OPINION

Auckland’s regional fuel tax has been in place for a week. It was in the Labour party’s election manifesto. Read more

Two high-profile cabinet members of the UK’s governing party have resigned in protest at prime minister Theresa May’s position on Brexit. David Davis, the UK’s Brexit Secretary, and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson stepped away from their roles, saying their government made too many concessions to the EU in the two-year-old Brexit negotiations Theresa May’s government presented a Brexit plan that in a nutshell equates to free trade with the EU in goods, not in services, using technology to determine which products went where and what tariffs they were subject to. Read more

We are lucky that, last year, economist Aaron Schiff provided us with an excellent collective noun for a grouping of economists. Owls, in concert, form a parliament. Read more

Journalists have a hard job. As well as being underpaid, they are constantly copping an earful from frustrated or confused readers, trolls, and even economists. Read more

While New Zealand is in political Neverland, I am taking refuge in rural France. Just an hour north of the vineyards of Bordeaux, it is no great hardship. Read more

After missing my chance to meet Scarlett Johansson last year, I was distraught and confused over the weekend as I read the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment’s (MBIE) findings and conclusion on film subsidies in New Zealand. In three reviews commissioned by MBIE, the reports concluded that without the film subsidies (New Zealand Screen Production Grants), the New Zealand film industry would disappear. Read more

"One of the uses of history is to free us of a falsely imagined past”, the late American legal scholar Robert Bork once wrote. One might add that another use is the prevention of repeat mistakes. Read more

In The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less, Psychologist Barry Schwartz argues that too much choice can hinder rather than support our decision making. That the validity of this theory has been challenged is beside the point. Read more

Paternalism is a lot less annoying when you get to be the paternalist – at home with the kids, as pater- or materfamilias. Let’s begin by acknowledging two basic facts. Read more

Late last month Housing New Zealand was widely condemned for being overzealous about amphetamine contamination. A report by the chief scientist had concluded that tenants were being evicted and state houses de-contaminated when there was no clear scientific evidence of a threat to human health. Read more

This seems about the worst possible month to be suggesting that anybody should try to emulate anything going on in America. The place seems to be going mad in ways no longer funny to laugh at from very far away. Read more

It is hard to introduce populist policies without hurting the economy. That is the takeout from the Government’s decision to water down its planned restrictions on foreign property buyers. Read more

Last week a long-standing geologist friend chewed my ear about the government’s irresponsible ban on new offshore oil and gas exploration. I call it irresponsible because on the evidence no meaningful consideration was given to the interests of New Zealanders. Read more

A couple of years ago we got the lads together and set off on a South Island road trip. It was a great opportunity to get away from the rat race and show some of my North Island mates around the South Island. Read more

In a different country, a long time ago, I once set out to be a weekly columnist. And it was no ordinary column. Read more