Show Notes
With just over a week to the election, the Labour leader is in with a shot of becoming the first New Zealander since Keith Holyoake to serve non-consecutive terms as prime minister. In the latest of our leader interviews, he defends an approach criticised for its small target and lack of boldness, discusses the impact of overhang and legitimacy, and reveals how embracing the philosophy of stoicism has changed his life.At Large with Toby Manhire is produced by Te Aihe Butler, Zoe Madden-Smith and The Spinoff. Read more at thespinoff.co.nz. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
More from At Large with Toby Manhire
In March 2024 Chlöe Swarbrick became co-leader of the Greens – right in the middle of what can only be described as a crisis year for the party. Today, they’ve jumped to around 15% in polling, and Swarbrick is under intense fire from Nicola Willis and the incumbent coalition. So how did they turn it around, do the Greens’ economic prescriptions hold up to scrutiny, and could they really work coherently with Labour?At Large with Toby Manhire is produced by Te Aihe Butler, Zoe Madden-Smith and The Spinoff. Read more at thespinoff.co.nz. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Across 12 years as Act leader, David Seymour has taken the party from 0.5% to two terms with a decent sized caucus and 18 months in the role of deputy prime minister. He goes into the 2026 election presenting as the stable leg of the coalition tripod, but how does that square with the scenes sparked by his treaty principles bill and this new focus on “one law for all”?
At its fourth time of trying, the Opportunity Party is on track for something unprecedented: making it to parliament. And a massive part of that is down to its new leader: Qiulae Wong. What is she doing differently? How does the party, with its powerful board, work? Is it really a party of change? What does she say to the allegations from former members about a “toxic” culture? And has she even met Gareth Morgan? Wong sits down with Toby for the latest At Large leader interview.At Large with Toby Manhire is produced by Te Aihe Butler, Zoe Madden-Smith and The Spinoff. Read more at thespinoff.co.nz. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Advertising campaigns are meant to capture the popular imagination, just not like this. A bank called Kiwi, a green sheep called Buck and giddy humans combined over recent days to create a strange fable for our times. Hayden Donnell joins Toby to walk us through the story that went from a pocket of the internet, via his post for the Spinoff (headline: “Kiwibank is desperately trying to stop people saying they want to f*** its sheep mascot”) and all the way to the John Oliver show.Plus: Lyric Waiwiri-Smith steps off the big pink bus to lay down the gauntlet in How Good, asking should huge campaign vehicles in fact be obligatory?At Large with Toby Manhire is produced by Te Aihe Butler, Zoe Madden-Smith and The Spinoff. Read more at thespinoff.co.nz. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Ali Mau first appeared on New Zealand screens more than three decades ago. She went on to run, for five years, the #MeTooNZ project for Stuff. Last year she published No Words for This – an autobiography the Spinoff called “gripping and revelatory”. Last month, after years of work, Mau and lawyer Zoë Lawton pressed go on Tika: a globally pioneering online service for survivors of sexual harm that joins the dots between survivors. What are the experiences that led to creating this technology? How does Tika work? And – a few weeks in – what has been the volume of response been so far?