The Mike Hosking Breakfast

James Cromwell has stood Hollywood’s test of time.
He’s remembered for his starring role in 1995’s Babe which earned him an Oscar nomination.
The 81-year-old star also featured in other massive films including The Green Mile, Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom, L.A. Confidential, and The Queen.
In 2012 he won his first Emmy Award for his work in American Horror Story: Asylum in 2012.
Cromwell joined Mike Hosking to discuss his career and new film Never Too Late, which comes out in cinemas on February 18.
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A call for more rights for victims of criminals found not guilty by way of insanity.
Victim support has made a submission on the rights for victims of insane offenders bill.
The bill passed its first reading last year and would remove the phrase not guilty from insanity verdicts and would let victims know when a patient has unescorted community leave.
Victim support spokesperson Patrina Hargrave told Mike Hosking verdicts like this are common here in New Zealand. 
"New Zealand had 40 cases of people being acquitted on account of insanity in 2019, and an annual average of 33 over the last 5 years." 
Hargrave compared New Zealand's statistics with Australia. 
"New South Wales had 24 over the last 5 years on average, and they have far more rights for their victims of insane offenders than we do." 
She told Mike Hosking victims of insane offenders are invisible. 
"Because even though it is proven that a defendant was responsible for the offending act, because they were legally insane, the victim is treated in the eyes of the law as if the crime never occurred." 
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Contact Energy has kicked off a $400 million equity raise to build a new 152 megawatt geothermal power station at Tauhara, near Taupō.
The company said it planned to raise $325m from an underwritten institutional placement at $7 a share - a 2.8 per cent discount to Friday's closing price - and a $75 million non-underwritten retail offer.
Trade in the company's shares have been put into a trading halt until Wednesday while it undertakes the placement.
At the same time, Contact reported a statutory first half profit of $78m, up 32 per cent on the same period last year.
EBITDAF increased by $25m to $246m, up 11 per cent on the prior year and in line with market expectations.
Operating free cash flow for the period increased from $120m to $157m in the first six months, up 31 per cent year-on-year.
Contact said it was a strong financial performance despite uncertainty of gas availability and the near-term future of major energy users.
The company announced a cash dividend of 14 cents per share, down from 16c in the previous corresponding period.
Contact said the $400m would support the $580m of further investment required to develop Tauhara.
The company also said it had undertaken a strategic review of thermal assets.
Chief Executive Mike Fuge told Mike Hosking the station will produce energy, but also plenty of jobs.
"it will add around five-hundred jobs at the peak of construction to the Taupo region and almost one-thousand jobs to the Waikato region." 
 

A New Zealand woman and her two children are expected to be deported from Turkey after being caught trying to leave Syria.
Turkish officials say the trio were caught by border guards in the country's Hatay province.
A local police spokesperson has told Newstalk ZB they've been in contact with the New Zealand Embassy in Ankara, and the woman is likely to face deportation to New Zealand.
But European correspondent Catherine Field told Mike Hosking authorities want to speak to her, as part of an investigation into ISIS.
"There is a blue notice out there for her, meaning she's a person of interest in an international investigation."
"We have seen pictures on Turkish television of the woman being accompanied by a female police officer to the public prosecutor's office near the border." 
Our Ministry of Foreign Affairs has confirmed it's aware of the situation. 
 
 
 
 

The Crusaders are looking at plans B and C for their Super Rugby pre-season after the cancellation of this weekend's match against the Blues.
Chief executive Colin Mansbridge says he's disappointed for the Blues who had been building a festival around the fixture.
He told Mike Hosking the Crusaders will now look at alternatives.
"We've got a couple of back-up plans based around playing pre-season in a different format and doing it with a different opposition. 
"We are probably okay from a pre-season perspective."
Mansbridge told Mike Hosking a key theme emerged last year with the rejigging of Super Rugby, Mitre 10 Cup and Farah Palmer Cup. 
"It seems to be that people are getting their heads into that space to be more agile. 
"If we go on for an extended period of time of lockdowns, like all businesses, it would be challenging for us."

