The People's Podcast

Bernadette sits down with Frankie and Jenny, the husband and wife team behind Good Chow NZ, to talk about the Gene Technology Bill and what relaxing New Zealand's GMO rules could mean for the food we grow, eat and sell to the world.Frankie shares the story of a soy sauce legacy that began with his great-grandfather in China more than 100 years ago, and why they chose to rebuild it here with non-GMO New Zealand soybeans grown on their own farm in Gisborne. Jenny explains the difference between genetic engineering and GMOs in plain terms, why GMO seed can lock growers into buying from large seed companies, and why there may be no going back once GMO crops are in the ground.They also cover the risk to New Zealand's clean, green reputation, the extra compliance that would land on small producers, what exporting is really like for a small brand, and the open letter they sent to every member of Parliament.Read the open letter and find recipes at goodchownz.comGuest: Frankie and Jenny, Good Chow NZHost: Bernadette Soares

Bernadette welcomes Dr David Wilson back to The People's Podcast for a wide ranging conversation about why New Zealand feels expensive, why our productivity has stalled, and what a genuinely different economic approach would look like.David breaks down the "cosy oligopoly" running our banking sector and the real cost it adds to your mortgage, why splitting the gentailers apart could pull hundreds off your power bill, and why the country that already owns Transpower and the lines trusts should own the generation too. He explains why manufacturing matters more than most people realise, why the banks would rather lend against houses than back a small business, and what Norway, Denmark and Singapore did differently while we sold ours off.The conversation also covers the aging population and the superannuation gap, why he opposes a capital gains tax, how immigration has been used to make us feel wealthy without lifting real export revenue, and why energy security sits underneath the entire inflation problem.Guest: Dr David Wilson Host: Bernadette Soares

Thirteen Indian states now have anti conversion laws, and Reverend Samuel says the pastors, home churches and families caught under them have almost no way of being heard outside the country. He joins Bernadette to walk through the cases he has documented, from a dismissed army officer to church raids, arrests and killings, and to explain why he believes the courts, the police and the media no longer act independently of the BJP government. It is a heavy conversation, and one worth sitting with.

Immigration has become one of the hardest conversations New Zealand is having, and too often it gets reduced to slogans. This week Bernadette sits down with Dharmesh Parikh, a community leader and businessman who arrived from India in 1986, for an honest exchange between two immigrants who love this country and do not always agree on what it needs, covering population growth in Auckland, what integration asks of new arrivals, student visa numbers and hiring bias. Have a listen, disagreements and all.

In this episode of The People's Podcast, Bernadette is joined once again by Dr. David Wilson for a wide-ranging conversation about New Zealand's economic future. They dig into New Zealand First's proposal to buy back the Bank of New Zealand, what economic sovereignty actually means, and why other small nations have built enormous wealth while we sold ours off.David explains how an oligopolistic banking sector siphons billions in profit offshore every year, what the Reserve Bank admitted about our mortgage rates, and how Norway turned its resources into a 1.7 trillion dollar sovereign wealth fund with the same population as ours. The conversation moves through the Singapore comparison, the electricity gentailer model and why generators are incentivised to push prices up, and finishes on why our renewable energy could become the country's greatest competitive advantage.A frank but optimistic look at ownership, resilience, and what it would take for New Zealand to stand on its own two feet again.