00:00:00
The day you become prime minister is the day you start losing the job. >> I've got a card here called 12 prime
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ministers, but I thought we could just run through and get some thoughts on each of them.
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>> Mold was a large corporal. Always carried that chip on the shoulder. Jim Bulger got a bit pissed off at me.
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>> He told you to off once. >> I did. Yeah. Helen Clark was true to what she had always been and was a hands
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down winner. >> Chris Hipkins. What was the story with with you and Chippy and Cocaine?
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This might be completely wrong, but you're all sort of right leaning. >> Me? >> Yeah. You've got this new book out. One
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last question. Prime Minister from Mold intellectu Untold Stories from the House
00:00:37
of Parliament. You're proud of yourself. Is there anything you regret leaving in
00:00:40
the book or anything you regret leaving out that you were going to put in? >> Oh, good. You're here. Come on. This is
00:00:47
the center of performance. Whenever there's a top performance in New Zealand, it all comes from here. That's
00:00:52
Lisa Carrington. She's been doing that for days. That's the boys who got the hole in one in two.
00:00:59
Oh, >> he did it again. Hey Finn, how's the performance going? >> Top tier. >> Nice. This is our generate room. In
00:01:05
here, you'll find our top performers helping Kiwis maximize their Kiwi Saver investments. Get in here, Finn.
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>> Maximize, generate. >> Putting performance first. >> Harry Sofa, finally you're on my
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podcast. >> Nice to be here. Um, you know, persistence pays off. You've been on and
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on and on at me. Finally, I relented. >> I think I've even asked you um you and I
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have the same sort of um we live in the same sort of area, >> so I see you on my runs sometimes.
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You're usually out strolling um one of your younger kids. >> Um I think I've even um like um harassed
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you to come on my podcast while you've been out with your kids. >> Yes, you have, Dom.
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>> Uh just not possible. I mean, ZB is very protective, but you know, we're here to
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talk about a book, so I guess we're not here to talk necessarily about business,
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although the book is business. >> Yeah. Well, and and business is a big part of your life. Yeah. So, so you've
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got this new book out. One last question. Prime Minister from Mold Interlock and Untold Stories from the
00:01:59
House of Parliament. Um why now? >> Um it's a fair question because I was badgered. But like you actually, Dom, I
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was badgered by um Harper Collins uh probably for at least five years uh telling me, "You've got to write a book.
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You've got to write a book. We'd like to publish a book." Blah blah blah blah blah. And uh it's funny because when I
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finally agreed that I'd do it, I had no time on my hands, of course, two little kids. Um and uh but and time is of the
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essence in any business like in your business as well. But I I thought I've really got to persevere now because
00:02:36
there are so many stories out of Parliament. The thing that really pissed me off uh at the beginning was years
00:02:43
ago, I thought I I'll write a book one day. But um from the Roger Douglas years on, I used to uh write a column every
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day and went right through up until I well after I went to Sydney to deliver a speech about 35 years on from Roger
00:03:02
Douglas and I was over in Sydney and one of my office staff said to me, "Oh, Bass, I'm having a clean out of the
00:03:08
office." And I went, "Yeah, yeah, that's cool." And when I got back went to assiduously file my column again. It was
00:03:16
about three and a half thousand pages that were in the filing cabinet all gone. >> And I went to him, I used some fairly
00:03:27
strong invective, but I did say to him, "What insensed you to throw all that stuff out?" He said, "Oh, I had a look
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at it, Bez. I thought it was old, so nobody had want it now and hipped it out." So my plan was always to get a um
00:03:42
a researcher in go through all the stuff because there were a lot of funny stories in there and politics and you're
00:03:48
probably aware of it is full of funny stories. I mean you know I like the personalities in politics and always
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have and um you know having been there so long I thought yeah reflect because every time I sit at a dinner table you
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tell a couple of yarns like oh god we'd like to hear those or see those in a book. No, I've got their wish.
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>> And it's been about a half a century that you've been you've been doing this.
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Are political reporters just sort of um glorified [ __ ] gossipers? >> You do. Are you a gossip? You you guys
00:04:19
do love a gossip. >> Oh, well, everybody loves a do a gossip. Dom Harvey talking
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about gossiping. Oh, please. But anyway, um no, I think uh the press gallery has
00:04:33
changed significantly from when I started. I started in 1980 and um it was predominantly uh men and the average age
00:04:43
then was uh probably late 30s uh plus and I was a young whippersnapper. I came in in my late 20s but I came in as
00:04:52
political editors. So I came in as the boss which was good. I came from television uh into radio and um I
00:05:01
thought like all young people do, oh I'll give it a couple of years and then move on. But you know, politics does get
00:05:07
into your blood and I haven't regretted a year that I spent there. I'm it's always fascinating. I traveled the world
00:05:15
god only knows how many times. Uh the experiences that you can get doing the job that I did are just fabulous and I'm
00:05:23
a very lucky person. Is there anything you regret um regret um leaving in the book or anything you
00:05:31
regret leaving out that you were going to put in? The funny thing is Dom and you know when you've written a book you
00:05:38
um when you reread it which is what I've done I think oh god it had already been
00:05:43
published or gone to the publishers oh why didn't I tell that story and there are there are a lot of stories that uh
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come up and they you know uh you tinge your memory about and this is all this book was totally on memory so I didn't
00:05:58
interview anybody so it's just me um and there are a number of stories And I've noted the odd one down, thinking, "Oh,
00:06:05
that would add a bit of color, uh, a bit more color hopefully." And, um, so we're
00:06:10
in our second reprint now. So, and it's only been on the market for less than two weeks. So, we've done okay.
