Nine To Noon for Friday 26 April 2024

09:05 Does NZ need mandatory child abuse reporting?

Any moves to make reporting of suspected child abuse mandatory should be treated with caution, says a group that helps train people in how to identify such harm. Earlier this month Act leader and associate education minister David Seymour announced changes to the early childhood education sector. He signalled plans to introduce mandatory child abuse reporting, while noting no firm decision had been made. New Zealand's awful history with child abuse is well documented, and mandatory reporting was a recommendation of a 2023 report by Dame Karen Poutasi prompted by the death of five-year-old Malachi Subecz. However she also noted the reporting should go hand in hand with regular training for frontline professionals who work with children. Joining Susie to discuss is Safeguarding Children's CEO Willow Duffy and Sarah Whitcombe-Dobbs, a senior lecturer in Child and Family Psychology at the University of Canterbury.

09:20 As school goes back, the cellphones go away

From next week, the kids will be back. But TikTok and messaging in the classroom won't be. The government's cellphone ban kicks in from term two, mandating that schools must ensure students don't use or access a phone while they are attending schools - including at lunch time and breaks. There are some exemptions for health, learning support or special circumstances. So how will schools enforce it? And how will kids cope with it? Kate Gainsford - is the chair of PPTA Secondary Principal Council - and also the Principal of Aotea College in Porirua.

09:30  Dr Hillary Bennett: Protecting workers' mental wellbeing after job cuts

In the past six months, redundancies have been signalled across both the private and public sectors. Roles have been dissolved at major Telcos Spark and ONE NZ, in the Bunnings head office, and most recently ANZ bank. To date, more than 3,000 jobs are on the line in the public sector. Dr Hillary Bennett is an organisational psychologist specialising in mental wellbeing at work. Over the years, she has developed processes to help companies identify and mitigate risk to staff wellbeing by redesigning the work. During a time of job cuts, she says the risk of burnout increases, with employees often expected to more with less.

09:45 Asia correspondent Ed White

The marathon Indian election is underway with Prime Minister Narendra Modi eyeing up his third five-year term in power. China is in the spotlight in Europe this week, with a series of arrests and charges relating to spying and espionage, and dawn raids on a Chinese technology company. And in Taiwan, debate over the death penalty is resuming.

Ed White is a correspondent for the Financial Times, based in Shanghai.

10:05 The entrepreneur with plans to bring cheap electricity to tens of millions of Africans

Mansoor Hamayun has grown his Bboxx company out of a university project that set up six villages in Rwanda with electricity - and now he wants to expand that to tens of millions more people in sub-Saharan Africa. Bboxx recently moved its headquarters from London to the Rwandan capital Kigali with plans to train 1000 locals and invest US$100 million in the country over the next 5 years. A lot of its work has focussed on Rwanda and the company now provides 10 percent of that country's households with electricity. But it has now broken into 11 different African markets with its products. The company aims to provide electricity to 36 million sub-Saharan Africans by 2028. Mansoor is co-founder of Bboxx along with two other university friends - and he is the chief executive.  

10:35 Book review: How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin 

Gail Pittaway reviews How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin published by Hachette 

10:45 Around the motu: Peter Newport in Queenstown

Peter highlights a proposal that would see residential developments in the Queenstown Lakes district go up as well as out - a plan that has the potential to drop rents by as much as a third. New birthing units for Clyde and Wānaka have been delayed - again, and a new Queenstown intersection could cost as much as $250 million and take four years to build.

Peter Newport is Managing Editor,  Crux, based in Arrowtown

11:05 New music with Jeremy Taylor

Music commentator Jeremy Taylor has reissues from Air, Spice Girl Emma Bunton and Kirsty MacColl, plus an outlier track from the new Taylor Swift album.

11:30 Sports commentator Sam Ackerman

Sam wonders if the bubble has burst for the Warriors, who have just suffered their third loss in a row and looks ahead to a potential huge weekend for the Pheonix in their A-League Football game against Macarthur FC.

11:45 The week that was with Michele A'Court and Irene Pink

Comedians Michele A'Court and Irene Pink look at the lighter moments of the week, including an RNZ employee's swipe card turning up in Antarctica, 21 years after he lost it. And a 40-year-old brewery worker in the US who has been acquitted of a drink driving charge, because he has a rare condition where his stomach made the alcohol.