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Andrew Dickens: Is the Michelin guide worth taxpayer money? · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Now bear with me. I'm going to talk about the
• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Mitchelland Guide for a while. I'm going to talk about
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  Speaker 1: food because the first Mitchellan rankings of New Zealand restaurants
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  Speaker 1: are out later this month, and yesterday Jesse Mulligan, The
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  Speaker 1: Herald's restaurant reviewer, pointed out, it's going to be a
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  Speaker 1: very incomplete list of our best restaurants and worth little
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  Speaker 1: to most, including the high Wealth tourists as supposed to attract.
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  Speaker 1: And there's a couple of reasons. Firstly geographic. The reviewers
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  Speaker 1: have only visited Auckland, Wellington, christ Church in Queenstown, so
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  Speaker 1: if you've got a restaurant outside those areas, you're not
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  Speaker 1: going to be visited. Many of those restaurants are in
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  Speaker 1: our wine growing districts and no Mitcheland reviewer coming to you.
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  Speaker 1: And Jesse's examples are Craggy Range and Hawkes Bay and
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  Speaker 1: Arbor in Marlborough, which he reviewed as probably being New
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  Speaker 1: Zealand's best restaurant, but no Michellan investigated there. He also argues,
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  Speaker 1: of course, a local word of mouth and trusted down
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  Speaker 1: to Earth recommendations hold more practical value for diners than
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  Speaker 1: anonymous international inspectors. But that's Jesse, just trying to protect
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: his job. But he reckons thirty five restaurants might be
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  Speaker 1: reviewed if we were lucky, and we'd be lucky to
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  Speaker 1: see any get a star. Now, normally I wouldn't care
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: about the story, except Touris of New Zealand paid six
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: point three million dollars to bring the Mitchelland Guide to
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  Speaker 1: the country in a three year partnership agreement. Now that
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  Speaker 1: is an awful lot of taxpayers money to get a
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  Speaker 1: very incomplete and very small guide of New Zealand restaurants
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  Speaker 1: that miss our best and much of our country. And
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  Speaker 1: you know what that sounds like to me? That sounds
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: like wasteful government spending. For more from Early Edition with
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Ryan Bridge. Listen live to News Talks it be from
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: five am weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.