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It removes a major point of friction between Canberra and Washington

It removes a major point of friction between Canberra and Washington

NZ Herald3 days ago
Almost 5% of all the beef eaten in America is Australian, and that largely goes into burgers. Photo / Fresh Media
Australia said today that it would lift trade barriers on beef from the United States, removing a major point of friction between Canberra and the Trump Administration.
US President Donald Trump singled out Australia as he unveiled his 'Liberation Day' tariffs in April, accusing the close ally of banning
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Heather du Plessis-Allan: We are being irrational about the price of butter
Heather du Plessis-Allan: We are being irrational about the price of butter

NZ Herald

time21 minutes ago

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Heather du Plessis-Allan: We are being irrational about the price of butter

Unless you're into commercial scale baking, butter is not the thing putting the most pressure on household budgets. Try power. This winter power is costing the average household almost a block of butter every day. Or rates. That's costing the average Wellingtonian more than a block of butter every day. Those expenses have no alternatives. You have to pay them. With butter we at least have alternatives. If we don't like the price we can do a swap. I don't want to be Marie Antoinette but at least we have the option to switch to margarine. Not only have we abandoned logic, but also facts. Even the Finance Minister briefly took to complaining that butter is cheaper in Australia than in the very country that produces it. Except that's not true. At the time of writing, if you take Woolworths' salted butter, which is available both sides of the Tasman, adjust for currency and the fact the Australian Government does not charge their equivalent of GST on butter, we actually pay 30c less. Discounting butter domestically is impractical, as it would require subsidies, impacting farmers and shareholders. Actually, the price of butter is a good news story for New Zealand. Because if we're paying our farmers more, the world is paying our farmers more. And they're buying a lot more blocks of butter than we are. So that means they're paying a good chunk towards our tax take, our health, our roads, our schools. It's become slightly fashionable to suggest the solution is to discount butter domestically. That's a nutty idea. A discount is a subsidy. A subsidy has to be paid by someone. Who? Fonterra? The shareholders will probably object to that. Maybe, if this drama runs on long enough and there is enough reputational damage to Fonterra, it might be in the business' interest to cut the price to make the pain stop. That would not be a good day for farmers and shareholders. Miles Hurrell attributes the 46.5% rise in butter prices to global demand and supply issues. Photo / Alyse Wright The Government? Again, bonkers. If New Zealand is too broke to afford the full Dunedin hospital build, we're too broke to help commercial bakers afford their butter. The truth is there is no fix to the price of butter that isn't stupid or temporary. We simply have to pay the price that we pay. And the Finance Minister knows this. She knows this because she is a very clever woman. And because she worked for Fonterra for six years. Finance Minister Nicola Willis has turned butter into the cost-of-living symbol. Photo / Mark Mitchell So, she should never have turned butter into the cost-of-living symbol she has. This really started with her in April when she visited Costco and was taken by the fact it could sell butter for about half the price mainstream supermarkets were selling it for. It became her evidence that supermarkets were ripping us off. But then somehow, Fonterra got dragged into it and one of their regular ministerial briefings became a please-explain. And then the TV news was chasing the CEO Miles Hurrell around the forecourt of Parliament and going live to air while the meeting was under way. And there were expectations. And then nothing happened. And it has become yet another example of the Finance Minister, disappointingly, talking big but doing nothing. Just like with the retail banks. And just like with the supermarkets, so far. Spare a thought for Hurrell. The man is one of the most impressive Kiwi CEOs of his generation but had to spend his week cast as the villain of the butter story. There is no story. It's not even the biggest pressure on our weekly bills.

White House seeks fines from other universities after Columbia deal
White House seeks fines from other universities after Columbia deal

Otago Daily Times

time14 hours ago

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White House seeks fines from other universities after Columbia deal

Harvard University. File photo: Getty Images The White House is seeking fines from several universities it says failed to stop antisemitism on campus, including Harvard University, in exchange for restoring federal funding, a Trump administration official said on Friday. The administration is in talks with several universities, including Cornell, Duke, Northwestern and Brown, the source said, confirming a report in the Wall Street Journal. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the administration is close to striking deals with Northwestern and Brown and potentially Cornell. A deal with Harvard, the country's oldest and richest university, is a key target for the White House, the official added. A spokesperson for Cornell declined to comment. Other universities did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Trump and his team have undertaken a broad campaign to leverage federal funding to force change at U.S. universities, which the Republican president says are gripped by antisemitic and "radical left" ideologies. Trump has targeted several universities since returning to office in January over the pro-Palestinian student protest movement that roiled college campuses last year. Columbia University said on Wednesday it will pay more than $200 million to the U.S. government in a settlement with the administration to resolve federal probes and have most of its suspended federal funding restored. The Trump administration has welcomed the Columbia deal, with officials believing the university set the standard on how to reach an agreement, the official said. Harvard has taken a different approach, suing the federal government in a bid to get suspended federal grants restored.

