The Wire with Manny

This week on the Tuesday Wire, Allan Blackman joined Casper and Milly in the studiofor Dear Science.

Casper spoke to Naitonal’s Dr Shane Reti about the proposed public media merger.

Milly spoke to Alexander Gillespie from the University of Waikato on the Royal Commission Enquiry into New Zealand’s Covid-19 response 

As well as Sir Collin Tukuitonga regarding record lows of Pacifica students smoking.

The Three Waters reform aims to provide safe, reliable drinking water, better environmental performance of wastewater and stormwater services, efficient, sustainable, resilient and accountable multi-regional water sewage services, and making it affordable for future generations. Taumata Arowai has already been established as the new water regulator and aims to strengthen regulation around the three waters - drinking water, wastewater and stormwater.

Arno spoke with Green Party spokesperson Eugnie Sage to get an overview of the issue and what might happen going forward.

New Zealand media has recently come under the spotlight with staff strikes at media outlet Stuff, where journalists and workers demanded more pay. The office of the minister of broadcasting and media has recently announced that the government plans to introduce legislation that would make large news aggregator sites like Facebook and Google reach formal agreements with local news outlets before being able to re-post or link to their news. 

Arno spoke with Professor James Hollings of Massey University to find out more.

A new report has called for a partnership with tangata whenua will be at the heart of our National Parks. Conservationists believe this could weaken the protection of the environment, while Iwi say it could end 135 years of alienation from their land. Joe spoke to Dr Nic Rawlence, from the Paleogenetics lab at the University of Otago, about how paleoecology and ancient dna could be beneficial. They also spoke about how a CT scan of a toothed bird fossil has possibly changed the history of modern birds.