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Mike Hosking

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Mike Hosking
Born
Michael Noel James Hosking IV

(1965-01-24) 24 January 1965 (age 59)
NationalityNew Zealand
Occupation(s)Broadcaster, Television producer

Michael Noel James Hosking IV[1] (born 1965) is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently works as the weekday breakfast host on radio station Newstalk ZB.

A supporter of the centre-right National party, Hosking is often openly critical of the Labour-led government.[2] He has lived and worked as a broadcaster in Wellington, Christchurch and currently, Auckland.

Career

Hosking's early career was in radio, working on the Radio New Zealand (he continues to work for Radio New Zealand network to this day) in the early 1990s hosting The Tonight Show nationwide, with a music and talkback format. He then went on to co-host Morning Report on National Radio with Geoff Robinson. Hosking first joined TVNZ in 1997, when it began its Breakfast show. He was then axed from the show in 2004. He made his return to television in 2008 when he filled in on TVNZ's Close Up programme. He hosted the game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? New Zealand, which began in September 2008 on TV ONE. In 2014, he and Toni Street joined Jesse Mulligan on the Seven Sharp panel for the show's second season. Hosking and Street left Seven Sharp at the end of 2017.

Personal life

In 1989, Hosking married Marie Angela Hosking,[3] and, in June 2001, she gave birth to twins Ruby and Bella.[3][4] They parted in August 2002.[3] In 2003, they were involved in a court case against women's magazine New Idea, involving photos taken by tabloid journalist Jonathan Marshall[5] in December 2002 of Marie and her two daughters.[3]

In 2012, Hosking married fellow broadcaster Kate Hawkesby.[4] She has three children from her previous marriage[6]

Politics and business interests

In an interview with North & South in 1990, Hosking described himself as "a money person, I’m a capitalist. I’m to the right of Roger Douglas."[7]

In 2012, Hosking was revealed to have received $48,000 in payments and perks from SkyCity Auckland Casino for doing regular work for them, while still working as presenter for TVNZ.[8] During controversy over proposed taxpayer subsidies for Sky City building a national convention centre, Hosking wrote in defence of the subsidy, describing the convention centre as an "aspirational investment".[9]

In 2013, he was the master of ceremonies at Prime Minister John Key's state of the nation speech, which he also endorsed.[10] Hosking is a climate change skeptic, stating on Seven Sharp that he doesn't believe in the IPCC report.[11]

In 2015, Hosking was accused of overt political bias by NZ First leader Winston Peters and Labour leader Andrew Little,[12] a claim strongly denied by Hosking and Prime Minister John Key.[13][14]

During the 2017 election campaign, Hosking was appointed moderator of one of the televised leader debates, and was again accused of political bias by much of the New Zealand public. This led to a petition for his replacement being widely circulated, and collecting over 75,000 signatures. Debate host and organizers TVNZ responded that it would not placate the petition signers, and affirmed that it will keep him on as moderator.[15]

Controversy

In 2016 the Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA) received complaints about comments by Hosking critical of New Plymouth Mayor Andrew Judd who resigned from office following abuse Judd received for proposing a Māori ward on the local district council. Complaints referred to racism implicit in Hosking's remarks.[16] The BSA did not uphold the complaints, noting that the Seven Sharp presenters regularly give their opinion on issues, and the outspoken and opinionated presenting style of Mr Hosking is well known to viewers. The BSA believed that overall Mr Judd was not unfairly treated and his comments balanced Hosking's view.[17]

On 23 August 2017, a month before New Zealand's general Parliamentary election, Hosking asserted that only those enrolled in a Māori electorate were able to vote for the Māori Party. He said “…you can’t vote for the Māori Party because you’re not enrolled in the Māori electorate”. Members of the Māori Party and the general public criticised his statement as being misleading.[18] The Māori Party lodged formal complaints with broadcaster TVNZ and the Electoral Commission over Hosking's comments.[19]

Hosking made further comment the following night saying, “The fact that anyone can vote for [the Māori Party] as a list party I automatically assumed we all knew given we have been doing this for 20 years… and it went without saying. So hopefully that clears all of that up.”

