Latest news with #ColeEasthamFarrelly
RNZ News
14 minutes ago
- Health
- RNZ News
Age Concern branch cutting some services as survey shows
Photo: RNZ / Cole Eastham-Farrelly The Wellington Branch of Age Concern says it has had to cut services due to an overall reduction in government funding and increased demand for financial help from service providers. At the same time a sector survey has set out the increasing need for support among the older population. A report by the insurance company, New Zealand Seniors, indicates that 2 out of 5 older people feel their quality of life has declined in the past 2 years. Financial security is said to be a major concern, with 60 percent reporting it as a key factor. The survey, involving 500 New Zealanders over the age of 50, suggests the situation is being worsened by difficulties in accessing timely healthcare and increasing social isolation, which is leading to a decline in mental well-being. Susie is joined by the CEO of Age Concern Auckland Kevin Lamb.
RNZ News
3 days ago
- Business
- RNZ News
Optimism in construction sector: survey
Construction underway a block away from the Mason Clinic in Auckland on Carrington Road. Photo: RNZ / Cole Eastham-Farrelly Construction sector leaders are confident about the industry's outlook over the next five years, despite persistent economic pressures. Equipment hire company Kennards Hire's annual Construction Confidence Check , which includes a survey of New Zealand business leaders for the first time, indicates confidence is high on both sides of the Tasman. The company surveyed 600 senior leaders of mid to large construction businesses in Australia and New Zealand - and 93 per cent of respondents were confident about the industry's growth performance over the next five years. Susie speaks with Kennards Hire General Manager Richard White
RNZ News
6 days ago
- Business
- RNZ News
Long-term investment is guaranteed Lotto 'win'
Your weekly Lotto spend could add up to a windfall over time. Photo: RNZ / Cole Eastham-Farrelly The money you're putting aside for your Lotto ticket could give you an almost certain $100,000 windfall. Lotto's Powerball is rolling over for a $20 million prize on Saturday, but while statistics show we spend a combined more than $700 million a year on Lotto products, investment experts say people might be missing out on a prize that they are much more likely to achieve. The odds of winning Lotto First Division are about one-in-3.84 million per line. Powerball is even less likely - at about one-in-38 million. On the other hand, if you put money away each week, fortnight or month, the power of compounding will deliver you a solid return, given time. Hamilton Hindin Greene investment advisor Grand Davies calculated the outcome for someone investing $25 a week over 45 years at just over $58,000, without any investment returns. If they received an after-tax and after-fee return of 4.5 percent, compounding weekly, they would grow their investment to $189,785. Adjusting for inflation, both in the weekly contribution and the future value of the investment, the investor would end up with about $160,000. "The allure of Lotto is that big win and the hope that comes along with it," Davies said. "That's why people do it, but if you start to do the maths, it often doesn't stack up quite so well. "The thing about compounding interest is that it does take a long time for small amounts to build up, but once they do build up, that's when you start to see the real benefit. "Over 45 years, it's not until you get to the final 20 years that you see the real effects of compounding start to play out. "That's part of the human condition - we're maybe more tuned to the short-term dopamine hit than the long-term one." Over a long time horizon, he said most investments should perform, "but when you're only dealing with small numbers at the beginning, it's hard to see that result at the end". Hatch managing director Waimarie Marks said she knew people who spent a lot more than $25 a week on Lotto. "I think it's because it's a habit they can't break," she said. "Although there is so much literature out there about the benefits of investing and compounding growth etc, the 'hit' of potentially striking big likely draws them in. "I will say, though, an upside of Lotto is the good work this money can do in the community." Koura KiwiSaver founder Rupert Carlyon said a big win was more alluring than a slow and steady return. "Even though you know that it is a one-in-38 million chance of winning, you think maybe you will be that person. "It's the same as a capital gains tax. Most people would benefit from it, yet it still polls negatively, because people think that one day they will benefit from a capital gain that they want to have tax free. "Lotto are currently going through a process where they add an extra number. This will reduce the odds and allows them to offer bigger prizes. "Their research is showing them that bigger prizes will mean more tickets sold. Unfortunately, it is human psychology. "We love big numbers and love to believe we will be the lucky ones, despite what the logic says." Fisher Funds chief executive Ana-Marie Lockyer, said it was behavioural economics. "You only need to watch Lotto's latest TV ads to understand it isn't just about the money - it's about your dreams coming true overnight. "The prospect of winning millions offers an immediate emotional payoff that saving or investing can't match, even though the odds of a big win are extremely low. "Gambling a relatively small amount each week feels harmless and the occasional small win keeps people going back for more. "Saving or investing, on the other hand, doesn't offer the same excitement, because the payoff is usually a long way off, and it's seen as complex and only for wealthy people. "Most people don't realise investing $25 a week into a balanced KiwiSaver fund earning 3.5 percent a year for 10 years could add up to $15,500. "We need to change those perceptions, so investing is seen as the best way of achieving those same dreams." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
