Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Brigitte Morten: Political commentator ahead of the State of the Nation address

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Brigitte Morten: Political commentator ahead of the State of the Nation address · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So it's a big day for the Prime Minister. Today
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  Speaker 1: he's delivering his State of the Nation's Speech in Auckland.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: It's his first major speech to the year, where he'll
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: be sharing his vision for New Zealand and share the
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: inside track on the government's growth agenda. Former Senior Ministerial
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: advisor for the National Party and political commentator Bridget Morton
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  Speaker 1: is with me now. Thanks for your time this morning.
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  Speaker 2: Bridget, good morning.
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  Speaker 1: First of all, how big a deal actually is the
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  Speaker 1: State of the Nation's Speech? Does anyone care?
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  Speaker 2: I think you've got to be a bit realistic. They
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  Speaker 2: are big set pieces for the year and a lot
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  Speaker 2: of effort goes into them, but realistically, most people aren't
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  Speaker 2: paying that much attention to all of the messages that
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  Speaker 2: are in that speech.
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  Speaker 1: What are you expecting to come out of it?
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  Speaker 2: The economy, The economy, the economy. Without a doubt, there's
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  Speaker 2: a big focus this year by the government on economic growth.
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  Speaker 2: You've seen that in the cabinet reshuffle, you've seen it
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  Speaker 2: in the announcements and the media interview's given over the
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  Speaker 2: last twenty four hours. I think you're going to be
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  Speaker 2: talking about how they can get the New Zealand back
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  Speaker 2: out of that recession, get employment back up, get you know,
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  Speaker 2: retail spending, business conference, all of those things happening. I
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  Speaker 2: think that's going to be absolute focus today.
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  Speaker 1: How much detail do you think we're going to get,
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  Speaker 1: bridget because we've heard from the Prime Minister and the
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  Speaker 1: Finance Minister Nicola Willis. They're painting this lovely big picture
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  Speaker 1: narrative at the moment, but we're not really getting down
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  Speaker 1: to the nitty gritty or any detail or how we're
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  Speaker 1: going to get there. Should we expect that today?
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  Speaker 2: Not in the State of the nation. They are much
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  Speaker 2: more about building that narrative, setting out that message about
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  Speaker 2: what the year will look like, what the sort of
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  Speaker 2: aims are, you know, so much more like a news
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  Speaker 2: resolution type speech as opposed to the detail about how
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  Speaker 2: they get to those goals. There'll probably be a small
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  Speaker 2: announcement in there. It normally is something, but for the
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  Speaker 2: most part is about setting the tone.
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  Speaker 1: But no one sticks to the New year's resolutions.
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  Speaker 2: Have you already given up on yours?
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  Speaker 1: I don't even bother anymore, Not not until it don't about February,
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  Speaker 1: when I've really thought about it long and hard. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: so maybe a little bit of policy.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so. But I think you'll hear some
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  Speaker 2: of those things we've heard, you know, trade deals, you know,
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  Speaker 2: how they can get rid of red tape in terms
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  Speaker 2: of regulation, what they can do in terms of getting
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  Speaker 2: business confidence and getting people back you know, spending. I
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  Speaker 2: think you saw yesterday, you know, they were applauding the
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  Speaker 2: fact that low inflation was staying relatively steady. So I
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  Speaker 2: think you'll hear a lot of those messages coming through.
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  Speaker 1: Is that enough? Do you think? Is that enough at
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  Speaker 1: the moment, especially when we've had a recent poll which
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  Speaker 1: has got you know, national dropping into the twenties.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. I think you've got to be careful here in
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  Speaker 2: terms of you know, as I said, that's the State
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  Speaker 2: of the Nation, that is about setting the toad. I
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  Speaker 2: think without a doubt there will be something in there
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  Speaker 2: that'll be something new. But you've got to be realistic
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  Speaker 2: that they're not going to dump out a whole lot
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  Speaker 2: of new policy right at the beginning of the year, because,
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  Speaker 2: as we've talked about, at the beginning, not that many
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  Speaker 2: people are listening to all of the detail in the
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  Speaker 2: State of the Nation speech.
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  Speaker 1: Is this speech away for him to entice voters.
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  Speaker 2: Oh, of course. I mean, at the end of the day,
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  Speaker 2: he's a politician. He needs the popular vote to keep
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  Speaker 2: him in. So everything's going to be about talking to
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  Speaker 2: voters and about what they hear about. We know in
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  Speaker 2: recent polls that cost of living in the economy is
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  Speaker 2: the biggest issue, and that is something that the National
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  Speaker 2: Party has really campaigned on that they're the right party
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  Speaker 2: to really focus on those issues. They're going to continue
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  Speaker 2: to demonstrate what they've done to date and what they're
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  Speaker 2: planning on doing to get those two issues under control.
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  Speaker 1: Bridget, thanks so much for your time today. Appreciated. That
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  Speaker 1: was former Senior Ministerial Advisor of the National Party and
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  Speaker 1: political commentator Bridget Morton. What do you want to hear
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  Speaker 1: from Luxem this morning? Is Bridget said, Look, this is
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  Speaker 1: kind of once again another big picture, set the tone
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  Speaker 1: for the year kind of speech. Oh what does Luxan
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  Speaker 1: need to do to catch your attention? To impress you?
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: You can text on ninety two ninety two for more
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  Speaker 1: from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge.
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