The Mike Hosking Breakfast

Gary Stead's downplaying his role in the New Zealand Cricket team after his re-appointment as head coach until the 2023 World Cup.
He told Mike Hosking his impact on results is minimal.
"A lot is made of the coach at times when you win or don’t win, but it’s the players out on the field. What I do is prepare and get them ready."
New Zealand Cricket expects to announce their summer home schedule within a fortnight, including series against the West Indies, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Australia.
LISTEN ABOVE

The Italian economy shrank by more than previously thought during the second quarter as a result of lockdown restrictions imposed to curb the coronavirus pandemic, official figures showed Monday.
The national statistics bureau ISTAT said the economy contracted by quarterly rate of 12.8% during the April to June period, with consumer spending largely behind the plunge. The Italian economy is also 17.7% smaller than it was in the same period last year.
Those figures were worse than preliminary estimates issued in late July of a 12.4% quarterly decline and a 17.3% annual fall.
Italy, which in March became the first European country to experience the full force of the pandemic, imposed one of the world’s strictest lockdowns.
The restrictions against travel between towns, then between regions, and the shutdown of many types of businesses, including clothing stores and restaurants, only started being eased in the last weeks of the second quarter.
ISTAT said the severe downturn was a result of the “the economic effects of the health emergency and of the (government) adopted containment measures.”
In addition to lower consumer spending, the agency said the Italian economy suffered from a sharp fall in exports, with all major areas of production taking a hit. Industrial production, it added, plunged by 20.2%.
Even though appliance and electronics stores were allowed to stay open during the lockdown, durable goods purchases dropped by 21.4%.

Apple and Google are moving ahead with the next stage of their contact tracing technology by integrating it more directly into their mobile operating systems, a step the companies say should help promote adoption of the notification tool.
With the new system, iPhone users will no longer need to download a separate public health app in order to opt into the contact tracing feature, while Android users will be prompted to download an app that Google will create on behalf of public health officials.
That means health agencies will no longer need to build a contact tracing app of their own in order to take advantage of the technology, though they will still be able to offer one if they choose.
Public health officials in Maryland, Nevada, Virginia and Washington, DC will be the first to use the more streamlined version of Exposure Notification, known as Exposure Notification Express, Apple and Google said Tuesday.
The existing app-based version of the technology is already in use in Alabama, Arizona, North Dakota, Nevada, Wyoming and Virginia, as well as 20 countries and regions around the world, the companies added.
Those that have yet to adopt the system have cited a lack of engineering manpower needed to build a dedicated app, the companies told reporters Tuesday, highlighting how a simpler process could accelerate the tool's spread.
"We are making it easier and faster for [public health officials] to use the Exposure Notifications System without the need for them to build and maintain an app," the companies said in a statement.
Apple will release the new tracing system in iOS 13.7 on Tuesday, and Google will offer it beginning later this month on devices running Android 6.0, the companies said.
The underlying technology will remain much the same.
Based on Bluetooth wireless communications, the tech giants' contact tracing tool records when two or more smartphones come within a certain distance of each other. If a person participating in the program later reports a positive Covid-19 test result, notifications are sent to all the devices that came near that person's device, indicating their owners may have been exposed.
The companies have said users can choose to opt in or out of the tracing program at will, and that users can choose themselves whether to report a positive coronavirus test on the system. In addition, they say, the program does not share location data with the companies or with public health agencies. And it does not share users' identifying information with the companies or other users, either.
Under the program, health officials in each state have been able to define for themselves how close two devices must be, and for how long, in order for their apps to record a contact. The upgraded system calls for the public health officials to submit those same parameters to Apple and Google directly, which will then build them into the system.
In Google's case, the company will automatically generate an Exposure Notification app based on the information provided by public health agencies and prompt users in various states to download it.
Apple and Google claimed Tuesday that their Exposure Notification system has already helped pinpoint some cases of Covid-19 infections, including some that they claim would not have been detected using traditional contact tracing methods.
The companies declined to say precisely how many infections have been identified so far, but added that hundreds of coronavirus tests per week are currently being uploaded to the system.
Text By Brian Fung, CNN Business

In the wake of confusion about ad content, the Advertising Standards Authority has released new official guidelines for social media influencers.
The ASA released the document titled "Influencers: Making it clear that ads are ads" today in a bid to encourage more transparency from influencers posting sponsored content.
The new guidelines define an "influencer" as anyone "who has influence over the choice, opinion or behaviour of their following", regardless of the number of followers they have.
"An influencer is someone who has access to an audience (regardless of size) for their own organic content and ad content they generate income from."