04-08-2025
- Health
- RNZ News
The ‘postcode lottery' for hip and knee replacements is still strongly in force
Lynette Wall Photo: RNZ / Cole Eastham-Farrelly Lynette Wall is waiting to find out if she will get a knee replacement Reforms were supposed to eliminate the 'postcode lottery' for healthcare. But new data shows access to care for people needing a hip or knee replacement still varies massively across the country. Lynette Wall did not think her retirement would be like this. She dreamed of freedom, travel and ticking off her bucket list. "I'm too scared to go anywhere," she says. She can't tackle the bucket list or do anything much, "apart from looking through a window". Three months before she was due to retire, she discovered she had severe osteoarthritis in her knee. She now walks with a cane and takes a self-prescribed combination of panadol and ibuprofen each day to manage the pain. Her world has shrunk. The long walks she loved are now short and full of fear her knee will either lock up, or give way. Social outings to places with stairs make her apprehensive, she sticks to territory she knows. She suspects she needs a knee replacement, but has no idea when this might happen. She has not even had a first specialist appointment at Middlemore Hospital which would assess whether she can join the surgery waitlist. A letter she received tells her the average wait time for the specialist appointment at Middlemore's Super Clinic is 47 weeks. "I would like to stop things getting worse, I would like to stay out of a wheelchair if I can," Wall says. Data obtained by RNZ shows that at the end of January 2025 Middlemore Hospital had 654 people on the waitlist for knee surgery - the biggest hospital waitlist in the country - with an average waiting time of 223 days. While Wall's likely wait for surgery may seem long, she may be one of the lucky ones. She is more likely to get onto a surgery waitlist than people in places like Wairarapa, Taranaki or Southland, and her wait for surgery will likely be shorter. If Wall lived in Invercargill, her time spent gazing out a window instead of enjoying life before she could get surgery would likely be three times as long - a whopping 721 days, despite a smaller waitlist of 190 according to the same data. A few hours drive north, at Christchurch Hospital, the average wait time for the very same surgery is 107 days, the lowest in the country. New Zealanders needing hip or knee replacement surgery face a double-whammy postcode lottery. The bar to entering a waitlist differs across the country, as does the time it takes to get surgery once you are accepted to a waitlist. Based on average wait times at the end of January, Southland hospital is the worst place to be if you need a knee replacement with 721 days, followed by Grey Hospital at 443 days. Christchurch hospital (107 days) is the only hospital meeting the target of treating patients on the knee surgery waitlist within four months. Patients needing hip replacements can also face long waits. Grey Hospital on the South Island's west coast is the worst for hips. The shortest waiting time was 128 days for Hawke's Bay Hospital, but this still exceeds the target of four months. Southland's average wait for 2025 was missing from data supplied to RNZ, but in 2024 it was 454 days. Average waiting times at different hospitals has changed over time, with some hospitals, such as Dunedin, experiencing several years with long wait times before improving. While wait times tell one part of the persistent postcode lottery story for hip and knee surgery, it is not the only factor. Patients in some areas need to be in a far worse way to even make it onto a waiting list than patients in other parts of the country. By the time many patients make it to Southland hospital's operating theatre for a hip replacement, their hip ball has practically imploded, according to Invercargill surgeon Chuck Luecker. "The ball has gone from being round, to not just having spurs," Luecker says. "Sometimes cysts form in the bone and sometimes you can collapse the wall of the cyst and the ball becomes deformed." Leuker estimates 40 percent of the patients who make it to surgery fall into this category. "They're not getting surgery in less than six months." Patients in other locations get seen before they are in such a bad way. In Southland, patients have to have a score of 70 in a prioritisation tool to get surgery. In Canterbury, they only need a score of 50 and in Tairawhiti, just 20. People in Wairarapa have the toughest time making it onto a waiting list, with a score of 80 required. Luecker says this postcode lottery of surgery comes down to Southland Hospital's capacity. "According to the Ministry, you're not supposed to offer anybody surgery that you can't provide in a timely way." Health New Zealand is working to standardise the bar to waitlist entry across the country. So far, this has been completed for cataract surgery but is yet to be put in place for orthopaedics such as hip and knee replacements. A report into the inequities