Nine To Noon for Thursday 27 May 2021

 

 

09:05 New Zealanders working harder and producing less: report

New Zealanders are working longer and producing less than their OECD counterparts, according to a new report from the Productivity Commission. The report finds kiwis work 34.2 hours a week on average, which was 2.3 hours a week more than the average of 31.9 hours per week in other OECD countries.  New Zealand's output was just $68 an hour, which was 25 percent less than the $85 of output per hour in other developed countries. Productivity Commission Chair Ganesh Nana says at the end of the 19th century, New Zealand once had the most productive economies in the world, alongside Australia, Britain and the United States. However, we have been overtaken and outperformed.

09:20  Groundwater wells at risk of running dry: research

09:45 Former aide says PM 'unfit for job', Queen of Scots heist, tougher dog theft laws

UK correspondent Matthew Parris joins Kathryn to look at Dominic Cummings' comments to Parliament that Prime Minister Boris Johnson ignored scientific advice, wrongly delayed lockdowns and that - as a result -  tens of thousands of people needlessly died. Matthew will also look at the fallout of a damning report into the BBC, the theft of gold beads Mary Queen of Scots carried to her execution and the tougher sentences that dog thieves could face.

10:05 Peter Singer: freedom of expression and cancel culture

Peter Singer is the renown Australian moral philosopher and professor of bioethics, who is the co-founder and editor of a new online journal which goes to the heart of the question of free speech and so-called 'cancel culture'. The Journal of Controversial Ideas  a peer-reviewed interdisciplinary academic journal in which authors can publish under a pseudonym. Peter Singer says freedom of thought and discussion are under attack, with academics and writers at risk of receiving personal abuse, including death threats, or of irrevocably harming their careers. But does publishing under a pen-name really benefit discourse or serve to polarise us further? Peter Singer is appearing in Auckland in August.

10:35 Book review: Helen Kelly by Rebecca Macfie    

Ralph McAllister reviews Helen Kelly by Rebecca Macfie, published by Awa Press

10:45 The Reading

Bob Dylan's New Zealand, episode 4. Written and read by Andrew McCallum, this week's reading acknowledges the work of the music great as he turns 80.

11:05 Digital Boost launch, could AI shorten the work week and goodbye CD-Roms

Technology correspondent Bill Bennett joins Kathryn to look at the newly-announced Digital Boost Alliance and what it hopes to achieve, new research into the impact AI could have on our work-lives, including the potential to help shorten the working week and how CD-Roms are finally about to stop working...

11:25 Is health and sex education in schools a once over lightly?

Katie Fitzpatrick is an associate professor of education at the University of Auckland and the lead writer of relationship and sexuality education curriculum policy. She says more emphasis and time needs to be devoted to the mental health, sexuality and wellbeing of students from primary to high school. Dr Fitzpatrick talks to Kathryn about why health education is the poor cousin of numeracy and literacy. 

11:45 Solos, P!nk: All I Know So Far, Whitstable Pearl

Film and TV reviewer James Croot joins Kathryn to talk about Amazon Prime's new anthology series Solos, which features a number of well-known actors including Helen Mirran and Anne Hathaway. He'll also look at the new documentary about pop singer P!nk called P!nk: All I Know So Far, also on Amazon and a new detective drama playing on Acorn: Whitstable Pearl.

 

Music played in this show

Artist:  Leisure
Song: Slipping Away
Time: 11.47