Coming up next, The Crunch with Cam Slater, conversations with a side of controversy. Every Thursday from 4pm, right here on RCR, reality check radio. People are struggling to have conversations and connect with others that they don't completely agree with on every topic and I think that's probably the biggest problem that we need to try and solve is how after all this division and after all this separation do we end up bringing people together again What does unity really look like? New Zealand faces some pretty big issues. First one is COVID in the aftermath. There's no getting away from that. Second is racial division. It's been ginned up and it's dangerous. Another issue that maybe people haven't got their head around yet is digital currency. What form does that take? Is it programmable? Will it be used to manipulate behaviour and patterns of behaviour? Those questions need to be asked and answered. How can you have fair, open, democratic government by people who are appointed? It's a ridiculous idea and if that idea is taken to zenith then this country is in real trouble because democracy, one person, one vote, where every vote is of equal value has to be the foundation of a modern New Zealand. What's true, what's not true, how our kids are to be educated and I have a great fear for the future. I think we know from history where this could end up. This is The Crunch with Cam Slater. Conversations with a side of controversy right here on RCR. Welcome to The Crunch on Reality Check Radio. I'm your host, Cam Slater and this is the place where we crunch the political issues and cut through the spin and the PR. We have another incredible show ahead for you this week. My first guest this afternoon is Ashley Church. We'll be discussing his interview on RCR with Rodney Hyde and then sharing how his faith in our colours is thinking on politics, polarisation and his thoughts on the coming election campaign. Then I'll be talking with Comrade Matt McCartan, an expert in the dark arts of politics and a hard-bitten unionist who I've always had a good working relationship with. We'll discuss what drives him in politics, his involvement in the 2014 Labour Party campaign and dirty politics along with an assessment of some current political issues. This week we've seen yet more violent crime and gans taking over the streets for yet another funeral. I'll talk to Nationals Mark Mitchell about what his party's going to do to solve New Zealand's growing crime problem. It's a busy afternoon and we have a lot to get through, but I can sneak in some of your feedback here on RCR. And finally, I'll get my buddies on the line to talk about Labour's new Climate Infrastructure Fund they've created with their cosy pals at BlackRock. Right here on RCR, reality check radio. Welcome back to The Crunch here on RCR with Cam. It's election time, so get ready for the promises, the lies, the innuendo, the charades, and most importantly, the shell game. The media are part of the shell game. You know the game where there's a P under one of three walnut shells? It's a scam where all the power is in the hands of the Game Master as he shuffles those shells around confounding and confusing the poor fool who thought he could outwit the Game Master. Politics, particularly during elections, is just like a shell game. The P is the promise you listen to. The walnut shells are the reasons they give you for not delivering up the P, the promise. It's all a con and every election you get played. Worse still, you fall for the shell game every single time. The politicians, just like the confidence trickster, are laughing at you, the voter. They're saying under their breath, here comes another mark. You may think I'm being cynical, but I've been doing this politics gig since when I was in Nappy's. Every party in every politician plays the shell game with voters. But the very worst party at this shell game is the Labour Party. Look at all the headline promises of the last six years of the Ardern-Hipkins regime. And then look at the delivery. Where are the 100,000 affordable homes they promised with KiwiBuild? Where are the billion trees they were going to plant? Where's the rapid rail to Hamilton and Tauranga? Where's the light rail to the airport or even Mount Roscoe? Where's the bike bridge across Auckland Harbour? And where is the elimination of child poverty? Now they're shuffling the walnut shells again, promising us the earth. This time it's five tunnels under the harbour and a cost of tens of billions of dollars. This mob couldn't build a house if they were sitting in a room full of Lego. They haven't laid a single millimetre of track to the airport or to Tauranga. Children are still living in the same crappy houses going to the same crappy schools living in poverty. And who knows how many trees have been planted? These clowns haven't delivered a single major policy. But they sure knew how to subjugate us, stomp all over our rights, divide our society and turn us against each other. Now they're playing the shell game again, making huge promises that they will never deliver. And in three years, they'll do it all again. The power to stop this is with each of us. We need to say no to the games. We need to vote for reality. We need to give the politicians a reality check. That's why I'm here on reality check radio, so you can be better informed about what these charlatans are up to. They think we won't notice what they're up to. But we're awake to their games. And now we get to show them just how awake we are to their shell game. Ashley Church is well known as the property guy and a favourite amongst RCR listeners. He's a former candidate for the National Party, but he wants to talk politics today. I thought I'd get him on to the show after listening to him and Rodney Hyde talking about his faith and his journey to discover that faith. Ashley, welcome to the show. Welcome to the crunch. I wanted to reach out and have a chat with you because I listened to your interview with Rodney Hyde the other day and you were talking about the impact Jesus Christ has had on your life and your Christian faith. I don't really want to talk about the specifics of that because it just triggered in my mind that your approach to politics now or the political life has probably been coloured a lot by your faith and I'm interested to explore a little bit of that and some of the things that we're witnessing now in society. Absolutely. You're right. Yeah, exactly. And it really touched me that interview with Rodney and I can see Rodney's grappling with some really big issues and you and I seem to have sort of hit our stride with our faith at about the same time and we've had some challenges in our lives and our faith is our grounding point now. Yeah, absolutely. So for me, it's been a battle of about 40 years. I mean, I've been nominally a Christian since I was about 18 but like you, it's something I've sort of really sort of come to terms with in terms of what it means for me just from the last two or three years in particular and it's interesting because you're right, it's completely transformed my life into a respectable sort of thing including, as you quite correctly say, my attitude to politics and how the country should be run. Yeah, you once stood for the National Party, didn't you? Oh, when I was a baby, yeah, when I was a nanny back in 1987 in the middle of the Rodgernomics reform in the seat that couldn't possibly have been won by anybody but Labour but it was an interesting period and I went on for me to stand for the City Council and make here a couple of years later and bolted in based on name recognitions. So yeah, I think that tracked a long time ago. Would you consider yourself to be a natural National Party person now? No, no, if you'd asked me that question 20 years ago I would have said yes, now I'm a natural conservative so my vote goes where, with the party that has had the most conservative political positions on the issues that matter to me which means that I can't be taken for granted as the national voter in the way I might have been able to have been 20 years ago. That's the problem with these big political parties, isn't it though Ashley, that they take voters for granted, they take their support for granted. They do, they do, they do. It's interesting in respect of National too because I haven't changed and I suspect you probably haven't politically either but the National Party has changed substantially over the last 20 years in particular and it's moved and I understand why it's moved more and more to the centre and then over to the central left in an effort to sort of mop up as many of those votes in the centre as possible and the process of doing that it's closed out people on the, I wouldn't say the extreme right but more to the right of the National Party that once would have been part of the traditional rump of that party and you saw that in particular with the pandemic and some of the stuff that took part there and you're seeing it now, it's manifesting itself in the formation of these little splinter parties that are really people who 10 years ago, 20 years ago would have been natural supported as National. Yeah, people say to me, you've left the National Party and I always say no, the National Party left me. Yeah, totally, I feel exactly the same. Because if you look at the founding principles of the National Party I still subscribe to those, it's a small government, individual responsibility, protecting private property rights, and we've got this woke, wet, sort of dripping National Party that people think are Tories or think they're right-wing but you mentioned it, you said they're centre-left and I agree with you on that, I don't think the National Party is even remotely conservative in any way. No, that's been a transition camp, it's during key era I would argue that that was done for political reasons, it was done because key for itself, the National Party is sort of an all-encompassing machine which looks to take as much of the voters as it possibly could and they did that for reasons that were designed to keep centre-left voters in the camp, but over the last few years it's almost as if they've taken that on as their new mentor so that's now who they are, it's no longer down for political reasons and you only have to look at the voting record of quite a large number of the members that can't caucus to see that that's actually who they are, certainly in terms of their attitude towards moral issues. Yeah, that's one thing that Helen Clark was very successful at doing is moving the Overton window firmly to the left and dragging the National Party across with them in order to compete and that's one thing I admire about her is her ability to influence and change New Zealand to being more left-wing than it was previously. Interestingly, that's not always the bad thing. I mean, if you go back to the 50s and the 60s and the 70s and look at some of the what would have been regarded as conservative or traditional values back then which were borderline racist and were probably misogynist that stuff, you know, I mean, I'm completely supportive of what's happened in that space and to the extent that that had an impact on the National Party and right-wing parties around the world it's been a good thing but some of the other stuff, it's a stuff around abortion on demand and some of this wokery around identity politics and stuff which is not about human rights. It's about basically, it's about pursuing an agenda which is foreign to anything that we recognise as Kiwis. That's the stuff I'm grappling with. Yeah, it's policing language and thought through finger wagging and tutting, isn't it, really? Yes, granny state or nanny state, yeah, totally. You mentioned and I looked through your website and I found an article that you'd written that said that you really struggled with sales and you mentioned a couple of books. Now, I've read those books and I've done some of those courses and I even invested in Brian Tracy's sales programmes and it actually may be a great sales person. Now, you're in that article, you're talking about your sales job on your faith and how you really struggle with that. But I listened to that interview with Rodney Hyden and I reckon you've got your sales pitch just right. It's interesting because when I wrote that nine months ago I was still transitioning, that's a terrible word to use now given its new meaning, but I was still going through this osmosis process in my mind where I was trying to work out exactly where that's at. So the point of that article that you're referring to was I was saying that when I was young because I used to have sales roles when I was young before I found my stride in my career that I was a shocking sales person and I was shocking for two reasons. One because I didn't like rejection and the other reason was because I was lazy and so I found it difficult to sustain an interest in selling stuff and I was comparing that to my faith and saying I found it very difficult to talk about my faith and using that kind of springboard to have that conversation. It's interesting though as of the last few months I've kind of become increasingly of the view that well you know what it actually doesn't matter what other people think. That fear that I might have had in a sales role where I was selling insurance or computers or whatever it was I was selling at the time that doesn't apply to my faith because you either take it or leave it and also the other thing I think that changes too is I'm old and ugly now. I was a young guy back then and I was still trying to sort of impress people and maintain a certain... none of that matters to me now. I've had that part of my career. Now I've got the few that I've got certain things I need to achieve before I die and I'll do them to the best of my ability and if people don't like it well that's tough luck. Yeah it's kind of the same position that I've ended in except I had a very close run was dying and I'm lying there in the hospital bed thinking I dodged that bullet. What am I going to do now and what I've got left? Totally. It totally focuses your mind but I see it as a sales training. I mean I've always said to politicians who've asked me how they can get into politics how they can... Well you need to learn how to sell because if you don't know how to sell how are you going to sell yourself and how are you going to sell your ideas and faith is exactly the same thing and maybe we need to form a little sales training team that can go... teach people how to sell their faith better I do a bad job at it sometimes. The other thing and I don't know whether this is personal to me or it's something everybody can learn from but the thing I've learned to and again it just comes back to age and experience is I tend to find now that I can use I'll call them parables but just little things that have happened in my life and they're kind of little open you can use them as examples and then you segue on to the stuff you really want to say so rather than just sort of jumping on people and hitting them between the eyes it's about using experiences to draw upon and their life experiences that people can actually associate with or are familiar with that then lead into this other stuff and I've got quite good at that I do it both in my writing and my speaking and I'd like to think back that part of the journey I've gone through Well you know it's kind of biblical as well because you look at all the parables and the stories of the apostles and you look at even Paul's change from Saul to Paul on the road to Damascus and their life story I mean that covers a hardened killer you know he went out there and persecuted Christians and then became one himself and then used that to perhaps become one of the greatest storytellers in the Bible Totally, totally It's interesting because you mentioned a