Any products or services being advertised must be clearly labelled that way.
"Consumers should know it is advertising at their first interaction with the ad content."
Previous hashtags such as #sp (sponsored) or #collab (Collaboration) are no longer acceptable, as the meaning isn't instantly obvious. And other hashtags, such as #gift, #gifted or #ambassador must follow a clear statement that the post is an ad.
And even gifted items count as advertising.
"'Payment' can be any benefit the influencer may receive in exchange for the content they distribute including but not limited to: money, free product or service, credit, event tickets, travel, product loans."
The guidelines also demand that every segment of a social media story that includes ad content needs to be clearly identified as advertising.
All parties to an ad, including the influencer and advertiser, are equally responsible for making it clear that the content is advertising.
The Herald recently reported that the ASA upheld four complaints against influencer Simone Anderson for failing to clearly label advertising content on her Instagram page, in the first decision of its kind against a social media influencer.
Complainants claimed her posts were misleading as they didn't make it clear that there was a commercial relationship between her and the companies she was promoting.
The new requirements will apply to all ad content posted from September 14 this year.

Actor Jake Ryan has become a mainstay on the Australian screen.
He got his first acting gig back in 2003 - after being Australia's Taekwondo champion.
Since then, he's been on Home and Away, Wentworth and Underbelly on Aussie TV.
Now, he's starring in the Kiwi film Savage - that tells the story of gangs, and how people end up in them, which is in cinemas September 10th.
Jake Ryan joined Mike Hosking to talk about the upcoming film release.
LISTEN ABOVE

Billions of dollars have been wiped off the events calendar due to the mass cancellation of conferences and conventions.
In a normal year there are more than 5000 business events nationwide, with almost a third held in Auckland.
The sector is typically estimated to be worth $5 billion a year but the on-off limit on gatherings since March has pushed the events industry into survival mode.
Some of the Government's almost $10m domestic event fund will go towards business conferences but the industry wants more support.
Conventions and Incentives NZ chief executive Lisa Hopkins said the impact has been "catastrophic".
"From the members of our association that I've spoken to they've gone down to zero events in many cases, everything's been cancelled or postponed. It's huge."
Official figures show there were 5300 conferences and conventions in the year ending June 2019, of which a third were held in Auckland.
But all that has come to a grinding halt.
"February was the last normal month we had, you could almost write the entire [$5 billion] amount off," Hopkins said.
"It feels like the confidence levels have been ripped out of the market. They don't know whether or not to invest in holding a conference or an event."
However, not all this year's conferences are cancelled.
Events management company Uno Loco has switched from organising live events, to creating virtual events - or a mix of both - for its corporate clients.
Its client services director Craig Muller said this means people in one region will gather together while those from outside the region attend via a livestream.
"A lot of businesses are going 'should we be flying everyone into one location whether it be Auckland or otherwise or should we be trying to communicate with your audience in a different way?'," he said.
He said one company was due to bring 400 people to Auckland for a multi-day conference, but is now taking a roadshow to the regions to meet in smaller groups.
Muller said other companies are taking their conferences online.
"We've been briefed on a project that is usually a large trade show and a multi-day event, clearly they don't feel confident enough by mid October to be able to get 600 people to gather in a room."
The Auckland Convention Bureau attracts conferences and conventions to the city, but its calendar for this year now looks blank.
Its head, Anna Hayward, said events are often planned years ahead, and the bureau already has 78 events worth $59 million locked in until 2028.
Hayward said business events are important for economic recovery, bringing visitors and expertise to different regions.
But she is clear that this year's cancellations have led to a $70 million hole in cashflow.
"It's quite devastating when you actually start to look at the numbers."
Hayward said not all cancellations are due to Covid-19, with some because of a delayed opening to the fire-damaged International Convention Centre.
The lack of business events this year has a ripple effect with companies struggling to retain staff and fewer people travelling domestically.
The managing director of The Conference Company, Jan Tonkin, wants more done to retain skilled workers in the sector and is calling for targeted Government support.
She said the sector is bleeding talent.
"I have seen experienced people leave the sector and that's the underlying concern for us because once they're engaged with another sector bringing them back in is never a sure thing."
Lisa Hopkins said it's important the sector is saved.
"We are the sector that redistributes revenue into regions, we're the reason why investment is put into building convention centres, hotels, creating jobs."
From RNZ