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>> One one thing that's um generated some um sort of headlines or some column inches, however you want to phrase it,
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recently is um you accusing um Gion and Ghana of being um bullies in an incident
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in Afghanistan. and they're both sort of rebutted saying um you know you can't bully a bully words to that effect. What
00:06:37
what what was the story there? What's the back story? >> How does a bully react to being charged
00:06:43
as being a bully? They go, "Oh no, Bears. Nobody could bully Bears. No, he's not like that. It's absolute
00:06:51
rubbish." And I've heard Ghana going on as he does um stato delivery. I hardly understand a word he says these days,
00:07:01
but nevertheless, I heard him. I listened to one about Mikey Sherman, a podcast, and um of course, he's fixated
00:07:08
by being mentioned in this book as a bully. Uh and the thing is that um Duncan Garner is probably the biggest
00:07:14
bully I've ever known in any business. And it's not just being a good reporter. A lot of people say, "Oh, you got to be
00:07:21
a bully to be a good reporter." That's rubbish. uh he's he does it in a way that is not kind at all. Uh but he you
00:07:28
know the last uh he had the last word on his last podcast uh talking about me and
00:07:33
said oh be you know uh look I wouldn't I wouldn't read the book uh if it was in the bargain basement bin for $2. Good
00:07:40
luck. I don't think it'll be in the bargain basement and for a while uh Duncan and when it is you probably won't
00:07:45
remember it. So, so there's there's no love lost with with you guys. If if you go to a
00:07:52
function and those guys are in the room, would you be like, "Oh, for [ __ ] sake."
00:07:56
>> No, I mean, you know, the thing is Guyan is not, you know, I wouldn't put him in
00:08:01
anywhere near the category that I'd put Ghana in. And Guy, I think, is sort of he was easily led on this trip. It was,
00:08:09
it was, we were all sharing a camera. We'd gone in to Afghanistan and we had to be secretive about our arrival in
00:08:17
there uh because ISIS were was around the camp and uh so we had to you know play it low and um so we're in Carbull
00:08:28
and you know there were a lot of things we were doing but I was sharing a camera. I was doing Sky News work as
00:08:35
well and they TV 1 and TV3 of course and um at one point and this is where he exploded was that I was following my own
00:08:45
story and I was doing a piece to Cameron and Guy not Guy Duncan was standing with
00:08:51
air with an airshot and I said to him Duncan not your story move off um and I'll um you know say what I'm going to
00:08:58
say and um anyway he then turned on me. You're a has been. You're useless. I'LL BE A LONG I'LL be around a long time
00:09:08
after YOU'RE GONE. YOU'RE WASHED UP. You and just went on and on and on. You don't think you're sharing the camera
00:09:15
with me, you schmuck. And you know, it was all this just terrible stuff. And um and I've likened it uh to me if now the
00:09:25
age gap is around the same. I'm old enough to be Duncan's father, but uh there was a man in the press gallery and
00:09:32
he's 20 something years older than me. He's now 97. Um and in Templeton and I thought of the same analogy. I could
00:09:41
never imagine myself speaking to N Templeton in that way. So Garner just shows no respect to anyone. Uh, and I
00:09:51
think it says everything about the man that he calls his podcast editor and chief because he never has been, never
00:09:59
will be, but he is at least in his own in his own podcast time. >> Do you enjoy having these little feuds
00:10:05
going on? >> No. >> I mean, honestly, it was a small part of the book and I heard him say that, "Ah,
00:10:10
it's a pity that he's got to use these sorts of things to sell his book. Please, you're not that important."
00:10:19
I've had both those guys um on my podcast at at various times over the years. Guyion had um a hell of a story
00:10:25
about being in Antarctica um getting steamed one night um waking up I think in the morning in a in a common area
00:10:32
half a glass of Marlo Merlo still in his hand and uh Sir Edman Hillary and Helen
00:10:37
Clark walked in. Have you got any any good stories like that? >> Oh, I've been to Antarctica. Yeah. Uh
00:10:42
no, there there are many stories in the book. I mean, you know, I start off with
00:10:46
Mold Dun, and many, many people know Moldune by reputation more than anything else. And it was me that coined the
00:10:54
Schnap's election because the snap election in 1984, that's what it was about. It was about Moldun drinking too
00:11:01
much. And um on the night that he called it, um I was I got up to Government House very quickly. And there was only
00:11:09
one other journalist that got through the gates before they closed off. And I was up there and to see Moldun arrive in
00:11:16
his LTD. Well, that's his limousine. He had to be helped out virtually carried up the stairs, put in a side room off
00:11:24
the main foyer. And for the next hour or two uh this butler with a silver tray fied in a glass of scotch and um by the
00:11:34
time he there was a function going on at government house and by by the time Moldun uh reemerged he came on to the
00:11:43
steps the front steps and um could hardly stand and David Beatty who was the governor general at the time and
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quite a good mate of Moldun uh he was sort of holding him under one arm arm and um so I talked I said to Molden I
00:11:59
talked to him and uh he was incomprehensible so he couldn't speak and David Beatty took over the interview
00:12:06
which is very unusual for a governor general to do and Moldern was piled into the car taken back to parliament to
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sober up and that was where you got this now uh immortal line it doesn't leave my
00:12:20
opponents much time on the run up to action and it was you know all slurred He was sober then compared to what he
