday. That was against the rules. The rules which we've fiddled with and argued over for decades now. Rules we've tinkered with and messed with to leave us with the mess we have.
In breaking the rules, they will most likely incur a fine. A full $1000. Thus, reminding us what a farce all this is.
Interesting statistic that came out of the weekend's debate, two thirds of us don’t work standard hours. In other words, the majority of us don't work the standard hours. Those are the hours which the Good Friday, Easter Sunday, Christmas Day, ANZAC Day morning nonsense is all based on.
People, quite rightly, raised the issue of days in lieu and time and a half for those who don’t work the Monday-ised holidays therefore get nothing. There are anomalies all over the place. Wanaka is an anomaly, some towns get tourist exemptions, Wanaka doesn’t. Why not?
Because the rules are farcical. The laws don’t relate to the real world and haven't for years, if not decades.
The unions whined, as they always do about people wanting to spend time with their families, as though that’s not possible outside of Good Friday or Easter Sunday, and if Easter is really a big deal to you, take a day or two off.
Unions are an anathema to the modern world. Their view is of the 1970s, if not earlier. The gig economy, part time work, and flexible hours are all completely out of step with their mindset.
That’s before we get to the new Covid world of zoom and working from home.
Wanaka has been whacked by Covid. So, on an Easter weekend when the town swells with visitors, to still sit their arguing we all need to be closed, is an affront and an insult to a region that is on its knees through border closures.
Not all of us hate work, not all of us want maximum return for minimum effort. Some of us like what we do, like working hard, and like getting ahead.
For a lot of us Easter isn't a big deal, nor is Labour Day or Queen's birthday. If it is for you, celebrate it, recognise it, and take a day off for it.
But if it isn't, life goes on.
I hope the Wanaka supermarket, all Wanaka businesses, and all those who opened had the tills ringing.
Sometimes the law is an ass.

So a couple of assumptions about today's travel bubble announcement.
Firstly, they don’t reneg the date is a proper date, as in this week or next week, not November.
And the most important question that sadly, even if it does get asked, won't get properly answered, is what literally has changed in the past few weeks that makes today so magically special, that the bubble could not have been reciprocated ages ago?
Just what is different ?
What is it we can do today, that we couldn’t do yesterday, last Tuesday or the Tuesday before that?
The answer of course is nothing.
Airports and airlines, as they reiterated over the weekend, have been ready for months.
Australia with its opening of the deal last year has been ready for months.
Scott Morrison busted this Govt wide open a few weeks back when he wondered aloud why all his citizens weren't in Queenstown on holiday.
So lets assume some sort of normality resumes today and the poor old tourist industry cut adrift so callously by a Govt hopelessly out of its depth and devoid of any sort of foresight and courage finally gets dragged kicking and screaming to the start line.
I think we can all be grateful that Queensland didn’t extend their lockdown last week, given that most likely would have been the excuse the Aderns and Hipkins would have been desperate for.
But here is the reality, small out breaks will happen, that’s life.
And if we had a system we trusted, we wouldn’t still be dabbling in lockdowns and their ensuing economic damage.
But as we have found out twice so far this year here and once last week in Queensland, a community out break of a handful of cases needs to be seen as a small hiccup to take care of, not a disaster unfolding and to be panicked about.
So today, a day of relief, it's about time.
Will it be good to get on a plane? Yes indeed. Will it be good to have Australian arrivals? Yes it will.
But like so much of this mess, it's been shockingly handled and its appallingly late.
But for today, let's say its better late than never.