couple of minutes ago people approaching you and saying how can I get into politics and I always think that's the wrong question I mean I understand the question because it's a question I would have asked myself when I was younger but for me politics should be about being taken kicking and screaming into it it should be about people who don't want to necessarily do it but are drawn to it because they've got something to offer and something to add and something to contribute to the country but that's not what we've got with the current crop right across the house we've got people who are there because they see it as a career or they see it as an ego thing or a status thing and that's not unique to New Zealand that's right throughout the western world and it just gets the wrong result it gets the wrong sort of people and the wrong result ultimately for your nation Well, I mean that's absolutely right and that's actually what I counsel it's depending on the age of them if they're quite young like you know when I say quite young I think under 40 now is young and I say to them especially when they're like in their 20s how do I get into politics hang on, you haven't lived you don't know anything you think you do but you actually don't you need another 20 years of working you know to get some life some of life's challenges out of the way because life is hard and if you're you know 20 something you're going into parliament people are going to be looking to you to provide solutions but you haven't even lived Well, with all due respect to her and I don't mean to offend anybody but that perfectly sums up Jacinda Rudin I've got no doubt Jacinda Rudin had had 20 years on it she probably would have made a good Prime Minister as it happens she'll go down in history as the worst Prime Minister of this country ever had certainly the most incompetent and that I think that purely reflection of the fact that she just got that job way too young in her life and needed more experience and more time of the ability to actually balance decisions rather than apply ideology in the way that she did so that's a perfect example of what you're talking about well, without having had a scaric of real life experience if I've had a job at all it's been in the public service in a lot of cases who think that they've got some ability to be able to tell people how to live their lives it's the wrong way to do things Totally, you know the road to hell was paved with good intentions though Yeah, totally Jacinda Rudin is I used to think she was a nice person but you know somewhat wonky in her thinking until we had the pandemic and then I came to the conclusion that actually out of all the politicians over all the years that I've met and I've been involved in politics all my life so I'm 55 this year I've met hundreds of them I know them intimately and she's the one person that I of all those politicians and everyone can have different views on them but of all the politicians I met she's the one person who I actually think was evil because of the actions that she did I understand that point and I know a lot of people share it I'm not quite sure I would go that far only because when I look at the way that she responded to things I recognised a lot of myself so I had some pretty strong ideological views when I was young and they were views that I genuinely believed and the views that I don't hold at all now but the views that I genuinely believed at the time were the right solution and if I think about how I might have applied those were I in a position to do so I'm sure I would have done it all that differently to the way that she did there were different policies obviously but it's this blind belief in your right this hubris this blind belief in your own rightness and the fact that if only people would do things the way that you believe that they should be done that the world would be a better place and I guess and maybe I'm naive but I guess there's an aspect of that in my view with her I'm thinking I don't know that she was necessarily evil but I do think she was absolutely driven by a lack of experience and confidence and see this massive ideology which drove everything that she actually did and that actually got worse that doubled down I think because she was surrounded by people who supported it and also the result of the 2020 election which I think she read as a massive endorsement of her when in fact all that was and you saw it right around the western world was a lot of people basically saying we just want to be safe we don't want any change and so I but I think she read that as a huge endorsement and that she almost started to double down at that point and actually get worse because she thought but there was a huge support for what she was doing and therefore she was untouchable evil don't know time will tell history will be interesting when it judges what she did well I mean I wrote an article about that on the BFD called the good the bad and the ugly and I explained why I came to that and it came down to she professed to be this epitome of kindness and then she you know she said and did things that showed that underneath her and the people who supported her and Chris Hickins is one of those were addicted to power and absolute tyrants and use the pandemic to make profound changes to New Zealand society where they pitted mate against mate family against family they you know other people they you know this is supposed to be she's supposed to be a politician that's inclusive and then everything she did was about exclusivity so if you didn't take the vaccine you would gonna be excluded from society the race relations landscape in New Zealand was has significantly eroded from where we were at you know under over many many years it's now I think it's been set I think race relations in New Zealand have been set back 50 years by her government maybe not 50 but for a long time I agree it's interesting carry on because you say all that and I agree with you completely and I looked at the polls for a long time certainly over the last 18 months stubbornly starting up at around 36-37% and I could never understand that because I looked at both and I think are these people seeing the same New Zealand that I'm seeing not just in respect of race relations but in the division that she created but also just in respect of all of the measures of against the things that they claimed that they were going to achieve whether you're talking about housing or health statistics or poverty or all that other stuff that they claimed they were going to do where they had failed failed failed failed basically in everything that they had done and yet those poll numbers were still stubbornly starting up getting close to 40 which did my head I couldn't understand it's becoming down now I see coming down as I was 26-27 which is probably still too high but finally the country starting to see but for a long time those things that you're quite correctly highlighting didn't seem to be resonating with the average key where they just didn't seem to get that we were in such bad shape and respectable with stuff I put that down to a combination of Stockholm syndrome and Pavlov's dogs people just got used to having been told what to do and we saw this the other day there was a fire alarm at Eden Park at one of the World Cup games and they had this guy on TV saying the alarm was going off and I couldn't find anybody who would tell me what to do then I thought you're a Labour voter you're stubbornly stuck because you want to be told what to do yeah I had a conversation with Paul Brennan a few weeks back on your station and we were talking about this and I made the comment that if a Dern and one of their 1pm stand-ups during Covid had come out and said in order to combat Covid we require everybody if you're out in public to wear a Polkadot 1Z I guarantee the following day probably 20% of the population would have been out there proudly supporting the Polkadot 1Z because they were being told to do that news reports of fights breaking out at the warehouse over Polkadot 1Zs and people being dogged in for not wearing it that was how ridiculous it got there was no empirical analysis of why we were doing these things it was coming from the podium of truth and that was the end of it that was the part I found so hard to understand because we're normally pretty decent reasonable people and pretty sensible common sense went out the window of a lot of people during that period I think part of the problem is in New Zealand we've got a large very large percentage of the population whose mantra in life is go along to get along and I think that actually caused a lot of the problems I had people saying to me come on Cam do the right thing I said what is the right thing who said it's the right thing I said well you know Jacinda Ardern said hang on that's the leader of the Labour Party since when have you ever listened to anything that a leader of the Labour Party has ever said and now you're saying we need to go along to get along stuff that I'm not doing that I completely agree it was a weird period it was interesting I saw a meme a few months back the nonsense and I think it said something along the lines I've got a headache so I'm taking a panadol to help my community that was that was essentially what was going on it was this nonsense that was being fed to us that we were believing because we were being told it by somebody who we thought was in a position to know we weren't really talking about what that stuff actually meant by the way I'm not a conspirator so I don't blend to a lot of this stuff on the right around you know vaccines and Covid and stuff some of that but I think generally I think there were no reactions but I can understand where that stuff came from it was a reaction to some of the nonsense that was being peddled and we were being told around the justification for some of the measures that were being taken Never before has our public health legislation being turned on its head pulled inside out and used in a way that it was never designed to do I mean you know the human rules applied to people who had transmissible diseases themselves not the whole population you know it was designed to if you've got smallpox for example then we're going to isolate you and the immediate people in your house and everyone else can get on with their lives they turned that on its head and said we're going to lock you all up so you don't catch this thing and we were just you know it was nonsensical and then I'm sitting there thinking does anybody not learn anything from history we are seeing here a master class in propaganda that's probably making you know use of gerbils sit there, clap his hands and do a little sort of jig that yes my strategies have worked you know you and I might just I gave us a lot of thought over sort of that period between 2000 and late 2020 2021 I guess where we might differ and I differ with a lot of people probably is I think that that first nine months maybe 12 was locked down I kind of get that and I'll tell you why I get it because when this thing first hit in early 2020 there were I'm going to say predictions but there were some specialists saying hey this could be a bad as the Spanish flu now I don't know if you know much about the history of the Spanish flu in 2018 yeah so it killed 7% to the world's population so if COVID had been as bad as that that we were talking half a billion people would have died and in the absence of knowing whether it was going to be that bad or not I kind of get the original lockdowns I understand that I think it was and I think National would have probably done the same thing where I differ with the government is once the figures started to come through once the mortality numbers had to come through and that was late 2020 early 2021 and the mortality rates were and this is a fact cam mortality rates were about 100 of the Spanish flu I think there was 6 million died worldwide versus half a billion which would have been the number had it had it been at the same level as the Spanish flu at that point that was the point for governments around the world to say this thing isn't nearly as bad as we anticipated it's basically just a bad flu we need to open things up again as quickly as possible and get life back to normal and she didn't she actually doubled down she actually made it that was the point where the country said if you'd hang on this isn't right but we didn't we get to continue to go along with it well and you know we had Auckland lockdown for one case you know for months on end and now every day there's thousands of cases in the community God knows why there is are people still testing you know is it a thing but the flu the bad flu exactly I'm very clearly the opinion now the bad flu is a little bit worse if you look at some of the other flu's over the last 20 years the mortality rate is a little higher but not appreciately but if you're fit and healthy and eat well and then you're fine if you're fat old and got a hold of other things well things are a little bit more difficult for you but that's life you made your choices by the way the idea from people when I put what I just said to them is they'll say oh the reason that it was only 6 million is because we had these medication measures and we had that donation so my argument today is I know it is rubbish and so let me to my argument today is well let's say the mortality rate has been twice what it was let's say if we hadn't had those measures have been twice what it was it was still tiny by comparison the reason we went into it the reason we went into it is because there was a fear that it could kill half a billion people worldwide people forget that that was the rationale it wasn't it was one hundredth of that the measures just didn't stack up and what people forget too was that rationale came from a scientist in the UK with a track record of making appalling chicken little sky is falling type predictions that never come true and everyone brought into that all of our modelling that was done we had oh no we need to trust the science we've got these data modelers and if you looked into the data model that they all used here in New Zealand they didn't reinvent the wheel they actually took the wonky wheel off that guy at Imperial College and brought it into here and extrapolated fanciful numbers that that weren't even remotely close to where we were going to end up that is a tough one though because what if it had gone the other way what if it had been you know these have for me to be wise and hindsight but what if it had been much more serious than it was and that's why I say there's an aspect of this that I understand I do understand the initial mitigation measures it's what they did subsequent to that that I have a real problem with and then you know and probably going up the ground as you talk a lot about but then with the parliamentary protests where and don't get me wrong I didn't necessarily agree with a lot of what was being protested there but people asking legitimate questions Kiwi protesting and civil protest in a way that they're entitled to do that was treated not just by the way by Labour who were appalling in their treatment of the protest but even by the National Party I mean all we needed to do was to go down and talk to those people and say look I don't necessarily agree with you but I'm here to listen and he would have won massive accolades from the country instead he chose to take the lead of a Prime Minister who'd lost any sense of who she was and was acting like a dictator Yeah exactly and that's the one thing that I cannot abide of both the ACT Party and the National Party was that unwillingness to talk and that's one of the reasons why when I was asked to come on Reality Check Radio and host a show is that I felt that changes in my life and things like that that we