Midday Report Essentials for Monday 7th July 2025
In today's episode, around 130,000 families were expected to take advantage of FamilyBoost, which reimburses a portion of early childcare fees, but only around 60,000 have benefitted, and only 250 received the full $75 a week credit, an academic says the rise of populism around the world has taken a different flavour in New Zealand, public hearings have begun in Auckland for the second phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Government's response to the Covid-19 pandemic, and "Project Vend" went awry when Anthropic let its artificial intelligence model, Claude, run a vending machine in its office.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
RNZ News
20 minutes ago
- RNZ News
Auckland councillor determined to ban residential helipads
An Auckland councillor is on a mission to ground helicopters taking off and landing in residential areas for good. It follows multi millionaire Auckland couple, entrepreneur Anna Mowbray and former All Black Ali Williams recently getting approval for a helipad at their waterfront Westmere home. Three independent commissioners approved the resource consent application with some concessions, including a maximum of two flights day and 10 flights per month between the hours of 7am and 10pm. They concluded as per previous decisions; the use of helicopters in residential areas is a permitted activity under Auckland Unitary Plan. But one councillor wants these rules amended. Councillor Mike Lee spoke to Lisa Owen. To embed this content on your own webpage, cut and paste the following: See terms of use.
RNZ News
22 minutes ago
- RNZ News
Are NZ banks being taxed properly?
The issue of how "parent banks" and branch banks in New Zealand interacted for tax purposes was being looked at. Photo: RNZ The government is looking at whether banks in New Zealand are taxed appropriately. The finance minister says she is continuing to receive advice from IRD on how income tax laws apply to the major banks in New Zealand, particularly compared with Australia. Nicola Willis asked for the advice last year, but says no announcements would be made until Budget next year. The key issues were around how the "parent banks" and branch banks in New Zealand interacted for tax purposes. She said there was some "very arcane and complex tax law" in that area where the OECD had guidance, but New Zealand operated slightly differently. Willis was also looking at the Australian "major bank levy" which New Zealand did not have. This forced banks with more than $100 billion in liabilities to pay a levy to the government, raising significant sums a year. Willis would not rule out applying something similar here, but she did confirm the government was not looking at a windfall tax. "So there's a range of highly technical, highly complex issues with the way that banks are taxed, and we're just doing a check in to make sure that it's resulting in an overall fair system." Willis said it was possible more revenue could be generated for the crown if the government found banks were not paying the full amount of tax expected. Acting Prime Minister David Seymour was asked about the issue on Monday and said he believed banks were being fairly taxed. "Some of the biggest taxpayers in New Zealanders are banks," he said, and stated they were all paying the 28 percent average tax rate as their company tax. "There's nothing to suggest that they are not paying the same share that they would if they were any other kind of business." Asked about Willis' work, Seymour said like most ministers, she was "always asking for advice, always tossing around the ideas." He suspected the result of that work would show banks were fairly taxed. Seymour said from what he saw, there seemed to be a "consistent pattern" in terms of what banks paid, and the question around any proposals to change the settings would need to be based on "fairness". He pointed to a dairy, retail or manufacturing company that were doing "pretty much the same stuff, making the same profit and paying the same tax, would you treat them differently?". "One of the core principles of taxation is that 'like taxpayers pay tax alike', and 'unlike, taxpayers pay tax un-alike' based on the size of the difference. "So you'd start with fairness as your principle." He acknowledged there may be more information he was not aware of. He also wanted more information on the major bank levy. "I've seen the argument for that, and it goes something like this: banks inevitably get bailed out. "If they're so big that their failure would affect the entire economy, maybe they should be putting something aside for that rainy day, if it happens one day. That's the argument. "It's, in a way, a form of de facto deposit insurance." He said it was an interesting argument, but would need to see the detail before deciding on supporting a proposal or not as ACT leader. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
an hour ago
- RNZ News
Hearings begin on Regulatory Standards Bill
David Seymour's Regulatory Standards Bill has been put through its paces at Parliament, with its opponents lining up one by one to tear it down. Beginning this morning, and for the next three days, MPs are hearing feedback on the legislation which sets out new gold-standard principles for lawmaking. Ministers introducing new laws would be required to declare whether they'd met the new standards and to justify themselves if not. Acting political editor Craig McCulloch spoke to Lisa Owen. To embed this content on your own webpage, cut and paste the following: See terms of use.