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was 2 hours earlier and on that campaign because the stories about Mold Dun are legendary in my mind that they're so
00:12:34
good uh to retell but sad for the man himself. He is younger than I am now. And um on the night uh before the
00:12:43
election in 1984, I said to Moldern, who was causing all sorts of trouble with protesters, poking his tongue and waving
00:12:50
at them and uh and he um was walking into the uh into his venue that he was speaking at. And I said to him, "Uh,
00:12:58
Prime Minister, can I sit down with you after this and have a final wrap-up interview? Um, and this was a scoop, a
00:13:05
final wrap-up interview with you, um, when you come off stage." And Mold said, "Ah, yes. Yes. Um, never called me Barry
00:13:13
ever. Mr. Sofa, always was RSA generation. Uh, come up to my hotel room in the South Pacific. Uh, make it half
00:13:22
an hour after I finished speaking." So, um, I did went up there at the July allotted time and walked into the room
00:13:30
and here was, uh, the gruntter as we used to call him, slumped on an armchair, uh, a bottle of red wine,
00:13:38
which normally whiskey was his thing, but he did like no dry red. He made that a bit famous or infamous, whichever way
00:13:45
you look at it, but he had it lying uh on on the carpet uh at his feet and um his tie was undone. His wisps of hair
00:13:55
were sort of cascading down from the comb comb over and uh so I genulected in front of him as you do with a microphone
00:14:03
and said to him, "Well, Prime Minister, do you think you've won the election?" And Maldine goes,
00:14:09
>> I said, "Prime Minister, um, it's radio. You've got to speak. Can I ask that question again? Do you think you've won
00:14:17
the election?" Moling goes, "Nope. This is, you know, uh, Thursday night, the vote was on Saturday, so he was
00:14:26
effectively conceding defeat." So anyway, I interviewed and went on and on and on how he'd lost and what he was
00:14:33
planning to do after and all that sort of stuff. And I was working for Radio Pacific in those days. And um so the
00:14:39
next morning, of course, we ran it on air with great fanfare. And no doubt Mulun woke up in the South Pacific Hotel
00:14:47
hearing his own tones saying how he had lost the election and immediately called
00:14:52
a press conference for 8:00 in the morning. So I Julie filed into the press conference. Uh the journalist the night
00:14:58
before I'd gone and had a drink after this interview. and after I'd filed it telling them that Mulun had conceded
00:15:04
defeat and they didn't believe me. So we went to the press conference at 8 on the
00:15:09
Friday morning and um Mulun denied all knowledge of it and when I said to him no hang on prime minister it was me that
00:15:17
interviewed you and I asked you the question you said you hadn't no taken out of context you're hating me Mr.
00:15:24
SOAPER. NO, IT WAS TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT. SO, OF COURSE, Moldun always got away with things like that. So, no, no, it's
00:15:30
lies. So, part of the public would say, "Oh, soap's been bullshitting again." Whereas Maldun was he he had an art of
00:15:40
decrying something that he didn't like even though it was absolutely true. >> He was the original fake news guy.
00:15:46
>> Oh, he was. Yeah. On on many things. But having said that, I mean, Maldun um you
00:15:52
know, I sat down with him a lot after he always never red raged to a bull when he
00:15:57
was prime minister, but after he got out and went and um onto the Rocky Horror Show and his fishnet stockings and um he
00:16:05
was a lonely man and I used to get a call at about 5 in the afternoon and it would be the distinctive voice of Maldun
00:16:13
saying, "Mr. Sha, what are you doing?" I'd go, "Rob, I'm I'm working. come out for a scotch.
00:16:18
>> So I'd go up and I'd sit with him and I did that for quite a number of months
00:16:23
and learned a hell of a lot about politics. He's an extraordinarily intelligent man, but I think he was a
00:16:30
man that had a great chip on his shoulder because all the people that surrounded him, Jack Marshall, um Duncan
00:16:37
McIntyre, David Thompson, uh all those people were very senior military people in the Second World War in the New
00:16:46
Zealand military. Mulun was a lance corporal. So, yeah, I think he always carried that chip on his shoulder.
00:16:54
This is going to be a great podcast. That that um that segment just there alone about Moldun, it sort of sets the
00:17:00
scene. It's like you see all the footage of him on YouTube and there's one common
00:17:03
face you often see in the background and that's Winston Peters. And it's you're the same. You're another one that's been
00:17:07
around >> as long as Winston. I like to say to Winston, I've been there longer than he
00:17:11
has. He came in 78. Uh he was defeated in 1981. Uh and I was in parliament then. So
00:17:19
Winston went out uh for came back in ' 84. Um then don't forget 1996 he was the first uh at the first MMP election just
00:17:29
not long few years before being expelled by the national party he went on to win
00:17:35
oh there's a story behind it but I won't tell you now you can read the book but uh he went on to win um 17 seats in
00:17:42
parliament the most he's ever held in parliament of course he had a lot of power um with the bulger lead government
00:17:49
as a result >> yeah he's he's a little bit older you. Um, only by a few years, but
00:17:54
>> by a few years. No, he's quite a long 5 years. Four. What are you, 74? >> I'm 74. He's 81.
00:17:59
>> Oh, is he 81? >> Yeah. >> [ __ ] that's even more impressive. That's um You see him, he's just always
00:18:04
immaculately dressed. He's um like sharp as a whip. And you you're exactly the same. You turned up here today on a
00:18:09
bike. Ebike, though. That's right. >> I can tell you riding up the hill and you didn't even get out of the saddle,
00:18:13
so I thought that's an ebike. >> But you're um How you feeling? You feel good? >> Yeah. Yeah. Well, I had a terrible
00:18:19
health issue um just under three years ago and um you know the old heart did stop when I was in hospitals had CPR.