had lost the ability to talk to people we've got this polarization and segregation of thoughts and ideas and if you dare have a broader idea that's from somewhere else then you're a you're a splitter, you're wrong, you get shouted down you get called a racist, you get called all sorts of other labels and we've lost that ability to talk to each other Totally and by the way I hate the fact that Winston Peter till I blame for the position we're currently didn't go down and talk to the protesters that really irks me so the people who should have didn't repeat to go down and do that Well the thing about that too is that he had media following him around during that and he told them all to go away I'm not here to talk to you, I'm here to listen to these people and he didn't make a speech and he didn't stand up in grandstand he just walked and talked and listened and that's what when we voted in MMP we wanted to remove the power of the parties in the two party state that we'd become with Labour and national and swapping shirts and really not getting anywhere when people voted in MMP they had this motherhood and apple pie naive view that somehow we're all going to get along now and we'd have these governments that talked and listened and represented a majority of people and the reality of MMP is that the politicians just treated it exactly the same they just found a different way to do it Back in the early 90s when MMP was being debated I did a speaking series with Michael Laws Michael was debating the program MMP position and I was debating the the ante and it's interesting because many of the arguments that I was putting at the time around why MMP wouldn't work were being poo pooed by Michael and pretty much anybody who was pro and yet most of them have actually turned out to be true for the time and actually seeing this thing in place but again, easy to be wise on hindsight Well, that's how wisdom comes because you've experienced life exactly what we were talking about earlier when people go into politics too early without any life experiences they don't have any wisdom they make stupid decisions Yeah, totally This election Sorry, yep I was just going to say it's not exactly the same question you were just going to ask what's your handle on how it's all going to pan out on October That's exactly what I was going to ask actually I was going to say this election is in all my life looking at elections everyone there's always these superlatives this is the most important election in a lifetime and I've seen 1990 with the landslide of Jim Bolger I've seen the end of the Muldoon era I've seen the end of Helen Clark that all seems to be so small in terms of the issues and things that we were debating back then compared to now and I think at the core issues that I'm seeing that I think are important a loss of freedoms a loss of rights a rise of state power a rise of the deep state all of these things I just want interested to know what your thoughts are on this election how important it is that we really put a stake in the ground here and say no more we're not having any more of this and what those things are that we don't want to have any more I have exactly the same view I'm really concerned about the rise of wokeism in particular and the impact that that had on the national and the international psyche of the way that people think but although when I say that I suspect that's got more to do with this certainly those on the right the fear of saying things rather than necessarily believing this stuff and the reason I say that is it's interesting the Posi-Parkasing up until that point there had been very little debate on the whole issue of gender ideology and you could have been excused for believing at that stage that everybody went along with it the Posi-Parkasing kind of split that wide open and gave those of us who were on the other side of that the permission to basically talk and now there's a much more open dialogue on both sides of that so that was encouraging which was interesting because she achieved that with that actually opening up now so putting that aside there are some really fundamental divides on the left and right it's no longer left and right it's left and right to some degree so this is a really important election and I guess my worry about the outcome of this election is the extent to which some of that because for me putting aside everything I just said the position of the National Party and the fact that they're currently sitting on the centre right the centre left sorry I still think it's really important that we get a change of government even if it's not an ideal government we've got to get rid of what we've currently got in place and in that regard I've got some real concerns about the extent to which the right wing vote currently is splintered and the splintering of individual little parties proliferation of little parties that have popped up and who are on their own none of them taking any particularly large share but collectively they might take 7 or 8% which could actually be quite important when it comes to the election by result now my view on that when people ask me is this is the election to vote national or act that not to vote for anybody else to vote for national if you've got concerns about traditional conservative politics but to the election following because there'll be a three year period when once you've got a national act coalition and power then you can start thinking about centre right alternatives to that right now the priority for everybody on the right is to vote for the only two parties that can actually form a government and that's national and act and I've got a real concern that as each day passes I have that concern lessen because as the polls are going in the right direction Labour's dropping I think the chances of that are less than they were a month ago but I'm still concerned so for me my gut feeling that this is going to be a pretty comfortable win for a national act coalition but it may well be a parliament that's got a fragmentation of some other weird and wonderful parties as well you may well have you're doing first back in parliament you know you could even have top that would be an extreme result but who knows so you may have a proliferation of little parties and then a government sitting on sort of 63-64% and that will be interesting if that happens it'll be interesting in terms of what that means but what we've got to do is we've got to break the stronghold that the sort of the woke ideology that the government and her cohort have had over the country over the last six years The wasted vote is a concern because at the 2020 election 9% or 257,000 or 258,000 odd votes were wasted 75,000 of those votes were New Zealand first and 43,000 of those were top but there was all of these little parties there with small amounts of support and really have got zero chance of getting into parliament and I hear what you're saying about national enact I think there's a distinct possibility that we will see a return of New Zealand first and my view is that national is the other side of the coin that Labour is on and there is a risk of wokeism infecting the national party and so we need to have a a bull walk against that that sort of wokeism of the national party and that in some respects is act but then David Seymour is a little bit sort of woke as well and a bit squishy on some of these things and so then you need the hard conservatives like New Zealand first I don't think there's realistically anybody else out there that would temper that and say no no we're not going to do that we're not going to have sorry mate I was just going to say it's interesting you say that about act because when you look at act so act on economics are entirely orthodox and I would support pretty much most of their position but when you start looking at their social policies there's some wacky stuff in there they're all over the place and it's much less easy to define as being seen to right I understand the idea of them being in Parliament but I understand your point I guess my argument is that the time to look at creating a strong alternative conservative party is in three years between 2023 and 2026 that's the time whether it's a coalition of the existing conservative groups or a brand new force that come up I don't know but that's the time to talk about it once we've safely got a I tend to agree with you on that but the problem with all these small parties and it's a perennial problem with them is they're very usually driven either by a single agenda or a dynamic personality that you know has developed a bit of a cult following and they don't like playing they don't play well with others because you know it's like the libertarians you know I kind of like you know resonated with them for years and years and years but the reality of them getting into Parliament was very small chance of them ever getting there so consequently their ideas were never actually entertained and I once told them go and infiltrate other parties and spread your ideas inside those because I don't think Nationals ever going to be a conservative a conservative party you know not in name not even with a little C it's like a silent C I don't think they're ever going to be that again I completely agree and so there is an opportunity for that it's just not this election interestingly I've had two different political parties approached me in the last six or seven months asking for advice on what they can do to increase their share and what they should be doing and both cases I've said to them hold up your tent and go and catch and think about what you're thinking about now in nine months time after we've safely got a National Government about the terrorism wanted to hear that although I noticed one of them did exactly that later on I won't mention who it was but one which was never really made any sort of impact but I've now folded their tent and joined into New Zealand first which was a good move but it's a hard thing to hear because these people have as you say they've either got an enduring philosophy that they think is the social credit approach to politics or they've got a dynamic leader or at least what they think is a dynamic leader of the land and there are very few Winston Peters and Bob Joneses on the political landscape Exactly Now in November 2022 you wrote an article on your site called The Biggest Threat Do you think that is the same threat now? I can't remember what I wrote, remind me what that said You said how to counter the biggest threat to our nation and you basically talk about we've kind of touched on this where differences in political opinions are now dividing families, ending friendships sometimes leading to violent confrontation between protagonists and you're talking about how we've lost civility and that there's anger in almost every debate Do you still see that as It's probably receded a little bit and it's receded a little bit I think because it's almost like a lot of us have woken up out of the family year that we were in so there was a period between 2020 and probably mid 2022 where I think what I said in that article was absolutely true, it was this protracted division where there was no ability to stand around a barbeque and have honest differences of opinion you either hold one position, Covid was a good example of that but it was also true in things like the whole world's agenda around gender and some of these other things I think that's receded a little bit and I think it's receded for two reasons but as I say, we've come back from the brink and actually realised how bad things have gotten, that's not who we are as a country but I also think if you look around the western world and you see that the right is starting to win government and national elections in different parts of the world I think that's also having a little bit of an impact as people are starting to realise perhaps this stuff isn't but if I think about for example the agenda of the Greens and to the lesser degree labour it's just repackaged communism or socialism, it's the same stuff that hasn't worked over the last 40 or 50 years and what happens is every 20 or so years the generation of kids that there's a new generation comes along, doesn't realise what a massive value was, how many people died in the name of those things and buy into this idea that it's going to work again but right now if that had some a tendency over the last two or three years I think it's sort of gone off the border a little bit it's interesting because the spluttering voice of that now is the Greens look at some of the stuff that's coming out of the Greens they're kind of the the last hurrah of that stuff as we move back towards what I think is the more practical centre left position and I hope I hope I'm right, that if we get an X National Coalition for all of this and for all of the issues that I might take for this you'll see a return to some of those more traditional New Zealand values and policies over the next three, six, hopefully nine years of that government all be at work as you correctly say some workism wouldn't have been present in a national government even ten years ago Yeah, I mean what you're saying is correct, you're never going to find a party that gives you a hundred percent of what you want if you do find a party that gives you a hundred percent of what you want then you need to question whether or not you're an old member you know for this election it's very important this election we have to remove the racist that we have in power, the people who wish to separate us dominate us, subjugate us control us, they need to be gone and that means that we have to really make sure that the Labour Party the Green Party and to party Maori are taught a very valuable lesson that the voters are important and we live in New Zealand and we want and don't need to have all of this you know these pathways to separatism that we're heading on whether you're vaccinated or not vaccinated whether you have the right ancestors or not whether you're what they call progressive you know it's all about controlling and dominating language and behaviours and we need to we need to go back to not so much the hedonistic values of the individual but protect individual rights and human rights and fight for those like they mean something you know it's all very well to have campaigns around the country talking about freedom of speech but when you get a real test of freedom of speech and you are found to be wanting in that regard then we need to know you should account for that even the racist you know Cameron she should raise that one it might surprise you hear me say this but I'm actually of some of that agenda but I'll tell you here's the difference under Finlayson and prior to that under Doug Graham and the National Government you actually had quite a bit of progress in that space they did it in a way that took the country with them so instead of forcing it down our throat and saying this is what we're doing tough luck if you don't like it they explain what they're doing they will put the country along and in the process of doing that they healed a lot of wounds that otherwise wouldn't have been healed the difference with these guys is that it's basically our way of the highway so I'll give you a really good example of that this stuff around naming conventions over government departments and even some local body of the country I actually haven't got an issue with that provided you take people with you and the way you take people with you is A you put both the English and the Māori version so you make sure that people can actually understand and B you do it in a way where you're explaining to people why you were doing it so I do fear and this is a reaction don't get me wrong this is a pendulum so when I look at like compatriots on the right there's some