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In February this year, I wrote about a surprising decision from New Zealand’s Supreme Court (Absurd: New Zealand courts can now decide on climate change, 5 February 2024). The Court allowed a climate change case against seven large companies to proceed, despite New Zealand’s emissions being a mere rounding error in global terms. This decision was not an isolated incident. Read more

Fertility rates have been dropping for a very long time, but the recent plunge is precipitous. Neil Johnson, Professor of Obstetrics & Gynaecology at Flinders University, took us through the numbers at a panel session for Fertility Counts Aotearoa at Parliament last week. Read more

Picture a country where unelected judges, not elected politicians, make the laws. Where courts rewrite statutes they do not like and reshape long-standing legal rules based on their views of ‘society’s changing values.’ Sound far-fetched? Read more

BusinessDesk’s Pattrick Smellie had the best synopsis of New Zealand First’s announcement on foreign direct investment this weekend: “it was less important for what it said than for the fact that Peters said it.” The Overseas Investment Act has placed New Zealand among the developed world’s least hospitable climates for foreign investment. Other countries recognise investment as a benefit to be sought. Read more

It is a Monday afternoon in Wellington. Journalists gather in the Beehive’s theatrette for the weekly post-cabinet media briefing. Read more

Imagine a game of tug-of-war in which one team steadily gains ground. Now, picture our legal system as a rope, with Parliament on one end and the Supreme Court on the other. Read more

The United States offers a stark warning of the consequences of an activist judiciary. The outsized role of the U.S. Read more