00:18:28
The thing that I've read about CPR since which I find fascinating is that um do you know how many people survive CPR?
00:18:36
>> No, no idea. >> One in 10. >> Wow. >> So not a very effective but I had it in
00:18:42
hospital. So but um my heart wasn't the real problem. My heart's fine. It was the arteries that were feeding the heart
00:18:48
and it wasn't high cholesterol. My cholesterol is always really good and I was a runner, you know, ran every day
00:18:55
and stuff. Um, it was a calcium buildup >> and one of my conspirator mates said,
00:19:00
"Mate, mate, it's that bloody CO jab you had. That's what would have done it." And
00:19:05
>> yeah, maybe so, but you know, there's no point in worrying too much about that.
00:19:08
>> Yeah, we'll get to that later. I've got a whole card about that health ski you
00:19:12
had a few years ago. But um um the story goes that the the night that you found out you needed to go to hospital, you
00:19:17
were on your way to Steven Joyce's book launch party. >> And I was thinking, "Fuck, that's a
00:19:21
drastic way to get out of a book launch." >> Well, I had to let Steven know, not that
00:19:26
night, but and I thought, "Well, that's a bloody good excuse." >> Yeah. >> Because um I had a message when I got
00:19:32
home from the office to get in touch with my doctor. They had had a blood test and the week the day before I'd
00:19:39
been um rotary hoing the front garden uh with a 40 kilogram rotary ho lifting it
00:19:45
up and putting it on the back of whatever. And um so the doctor I talked to said she said look Barry you've got a
00:19:55
very high reading for trainan in your blood. And I didn't know what that meant. >> And I went well look Paula can this wait
00:20:01
cuz I've got something I've got to go to tonight. um so can I call you in the morning? She said, "No, you can't call
00:20:07
me in the morning. You're going to hospital right now." >> So I was taken to hospital, the public
00:20:12
hospital here, and um you know, had all sorts of um tubes put in and heart monitors and stuff. Heather was still on
00:20:20
air, >> so I thought, "Don't tell her. Don't let anybody tell her until she's off air
00:20:26
because it would be a bit of a bloody shock." So they told her and of course she came up. But um it's one of those
00:20:33
things in life. If you dwell on it, you'll become probably quite a sick person. But if you if you look
00:20:39
positively at it, and I do generally look very positively at it, I say, you know, I've had the opportunity, they've
00:20:45
given me a rebar, you know, they took a vein out of my leg and stitched it in into the vascular system around the
00:20:51
heart. So I had a triple bypass. And I go, good as gold, you know, and you're lucky. An old Willie Jackson came up to
00:20:58
me once in the office and he said, "Oh, BASH, HOW ARE YOU, MATE?" I SAID, "OH, NO, GOOD." Even though he calls me a
00:21:03
racist most of the time, but he said, "How are you, mate?" HE SAID, "UM, OH YEAH, I WAS READING ABOUT your ticker
00:21:08
the other day." He said, "Do you know what?" And Willie would be in his 60s. HE SAID, "20 YEARS AGO, I had a triple
00:21:14
bypass as well." And I thought, I don't believe it. Here's this guy, you know, looking as fit as fiddle. And then I
00:21:20
thought, well, there's hope yet. >> Yeah. And you're doing it right. As I mentioned before, like I see you on your
00:21:25
your walk, you've got like a 7K loop that you do most with your kids. >> Um >> yeah. Okay. Just before we get back into
00:21:31
into your um the early years of Barry soap. >> Um >> Mikey Sherman. Yeah. That's been a big
00:21:38
thing in the New Zealand news cycle over the past like 3 weeks, four weeks. What
00:21:41
What do you make of all that? >> Um look, it's I think it's very tough on her. She's a mother of six amazingly and
00:21:49
I know Mikey quite well and I've never had a problem with her. I've always liked her and you know I remember when I
00:21:54
saw her just after she had her sixth child and it's and I wasn't aware she was even pregnant. She was pushing the
00:22:01
child out the back of parliament and I said that's not yours Mikey surely. She said yeah it is. And I said she said it
00:22:09
just popped out before I knew it another baby. I've got six I've got seven now but six that's a lot young kids. Um, so
00:22:20
yeah, look, um, there were probably more issues with Mikey than meets the eye. It
00:22:26
wasn't just the, uh, heranging match between Lloyd Burr and her. Uh, there are other issues as well. And I think,
00:22:34
you know, Parliament, if if you're not careful, is a fairly much a drink um, saturated place
00:22:42
>> still. Well, to an extent because there are so many functions that the media are
00:22:48
invited along to in the um grand hall or the um the big hall in the beehive that
00:22:54
you know there's always drink and stuff and some people handle drink better than
00:22:58
others and I think uh with respect to Mikey and I speak about genuine respect for Mikey I think uh maybe at times
00:23:06
she'd probably had a tipple too many and didn't act in the way maybe that you would ect of a political editor and
00:23:14
you've got to remember being uh the state broadcaster and being the political editor of that is a fairly
00:23:20
responsible job and you can't can't in an election year be painted in the way she has and for the television um uh
00:23:29
company to stick by you and I think they probably had no choice but to let her go
00:23:34
and I think it's sad but I'll tell you what I'll guarantee she'll come back in some way but maybe not through the
00:23:39
mainstream media maybe moldy television version or something like that. It should be well capable of handling.