fairly racist reactions to this stuff and it's a response and a reaction to what the government's doing and it's because of that so if they were doing it in a different way will they're actually bringing people with them I suspect you would find there'd be a lot more support for it so it's not so much what they're doing it's how they're doing it how they're forcing it down people's throat Absolutely you're 100% correct on that and it's been done in a rather sinister way as well you know you're seeing it's been organised you know we've seen all of the news media in lockstep we've got an article in the Herald on Tuesday where there's some guys a sports coach who's saying that he's a better sports coach because he has incorporated you know Māori science into his sports coaching I was thinking what? this is nuts it's crazy there's no critical it's almost like there's this I don't want to sound racist because I'm not but this Māori wonderfulness that it's a revisionist view of the past and creating a fantasy that a lot of academics and particularly government people as well buy into that there was this nirvana in New Zealand that was upset by these awful colonialists that came here and so that comes from no go ahead I was just going to say that comes from and you'll be familiar with this obviously but that's not just about Māori culture that's critical race theory that's the whole concept of white privilege and so that comes from this idea that indigenous people in New Zealand can do no wrong and that the cause of society is colonialism and ultimately if you take it back to its basis it comes from the Caucasians who have infected the world with their disease now don't get me wrong there is an aspect of colonialism that we should be ashamed and embarrassed of if you think about what colonialism was driven by and it's interesting because it segues back to how we started this conversation it was driven primarily by Christianity it was driven by the battle between the Catholic church and the Protestant church as wanting to get to nations first with the Bible in one hand and trade in the other with their version of the message of the gospel and so to the extent that they did that there were some atrocities that were carried out in the process of doing that and that's fine we should acknowledge that we should be honest about it and we should recognize it but let's not then turn that head and pretend that everything that was virtuous in the nation that we came to until the Europeans came there were some pretty atrocities going on in New Zealand and or Aratiara if you want to call about in other parts of the world at that period of time as well which were assuaged by the entrance of Europeans there were some good things that came with that but here's the thing about this that I find most fascinating is if those who promote this idea that colonialism was a bad thing and should never have happened had their way with the exception of a handful of poms who've immigrated here over the last 50 years and a few of the nationalities almost none of us, European or Maori, would actually have ever been born and that's the idea so these people who are arguing for a return of reversion back to this previous society would never have existed if that colonialism hadn't taken place so while it may not have come with it may not be completely virtuous in terms of the way that it was applied that the society that we now have rightly or wrongly is a direct result of that and so for me the answer is not to look bad but to look forward to say how do we work together as one people and work forward and make this the best society that we possibly can I think we also need to acknowledge Maori's own oral history the reality is that we're all colonisers in this country including they were the first colonisers they came here in a boat just like everybody else and it's kind of forgotten in our history one last thing I wanted to just touch on Ashley that all people don't talk about is that you are very open in your support for Israel as am I and I will certainly get attacked for being pro-Israel for one to the better term has your position come about because of your conservatism in your face or is there another driver Yes, so a lot of them have been a shocking Christian for the last 40 years one thing I've always been very animatable and I was a bad Christian was around prophecy and it's something I took a lot of interest in and for a big part of that time I brought people with the definition of this but I was into something called premillennialism which is the belief system within Christianity that's got a whole lot of it and one of those was that Israel had been put aside by God because of the disobey and Christians had taken the place of Israel and we're now the new Israel the spiritual Israel if you like but 15 or so years I've realized it's out of garbage complete nonsense Israel is front and center when it comes to it has an extraordinarily important role to play in terms of where we are I obviously believe in this idea that we're getting close to the end of civilization or should be this particular period of civilization and Israel is absolutely crucial to that in fact so much so I'm not sure whether you're aware of this or not but I've actually written a couple of books on this topic and I'm about to publish one of them soon which is actually explaining exactly the role of Israel and where it fits into this big picture Oh, make sure you see them in your copy I'm just putting all of that aside and just looking at it at a secular level the barrage the infected barrage of criticism of Israel the claims of apartheid it's just complete garbage it is absolute garbage and when you actually understand this country and its history and you look at the way that it operates the way that it treats people who in any other nation would be treated extremely badly and tries to do the right thing by them and just its whole demeanour toward what it sees as its responsibility being a democratic state in the Middle East it's completely the odds with the propaganda that you hear so I'm a massive supporter and will be till the day I die I've come to this same position I've always been a supporter of Israel but when I went there in 2014 people said why are you going there with the Palestinians and I said well no it's the other way around actually the Palestinians are at war with Israel and I was accused of all sorts of things and look the country reminded me of New Zealand 30 years ago a can do attitude filled with inventors that are making do and doing things kind of cause they have to and it really reminded me of what New Zealand was like 30 or 40 years ago and I think we've lost I think we've lost a lot of our our core strengths in New Zealand over the years and so I looked at Israel as a guiding light for how through necessity and working together you can become a great nation and I just I'm hoping that after this election that we put all of this nonsense aside this polarization this extremism on both sides and come together as a nation and to use the amazing resources that we have and that includes the human resources that we have to make New Zealand the greatest country in the world couldn't agree with you more couldn't agree with you more interestingly and it's probably a good point to end on but if you wanted to talk back to the biblical position if you wanted a foreign policy which which just a pretty benevolent place in the world it's right at the beginning of the Bible it's in Genesis 12-3 and it's talking about the attitude of other nations toward Israel and it says I will bless those that bless those that curse them and that might sound pretty simplistic but if you look at that throughout history the nations that have attacked Israel and have taken the belligerent attitude toward Israel have ultimately paid the price for that and the nations that have blessed Israel and have done what they can to support it the United States is really an example of that have gone on to bigger and better things so you couldn't go too far wrong as the nation to have your starting foreign policy of making sure that you were supporting Israel and doing everything that you could to support its position in the world and that's one of the things that even though you don't like Winston Peters that's one of the things he's strongest on is support of Israel so on that note Ashley I think we will leave it there no problem hey I'm enjoying the chat thanks for the opportunity no problem thank you very much Ashley Church I thoroughly enjoyed that chat with Ashley Church his faith is certainly giving him a different perspective on politics and it's clear that he cares very deeply about the direction the country is currently heading in and what we can do about finding solutions to that Altec's machine is now live send us your thoughts by texting your message to 2057 that's 2057 so get in touch with us now right now free speech is under heavy attack in New Zealand with the government constantly devising new ways to enforce censorship to revive honest media and support RCR join our foundation membership club today to learn more visit dot radio slash members this is The Crunch with Cam Slater conversations with a side of controversy right here on RCR Matt McCartan is one of New Zealand's finest experts in the dark arts of politics he and I have a long history on opposing sides but Matt has always been easy to deal with and a straight shooter he is one of my most respected operators in politics and he is with me now as this week's political tragic welcome Matt morning brother we've had a long and fractious relationship politically haven't we Matt we have indeed we haven't either say we are fractious but not personal but we are a couple of different sides of the field so we engage, when we engage with the other conflict we have always been amicable well that's the thing Matt we've never seen eye to eye politically but on some issues we've contacted each other for assistance now and then and have what I call a collegial business relationship with each other and we seem to get on alright and it seems to be something that is somewhat lacking in politics these days yes mainly because this is my experience I've come from a trade union background I'm negotiating with employers some schools they're just doing their job and then some who I deal a lot in the migrant exploitation world if people have a belief as they might you and I have then you can disagree on the issue you are discussing but it's not personal what I find is what politics is personal when people don't really this is my experience that people who take things perfectly personally seem to not really have a strong they're not really in politics because of politics you know political it comes quite personal why would I get upset as an adversary whose articulation is what they believe in why would I get upset by that because we live in a civil society right so we debating and sometimes I know it will shock you but sometimes you might be right and I might have to accept it and on the other hand that might be the same you see and that's where you you're a conviction we do conviction politics so therefore it's not personal you know and so therefore what I find in the middle ground of politics is like their political differences aren't that great so therefore they tend to make their differences quite personal that has been my well you know politics tends to be a zero sum game where one side has to win and the other side has to lose and I think that both you and I have kind of ended up in the same place you're talking about the middle ground and you know I'm no longer you know a tribal nat or tribal any particular political party and I'm looking for solutions that are good for the country as a whole with a firm belief that we should look after New Zealand first and foremost ahead of perhaps some of the other countries around the world that always seeking New Zealand's input and so I think you and I have come from different ends of the political spectrum and we're meeting in the middle which is kind of ironic considering where we've both come from I think you should wash your mouth out as when you say the middle it's a dirty word to come at me no I think you're right I mean we're not aligned to political parties and you're aligned to political parties you have a certain responsibility right you can't be a free agent you can't have it both ways so that when you're not you can say you think you know without that sense I can't say that because that compromises the change so then you've always been a bit of a free agent sort of being anyway and a lot of times I haven't been but you keep you keep your own faith and you always be you have disappointments on you at times but you should always articulate what you believe in and I think that you've always well my relationship with you you've always been that don't like some of it but I know that you believe it you know and that wasn't and I respect that so sorry I sort of forget that I'll come back to what I started off with about employers I will work with many of them because they believe in what they're going to do they're not going to respond to your share and etc and I've got a responsibility to the workers and therefore you both concede that you have a different and a conflict of interest you just do but that doesn't make it all personal that makes it is that you have a responsibility both sides and I always say to a lot of the bosses I don't like this capital very much at all but I don't bring that to the table I'm here to do work on the half of your workers and therefore we accept that and once we get past that ideological stuff we just dare to do the job and so I've always been able to keep an integrity with the people I go up against with I always can shake hands you know and I think that's important I do that in politics as well I never have Well I've always found you to be a man of your word Matt and we've looked each other in the eye across the table and shaken hands on particular things we may not have 100% agreed with where we were heading on that but we found a solution to a particular problem and we've gone ahead with that and I've always respected you for your ability to do that and it's one of the things that I find missing a lot in politics these days the ability to sit down across a table or have a beer or a chardonnay or whatever your particular tipple is and and actually nut out some solutions yeah well you and I are old school right and we come from old school and the world has changed now where people can't be straight you know and can't be direct because there's a lot of feelings and I think that the institutions in society now have been inherited by the culture and I say this and I don't mean it in a way that could be construed but I come from a background of worse in class people just talk straight and I've been with bosses talk straight but what I deal with in politics now everyone is watching is what they say and also what they think and I think that's made a less tolerant society and a less honest society and I think that's what I admire those who have beliefs they actually say what they think but that's coming less and less though well that's what's prompted you to join the free speech union isn't it yeah indeed and of course all of my mates on my left just say oh this is the right wing thing you shouldn't belong to this is about an issue of free speech I've just been appalled at those that I have to explain sometimes to like and it stresses me to have to explain to them free speech has always been an issue a campaign of the left it was always about because free speech was muggled by those without power and that those who had power use the state to get so with union I just know the amount of time I've been silent in the work that I do you know run off to the