Episode
Cuts, Culture Wars and the Cost of a Frigate
- Podcast
- Cross Party Lines
- Published
- May 25, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 2895
- Processing state
not_requested
Actions
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Summary
Hosted by Phil Goff and Chris Finlayson , Cross Party Lines dive into a budget week episode that is almost entirely domestic: 8,700 public service jobs cut, state house rents going up, culture war bills clogging Parliament, and a defence announcement both men broadly welcome but want to interrogate. Cross Party Lines is made possible by Frank Risk Management , the 100% Kiwi owned insurance brokerage. In this episode: * 8,700 jobs — efficiency or ideology dressed as savings? — The government’s announcement of a 14% public service reduction draws a forensic and at times sharp response from both sides. Phil’s theory: this was never about efficiency — it was about finding $2.5 billion before the credit rating agencies moved again, and the justification was built around the number, not the other way around. * Social housing - who pays the bill? — The social housing changes draw Phil’s sharpest words of the episode: $31 a week more from people who are, by definition, at the bottom of New Zealand’s social and economic heap. Chris asks whether Margaret Thatcher had a good idea selling council houses to their occupiers and we pass judgment on Nicola Willis’ “lotto” comment. * Defence — necessary, expensive and long overdue — The pre-budget defence announcement draws broad agreement: New Zealand spent two decades at 1% of GDP on defence during what Helen Clark correctly called a strategically benign environment. That environment no longer exists. The frigates are nearly 30 years old. Ships sit at Devonport without enough crew to sail them. Any government serious about defence has to make the career attractive enough to keep the sergeant majors you can’t simply replace. Along the way: a tribute to Jules Topp, Stuart Nash’s road-to-Damascus conversion to New Zealand First forensic…