The Panel with Catherine Robertson and Finlay Macdonald (Pt 1)

Cycling death are up more than three times on last year. 18 cyclists have died so far on our roads, with three weeks of the year left. Only 5 people died in 2016, 6 in 2015. The road toll is up for drivers and motorbike riders too as well as pedestrians. For cyclists, it's mostly men over 40. We ask the panellists if the pushback against cycleways is valid and what can be done to keep our roads safer. Police have launched their summer operation focussing on preventing assaults in Auckland's CBD in the lead up to Christmas. More than 40 % of public assaults happened during this time of year, often between 2am and 4am on weekend mornings. Police will be cracking down on drunk people. We ask the panellists what police can do to reduce the number of fights. Is there an uneveness in the justice dispensed to some teachers? Two cases have attracted attention recently, a Whanganui teacher that received home detention and name suppression for sexual offending against a young woman, and a Masterton teacher who stopped a boy headbanging, and was found to have committed serious misconduct in doing so. PPTA president Jack Boyle joins the panel to discuss whether the outcomes of these cases against teachers are positive for all involved or not. There are calls for a single nationwide authority to keep our drinking water safe, following the discussions around the country's water quality. What hasn't had much attention is those on tank water. As people head to their bachs this summer, should they be worried about what's coming out of their tanks? We ask Stan Abbott, the director of Massey University's Roof Water Harvesting Centre about these concerns.