authority of the courts get muzzled or orders on you look at the history of any country but New Zealand 51 they passed laws that you weren't even allowed to speak to the workers the workers were not to be given voice I've got a a gazetna donated to me by the old communists and they used it during the 51 blue to do printing of the leaflets in the in the Hillsborough graveyard in the cemetery there they used to do the printing there at night because they were not allowed to have their message heard out and all the tradition has always been that state stopped those without power and speaking and I just I don't know how the left has got itself into a position or many of those situations they all seem to think that free speech is dangerous that's where they're talking about these hate speech laws and I always say with things like that and with censorship and you know all of the things that we saw happen during the madness of the pandemic with the government of the day and supported by the opposition parties I might add leapt on board totalitarianism in a heartbeat something that you've spent a lifetime fighting against and I've spent a lifetime explaining why we must never go down this path of the state having these awesome powers because you know I always say be careful what you wish for you know the right might bring them in someone might bring in hate speech laws but I can see the left wing being silenced by the very laws that they brought in look I I accept that when the when the pandemic took hold in the world that people were scared and that New Zealand was lucky because we were down the other end of the world and it took a while to get here so we had time to get precautions in and whether you believe in the vaccine or not I think that New Zealand handled it well but then continued on where it was unnecessary to do things like that but I was the thing which I got from it was the power of the state and how the mess just marched in steep with it I was just I found that extraordinary and I think the thing which was really stunned me was when the campers the occupiers went to Parliament and the trade union movement you know passed the resolution and put out a statement supporting the police removing the protesters and I just like I was just stunned now I'm not in the leadership of the trade union movement anymore but I called my old union which I founded and you know we can't have a part of any of that and the CPU put the state out and I understand my union went along with it which I just think where does a union movement support the state removing protesters from the people's Parliament in a civil society you know what I was afraid of the people when I shut them down you know you and I both know we can't have someone like a Muldoon or a Norma Kurt that go down there like Winston Petersen you go and take a look what does an annual gauge but what we have is a fear of the people and that if we don't like their ideas or what they're saying instead of debating we'll close it down I mean how hard would it have been for them to go and put up a tent and a couple of chairs and a table and say right it would have been great because St. Jacinda went down there but she was very popular and she goes down with a number of the MPs and so let's have a dialogue you know and be respectful and New Zealanders are respectful you know I mean they are it's just our culture and it would have been it's like when Helen Clark when she wouldn't meet the Maldi Landmarch for the sea bed and four shores she wouldn't meet the sheep and wouldn't engage with them you see and all that thing is about this respect and you create something that you probably wish you hadn't if Clark hadn't treated the Maldi protestants with more respect when they came down to Parliament maybe they wouldn't have had a Maldi party you know maybe because they said well we're going to have our own boys I think in Malart mishandling the protest supported by the institutional left I think they missed an opportunity and I think it built a working class resentment which you know was unnecessary So if you'd been Jacinda Ardern's chief of staff would you have advised her to go and talk to them do you think that would have diffused the whole situation after a couple of days? Well even if they didn't go home they're entitled I've always protested because I think that bringing grievances to the attention is important to the civil society all change it comes through confrontation it doesn't come through persuasion every time you have a major push it's because there's been conflict and physical conflict sometimes the conflict of ideas that needs to be expressed so you know if Jacinda had gone down there she would have gained the respect but also given respect to the protest you know so say look you know because they had a legitimate beef and we agree with it or not it was legitimate right to protest and saying that we're going to far to the states there were anti-vaxxers and other things but that's just meanness but there were a lot of other people there people I know who are friends of mine who have been deported to journalists they went down and one of them which you would know he went down to interview the protestors put it up and he got pilloried pilloried just for interviewing the protestors when has that ever happened in less time it's like it's a different beast now I find it strange Matt I have to say that you and I seem to have more in agreement with each other these days than we ever did in the past we work on our services before the end of the course that way that we can get back to normal I don't know if I want to go back to normal I'm enjoying having discourse with political opponents without any sort of you know anger or distrust or angst or anything negative it's just conversation and I'm enjoying it and I wish I could pour myself back in time and change a few things do you wish there was some aspects Matt that you could go back in time to do do something different not more than once an hour yeah well let's talk about they have no regrets they've not had a life let's talk about something that's not too far in the distant past in 2014 you were the chief of staff to David Cunliffe he had a election campaign Cunliffe announced at the campaign launch that this is what he said this election campaign should not be about dirty tricks or dodgy deals or smear campaigns or even a personality cult that was on the 7th of July 2014 now you were in that in a group of the Labour Party and you came up with the slogan vote positive which at the time I sat there scratching my head what does that mean and it didn't mean anything and it certainly didn't mean anything during the election campaign unless one thing happened and that one thing was the release of Nicky Hager's book dirty politics so I'm just going to put you on the spot now Matt how much heads up did you guys have about his book I can't speak rather than speak for myself so you got to remember I went down there in the early part of 2014 and I had been as I said to Cunliffe sort of at the time I've been trying to kill your party for the last 10 to 20 years from the alliance side but you aren't no longer around so I'm a working class boy but I hadn't been part of the Labour Party thing since my 20s so I didn't really know the internal I mean I knew enough about them so I've always decided about being positive and inside for the things I had no knowledge of them because they were done before I arrived so it wasn't I'm not thinking if I knew about it I'd say what does your gut say though Matt about what does your gut say about how close Labour was to Nicky Harger and that the book was not just a mere coincidence but actually planned not I had no knowledge of that and if you ask me I know Nicky you know in the early days he knew that was close to Labour at all and I never saw many late Labour people around as old as Nicky he always had this thing to be independent and the conversations I've either had with him who's got nothing to do with the late Labour Party I think Helen Clark with one of those books in her election the seeds of distrust so I think you know I'm going back to the long time ago now but hand on heart I don't recall in a meeting where I was involved and there's any discussion about our mate Nicky I don't recall that at all and I haven't seen Nicky for 20 years he's a Wellington as I said before earlier on in this interview Matt you've always found you a man of your word and I'll accept that you don't know anything about that but it just seemed to me to be a very happy coincidence at the very least my experience is that parties I know this will shock you but parties aren't that smart it doesn't shock me at all you know the world everyone's sitting in bunkers and plopping things out and they've got their mats up on the wall and they kind of think a thing and people kind of think there's some master plan most of the thing is just and cock-ups and because everything as you know our politics or party politics is all committee items that all decisions are never made and you sit in rooms and you talk about things but you don't really decide a lot and most of the politicians I've come across are not conviction politicians in the way that I would like them to be so they have trouble of making decisions you know because they've taken all the things water from water I was a bit lucky with Jim Anderton now I know that people have drawn the view of Jim many times but one thing he's had which was very good he believed in stuff he believes in stuff and he made decisions and I think that's the requirement which of the people once said to me which I thought was good to go the main thing in politics you need to have is ability to have courage and ability to make decisions or to have courage and ability to make decisions and he's right most politicians and certainly those who are centre, centre left or centre right there's a bit of mush in there they don't like that everything's got committee items and everyone's all scared and they're watching but they don't really think about what do we do to help to make our society better at least to have a view so I've more respect for those on the right who have a conviction about something then at least I know and you can make agreements and shake hands and get past your long pathway because at least you're fighting about an issue not about where I like somebody it's not about us that's the thing is that I used to be on Martin Bravery's TV show and he always tried to have a guest on that was going to attack me and get cam and he used to say I'll get Chris Trotter on, he's very smart he'll beat cam and it was always for Martin a zero-sum game someone had to win and someone had to lose and I think it was extreme frustration for him when Chris Trotter and I or you and I or anybody else would be on the show and at some point one or other of us would say I think Matt's right on that or Chris Trotter would say you know what I agree with Cam on that and I don't think he ever understood that by and large we all want the same things for this country we've just got a different approach to get there I think that's right at some point, it's funny when I negotiate as well they say this thing we all want the same thing no we don't because your job is to maximise return to your share shareholders and my job is to get a bigger return to the workers so we don't have them in common well we do we don't have conflicts of interest but in a society what we think is best we'll have differences on that but I think what we want to do is reach agreements that I think will advance us towards or that so I agree with you on that so even though I tend to find a better political education and submit another view to others on the right and that's a healthier debate because sometimes on the left when you're with your own tribe it's sort of really a religious experience that you can choose the best of all like how we can be outraged at the most things you can talk to a few people on the left on my side, you talk about something if you want to upset the crowd and get them all going just use the word Trump, the way they go and then it comes by like how much we all hate him but it doesn't actually advance us much and I think what's important about debates is it's actually testing your ideas you know and then testing their ideas because you always come along I always walk away from any of them what do I learn do I learn something if I didn't, oh it's a point exactly right let's move to more modern times you're the ultimate insider you know how political parties deal with crises and cock ups and stuff ups and everything else let's talk about an implosion of a career recently in the Labour Party and I'm talking about Michael Wood here a guy who was the understudy to fill golf for decades has long wanted to be he probably still has ambitions to be Prime Minister and he tanked his career over essentially a Big Mac chips and a Coke what tell me from your perspective what you was thinking when you watched all this unfold because I was gobsmacked I just couldn't believe that someone would jeopardize their career in such a way over the equivalent of a Big Mac chips and a Coke I agree and you know you put it down to Cuba really you know that when some of the companies who jumped by 20 points and they suddenly you know before they were an MP they suddenly become an MP and Michael was bright and was work hard and ambitious and these were all good traits I liked those things because they were a card they wanted to push themselves and he would see I don't know if he would have succeeded but he was not shy and they liked to be the Prime Minister you know and then what happened and it's just extraordinary so I think these two points I think there is him and you and I both know this and I've been guilty all over myself you've got to have your personal life your personal way you can duck yourself pretty strong a high powered job you're going to be under a lot of stress and you're going to you've got to be careful not to drop in the ball and I think you've got a blind spot it was about nothing the finances and all the trust stuff and the shares are really managed by his wife truly and I don't think I don't know how a family operates you know like pillow talk and they go I'll do it I think that because you know when you start doing all these really important things that's a very small thing but as you know right the Cabinet Office went to him 12 times now which part of those 12 times do you think should I better get on with you know and he kept telling me what but he wouldn't then three times they went to the Prime Minister's office now see that's when you think it's where the problem is you know I get with my uncle they think you know I'm too special it doesn't matter and all that I will get around to it not seeing the political thing but someone like a chooser start job is to look at it politically and they should have gone down you know you and I know how it works you go down there and say but the Cabinet Office went to him twice see there's no baseball bat right let's hold hands and convey our gentle with each other right what required was a Michael the Prime Minister said to you twice now I want confirmation on Monday that they will be sold are we clear good okay now here's the thing if you haven't given me the evidence by Monday don't turn up the Cabinet okay we got that are we all clear all right because it's not about you it's about us and just don't turn up the Cabinet then he would have sold them right so it's a question of you know you looked at the recently with Kerry Allen there's something about soft management which comes and bites you in the eye I think that was Michael nobody went to him and said get it sold this week send me the failed Dr. Hopeman and don't turn up to kick the Cabinet there was no Heather Simpson was there exactly no one who made just a mere you know indication on your phone that Heather Simpson was calling you would would make your insides turn to liquid with fear I look you know right it's a bit of like all management you create these iconic people because of the history, but you had someone and she'd been there for a long time and she was quite age two. So people knew that she was more than just the chief. When she spoke, she was speaking for the prime minister? She spoke for the prime minister and what she had was there was a compliment. And people understood it. What we've had is under Jacinda's leadership, a style which worked for a while and people liked it. But what you had was we'd be kind. People liked that. Life in kind. But this is the other part of it. Internally, there needs to be some peace too. And she'd have errant MPs and they were just cautioned. And she put people into positions. She shouldn't have been in there because she'd want to be kind. She doesn't want to hurt people's feelings.  