A quarantine-free transtasman travel bubble will get the green light today - and may start within two weeks.
The Australian reported this morning that the bubble was expected to begin next Monday, April 12, or the following Monday, April 19, according to the newspaper's federal government and industry sources.
New Zealand's Cabinet is meeting today to sign off a starting date, which Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern will reveal in a press conference this afternoon.
Airlines and airports stressed yesterday that they were ready to go, and Air NZ is planning to operate quarantine-free flights from April 12 from Auckland to Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.
But that date, the Herald has been told, is not necessarily an indication of where Cabinet will land for a starting date, which won't be today but is still expected to be before the end of the month.
Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry tourism chief John Hart told The Australian "the 19th was pretty much definite". "That's what the airlines have been told and they've already started bookings," Hart said.
The New Zealand tourism sector will be hoping it starts in time for the long Anzac holiday weekend, but systems still need to be set up and tested, and the Herald understands there is little appetite to rush that process.
Airlines will need flights for quarantine-free travellers only, who will then need to pass through an airport without mixing with transit passengers or returnees heading for MIQ.
Dedicated airline and airport staff for quarantine-free travel will also need to be kept from mixing with other airline and airport staff.
Today Ardern will stress her "flyer beware" warning because of the possibility of being stranded in Australia at short notice, and without insurance coverage or financial support from the NZ Government.
Flyers will be urged to have a contingency plan, such as money in the bank and a place to stay for potentially a reasonable length of time.
Ardern will also outline scenarios where the bubble might burst, though it will depend on the particular circumstances of any new outbreak, including the number of cases and contacts, or whether the source is linked to MIQ or is unknown.
A contained outbreak in one Australian state will likely see quarantine-free flights to other states remain open, except if people can freely travel in and out of the state where the cases are.
Cabinet may also decide to keep the bubble open for parts of a state where an outbreak has happened, as long as it was contained in a specific place or city.
Kiwis in a part of Australia suffering an outbreak will be told to follow the local public health advice; if that area goes into lockdown, that would also apply to any Kiwis there.
Likewise, any Australians in New Zealand would have to follow the lockdown rules here, if they were in a region that was put into level 3 or 4.
The Government could also direct Kiwis returning from Australia into quarantine or self-isolation at home if, for example, they had been a close contact of a case there.
People on both sides of the Tasman will be encouraged to use the Covid tracer apps in each respective region, though this will not be mandated.
People won't need to be vaccinated for bubble travel.
The bubble will also open the way for Australian PM Scott Morrison to come to New Zealand for the annual transtasman leaders' meeting.
Ardern may be asked about what the Government plans to do with the extra MIQ capacity - up to 1800 rooms a fortnight - though Cabinet is not expected to make decisions about that today.
Australia Trade and Tourism Minister Dan Tehan told the Australian a two-way travel bubble would be "another major step towards further confidence returning to our tourism industry".
Before the pandemic, 7.27 million people travelled between Australia and New Zealand on 47,555 flights each year, making the Tasman one of the...

A climate change group in Britain wants to flip airline loyalty schemes on their head.
It says frequent flyer points should be replaced, with frequent flyer levies. 
New analysis suggests a small group of people do most of the air travel, in most countries.
Alethea Warrington of the UK climate group Possible told Mike Hosking the current global pause in the aviation sector, is an opportunity.
"It's a great moment for people to stop and think about how we approach air travel, once it resumes."
Warrington says even as work practices change with Covid-19, aircraft emissions still need to be reduced.
She says only a small proportion of flights are for business travellers, and flying needs to be more widely discouraged.
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Mike Hosking is joined by Tim Wilson and Kate Hawkesby to wrap the week in news.
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Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says 66,296 doses of the Pfizer vaccine have been administered as of last night.
About 52,183 New Zealanders had received a dose, while 16,483 had received both, Hipkins said at a media update this morning.
For the next couple of months he expected 7000-8000 people to be vaccinated each day.
The Government aimed to ramp up to 50,000-60,000 vaccinations a day, Hipkins said.
Auckland University Professor of Medicine Des Gorman told Mike Hosking it has been a clumsy process so far.
"The people I have talked to say there's about ten people involved in each person getting an injection."
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Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins says 66,296 doses of the Pfizer vaccine have been administered as of last night.
About 52,183 New Zealanders had received a dose, while 16,483 had received both, Hipkins said at a media update this morning.
For the next couple of months he expected 7000-8000 people to be vaccinated each day.
The Government aimed to ramp up to 50,000-60,000 vaccinations a day, Hipkins said.
Auckland University Professor of Medicine Des Gorman told Mike Hosking it has been a clumsy process so far.
"The people I have talked to say there's about ten people involved in each person getting an injection."
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Should we have vehicle specific speed limits, especially for rural roads?
A proposal in Victoria, which the government is apparently considering, is looking at dropping speed limits on country roads and applying a different speed for cars, trucks and motorbikes.
It's in response to the government trying to half road deaths by 2030 after not exceeding the deaths per road target for the last four years.
Road transport forum chief executive Nick Leggett joined Mike Hosking to share his thoughts on the proposal.
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