The Hoon

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night featured co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking with regular guests Cathrine Dyer and Robert Patman about geopolitics, the economy, climate change and politics here, along with special guest Helen Clark.
This week:
* Bernard and Peter began with a chat about the Iran war, New Zealand’s looming fuel supply issues and Marsden Point.
* Bernard then spoke with Cathrine about new research confirming an acceleration of climate change, about research showing a rise in carbon dioxide in bloodstreams, and the links between the Middle East conflicts and climate change.
* Then Bernard, Peter, Robert and Helen talked about the current mess in the Middle East, New Zealand’s weak response, our health system and an upcoming play about Helen Clark called ‘Helen Clark in Six Outfits’
The Hoon’s podcast version above was recorded on Thursday night during a live webinar for over 200 paying subscribers and was produced and edited by Simon Josey.
The Hoon won the silver award for best current affairs podcast in last year’s New Zealand Podcast awards.
(This is a sampler for all free subscribers and anyone else who stumbles on it. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, we’re able to spread my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction other public venues. Join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments, and by subscribing in full. Remember, all students and teachers who sign up for the free version with their .ac.nz and .school.nz email accounts are automatically upgraded to the paid version for free. Also, here’s a couple of special offers: $3/month or $30/year for under 30s & $6.50/month or $65/year for over 65s who rent.)
Ngā mihi nui.
Bernard


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

I spoke with Green Co-Leader Chloe Swarbrick last night in a Substack Live Video for over 150 subscribers about the urgent need to decarbonise & provide housing, along with challenging the bipartisan assumptions about the size of Government and Government debt to GDP — the ‘30-30’ rule. We also talked about migration policy and population growth.
The full interview is above for all.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Context Setting
07:22 Fuel Crisis and Government Response
10:43 Housing Crisis and Emergency Solutions
13:20 Economic Policy and the 30-30 Rule
19:19 Debt Management and Economic Stability
24:15 Electrifying the Economy and Climate Change
27:28 Population Growth and Migration Policy
Cheers
Bernard


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

The podcast above of the weekly ‘Hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers on Thursday night featured co-hosts Bernard Hickey & Peter Bale talking with regular guests Cathrine Dyer and Robert Patman about geopolitics, the economy, climate change and politics here, along with special guest historian and author Jonathan Lyons.
This week:
* Bernard and Peter began with a discussion about deaths of a record 129 journalists reported in 2025 by the Committee to Protect Journalists, mostly in Gaza, and the risks of it worsening in an extended war in the Middle East.
* Bernard and Peter talked about New Zealand’s lack of resilience to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz for both diesel and fertiliser.
* Bernard, Peter and Cathrine talked about the impending dropping of clean car standards and the connections between war and climate change.
* Bernard, Peter, Robert and Jonathan talked about the implications from the widening war in the Middle East, including Israel’s role and Iran’s history.
Jonathan has written these books on Iran: The House of Wisdom: How the Arabs Transformed Western Civilization, and, Islam Through Western Eyes: From the Crusades to the War on Terrorism.
The Hoon’s podcast version above was recorded on Thursday night during a live webinar for over 200 paying subscribers and was produced and edited by Simon Josey.
The Hoon won the silver award for best current affairs podcast in last year’s New Zealand Podcast awards.
(This is a sampler for all free subscribers and anyone else who stumbles on it. Thanks to the support of paying subscribers here, we’re able to spread my public interest journalism here about housing affordability, climate change and poverty reduction other public venues. Join the community supporting and contributing to this work with your ideas, feedback and comments, and by subscribing in full. Remember, all students and teachers who sign up for the free version with their .ac.nz and .school.nz email accounts are automatically upgraded to the paid version for free. Also, here’s a couple of special offers: $3/month or $30/year for under 30s & $6.50/month or $65/year for over 65s who rent.)
Ngā mihi nui.
Bernard


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

This week I hosted a ‘Hoon’ on Substack Live previewing The Reality of Everything symposium to be held at Victoria University of Wellington on June 26, which will examine the interconnected crises of climate change, energy, water & food constraints, economic instability & public health.
I was joined by regular Hoon guest Cathrine Dyer, substacker and symposium facilitator Catherine Knight, conference speaker and epidemiologist Professor Alistair Woodward from the University of Auckland, and fellow public health specialist Associate Professor Caroline Shaw from the University of Otago.
We started by talking about the need for the Symposium and referring to the National Emergency Briefing held in the UK last year, including an address by Professor Hugh Montgomery, a Professor of Intensive Care Medicine at University College London. The video of his address is below via Youtube.
We talked about the intersection of public health and climate change, emphasizing the urgent need for a comprehensive approach to public health in the face of climate, resource and economic crises.
We talked about tobacco control as a precedent for health policy, the social determinants of health, and the benefits of e-bikes. The conversation concludes with recommendations for policymakers to prioritize health and well-being in climate action.
Here’s Catherine’s substack post announcing the conference.
And a follow-up post with the latest details.
Here’s the chapters in the video above:
00:00 Introduction to the Reality of Everything Symposium
02:43 Understanding the Interconnected Crises
05:36 Climate Change and Health Risks
07:18 Tobacco Control as a Model for Climate Action
11:41 Social Determinants of Health and Climate Change
15:29 Transport, Health, and Climate Change Solutions
18:10 Rethinking Emergencies and Public Health
19:05 Transport Policies and Health Implications
21:20 Access Over Infrastructure: A New Perspective
22:19 The Hidden Health Costs of Transport
24:23 E-Bikes: A Healthier Alternative
25:34 Policy Solutions for Health and Climate Change
29:18 Public Health as Climate Action
31:48The Economic Case for Climate Action
Thank you Susan St John, Mike Joy, Paul Singh, Melanie, Brian Rathbone, and many others for tuning into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe

This week a speculative post on Substack by Citrini about ever-faster AI tools creating a self-reinforcing doom loop of fewer jobs & lower wages for humans -- while AI owners win big -- shook global stocks. A link to the post is below.
So I decided to have a Substack Live with Ben Reid, who writes about tech and AI for Memia. The resulting chat is above.
Thank you James Wilkes, Nicola Francis, Summerhaze, David, Elaine, and many others for tuning into my live video with Ben Reid! Join me for my next live video in the app.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thekaka.substack.com/subscribe