The BBC on Wednesday reversed its controversial decision to scrap the lyrics of two patriotic songs during its annual end-of-summer concert, saying it had found a way around the problem a day after its new director-general took office.
Britain’s publicly funded broadcaster said last week that the orchestra would perform instrumental versions of “Rule, Britannia!” and “Land of Hope and Glory,” instead of the traditional audience singalongs on the final night of its Proms concert series.
That decision sparked a backlash from people who said it was an example of political correctness run amok at a time when the Black Lives Matter movement has led to a re-examination of the British Empire, which the songs celebrate.
The BBC initially said the decision reflected events of this "extraordinary year,'' including the fact that there would be no live audience for the concert due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But the broadcaster announced a U-turn on Wednesday, saying the songs would be performed by a select group of vocalists.
“We hope everyone will welcome this solution,’’ the BBC said in a statement. “We think the night itself will be a very special moment for the country — and one that is much needed after a difficult period for everyone.”
The decision comes a day after Tim Davie, who previously led the BBC's primary commercial unit, succeeded Tony Hall as the corporation's director general.

Two cheap and widely available drugs have been found to help save patients critically ill with Covid-19, international research involving New Zealand experts has concluded.
The steroid treatments have proven major breakthroughs in the fight against the deadly virus, with fewer patients dying and less intensive care unit (ICU) support needed, compared to usual treatment.
"It's proven to be the most effective treatment," said Dr Colin McArthur, intensivist and researcher at Auckland City Hospital who leads the New Zealand arm of the trial and is a co-author of the World Health Organisation meta-analysis, published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).
The drugs, hydrocortisone and dexamethasone, cut the risk of death for those needing ICU care by 20 per cent, with one extra patient surviving for every 11 treated.
The findings reinforced the United Kingdom-based RECOVERY trial, published in July, which found dexamethasone cut the risk of death by a third for patients on ventilators, and a fifth for those on oxygen.


Researchers said had that drug been used to treat patients in the UK from the start of the pandemic, up to 5000 lives could have been saved.
Since then many hospitals around the world adopted dexamethasone as part of their usual care for severely ill patients with Covid-19.
McArthur said they'd now confirmed hydrocortisone was just as effective.
"Going forward I think it will become a very common treatment in ICU."
Their findings meant clinicians now had options, especially if there were drug supply issues.
Both drugs were widely available in New Zealand hospitals, and cheap, McArthur said, also making it a huge benefit in poorer countries with high numbers of Covid-19 patients.
"An oral course of dexamethasone costs less than $1, or if intravenous is needed a course of hydrocortisone is about $150.
"So it is not expensive and is applicable anywhere in the world.
The international study pooled data from seven randomised clinical trials from 12 countries involving 1703 critically ill patients with Covid-19 from February 26 to June 9.
The New Zealand study was an extension to a wider international study, REMAP-CAP, that's been recruiting patients with severe community-acquired pneumonia – the main cause of death from Covid-19 – for the past three years.
In April, the trial was awarded additional funding by the Health Research Council and Ministry of Health, as it adapted to focus on Covid-19.
In the international analysis involving 1703 patients, the odds of death within four weeks was much lower among patients who received corticosteroids, compared with those who received usual care or placebo.
Of those patients randomly provided corticosteroids there were 222 deaths and 456 survivors, compared to 425 deaths and 600 survivors of those randomised to usual care or placebo.
The treatment was "very straightforward", and involved tablets taken orally daily, or intravenously if required, McArthur said.
The steroids worked by "dampening down" the body's immune response to Covid-19.
"We have learned from people particularly unwell with Covid-19, there can be an overly-active immune response, which can actually damage organs, particularly the lungs.
"We already have a steroid circulating in our blood, cortisol, which is a hormone and part of our stress response. What we do by adding these steroids, is increasing that cortisol effect, balancing the reaction, and allowing the natural healing process to proceed."
The New Zealand arm of the trial only involved six patients, which reflected the low numbers of cases here, but there was a lot of "operational support", McArthur said.
The ongoing trial would now be testing a range of other treatments to further improve the survival rate from Covid-19.
Convalescent plasma, anti-coagulation and anti-platelet treatments are...

Former deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett is starting a new career in real estate when she stands down as an MP next month.
Bennett is joining the senior management team at Bayleys Real Estate in the commercial property division two days after the general election.
She told the Herald she was recommended by former Prime Minister John Key, who praised her talents at a function with Bayleys' managing director, Mike Bayley.
"I wasn't there. They were talking about me, not with me. There you go, sometimes when you're talked about it's not all bad," she said.
"I'd been talking to John and he said 'Well, if there's any set of skills I can just see you using it's definitely in that property market', and that kind of got me thinking and that got me talking to Mike Bayley and then we've kind of gone from there."