in planned care published by the Office of the Auditor General noted standardising some treatments would incur additional costs for districts already under pressure. Luecker believes a one-off population decline is behind the hospital's current predicament. The decline was incorrectly taken as a sign Southland's population would continue to fall and when a new hospital was built the number of beds was reduced from 198 to 166. Of those 166 beds, only 157 were fully staffed. But, instead of decreasing, the population grew from 82,000 to 135,000. The hospital opened in the middle of the ski and flu season and immediately elective surgeries were cancelled due to a lack of staffed beds, he says. "We were turning away people who were truly disabled, out of work, on a cane or a crutch, and struggling." Health New Zealand national chief medical officer Professor Dame Helen Stokes-Lampard says work is underway to standardise the score for acceptance onto waitlists across the country, but she says there are challenges to do this over 20 separate districts. "In some areas it's workforce challenges," she says. This means more staff are needed to increase the number of surgeries which can be completed and lower the acceptance score. In other districts, the number of people already on the waiting list needs to be reduced before the score can be lowered. "In some areas there's been disagreement as to what the standard should be," she says. Stokes-Lampard is unable to give a timeline for when entry criteria to surgical waitlists will be equitable no matter where someone lives. The current focus is on reducing the number of people waiting for surgery, and a funding boost to outsource procedures will tackle this, she says. In the 2024/2025 financial year, 990 hip replacements and 1061 knee replacements were outsourced to the private sector. Data at the end of January shows in total 4600 people were waiting on the public hospital lists for hip replacements and 3300 for knee replacements There is concern the push to outsourcing could have perverse results long term. "Outsourcing in the short term is undoubtedly very helpful for our waiting lists. In the longer term, you need to get the balance right of using the private sector so that you don't destabilise the public sector," she says. "That would be quite an own goal." Patient Voice Aotearoa's Malcolm Muholland Photo: Matthew Rosenberg/LDR Chair of advocacy group Patient Voice Aotearoa Malcolm Mulholland sees the sense in outsourcing elective procedures to private hospitals as a short term method to get through a backlog of surgeries, but he's against it as a long term plan. "We're basically paying twice. We pay tax, it goes into the public health system. Then the government finds they have a shortage of workers, and therefore they contract out at a higher rate to the private sector." A lack of staff is the biggest issue he sees, but says he is yet to see a workforce plan. Wages need to be increased to match other countries, such as Australia, to make New Zealand an attractive option. He is against the idea of 10-year-long contracts with the private sector. "It's a move to privatisation," he says. "We're saying that no longer do we trust or have faith in the capability within the public health system, so rather than try and fix the public health system all we're going to do is outsource to private and they will charge a higher price." Since Mulholland started advocating for patients, he says he's seen a little less of the postcode lottery, but it's not because things are improving. He believes access for people in all areas of the country is worse, with a widening divide between rural and urban access to help. Photo: RNZ / Cole Eastham-Farrelly For Lynette Wall, who may be waiting months to find out if she is eligible for surgery, daily life consists of cautious shuffling around her home. She's determined to not need a wheelchair. "I want to stay independent, not need home help, which would cost the government money." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
27-07-2025
- Automotive
- RNZ News
NZTA has not developed national tolling plan
State Highway 16 full of slow moving morning traffic as the sun rises. Photo: RNZ / Cole Eastham-Farrelly The New Zealand Transport Agency / Waka Kotahi says it has not developed a national tolling plan but is working on a strategic network assessment. On government orders, the agency will be using tolls more to pay for roads. Internal documents in April said managers were going to develop a National Tolling Plan for the agency's board. But Waka Kotahi, in a response to a request under the Official Information Act, said no plan existed, and instead it briefed the board last month about being more strategic. "We are changing our tolling assessments to cater for a broader system network perspective... to provide decisionmakers with a more strategic, system-wide consideration of tolling the network," said the update in June. It was doing tolling assessments of all dozen or so roads of national significance in the works, including the Northland corridor to Whangārei, Mill Road in west Auckland and Tauriko West near Tauranga. "Due to data and modelling complexities associated with modelling tolling proposals for each section of the Northland Corridor, a proposal will be made to the board on the whole corridor" by the end of this year. An expensive overhaul of tolling technology had been going on for several years, however, the national manager of system design told RNZ an update on tolling tech has not been presented to the board.