What we had was MPs had no conflict. And so you've created and under the Chris Whitkins as well, there's no element of that. And he's had to pay the price for it. Because what it shows is weekly leadership. One thing New Zealanders don't like is weakness. We've never liked weakness. Look at the leaders that we've had. Robert Muldoon, very strong. David Longy, very strong. Jenny Shipley, Helen Clark, very strong leaders. And then we've sort of got the mealy-mouthed ones after the Helen Clark leaders. I think that's right. And I think that's a culture which, you know, go about it.  It's like, when I do negotiations with big employees or with from law and bar employees or exporters, you always apply and think until you're not. And I was on the call with someone this morning and said, look, I work with good faith. But now you're not wearing good, good, good faith. So now I'm going to burn the house down. And then I'm going to follow through. Like you don't bluff. So there will be a conflict.  They get charged after charged. Yeah. And I used to say to some in the past, you know, that sometimes you've got to hang someone in the vivid square. So that everyone will understand, you know, is that, you know, you've got to, you know, if you don't have discipline, and one of the things when I went down with the Labor Party in 2014, in the election year, which they were going to lose, full of factionalization, division, factionalization. And I thought, well, I don't know. I know, you know, most of this guy, they will think I've got horns and I'll make it work. So my thing was to stop them from, from fighting each other, you know, under money, each other. And my, my thing was simple. It's that I would talk to them about their responsibilities to the people who put them there. Yeah. What about them? There are people who vote for them no matter what, because they believe in them. And they praise them by working on a little band, they band to use who's up and who's down, who's got to think. Now that didn't work for most of them, but they all got the message of the moral responsibility. And when it was a leak or undermining, I'd go and see them. Yeah. And I'd call them out on them. Yeah. I'd say, look, this has been going on and you've been accused of this. I didn't do it. Good. I believe you. Good.  Right. But I'm not leaving now. I'm sure the leader wasn't you. Oh, but brother or sister, I don't have to do this at DNA. We don't. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's right. But that's because there was consequences. And that, that seems to me to be the major flaw of MMP is that there are not the electoral consequences that they used to be for doing appalling things. You know, the Labour Party suffered that in, in, in 1990, you know, after six years of the Douglas years and all of the, the things that happened then, there was a consequence for that. And it was a landslide election victory. Yeah. Well, that's what that's exactly right. And that's what you've got to, it's the sort of thing is, you know, when you do party politics, right?   So we can do whatever we like, right? We can say whatever we like. And that's fine. That's how it should be. But once you take a click of gold and you work for them, then you have a responsibility.  You know, and yeah, and I don't think that something in peace, they actually think that it's a privilege for us to have them, you know, not the other way around, you know, and every in peace, you always wake up.  And I get paid to do it. Mostly as a volunteer, you know, mostly they look in the mirror and go, aren't I great? Well, unfortunately, there's no, but most of them are actually quite fearful. Yeah.  Well, they make things happen, don't they, Matt? Yeah. Well, they want to prove themselves. So I like those ones because they can hold them to account. It's very fearful. And all they do is scared about, you know, I think that some of them got an imposter in the way they probably say that they shouldn't be there. I mean, you know this, right? It's about a third of the MPs are doing the work, do the leadership, but a third are okay, you know, will be solid, you know, will be fast, but they get the job done. And the other third are... Do you think, what are they doing here? Yeah, they're not fit for man or beast, are they mostly? So, and when you've got a party with a long tail, then that's going to shift. But using code, whether it had been that, I always say, well, this is what you get, a representative, a representative's size, the size, size, size, size, size, that even the dumb are allowed to have them represent themselves.  So this election is shaping up to be critical. Perhaps one of the most important elections in my lifetime, in your lifetime. Do you mean unlike every other election, which they say the same thing? Well, you're right. They do say the same thing, you know, and I look back on them and I think, you know, and this is what people say, if we've got to get rid of this government because otherwise this country is lost or whatever, and I sit there and think, well, yeah, they said that at the end of the Douglas Longie years, they said that at the end of the Jim Bolger years, we said that at the end of the Helen Clark years. And I look back on those battles. And I think compared to where we're at today, they were nothing. And I am genuinely fearful about the future of New Zealand for the first time in my life. We've said all those things in the past, but we've seen governments use the fearsome powers of the state against its own citizens. And there wasn't very much pushback on that at all when that frightens me. Yeah, I was a bit surprised by that too. And I think, and I think it's not just in this country, I think it's the ground around the world. And do you think that's the main sort of issue for the solution? I think that we've seen a flipping of the roles and you alluded to it earlier saying that, you know, free speech and freedoms and rights and all of those sorts of things used to be the wheelhouse of the left. You know, some of the great advances that we've made in human rights have come from, you know, those left wing parties. I know that's right. They challenged the right to speak. Exactly. Martin Luther King, you know, I mean, look at Mandela. I mean, it's not a free speech until the state oppresses them, they make it into more violent means. Yeah. And we've got this situation happening now where we've got, you know, in the United States, we've seen collusion between the federal government and tech companies to silence people simply for having a differing opinion. We've had the advent of that here in New Zealand.  We've even got individuals like Nikki Hager, for example, who wrote a book in my case because he wanted me silenced because I had a different point of view and a different outlook on life. And that concerns me more than almost anything else that we we haven't learned any of the lessons that we had from history where totalitarianism never ends well. No. And yet we dabbled with that and enthusiastically jumped on board that as a nation. And that concerns me. And for that reason, it's my view that this actually really is important because we're at a crossroads here. We can either continue down the path to what I see as destruction with separatism, with the inability of polarization, all of those sorts of things, or we draw a line under that. But the problem with drawing a line under that is just, well, who do you support? Because all the parties that are currently in the parliament, we're all on board with it.  You can't even look at David Seymour and the ACT Party without being suspicious because they were all on board all of that as well. That the only difference was that they would be more efficient at stomping on our freedoms. Well, you raise a good point. And I don't have the answer because I think it's been a I think, you know, I go back to the comedian who took over from Noah, you know, the South African comedian who took over from on the daily show. Oh, John, John, what's his name? Anyway, it'll come to me. God, I don't know why I I can't. Trevor Noah. Oh, yeah, yeah. He said it's under South African. And he said an interesting thing that when Mandela came and they had the Truth and Reconciliation process, and Noah was going to be sent to jail if they told the truth, right? And he said that created a very selfie environment where people could discuss things openly. And he said that racism was addressed and people, yep, no, because we don't get into denial. And he goes, the South African political dialogue was better than America because there's a suppression all the time. He goes, they're watching that, you know, this time. And that's not the Civil War. And that's a clear example, you know, by people saying, OK, we don't know how we're going to get through this, right? And they got through it. Yeah, not great, but they got through it. And so my thing is, is that I'm never afraid of someone else's speech, and nor should anyone, right? You know, and they're just, you know, if you disagree and I think it's really bad, then you have a right and you have a responsibility to engage. Engage and challenge and offer your own ideas. That's the title you've developed, right? Always. A lot of things can go, OK, racism or separatism or other things. And that's a two-way street tour. And some people might debate it. We're growing up, you know, and they will change each other's views. And we'll have an outcome. So I think that all debate is healthy. And unless you agree with it, the better it is, you know, and that's how society changes. And it stops us from undercurrent. It stops us from having a very unhealthy society of fear. And then in the state. And I say this from some experience, right? I mean, a different world. In the employment world I work in, I'm constantly suppressed to protect those with power to have been exploiting. They had all these agreements are confidential. It's, the whole thing's a lot. So all employment law is done on no admission of guilt, and it's all kept in confidential. You know, and the thing is, is that if people knew what people were doing, then they would change. They just see this as a racket. And there's a whole industry of people suppressing those who are poor and vulnerable, and they get away with it. It's just a racket, all protected by, by the state. So that's the extreme example, but it can go everywhere. And so I, I ignore the suppression of the bit of a history you have in common. So I was even threatened with our suppression or order last week. Yeah. I said, Oh, right about it. Okay. Then they backed off. Yeah.  About two months, I get them. You know, and I just see them and see them, see them back with Jeff off, sort of on it. And I don't hear from them again, because it's all to intimidate, shutting people up to intimidate them from speaking their truth. The poor or those with a different view from those who rule us, the only thing they have is their voice. And they must make their voice. And that's where the media have let down society because they've become part of the state's apparatus. And then in silencing points of view that they deem to be not in the best interests of whoever. Well, what it is, as you know, right, it's a very middle class being there, sensitive to anything I need to be protected by your ideas could be all confronted. What they're really saying is that those ideas are challenging. And I don't have an answer for that.  I think that's an extreme thing. But look, I deal with a lot of lefties, right? And when I pull that lead, I come from a working class.  What we have now, I think it's more than liberalism, liberal left, if you like, middle class left, and these feelings are more important. And I just said, but your feelings are not a reason that I can't say what I think. And you can't be protected from other people's ideas, but they think they can. And I think it's become very extreme. And I think unhealthy, well, I think I know it's unhealthy. And, and, you know, I just want to support all occasions for workers, which shouldn't even be shouldn't even be you shouldn't even be arguing about it. It's just, you know, in the states, of course, with the Southern Poverty Center, the Southern Poverty Law Center, Law Center. They used to be seeing Nazis, right? Because they said that right to speech is important for all people, including, you know, their main focus is on Black people. But they knew that by defending all rights of speech, that was the way that you could deal with racism.  