Nine To Noon for Tuesday 6 March 2018

 

 

09:05 'Day activities' mooted for beggars in Wellington

A proposal to fund 'day activities' for beggars on the Capital's streets at the cost of $1 million will be considered by Wellington City Council. The idea is to address anti-social and intimidating behaviour. The council's social development portfolio leader is Brian Dawson.

09:20 Free legal information through digital innovation

A team of Wellington developers has created a free resource for people who can't afford a lawyer but need to seek legal aid, through the use of artificial intelligence. The project will make information on tenancy law, employment law, and the law related to prisoners accessible to the more than 2 million New Zealanders who use Facebook every day. Kathryn talks to the developers, Geoffrey Roberts and Matthew Bartlett, the executive directors of a new initiative called Citizen AI, that Community Law Wellington is setting up to develop artificial intelligence projects for the public good.

09:30 The health effects of a house's defects          

David Ormandy talks to Kathryn Ryan about the Housing Health and Safety Rating System – a scheme he developed which has been used for over ten years and is credited with raising housing standards in England and Wales. The HHSRS has also been adopted in the U.S. and has inspired the University of Otago's rental warrant of fitness. David is also contributing to the early stages of the Grenfell Tower inquiry.

09:45 USA correspondent Steve Almond

Steve Almond joins Kathryn with reaction to Trump's trade wars, the Oscars and a teachers strike in West Virginia – one of the most staunchly pro-Trump states in the US.

10:05 Alan Hollinghurst - the changing face of queer lit

Alan Hollinghurst discusses his sixth novel and how gay literature has changed over the decades. The British author won the 2004 Man Booker Prize for his satire of the 1980s Conservative government, The Line of Beauty. It was the first 'gay novel' to win it. His latest work, The Sparsholt Affair, follows the intimate relationships of a group of friends across three generations and explores how attitudes have changes towards gay men since the 1940s.

10:35 NZ Books review

Harry Ricketts reviews Summer Grass by Ginny Sullivan, published by Steele Roberts.

10:45 The Reading

Baby No Eyes by Patricia Grace, told by Nancy Brunning, Rawiri Paratene, Bradley Carroll and Ida te Rito. The story of a young mother and her young son, both of them haunted by the ghost of his lost sister. (Ep. 2 of 17)

11:05 Business commentator Rod Oram

Business commentator Rod Oram has more on the repercussions of Rod Drury stepping down at Xero and also Fonterra going to court to get an injunction against the media.

11:30 Solving an art history mystery

Bronwyn Holloway-Smith has been on the trail of New Zealand artist E. Mervyn Taylor's lost or imperilled modernist murals. Both detective and restorer, based at Massey University’s College of Creative Arts, Bronwyn is an investigative artist and researcher, and has edited a beautiful new book Wanted - The Search for the Modernist Murals of E.Mervyn Taylor telling the story of 12 his artworks. There's one in Radio New Zealand House, but like many others this mural was rescued from the brink of oblivion.

11:45 Media commentator Gavin Ellis

Gavin joins Kathryn and asks should the politically-connected be banned from media commentary? And he also looks at the latest readership figures - and NZME rightly trumpeted an increase for the Herald on Sunday. But why did it play with numbers to disguise the fact that the print readership of the daily Herald had dropped?

Gavin Ellis is a media commentator and former editor of the New Zealand Herald.  He can be contacted on gavin.ellis@xtra.co.nz

 

 

Music played in this show

Artist: Angus & Julia Stone
Song: Snow
Comp: Stone/ Stone
Album: Snow
Label: EMI
Time:10.36