Luxon’s smooth landing in Queenstown

Luxon’s smooth landing in Queenstown
Familiar territory: Christopher Luxon went down well with Queenstown business leaders. (Image: Getty)
Paul McBeth
Queenstown’s Chamber of Commerce was the perfect audience for shiny new National Party leader Christopher Luxon to show off his wares.He knew these people from his time as a high-flyer at Air New Zealand, feeding them an increasingly diverse diet of international visitors through the better part of the 2010s to help tourism become the country’s biggest sector, and reminisced on working with them in his old role when it didn’t matter which government was in power: “We were all marching together.”From the get-go, Lux...

More Policy

Fast-track legal fight over Tauranga wharf extension
Policy

Fast-track legal fight over Tauranga wharf extension

Bay of Plenty hapū seek High Court intervention to stop expert panel being set up.

Oliver Lewis 23 Jul 2025
Contractor costs climb as Scott Base spend tops $143m
Policy

Contractor costs climb as Scott Base spend tops $143m

Antarctica NZ spent $9.3m on contractors in five months this year.

Oliver Lewis 21 Jul 2025
Simmonds bins official advice on waste policy
Policy

Simmonds bins official advice on waste policy

Officials pushed for planned targets, bans and mandates. Simmonds overruled them.

Cécile Meier 18 Jul 2025
Banks class action: the lawyers blinked first
Policy Opinion

Pattrick Smellie: Banks class action: the lawyers blinked first

Class action funders show their hand with pre-emptive settlement offer.

Pattrick Smellie 17 Jul 2025