And I said before, as I said before, you know, for those without power, the only thing to have is their voice. And those with power want to close those voices down for their only reason. And I think that needs to be fought. And that's the reason why the founding fathers of the United States had the First Amendment being the right to free speech. Absolutely. And the Second Amendment was the right to be armed to protect the right to free speech. Yes, I think that's been misconstrued a bit. But anyway, that's a whole different debate. But it is, you know, yeah, but yeah, I think it might be more an important sort of issue than a philosophical one. These kids running, sort of running around with machine guns, sort of low and down the class length. Yeah, yeah. That's right. What's Matt McCarty's prediction for this election? Oh, I think I round up to find them to to wrap this all up. Where were we heading Matt? I think it'll be close. I think it'll be closer. I think that lately, they're two on goals with Kerry and Michael Wood. I think that's done them some damage the way they managed it. But I think that Chris Luxman has got a class tool. Yeah, I think in the debates, I think that Chris Hippens will dominate that. Yeah. And all governments say, don't put it at risk. I don't think that National is doing its right to be government this time. I think that the Maori party are going to keep the Labour party in. So I think it'll be close. I think it'll be within two or three seats one way or the other. If Labour runs a good campaign, they could pull it off. If the election was done today, of course, that they'd lose. Yeah. But you know, what Labour are good at, the Nats are not good at. They do early voting really well. Yes. And I think that that may make a difference. If the Maori party can pull off four seats, or maybe even get to five, five percent of the poll, I think then that's going to make the difference. Well known a few short weeks, won't we? Well, I have to put a dollar on it now. I go for a Labour lead by a inch. Well, I reckon it's harder to pick than a broken nose. I agree. But I think you ask me to make a pick, so I'll make a pick. Good on you. Thanks so much for coming on the crunch with me today. Matt, and I hope that's given listeners a bit of an understanding about how you and I have operated behind the scenes to actually make some things happen. All right, brother. Thank you so much. Like Morris Williamson, Matt McCartin has some great yarns to share about his roles in the trenches of New Zealand politics. I hope you enjoyed hearing his pearls of wisdom as much as I enjoyed talking about them with him. Check out our brand new RCR Foundation members club. Go to www.realitycheck.radio slash members and join now. You're listening to the crunch with Cam Slater, right here on RCR. Reality Check Radio. Mark Mitchell is a former police dog handler, has worked in the Gulf, setting up and protecting a global logistics company, and now is the National MP for Rodney as well as Nationals Police spokesman. He's with me now to discuss the latest spate in gang and gun crime that seems to be troubling our society with a far greater frequency than ever before. Mark, welcome to the crunch. No problem, Mark. Look, we seem to have this moving feast of negative headlines involving gangs, guns, gun crime, violence, gangs taking over the city just this week alone. We're looking at our shooting in Point England, which has cost the life of somebody. We've got a gang killing in Palmerston North, which apparently is a de-patching. It seems to be set of taking the patch off somebody's back. It looks like they've shot somebody. We've got another shooting in the CBD in Auckland a week after we've had the terrible tragedy downtown as well. And now we've got on Tuesday afternoon another gang taking over Auckland City so they can have a funeral for one of their scumbag mates. What's National going to do about this, Mark? Well, I think number one, Cam, the reason why you've just read out a laundry list of shame for the country is because six years ago, well, that's right. We've seen headlines around the country just on a weekly basis now in terms of gang violence and firearms violence. I mean, I won't even start with the amount of unreported cases, firearms incidents that actually aren't reported through the media. I mean, the day that we had that tragedy unfold in downtown Auckland, there was a further five firearms incidents that day that went unreported in the media. So just to give you a sort of a snapshot and understanding what our frontline police are actually dealing with at the moment. Look, the reality of it is is that you had a soft on crime labor government come into power six years ago and there are only two priorities in our criminal justice system was quite simply reducing the prison muster by 30% and repealing the only tough piece of sentencing law that we had on our books. And that was the three strikes legislation, which by the way was working. And so we've got a legacy of those two decisions emptying the prisons. Who would have thought that crime would have skyrocketed if you emptied the prisons? Oh, exactly. Exactly. So that's one of the few things that they have been successful at doing and set themselves targets on. And that was a reduction of the prison muster and they've actually reduced that by about 20%. But the reason why I mentioned that is because that was the ideology that was bought into the government by this government. And the fact of the matter is they've created a very permissive environment for adult gangs to sort of flourish and operate with impunity.  And then of course, the other thing they've done is they've victimized gun owners confiscated firearms and taking them off law abiding people. And at the same time, brought in this gun register on the premise that it's going to reduce gun crime. Can you see that actually succeeding the way the police have sold it to us? Well, there's got to be a balance here. So it's completely out of balance in terms of this government without a doubt have gone after our law abiding firearms and hunting community, which is a big part of our history as a country on the very keen recreational hunter myself. And there's things there. There's a whole bunch of over-regulation. There's things that they've done to sort of target the part of our armed community that's not the problem, instead of the gangs and the organized crime. The balancing and the flip side to that cam is quite simply this. The evidence that's been given to the Justice Select Committee, which I sit on, is that it's quite clear that we have got a problem in New Zealand with licensed firearms or people that hold a firearms license that are receiving money from gangs that are going into gun stores and buying them on orders, strawman sales, and then passing them on to unlicensed people, i.e. the gangs and organized crime. Now, the evidence is that the only way to be able to clamp down there and stop those strawman sales is a register, where if one of these licensed firearm holders, who by the way, is the actual, the legal, everyone in our firearms community that actually is doing things right, they need to be protected from them because they need to be purged because they end up impacting everyone that has a firearms license. But basically cam, the register is quite simply this, is that the only way to stop those strawman sales is to have the firearm registered against the buyer and the police or whoever the regulator might be because actually I don't feel that the police is the right regulator. There is a clear conflict of interest there. They are able to go and order those firearms and if you've got a firearms license holder that's bought 20 firearms and in order to tune up and they've only got 10, then there's going to be a fast track into prison. And some serious questions asked, where are the other 10 firearms? Because at the moment they're ending up in the hands of gangs. But will they though?  Canada was the most famous example. They spent a billion dollars trying to implement their register and then ditched it because it just doesn't stop anything. The second thing about that is that these people who are doing this and converting these firearms are criminals and we're passing laws that are already in place essentially to say that you can't sell guns to unlicensed people, but they're doing it already. So all we're doing is... They are criminals, but they're criminals that have got firearms licenses. Yeah, but what's going to happen is and I'll tell you exactly what's going to happen. All it means is that the gangs will pay more money for their guns now because there's a consequence for the person getting caught. And so that person will want recompense for that. And so it's not actually going to stop criminals getting guns. But it is going to put a massive amount of paperwork in place, which is all this the system is already creaking and groaning under the changes to the license regimes. You know, they're spending $220 million on the gun register. Building an empire. What's that called a business unit? Well, we've said that those costs seem excessive and we've said that we want a very narrow register where there aren't massive cost blowouts and its reasonable cost. But we do want to protect the firearms community by making sure that they've got bad eggs in there that have got firearms licenses that are buying guns for gangs. And the register is the one way to be able to clamp down on that. That's evidence that's been put in front of us. Apparently they've been successful in Australia. And unfortunately, like you said, we've got way too much gun pilots in this country at the moment. Now we've got to stop the other, you know, obviously there's other supply chains. There's other ways of getting contrabanded to the country and firearms into the hands of gang members. And we've got to go after them. But it's clearly when you saw the case for the Bay of Plenty that was reported last week with a high profile ex international rugby player that was given $10,000 by the common heroes as payment to go and buy a whole lot of firearms. Now he has a license, he had a firearms license. So, you know, within the community itself, many people that I talk to, some of my very good friends up and walk with her collectors, they're not against the register because they feel that a register might actually be effective in being able to flush these people out. The ones that have got firearms licenses and they're giving everyone else a bad reputation. Yeah, collectors and pistol users have been in a register anyway. And any one of us, and I'm a collector myself, we can point and this came up in a recent inspection at my house. The police came around and accused me of disposing of a firearm illegally. And this was the existing register in place. And they treated me like I was a criminal. And the actual problem was actually at their end in not processing some paperwork. And I had to produce the paperwork to show them that they hadn't done their job.  Yeah, we've been very clear in a meeting with the minister and the police leading the work on the register that the protection of information was paramount. And it had to be proven that they could do that and that our support would be dependent on showing that they could do that. And it could be held securely. Two weeks after it launched without a data breach. Yep. Yep. And that was totally unacceptable, the email that went out. So look, they have to show it they're serious about it and they can do that. And of course, we said the other caveat was around cost. But look at the end of the day, Cam, the reality is this is the advice that we have got is that this will help make our frontline police officers safer and it will help make the public safer. And I actually firmly believe as someone that doesn't hold a current firearms license but has in the past, and it's spent a lot of time hunting and as a recreational hunter, is that this will actually protect our firearms community as well because we want to flush out the ones we want to flush out their response for ones that are holding firearms licenses and buying them on order to the gangs and organized crime. We want to get on top of them. And although I understand that there's some resistance and that's been challenged within the community, and I totally get that, there's also a lot in the firearms community that support the idea of having a register and being able to flush these people out. The other issue is this is that is that we're going to appoint a hunting and fishing minister, Todd McClay holds the portfolio at the moment. So that the firearms community, whether it be gun clubs, which of course are often family intergenerational, you know, important clubs as part of the community, or whether it be our hunting and fishing community, feel like they have a strong voice and representation around the cabinet table, which I think they feel has been missing up to this point. It's been a long time, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And by the way, coming back to your situation is that, you know, I actually strongly feel that the police aren't the right agency to be the regulator because there's a clear conflict of interest there, which you can understand because, you know, they're all about, they're completely focused on part of the place. Yeah. In the news reports on Tuesday about the Hell's Angel funeral for the ex-president of Hell's Angel, the police have said that they've invoked new legislation to disrupt gang activity, giving of officers powers to search vehicles and occupants of vehicles of suspected gang members. And this is the important part, to seize their weapons during times of conflict. That seems a bit ass-backwards, don't you think, Mark? Shouldn't we be seizing their weapons at all times? Yeah, absolutely. Look, you know, this is a government that passed a foreign prohibition order that had no warrantless search powers for police. And both the Police Association, ourselves at the time through the select committee process, you said that if you don't have that power for the police, then it's not worth the paper it's written on. It's been available to the police now, or it's been available now for the courts to use for 10, 10, 11 months. And I think there's been two orders used, so it just shows how ineffective it's actually been. But yeah, the point that I'd make here, Cam, is that there's already plenty of laws and, you know, the fences contained within the Crimes Act and the Summary Fences Act and the Arms Act for the police to act now. But there's got to be a will to be able to clamp down and police the gangs hard. And that will has to be driven out of P&HQ and then sort of down through the districts. And I just don't think that that will has been there. And I think also a key problem is that the courts don't seem to have a will to prosecute people for gun crime because we see this every week. Every week there's a news article about somebody who's done something with a firearm.  And they don't even end up with often with anything other than fines. And we've got the laws in place, but the courts won't apply them. Look, I'm not going to argue with that. Without a doubt, this government sends signals to our judiciary that, you know, they want the prison must be reduced and to avoid prosecution. So, you know, they do take, look, it's very important to highlight that in our democracy, which is still one of the best in the world, the judiciary is independent. And we shouldn't be interfering with them. And it's very important that they maintain that. But they do take signals from the government today. There's no doubt about that. And this government has very clearly signaled that they want, that they want slaps on the wrist with a wet bus ticket. And that's what's happening. And two of the biggest deterrents for offending is number one, the likelihood of being caught. And number two, the consequences sitting behind being caught. And in this country at the moment, neither of this, you've got a very low likelihood of being caught. And there's no consequences sitting there. And that's a big part of what's fueling this violent crime that we've currently seen around the country, you know, led by the gangs.   But criminals are not that smart. Would you agree with that in your experience? They're not that smart. And so some are, some aren't. Yeah. The reality of it now, Cam, is that these adult gangs now quite sophisticated the way they operate. Yes, but when it comes down to big global. Yeah, when it comes down to tin tax, though, they react to signals that they're getting. And if society is saying, well, actually, we don't care if we've got a prison muster of 10,000 people, we just don't want those people on the streets.    Yes, you sort of raise sentencing and and I didn't really answer your question on that. Look, the reality is this, but is that we do feel very strongly that the serious, the consequences need to match the seriousness of the offending. And one of the things that we have done is we announced a policy about three or four weeks ago that we would cap the discounts that the judge can apply to a sentence 40%. And by that, what I mean is that often when they come in front of a judge for sentencing, they might start with a sentence of six years, and then they'll get discount discounted down for showing some remorse or or an early guilty plea or a or a cultural report. And all of a sudden they discounted down below the two years and then they're eligible for home detention. And we've seen an increase of 158% of people on home detention in the last six years. Still on the community. That's right. That's right. And a lot of the violent incidents and unnecessary deaths that homicides that we've had recently have been directly attributable to people that shouldn't have been out on home detention. Wouldn't having minimum sentences be a way to stop the judge's discounting? Where you say, well, you've used a firearm in the in the commission of this crime. That's straightaway three years in prison. No discounts, no possibility. Yeah, look, at the end of the day, Paul Goldsmith has got the justice portfolio. That is under his sort of remit. But he has, he has come out publicly and said that we will look at the Sentencing Act if we need to, to make sure that the, that the sentences are matching the seriousness of the offending. Oh, that sounds like a perfect opportunity to make a clear differential between the National Party and every other party. If you, if you actually looked at the Sentencing Act and didn't consider minimum sentences rather the maximum sentences.  