Bennett, who was elected as an MP in 2005 and held 14 portfolios during her political career, from social housing and welfare to finance and tourism, said she was excited about the "completely random" career change.
"It's neat, eh? Just do something completely different and exciting and interesting," she said.
The skills she learned since dropping out of school at 17 and ending up deputy prime minister will enable her to see the bigger picture and to problem solve for her new corporate and high-net-worth clients who are working in what is now an uncertain environment because of Covid-19.
"I suppose I bring the ability to see change – if there's nothing else you get from politics it's that. Lot's of change, lot's of that horrible word resilience, and bringing all of those relationships as well."
What the job boils down to is selling real estate, she said.
"My new job is called strategic adviser for Bayleys Commercial and Industrial Property Division but ultimately, yeah, we're all salespeople and I'm really looking forward to selling, mainly in the corporate and private wealth sectors of the commercial property market."

Paula Bennett, pictured getting ready for her valedictory party in her office at Parliament earlier this year, is moving into the real estate industry. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Bennett said she was attracted to Bayleys because it's a New Zealand-owned success story with humble beginnings, just like her – once a beneficiary, Bennett worked her way up the ranks in Parliament.
"I had other things going on as well (since announcing her retirement from politics). I've been pretty lucky and then I just went 'you know what, this one makes my heart beat a bit faster and genuinely gets me excited and is so far removed from what I've been doing that it just feels like absolutely the right move.
"I genuinely felt it just kept ticking all the values for me, and they displayed the attributes I liked, which is roll your sleeves up, work hard, take some risks and when you get a knock get back up and do it twice as hard and keep going."
Bennett is studying hard to finish her real estate qualifications for when she starts on October 19 and says while politics will always be a big part of her life she can happily leave it behind.
"I've done it, I've got near the top, I'm really happy and I can very comfortably draw a line under the politics but still work with Government."
Bennett says she pinches herself daily at what she has achieved which is "not bad from this high school dropout that had a baby at 17 that can now kind of hold her own and hopefully add value for Bayleys and their businesses. It's very humbling."
Mike Bayley said Bennett's role would be focused on further strengthening Bayleys' position in the corporate and private wealth sectors of the commercial property market.
"We're always looking to recruit a proportion of our staff from outside the property industry to bring a fresh perspective and new ideas into our business and we are delighted to have been able to secure someone of Paula's calibre.

Winston Peters is right, and disingenuous at the same time.
Are the government, have the government, been “gilding the lily” over our Covid response? Yes they have. But Peters was part of the gilding, he's been in cahoots for three years.
This government is the government he picked, the government he created, and the government he has been a part of. If they gilded, he gilded with them.
The gilding is real.
We had the lockdown that came a week too late as many of us pleaded  to close the border. We had the claim that self isolation would work, when it didn’t, because the coppers never knocked on the doors they said they would. We had the mess over testing kits, PPE and flu jabs. The Ministry, namely Ashley Bloomfield insisted we had, but clearly didn’t. We had the testing they insisted we were doing, they clearly weren't.
The border that was leaky, but we were told it wasn't.  And don't mention Thelma and Louise, the guards asleep, the recruitment of Megan Woods and Commander Webb, the replacement of David Clark with Chris Hipkins, and last week's shamble over testing.
So when the Prime Minister says Peters does us all a disservice, she once again is covering her own ineptitude by dragging us into it.
We did our job.
Even those of us who argued it was overkill and too driven by epidemiologists at the expense of jobs, the economy and mental health, did our job.  Only to be let down by a government so far out of their depth, it's now really all been laid bare and we aren't even out the other side.
So Peters points out a truth. But, it's his truth as well. It's his fault as well. If he wanted the military in earlier, if he was worried about the border, if he felt this hadn't gone the way it should, it was up to him to make this clear.  It was up to him to argue his case, to bring it to our attention, to make sure that it went a better way than clearly it has.
So now it's too late, why? Because he's telling us all this, for his own political survival. He didn’t put us first when he needed to. He's only doing it now, when is party is at two percent and looking like it's on its way out.
Yes, they didn’t do it properly. Some of us have been saying that for months. But some of us have been saying it for months, because it was the right thing to say, not because we need votes.