Seven West Media has become the largest Australian news media business to strike a deal with Google to pay for journalism in a partnership announced on Monday before the nation's Parliament considers draft laws to force digital giants to pay for news.
Google and the publicly listed broadcast television, print and online publishing company jointly announced they had agreed on a "long-term partnership" after weekend discussions Australian government ministers had with media executives, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Sundar Pichai, chief executive of Alphabet Inc. and its subsidiary Google.
Kerry Stokes, chairman of Seven West Media, which owns 21 publications, thanked the government and the Australian competition regulator for their proposed law that the Parliament will consider on Tuesday.
"Their outstanding leadership on the implementation of the proposed news media bargaining code has resulted in us being able to conclude negotiations that result in fair payment and ensure our digital future," Stokes said in a statement.
"The negotiations with Google recognise the value of quality and original journalism throughout the country and, in particular, in regional areas," Stokes added.
The decision follows Google's threats to leave Australia over their proposed News Media Bargaining Code bill, which will force digital giants to pay for news, should it pass.
Sky News host Laura Jayes told Mike Hosking it looks like Google has blinked first.
"The Government will be happy because the legislation hasn't got through parliament yet, it's been through a select committee and it's understood to be introduced today."

THE BEST BITS IN A SILLIER PACKAGE (from Tuesday's Mike Hosking Breakfast) We've Blocked it All Out/Border Frustration/The Two Daniel Andrews/Mission to Wuhan/Welly So Broken

Another close contact of the Covid-positive Auckland family has tested negative - bringing to 12 the number of close contacts who have tested negative, director-general of health Ashley Bloomfield said today.
It is further positive news as the country awaits today the majority of test results from Papatoetoe High School - and with it, future of Auckland's snap level-3 lockdown and the rest of New Zealand's level-2 restrictions.
The Auckland family - a mother, father and daughter who have tested positive - have what are considered 42 close contacts. Thirty-three of them are students and teachers from the high school and nine are non-high school close contacts.
Eleven of these 42 people returned negative tests yesterday, and a 12th - another school test - came back negative last night.
Bloomfield told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking that if all of the close contacts came back negative "that would reduce the likelihood" Covid-19 was widespread in the community.
But he wouldn't go so far as to say New Zealand would be in the clear. "We're not done, what we are is reassured that there hasn't been any onward transmission from our current cases. The other thing we're really looking for - because we're not sure exactly where this infection has come from - is are there any parallel sort of chains of infection or chains of transmission out there in the community.
"So the wider testing in the school, and in the workplace and the community, and in particular those places of interest is what we're really looking at as well."
Separately, seven of nine close colleagues of the mother - who works at airline food and laundry provider LSG Sky Chefs - have returned negative tests so far.
The mother is considered the most likely of the three family members to have contracted the virus first although that has yet to be confirmed.
Bloomfield said officials were keeping an open mind about the source of the infection because the daughter developed symptoms before the mother.
"The important thing about a source is keeping an open mind and not to jump to conclusions, just because the mother works around the airport precinct is not to say 'oh that's where it's come from'. One of the interesting things here is that the daughter reported onset of symptoms before the mother. So we have to be open-minded that she could be the first case, and could have got it somewhere else. And that's what we're trying to track down."

Onward spread and whether the source of the infection has been found - or narrowed - would be the key things Bloomfield will be looking at when he writes his advice for Cabinet tomorrow on alert levels. "By the end of the day we'll certainly have a lot more information."
More than 3000 people were tested yesterday and the bulk of those results would come back today.
Those results will help determine if Auckland's lockdown is a short, sharp affair - perhaps over as early as tomorrow night - or whether the country is dealing with a bigger community outbreak of Covid-19.
Health experts are still striving to pinpoint the source of the UK variant which has infected the Auckland family.
Hundreds of people were tested at a pop-up testing station at the school yesterday. The school's principal, Vaughan Couillault, expects 3000 tests to be administered over Monday and today, and urged patience for those waiting up to two hours in line.
News yesterday of no new active Covid-19 cases connected to the family came as "heartening" news to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern but she is waiting until today's mass-testing results before she gets too comfortable.
"We do want to give it that bit more time before we get too far ahead of ourselves," she said last night.
Bloomfield was also pleased, saying yesterday's reported Covid numbers were an "encouraging sign".
But, like Ardern, he will be keeping a close eye on today's test results – particularly those from the...