Very, very proud of my policing career. I spent 14 years in the job, most of it on the dog section and in the armed offender squad. And I did that because I wanted to serve my community and I wanted to keep them safe, just like just about any police officer that joins the police wants to do. And I have been, I have sat by and had a, unfortunately had a front row seat watching this present government take us completely in the wrong direction. I've never seen the levels of violence and lawlessness that we currently experiencing as a country. And I am determined if we are lucky enough to win the election October 14 to do everything that I can and provide the leadership that I can from the National Cabinet to try and turn that round and get us heading back in the right direction in terms of being the safest, being aspirational about being the safest country in the world rather than being an embarrassment, which we are at the moment. So, I mean, it is an embarrassment, really. We've got tourists we want wanting to invite back into the country and yet downtown Auckland, you can talk to anybody. Nobody wants to go there anymore. There's just this crime coming out our ears and there seems to be no willingness to actually put rap bags in jail. Well, you know what, the funny thing about that, and this has just been or always been my own personal gauge of how safe a country is, is how safe their capital city is or their, or their major city. So Auckland is our, is not our capital city, but it's certainly a major international city and that's our viewed and seen. And if we can't secure and keep our CBD safe, then that's a sad indictment on us.  It's a sad indictment on this Labour Government. And this is an embarrassment. Look, I was overseas recently for the wedding of one of my best mate's daughter. And while I was overseas, as normally a very proud Kiwi, we had a Pote Ki taken over by the gangs. And people there were saying to me, how in New Zealand can you have one of your towns taken over by the gangs? You know, look, the reality of it is, we've just had our Justice Minister arrested for failing to accompany police. Yeah, doing your own. I mean, it's just, yeah, I'm sorry, but on the international stage, and this was reported all around the world by the media, it is a terrible.  You imagine the comments that would be made if it was a British Justice Minister or Australian Justice Minister or a Canadian or US, you know, Secretary of the, I don't know, it's just, for me, Cam, when you look at the those two examples I've given you, gangs taken over, you know, one of our provincial towns, Justice Minister winding up in police cells. You know, the amount of shootings that we've seen in the last week, we are shambles when it comes to law and order. We've got to get it fixed. And now in our own media, excuse it all the way, saying that the Justice Minister was a victim of racism and misogyny. You know, nobody forced it to drink all that booze and drive drunk. Well, I'm not even going to enter into that debate. At the end of the day, what I'm quite simply saying is this, is that it's a New Zealand Justice Minister. And there is no circumstances that excuses that sort of behaviour. No. Waira was a gang town when you were a police officer. Was it a gang town when you left Waira? Waira always had a heavy gang presence, but Waira has always had some pretty good local leadership through the media. And I used to get called down there on a regular basis along with myself and the other AOS dog handler, Kevin Weatherly, would often get called down there when the gang started to play up. The difference, and we used to get called to Waira, we used to ask, we used to get called to a podarchy as well. The difference then came was that when we rolled into town with the dog vans, the gangs could scuttle back down to the holes that they'd sort of come from, because they knew that we meant business. And they knew that we were going to give the town that we served a sense that we were controlling the streets and not them. But now it's, you know, I watch with dismay when I see police officers standing on the side of the road, videoing them on their phones and providing traffic control. While they take over the streets, hanging out of their vehicles, sitting on them, abusing, giving the police fingers of abusing and intimidating them to the public. This is where we've got to, and it's completely, totally unacceptable. And National is going to end that? Well, that's going to be a directive coming straight, firing straight down to the Commission's office on day one, that we are not going to see gangs taking over public roads anymore. And our law abiding citizens in this country are going to have their rights reinforced rather than the gangs. Maybe we need a Commissioner that doesn't have the nickname Cuddles. Yeah, well, no comment on that. All right, on that note, Mark, thank you very much for coming on The Crunch and talking about law and order and the mayhem that's on our streets.  Yeah, thanks, Tate. Listen, thanks for having me on to all your listeners. And look, we'll be working as hard as we can to change this government on October 14. All right, well, it's not far away. And hopefully we've got something to celebrate with the end of this crime friendly regime. Yeah, absolutely. All right, thanks a lot. I want to thank Mark for coming on The Crunch. He's the first National MP to show the courage to come on the show. He certainly showed us a good grasp of the issues that are leading to the crime wave currently enveloping the nation and has the necessary policing skills to rattle the right cages to get some much needed action. I'm not sure he's on the right track with the gun register, though, so we may have to get him back to discuss that in more details. You're listening to The Crunch with Cam Slater right here on RCR, Reality Check Radio. Now it's time for Cam's buddies. I've decided to share with you how I get impartial advice about issues by calling a few of my mates. Most of them are non-political and we've known each other for over 20 years. I regularly catch up with these mates and they always give me their unvarnished views on anything. My producer has them all lined up and ready to go. Let's hear what Cam's buddies have to say about letting BlackRock in to build a climate change fund for a cosy $2 billion. Good afternoon, Paul. Welcome to Cam's buddies. Good afternoon, Cam. So you might have seen the news on Tuesday that the Labor Party has announced a climate infrastructure fund of $2 billion in conjunction with the globalist finance company BlackRock. What are your thoughts on that? I think it's a little bit concerning. I think BlackRock is worth something in the order of $10 trillion. It's one of the biggest asset management companies in the world and I don't think too many of our folk would be mentally equipped to negotiate with them. I think we'd be thinking we're getting a good deal if we get some land for some muskets or something like that, but that'll be that style of trade. These people are far smarter than the best New Zealand's got, I would be pretty sure. So BlackRock wouldn't be doing this for Big Mac Chips and a Coke or out of the goodness of their heart, would they? I wouldn't think so. I mean, if I remember BlackRock, they were divesting themselves of coal and natural gas type assets when the price was, I don't know, $80 a tonne. Now that the price with the wall is $308 a tonne, they're saying, oh no, we need to be a bit more shareholder focused. So they're getting back involved in it. And I think the leader, I think he's a smart, smart guy and they're going to do stuff for money. And I don't think Megan Woods, for example, our energy minister would have a clue with how to negotiate with such people. We've kind of got a devil's dilemma, though. We've got the National Party on one hand that's promising to use vast sums of CCP cash. And now we've got the Labour Party wanting to use vast sums of BlackRock's cash. Isn't this something that we would be better off building the capacity for sovereign investment in New Zealand? Well, I'm really concerned about environmental social governance. And I think BlackRock is very much down the path of saying, we will own your country and we'll show you how to do it. And so that once you let them in the door, you could find there's a whole lot of policies that come with it. We don't want to miss out on the next branch of money that they may want to put our way. So we lose our sovereignty to people that were never elected and never liked it to be because they're about the money. Yeah, I have a real problem with how they throw these numbers around like, oh, it's $2 billion. And then nobody in the media seems to cross-reference that to how much they spent on the COVID response and whatever it was, $50 million or $55 billion. It sounds $2 billion then sounds like chicken feed. We've got a hole in the budget with the government's finances right now of about $20 billion.  It's only $2 billion. Yeah. Well, in my view, what we're doing is we're sort of allowing these people to say the world won't deal with us unless we're so woke that we're the wokeest people on woke day. The world won't deal with us. So we have to be greener than green. And anytime you're number one in business at doing something, if you do it well and it's really successful, other people will copy for a tenth of the money. And if you do it poorly, as many first cab of the ranks do do it poorly, they think, oh, other people will learn from your mistakes and do it better having watched the failures that you did. So I think being first to that level by 2050 of net zero or fossil fuel free, I think we're aiming at something that, and they say, oh, we're less than 1%. We're less than 0.1 of a percent. They tell us what we're doing, the difference we make is huge. And then they say, all these other people won't deal with us. Well, who are they? Is it Australians that won't deal with us? Is it Americans that won't deal with us? Chinese? Indians? Yes. Yeah.  Well, it's somewhere that, and it is a science settled is the next question. I mean, they're saying all 65 million scientists think this, well, that's not how science works. And having Chippy saying, the best thing we've ever done is take us $2 billion worth of investment in companies in New Zealand. We all know some of the biggest money made was when the likes of Telecom went private, the likes of the different power infrastructure companies went private. If this is a company investing in an energy infrastructure in New Zealand and getting it in cheaply through the back door or the side door or whatever door Chippy's letting them in, it's like, why don't we build some of this stuff instead of spending billions of dollars on, that you could just manufacture out of Grant Robertson's hole? Why don't we get some money that invest in infrastructure and see what it can and would do without having the crumbs of a plate of a $10 trillion company that turns over sort of between 10 and 100 times what New Zealander. Yeah, it seems to be a very big risk in almost letting the wolf in the door.  Well, I think that they're thinking we're oaky from Muscogee and they're going to take a lend. That's my thought. So when I hear Megan Woods talking about it, I think they're not far wrong. But I think you're not far wrong at all, Paul. Thanks for calling in to Cam's buddies. And those pills of wisdom will be enjoyed by our listeners. Thanks, Cam. Take care, right? Talk to you. Thank you. Good day, Marcus. Welcome to Cam's buddies. Yeah, good. Did you see the news on Tuesday that Chris Hipkins together with his pals from BlackRock have announced a $2 billion infrastructure fund for climate mitigation and climate change resolutions. What do you think about that? Well, I only found out about that today, but yeah, I've got some opinion about that. We're all ears, mate. Yeah, well, I mean, first of all, they might as well just do a deal with the devil himself. I mean, if you're going to go out and find investors and that sort of thing, it's ironic that they recently have been hassling national with regards to their private public partnership deal with Rodin. Next minute, they go and do the mother of all private partnerships with the devil himself, BlackRock. I mean, they could be worse. They could have gone with Vanguard, I suppose, so we should be thankful for that. I mean, BlackRock. Well, hey, I mean, yeah, I don't know. They're both the same as far as I can tell. I mean, BlackRock owned the world, and this comes back to something I said a while back with you. We don't understand the sort of money we're talking about when we're talking about BlackRock, and this just goes to show they're playing down the globalist market. And they keep saying that, no, no, we're all just conspiracy theorists and that sort of thing. But I mean, BlackRock, we don't know, we can't comprehend how much money they own. I mean, they have, I think back in 2020, just before the before the pandemic that came in, they own 7.3 trillion or their abouts of assets worldwide. And in 2021, it jumped up to yeah, or 2021, it jumped up to nine, nine and a half trillion, I think it was. And I mean, I wonder how that happened. I mean, they own near on 8% of FISA. It's just, it just blows my mind, you know, that all what we've been told and the narrative we've been given, and then the next minute they go and do this and say, no, nothing to see here, we're just borrowing off the devil. And yeah, you'll be, you'll own nothing and be happy.  Are you scared?  And I think that it should be. I can't wait. It should be, you know, every New Zealand is right to be able to grow mangoes and pineapples in the back garden, even in the cargle in the middle of winter. Could not agree with you more. I mean, it's, it's funny, because we go on about climate and carbon and all that sort of thing and, and how, how we're making such a big deal with all this carbon going out into the year and that's something I think we're around about 300 parts per million at the moment. I mean, the last 490, that's right. So, so the last ice age was something like 10,000 parts per million or something like that. And life ceases to exist at 180 parts per million. So what, what should we closer to 180 parts per million or 10,000 parts per million? It's just ludicrous. It's all things ludicrous. I mean, this is something, and they're just wasting our money too. What, they're borrowing too much. How much, how much taxpayer money has gone into that? Well, I'm, I would hope none. But, you know, you just never know with these foot with these falls. I mean, you know, Grant Robertson doesn't have any idea about global finance and these guys at BlackRock are a whole lot more as clued up when it comes to financing than Megan Woods or Grant Robertson. Well, Grant Robertson doesn't even think the word economic form exists.   Next minute, next minute we've got Chris Hopkins a couple of weeks ago meeting with Clash Schwab himself. Honestly, they just, they just think we're stupid, mate. And unfortunately, a lot of the times you're right. It's a bit of a shell game. But, you know, would we be any better off with national because Christopher Luxon's come out, you know, Tuesday afternoon and said, well, this is fabulous. This is fantastic. And of course, he's also wanting to sign us up to read of CCP cash. And I