00:23:47
>> Well, thanks for those insights. All right, now back to you. So, Barry Soaper,
00:23:52
>> born in Gore 1951. >> Two. >> Yeah. 1952. >> Everybody says 51. It really pisses me
00:23:58
off a year on to me. Yeah. I was born in the Gore nursing home. Um, and sharing or
00:24:07
not sharing the bassinet. And the next bassinet to me was this winging, wailing, wowing baby. Drove me bloody
00:24:14
mad. And it was Jenny Shipley. And she never stopped. And um, that's absolutely true. She was born at the same time as
00:24:24
me in Gore. Our mothers sort of shared the ward. And um you know I I reminded have reminded Jenny of that over the
00:24:33
years and her me and she on the odd occasion she used to ring me in her beautifully maleifluous tones and sing
00:24:41
happy birthday. Um I've got it recorded somewhere but uh not to be repeated. >> Yeah she was so calm. Eh always had that
00:24:50
calm voice. She was but then um like Bulier you know knifing old Jimbo was not a very pleasant time not only for
00:25:00
her but for um many in parliament that Bulier had number of faults but most people actually liked him as a king
00:25:10
country farmer left school at 15. Uh and it's extraordinary when you think a man
00:25:15
like him went on to become the prime minister but he's not the only one. You had Norman Kirk, of course, uh, and you
00:25:21
had Mike Moore, you know, no formal education, but went through the system and, um, you know, became prime
00:25:27
ministers, some more successful than others. And Jim, Jim was, you know, quite successful in his time. He had a
00:25:34
good team around him, but um you know we we knew that the numbers were being counted on Jim Bulier and we went we're
00:25:43
on a trip to Europe with him and um we we ended up in Paris and I remember having a great night out with Jim in
00:25:50
Paris and Bum Orovoir and I was going on to Germany to see some friends they have
00:25:56
there and um knowing that the numbers were being done on Jim and I thought well you know I'll spend a week out of
00:26:03
the country and get back and you know but he was met on arrival back in the country by Doug Graeme at the airport
00:26:10
and told Jim the numbers have been done and they're not looking good for you and
00:26:14
um he was gone and certainly gone by the time I got back. >> [ __ ] it's a bloody sport isn't it? It's
00:26:19
it's a really tough sport politics and um you know the day you become prime minister is the day you start losing the
00:26:25
job always either by your own hand which is John Key and dare I say it justind but um most there's plotting at some
00:26:35
stage or they've simply had enough and that's why I respected old Helen Clark on the night of the election she got up
00:26:42
to the podium not to concede defeat but to resign from parliament and I think that's what you do get out. You know,
00:26:49
you've had enough. She had nine years as prime minister. That's enough. You've done your bit. Uh and I wouldn't mind
00:26:56
betting, and you heard it on this podcast first, Dom, that she might make another bid for the Secretary
00:27:02
Generalship of the United Nations. Uh she did n or uh eight years ago. I hope she does again because if there's ever
00:27:11
an organization that needs reform, it's that. If there if there's ever a person that could do it, it's Helen Clark.
00:27:17
>> Wow. So, what are your earliest memories? You mean you told the Jenny Shipley story
00:27:23
before, which I'm guessing is not something you remember firsthand, but you um you you called you were running a
00:27:28
little bit late for the podcast today and you you you phoned me and you said, "Call me a call me a boy from Gore, but
00:27:34
where the [ __ ] am I going?" And um I I thought the Gore thing was interesting cuz you haven't lived there in like 70
00:27:39
years or something. 50 60 years. >> I left Left when I was 17. >> Yeah. What do you remember about your
00:27:44
early years in Gore? >> In Gore? >> Yeah. Um, I was a Catholic boy. Um, taught by nuns with those strange habits
00:27:52
on, you know, right covering their face. Really liked them. Um, and, um, and I was given the honor of speaking at our
00:28:02
centennial of my school a number of years ago, and some of the old nuns that taught me were still there. And then
00:28:08
they'd come up to me, "Ah, you're a dear little boy, Barry." I thought, "My god,
00:28:13
if you only knew what was going on in my mind, sister. But but look, I don't I enjoyed Gaul was
00:28:20
a great place to get outdoors and, you know, have your mates and what have you. But I was um I was quite good at rugby
00:28:27
and I was playing rep for Southland and I thought why don't I try and progress my rugby career which is what it was all
00:28:34
about. And um I thought one way to do that would be to come to a place like Wellington. And so I applied to become a
00:28:42
police cadet of all things and was accepted and that's a 19-month course that you know you do a law stuff at
00:28:50
Victoria University and what have you. And um so I did police school and uh played rugby there. And you know uh I
00:29:01
left before I could prove myself uh that able uh because I the discipline at the
00:29:08
police college was not something that I could possibly countenance for the rest of my life.
00:29:14
>> Yeah. >> That's why I'm a journalist. >> Yeah. 1969 that's when you went to police college and yeah I was going to
00:29:19
ask you I've got a question mark next to that. Yeah. What was the story there? What do what do you mean the discipline?
00:29:23
>> Well, um I'll give you an example. And unfortunately, the poor man who was my
00:29:29
sectional sergeant has passed away, but his wife, I think, is still alive. And for old viewers of your podcast, they'd
00:29:36
remember a woman called Veronica Ellen, who used to uh do the weather on TV1 News when Doo Stevenson uh was uh
00:29:46
reading the news. Now, um Veronica and I got on quite well. were quite good buddies and um this Tony her husband uh
00:29:55
he was my sectional sergeant and I didn't know it at the time at police college and uh he would come up to me on
00:30:01
parade. I was in full dress uniform and come up and say to me and put his face right into mine and say did you have a
00:30:07
shave this morning Mr. Soaper and I'd say yes Sergeant what's that Mr. Soaper? So it's a hair
00:30:13
sergeant. Did you have a shave this morning Mr. Soaper? Yes, Sergeant. What's that Mr.