The Māori Party complaint was referred to the Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA) which upheld the complaint. The BSA ruled Hosking breached its accuracy standard when he said to his co-presenter, "…you can't vote for the Māori Party because you're not enrolled in the Māori electorate". The comment was made on August 23, just under a month out from the 2017 general election. The BSA found Hosking's comment could have misled voters. The BSA found that the potential harm caused by this broadcast, in leaving viewers misinformed about their ability to vote for the Māori Party, outweighed the broadcaster’s right to freedom of expression. The BSA consider that Mr Hosking’s statement during the 23 August 2017 broadcast was inaccurate and misleading, and that the clarification subsequently provided was confusing and insufficient to correct the inaccuracy. This was an important issue, particularly during the election period, and had the potential to significantly affect voters’ understanding of the Māori roll and of New Zealand’s electoral system.[20]

The results of the 2017 general election saw the Māori Party lose its electorate seat. It also failed to meet or exceed the five percent voting threshold needed for election and the Party lost its representation in Parliament.[21]

See also

References

  1. ^ "Episode 187". Seven Sharp. Season 2. Auckland. 21 October 2014. TVNZ.
  2. ^ Bamber, Shaun. "Mike Hosking's political leanings - in his own words". Stuff. Stuff. Retrieved 18 November 2017.
  3. ^ a b c d "High Court of New Zealand hearing between Mike Hosking and Marie Hosking, and Simon Runting, Pacific Magazines NZ Ltd., ACP Media Ltd., and the Commonwealth Press Union". ucc.ie. Retrieved 21 October 2014.
  4. ^ a b "Media couple: 5 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms but we need more". The New Zealand Herald. 26 June 2013. Retrieved 21 October 2014.
  5. ^ Roger Maynard (14 October 2012). "From enfant terrible to media darling". New Zealand Herald.
  6. ^ Eriksen, Alanah (26 June 2013). "Media couple: 5 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms but we need more". New Zealand Herald.
  7. ^ Wilson, Tim (May 1990). "Tonight's the night : Mike Hosking radio's rising star". North & South.
  8. ^ Kathryn Powley (1 April 2012). "Celeb cash, perks worth $50K a year". New Zealand Herald.
  9. ^ Mike Hosking (11 February 2015). "Mike's Editorial: The Old Renovator's Curse". Newstalk ZB.
  10. ^ John Drinnan (1 February 2013). "Hosking plugs car and Key". New Zealand Herald.
  11. ^ "Seven Sharp". TV One. 1 April 2014. Archived from the original on 7 April 2014. Retrieved 3 April 2014. [at 22:46] Bad news. I'm afraid the IPCC – the International Panel on Climate Change – has issued its latest report. It's 2,600 pages long and spans 32 volumes. But I can sum it up for you. Ah, we're stuffed. The seas are rising, the storms are coming, the locusts are close, we are going to climatic hell in a handcart. That's of course, if you believe them. Which, as it turns out, I don't.
  12. ^ Jo Moir (17 August 2015). "John Key dismisses opposition leaders accusing Mike Hosking of 'political bias'". Waikato Times.
  13. ^ Katie Kenny (27 August 2015). "Hosking's reply 'pathetic', Peters says". Stuff.co.nz.
  14. ^ Jo Moir (18 August 2015). "Mike Hosking responds to opposition leaders' criticisms of political bias". stuff.co.nz.
  15. ^ Petition from 76,000 not enough to remove Mike Hosking as TVNZ debate moderator
  16. ^ Colin Peacock (30 October 2016), Controversial comments cleared - but condemned, RadioNZ
  17. ^ Peter Radich, Chair Broadcasting Standards Authority (19 October 2016), Hayward and Television New Zealand Ltd - 2016-040B (19 October 2016), BSA
  18. ^ Jo Moir (24 August 2017), Mike Hosking says he 'confused' the Māori Party by saying only Māori could vote for them, stuff.co.nz
  19. ^ Jane Patterson (24 August 2017), Māori Party want Hosking dumped as debate moderator, RadioNZ
  20. ^ Peter Radich, Chair Broadcasting Standards Authority (18 December 2017). "McCaughan and Television New Zealand Ltd - 2017-083 (18 December 2017)". BSA.
  21. ^ "New Zealand 2017 General Election - Official Results".
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