It was a funny old weekend of lockdown chat.
I was talking to my daughter on Friday in Melbourne and ask her what time she thinks she’s heading into lockdown. She asks what I am talking about
I tell her the 13 cases at the time is too many and Dan Andrews is a control freak and I am reading reports that federal politicians have been told to get to Canberra and the state cabinet is meeting in 15 minutes. This was at 11:45 Melbourne time.
She seems aghast. Her disadvantage is she’s 19, I’ve been around following control freaks like Andrews longer than she has.
By the time the announcement is made, she texts and tells me this lockdown completely blindsided me.
Fast forward to last night and it’s my turn to gobsmacked. My wife, a veteran of news and current affairs of many years standing, announces there will be no lockdown.
I have no words. The PM has flown to Wellington, they have no idea where the cases have come from, its Americold all over again and there is a New Plymouth connection. The whole cabinet is meeting, what part of that doesn’t she get?
We have a bet. The treat of our choice, we shake on it. she’s says I’m out of touch. I can’t believe she’s forgotten how this works
it’s an insight into how complacent we have become. Ardern is Andrews, Andrews is Ardern; they’re afraid, they are governed by fear and caution, they are control freaks
I text several people in the news industry and ask them to call it. They call it wrong. They too are asleep having taken the complacency pill.
But here is the important thing: vaccine or no vaccine, we are stuck with this.
The reality is a handful of cases locks a place down. We have not progressed one step in 12 months. Tracking tracing promises and hype mean nothing. Three cases does it, three cases and we panic.
Here we go again. Forget your bubble, forget the borders, this is our reality. We aren’t on top of it, never have been.
Melbourne its 14. Auckland its three. Same story same result.

I think it's fair to suggest that for a government that has built a fairly serious reputation of talking a big game, and not delivering on it, the vaccine news is a major kudos win.
"By the end of the quarter,” they said vaguely. Suddenly, bang, we're on as of this weekend.
The big question now for them, indeed all governments, is what does the vaccine now actually mean? Most of us, did we not, started thinking that a jab was the answer? A jab was the finish line?
It appears now it is nothing of the sort.
Certainly, what we know currently is that those jabs cleared are effective in doing the extreme work. In other words, the old and the frail, are protected to a large degree from serious symptoms and death.
The broad idea that the ICUs of the world are not overwhelmed appears to be a realistic goal, and potential outcome of the vaccine rollout.
But as millions of Brits discovered last week, and we got informed as of Friday's announcement here, a vaccine appears to have little, if anything, to do with a border, travel, or anything much different from what we are currently experiencing.
A series of medical experts from Fauci, to the Moderna boss, to the W.H.O are now saying we are going to have to live with this. The Head of Johnson and Johnson says we'll need to be jabbed annually for years.
None of that is the end of the world, but it does make it very much a flu type virus, as opposed to a disease we wipe out. There seems, for now, no end.
So surely, the question is this, what's the plan? How do we live it? What are the boundaries?  What's the future of the border? The border with who? What are the rules? What is the timeline? How do we handle MIQ? How do we handle MIQ mistakes? Do we change our stance to lockdown?
What do we do with long term industries, like tourism, if borders are longer terms issues?
It's not hard to line up several hundred questions over a variety of industries, groups, and people, and all of which will need to be answered.
As a country isolated from the world, with the theory being a vaccine would fix stuff, welcome to an unwelcome, new reality.
It ain't happening the way we thought it would. So, what now?