00:30:19
sober a here sergeant. So he'd go on as you can see I've never been great at shaving. So there was that and there was
00:30:27
uh an incident where uh post they had a lot of cadet ships in Trentham at the time and there was a um post office
00:30:34
cadet ship and this there was some um guy at our barracks taking the piss out of cops and what have you and we said no
00:30:43
bugger off car as we were shunting him out he went through one of those not through but dented one of those old
00:30:50
Pyrex um uh walls pineex I think they're And um the sectional sergeant comes through that night and um a knack at up
00:30:59
the other end of the barrack said, "Oh, it was Barry Soaper, Sergeant." So he got me in full dress uniform, marched me
00:31:05
over to the um the post office barracks. And got the guy out of bed and said, "Um
00:31:11
this man, did he assault you?" And of course it's smartass young kids. Yeah, he did. He said, "Well, Mr. So we'll be
00:31:17
talking in the morning about this." I said, "No, we won't sergeant cuz I'm going goodbye." and left the next day.
00:31:24
And uh because I I was absolutely sick of it by then, but uh then move on years and Veronica Alum, she said to me, and I
00:31:33
was working TV1. And she said to me, um, I've got my husband coming up for a drink in the TV one club bar out in
00:31:40
Avalon tonight, Barry, would you like to join us? And I'd never made the connection. And I said, what's his name?
00:31:45
She said, oh, Tony. I said, not Tony Alam. She said, yes. Oh my god. >> So, an essential sergeant came in and we
00:31:53
got on like a house on fire. >> So, who's in your family? I know there's there's two brothers and you lost a
00:31:58
brother and his team. >> I lost two brothers. >> And you lost your brother Lenny to
00:32:02
cancer. >> Cancer at 46. >> Yeah, that's right. >> Was it just the two three of you?
00:32:05
>> Uh, no. No, there were five. >> Right. >> And when I was in hospital, unfortunately, my excuse me, my sister
00:32:11
who was 14 months older than me, she died. So, I had to write the eulogy from hospital. Uh so I couldn't go to the um
00:32:19
funeral. Um so out of the five of us, there's only one two of us left. So I lost a brother tragically when he was
00:32:28
16. And it was on a motorbike that I'd given him for his birthday. >> And but I was much older. I was 14 years
00:32:36
older than so I was 30. 30. >> And um and I gave him this motorbike. And I remember saying to him, he was um
00:32:42
he was at St. Peter's College in Gore. And I said to him, Paul, if anything ever happened to you on this, I'd blame
00:32:47
myself. So, you've got to learn to write it properly. And he did. Never drank. And he was ironically playing uh God. He
00:32:55
was playing Jesus Christ and God Spell. He was a thespian in the local repettory
00:33:00
um place. And he was on his way out to go to the final dress rehearsal and it was pissing down with rain and he hit
00:33:08
some loose metal and the bike slid out in front of it. And Gore was not a busy place, but it slid out in front of a
00:33:14
truck and the truck ran over him. So, >> oh my god. >> And for the family, it was just because
00:33:20
we adored him because he was such an afterthought. Honestly, >> the baby of the family.
00:33:25
>> Well, and there were years that I couldn't even mention his name. I couldn't look at his photo. And every
00:33:30
time now you see road accidents, I think of the families uh of the people around
00:33:36
those road accidents because you know there is so much devastation if it's a young life like Paul's taken so suddenly
00:33:43
you're not expecting he had just won an American field scholarship to go and study in the states and you know this
00:33:50
boy full of promise dead he would have been 60 now. >> Did you feel additional guilt cuz you
00:33:55
gave him the bike? >> Oh for years. Yeah. I mean >> it's not fair on yourself. No, but you
00:34:00
beat up yourself because we didn't have the bike. You, you know, wouldn't have been on it,
00:34:03
>> but um so you do and you know, I'm into counseling and what have you. And so,
00:34:08
you know, I got through it, but it took me at least a decade before I could address it. And I was in parliament when
00:34:13
he was killed. You know, I was at Parliament. Yeah. >> And I remember um you know, meeting old
00:34:18
Norman Jones, who's a was a distant relation of mine. His brother was my uncle, and he was the guy that was so
00:34:25
antihomosexual that you couldn't run half the interviews you did with him. and he ran into me at the um Wellington
00:34:30
airport and he oh be how are you mate and I said not very good actually I'm flying down my brother's been killed so
00:34:37
those sorts of things just terrible yeah >> you know I heard you tell a story about
00:34:42
your brother Lenny the one that died of cancer at 46 I it's a line that stuck with me um you spoke to him like a
00:34:48
couple of weeks before he died and you said are you scared of dying and he's what do you remember the line cuz Lenny
00:34:54
I came from a farming background and Lenny was your typical role pull your own, you know, [ __ ] out the corner of
00:35:00
your mouth and uh he had terminal uh lung cancer. And I used to say to give your lungs a rest for God's sake. A MAD
00:35:08
HAD A GOOD LIFE, you know, 46 and take another pub. And then um I said to him as he was driving me to the airport to
00:35:17
uh I take him on a pub, crawled around south and said to my mother, "You won't see us for a few days because I'm taking
00:35:22
Lenny out because he was so sick." but he was uh well enough to go into the bar and have a beer. And um he was driving
00:35:30
me to the airport and I said, "You know, Lenny, at your age, it must be terrible
00:35:33