Israel, US abandon Gaza ceasefire negotiations
Israel, US abandon Gaza ceasefire negotiations

Otago Daily Times

time14 hours ago

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Israel, US abandon Gaza ceasefire negotiations

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump appeared on Friday to abandon Gaza ceasefire negotiations with Hamas, both saying it had become clear that the Palestinian militants did not want a deal. Netanyahu said Israel was now mulling "alternative" options to achieve its goals of bringing its hostages home from Gaza and ending Hamas rule in the enclave, where starvation is spreading and most of the population is homeless amid widespread ruin. Trump said he believed Hamas leaders would now be "hunted down", telling reporters: "Hamas really didn't want to make a deal. I think they want to die. And it's very bad. And it got to be to a point where you're going to have to finish the job." The remarks appeared to leave little to no room, at least in the short term, to resume negotiations for a break in the fighting, at a time when international concern is mounting over worsening hunger in war-shattered Gaza. French President Emmanuel Macron, responding to the deteriorating humanitarian situation, announced that Paris would become the first major Western power to recognise an independent Palestinian state. Britain and Germany said they were not yet ready to do so but later joined France in calling for an immediate ceasefire. British Prime Minister Keith Starmer said his government would recognize a Palestinian state only as part of a negotiated peace deal. Trump dismissed Macron's move. "What he says doesn't matter," he said. "He's a very good guy. I like him, but that statement doesn't carry weight." Israel and the United States withdrew their delegations on Thursday from the ceasefire talks in Qatar, hours after Hamas submitted its response to a truce proposal. Sources initially said on Thursday that the Israeli withdrawal was only for consultations and did not necessarily mean the talks had reached a crisis. But Netanyahu's remarks suggested Israel's position had hardened overnight. US envoy Steve Witkoff said Hamas was to blame for the impasse, and Netanyahu said Witkoff had got it right. Senior Hamas official Basem Naim said on Facebook that the talks had been constructive, and criticised Witkoff's remarks as aimed at exerting pressure on Israel's behalf. "What we have presented - with full awareness and understanding of the complexity of the situation - we believe could lead to a deal if the enemy had the will to reach one," he said. Mediators Qatar and Egypt said there had been some progress in the latest round of talks. They said suspensions were a normal part of the process and they were committed to continuing to try to reach a ceasefire in partnership with the US The proposed ceasefire would suspend fighting for 60 days, allow more aid into Gaza, and free some of the 50 remaining hostages held by militants in return for Palestinian prisoners jailed in Israel. It has been held up by disagreement over how far Israel should withdraw its troops and the future beyond the 60 days if no permanent agreement is reached. Itamar Ben-Gvir, the far-right national security minister in Netanyahu's coalition, welcomed Netanyahu's step, calling for a total halt of aid to Gaza and complete conquest of the enclave, adding in a post on X: "Total annihilation of Hamas, encourage emigration, (Jewish) settlement." MASS HUNGER International aid organisations say mass hunger has now arrived among Gaza's 2.2 million people, with stocks running out after Israel cut off all supplies to the territory in March, then reopened it in May but with new restrictions. The Israeli military said on Friday it had agreed to let countries airdrop aid into Gaza. Hamas dismissed this as a stunt. 'The Gaza Strip does not need flying aerobatics, it needs an open humanitarian corridor and a steady daily flow of aid trucks to save what remains of the lives of besieged, starving civilians,' Ismail Al-Thawabta, director of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, told Reuters. Gaza medical authorities said nine more Palestinians had died over the past 24 hours from malnutrition or starvation. Dozens have died in the past few weeks as hunger worsens. Israel says it has let enough food into Gaza and accuses the United Nations of failing to distribute it, in what the Israeli foreign ministry called on Friday "a deliberate ploy to defame Israel". The United Nations says it is operating as effectively as possible under Israeli restrictions. United Nations agencies said on Friday that supplies were running out in Gaza of specialised therapeutic food to save the lives of children suffering from severe acute malnutrition. United Nations aid chief Tom Fletcher also has demanded that Israel provide evidence for its accusations that staff with the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs were affiliated with Hamas, according to a letter seen by Reuters. The ceasefire talks have been accompanied by continuing Israeli offensives. Palestinian health officials said Israeli airstrikes and gunfire had killed at least 21 people across the enclave on Friday, including five killed in a strike on a school sheltering displaced families in Gaza City. In the city, residents carried the body of journalist Adam Abu Harbid through the streets wrapped in a white shroud, his blue flak jacket marked PRESS draped across his body. He was killed overnight in a strike on tents housing displaced people. Mahmoud Awadia, another journalist attending the funeral, said the Israelis were deliberately trying to kill reporters. Israel denies intentionally targeting journalists. Israel launched its assault on Gaza after Hamas-led fighters stormed Israeli towns near the border, killing some 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages on October 7, 2023. Since then, Israeli forces have killed nearly 60,000 people in Gaza, health officials there say, and reduced much of the enclave to ruins.

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