to be meeting the Grim Reaper." And Lenny turned to me as quick as a flash and he said, "You know, Beth,
00:35:39
>> being dead, I reckon it can be no worse than it was before you were alive." I thought, "It makes sense, a religious,
00:35:47
you know, you can't say that to a man of the cloth." But I thought and Peter Sinclair and a lot of you viewers would
00:35:53
remember uh Peter and Peter was quite a good mate of mine and I he was right he was himself writing a column about his
00:36:01
cancer in the Herald. So um I got in touch with old um Peter and said mate mate I got a great line for you and this
00:36:09
is my brother who's dying of cancer like you and I gave it to him and he laughed
00:36:13
like a drain and of course incorporated it into one of his columns. >> Yeah it's it's a great line. and that
00:36:18
stuck with me. >> So, so after the um after dipping your toes into the police waters, um you go
00:36:24
back to Southland and you work at the Southland Times. >> What what were the Can you remember any
00:36:29
memorable stories from Southlands? I mean, >> you know, I worked um the the uh editor
00:36:36
was a chap called Grimaldi who spent most of his time at the golf course. Uh there was Norman Pierce who was a racing
00:36:42
editor and I fancied one of his daughters and took her out a few times. Um I lived in a boarding house which was
00:36:49
terrible. Uh in one corner was a guy who stank of alcohol was obviously an alcoholic four in a room and that's how
00:36:56
you lived in those days. Another was a paraplegic and it was me this 17-year-old kid and uh in the end I
00:37:04
thought look it all became too much. So I um went back to mom's cooking and gore
00:37:09
got a job for the gore insign was matara in sign in those days and um that's where I started and then my um my
00:37:18
girlfriend at the time had gone off to university and um this is how your life makes changes which is quite incredible
00:37:27
really and um I went up to a university ball in Deneden. to Morris Miner which was always breaking down but it made it
00:37:33
to Deneden and we're at this um university ball and I got quite sick because I was an asthmatic and ended up
00:37:41
in hospital and um lying next door to this old geyser and I said to him after we'd got a bit better he had a heart
00:37:49
issue and I said I said so what do you do for a living he said I'm the editor of the target Daily Times mate I want a
00:37:55
job >> networking networking so then I got a job there and then one of the subeditor
00:38:02
worked there for a few years and one of the subeditors was a man called John Thompson and he went off to work for
00:38:09
Truth which uh in those days sold 230,000 a week. So it was a big magazine and it
00:38:16
was you know was a um salacious magazine. It >> was a tabloid. Yeah. They had like a a
00:38:20
topless um a topless lady on >> No, that was Sunday news. >> Oh, Sunday news. >> Yeah. No, no, Truth. Truth. We had a
00:38:26
full-time lawyer on our staff, a guy called Dunn. He was a lawyer. So, all our copy was always run past him. So, I
00:38:33
was offered this uh job on truth as the sole office representative in Hamilton. Uh an office on Victoria Street above a
00:38:41
billyard parlor. Um the offer of a company car, a Morris 1100. Um I was made. So, I was breaking stories about
00:38:51
what a sin city of the North Hamilton was. And then the travel bug got me. I saved enough money and um the woman who
00:38:58
had followed up to the university that night, she was my school uh school girl sweetheart. Uh we took off for a number
00:39:04
of years in Europe. So um had a nice time then came back and >> that's when you got into parliament.
00:39:10
>> No, no, I came back I came back and I was offered a job on the Herald um because I'd done a bit of work overseas.
00:39:18
So I was offered a job there and the Wicked Times and I took the Wet Times because I'd been in truth in Hamilton. I
00:39:24
had a lot of good mates there. So, I went to Hamilton and then I was offered a job, funnily enough, by Sean
00:39:30
Plunkett's father, Pat. Uh, first of all, I went to the Wool Board. Uh, that's where I got down to Wellington
00:39:35
and wrote speeches for the um the chairman of the Wboard Board, John Clark. And then, uh, Pat Plunkett
00:39:42
offered me a job in TV was then TV 2. Um, so they had, you know, state televisions one and two. And I went and
00:39:50
worked uh with Pat who was um you know a fairly boisterous boss but you certainly
00:39:57
learned your traps with Pat and later on I went and employed Sha and gave him his
00:40:02
first break in Parliament. So as father and son but um and then went to television and then radio which was the
00:40:10
result of all this. >> Yes. So when you first went to parliament was that as a radio
00:40:15
journalist? >> It was it was as political editor. I was offered a job when I was doing the
00:40:20
industrial round for TBN Zed >> and um so therefore I had a lot to do with parliament and a lot to do with Jim
00:40:26
Bulier who was a labor minister under the Maldoon government and um you know used to go up to his office and have a
00:40:32
drink and I was a young TV journalist and then was offered this job in uh radio and never thought I'd be there
00:40:41
almost 50 years later. >> And in terms of equipment, what did you have? Did you have like a a massive
00:40:45
realtore or was it was it a tape recorder? Was this pre-tape record? >> Well, we had cart machines. We had a
00:40:50
Yeah. Realtore tapes >> and uh it was an intimidating looking switchboard. Um and the you know the the
00:40:58
thing a lot of people have said to me, you know, what's the biggest thing that you've noticed about in journalism and
00:41:04
how it's changed over the years and there technology and it's magnificent the technology. I love it. Embraced it.
00:41:11
Sometimes I'm I'm a bit of a lite, but you know, just the technology that we now use. I remember standing on the west
00:41:18
lawn of the White House with a brick phone and being interviewed in New Zealand thinking, my god, no cords,
00:41:27
nothing. I'm on the west west lawn of the White House talking to New Zealand. I thought it was phenomenal just that
00:41:34
just doing that. Uh and that's how how unsophisticated we were in the old days when you traveled with a prime minister.
00:41:42
You would file probably once a day and that was late at night after all the day stuff had happened. And um say that was
00:41:49
happened with um both Moldun and Longi, you know. So technology is great. >> It's it's incredible. Yeah. On on your
00:41:56
on your iPhone now or your Samsung Galaxy, you've got like a notepad, um like a a voice recorder which is
00:42:02
phenomenal quality. anything you know you can um it's just you know that that is the biggest change and I you know
00:42:09
when and the media have embraced it greatly I mean I used to go book into hotel rooms and if they didn't have a
00:42:15
screw mouth piece on the phone I would want to change my room per phones you couldn't do it you had to take the phone
00:42:21
apart put crocodile clips into it uh to feed the audio like we called it a mutter box and so all that paraphernalia
00:42:29
you had to carry with you and you know it's just terrible today on the computer audio file on the computer and away you
00:42:37
go. It's fantastic. >> When you started in parliament, is that when the Barry Soaper bow tie era begun
00:42:42
or when did the bow tie >> after that? And what was it? Was it Heather that stopped that? I'm trying to
00:42:48
Heather stopped. >> I'm trying to There's some paral with you and you and Hosking. Like you see
00:42:53
old clips of Hosking and he was a young man that dressed old. Now he's an older man that dress wears his ripped Versace
00:42:59
jeans and stuff. >> That's right. >> You're sort of young down as you get up. When I see you going for your walks,
00:43:03
you've often got like a like a a t-shirt on tucked in the front. You're looking very sharp.
00:43:07
>> Yeah. Well, um you know, the thing is um with like the bow ties I cuz I've always
00:43:14
liked fashion. I've always loved fashion actually and um and ties in Wellington just annoyed me cuz I flop around and if
00:43:23
you went out for a meal, you'd get them stained and stuff. And I thought, bug, I'll try a bow tie. Well, you know, it
00:43:30
became such a thing that was related to me and I've still got a box of bow ties at home and uh you know, so you change
00:43:37
your bow ties and and I they were just really convenient so you didn't have to worry too much about you know getting
00:43:44
them dirty and what have you. Uh and it sort of stuck and then you know I became
00:43:48
known as Bow Tie Barry and they had you know bow tie Barry from the Beehive show
00:43:54
once. I mean it was ridiculous. So, uh, yeah. Um, nobody wears ties these days. I remember me old mate Bob Jones saying,
00:44:02
and it's funny, if you look at anybody on television now, it's sort of out in the field and stuff that they don't have
00:44:07
a tie on. And Bob Bob was a stickler for ties and said um, said, you know, it's the ONLY WAY A MAN HAS TO DRESS HIMSELF
00:44:17
UP a bit, wear a colorful tie. And to an extent, he was right. So when uh I I was
00:44:23
privileged to speak at Bob's uh wake when he um passed away last year and Bob and I were great mates for more than 40
00:44:31
years. So, I wore this outlandish blue suit with a garish tie on and um and talked about Bob briefly because he
00:44:41
wouldn't have liked a long speech and his son Richard had come back from Portugal uh to talk and unbelievably
00:44:49
he was uh reading his notes from a cell phone. Now, Bob had been there, he would
00:44:55
have grabbed the cell phone and put it in a water jug. He hated them. Never used one in his life. Uh, and my old
00:45:02
cobbard Tom Scott is now writing a book on U Bob Jones and he's yet to interview
00:45:08
me. He wants to interview me, but it's bit like you, Don, making the time. >> Yeah.
00:45:13
>> Yes. >> Oh, that's some good memories. I I was going backwards and forwards with um Sir
00:45:18
Bob Jones actually before he died about doing a podcast and then he um Yeah. was
00:45:22
um it was leazed by Dame Julie Christie. >> Um but unfortunately he fell ill quite
00:45:26
suddenly and then it uh it just never happened which is unfortunate. progressively worse. You're
00:45:30
>> quite It be would have been nice to capture some of those stories cuz he's one of those New Zealand characters.
00:45:34
We'll never see another one. >> This I remember Bob saying to me, um, he goes, "Mate, MATE, WHEN YOU TURN 70,
00:45:40
BUGGER IT. SAY WHAT YOU BLOODY LIKE. YOU GOT to have an opinion. Just say it." And Bob was a good proponent of that.
00:45:48
So, you know, Bob would say what came into his head. Normally, it was quite intelligent, but you know, he was a,
00:45:54
like you said, one of New Zealand's characters. >> Yeah. Did didn't he buy buy his own
00:45:58
private plan after he had a falling out with someone at New Zealand counter? He had a pub in K's Bay. Um and he you know
00:46:06
he used to say, "OH, COME ON BEARS. WE'LL GO DOWN TO K'S BAY for a night." You know, he had his um because they he
00:46:14
they wouldn't be silent when Bob wanted to be silent and all this. He said THIS BLOODY RIGAROLE THEY GO THROUGH, you
00:46:20
know, telling you how to do it, your seat belt and stuff. He said, "FOR GOD'S SAKE, AS LONG AS I HAVEN'T BEEN ON A
00:46:26
PLANE," and I said, "Yeah, but Bob, other people haven't. They may need to be reminded." Bob bugger them. So, he
00:46:31
went off and bought his his own plane. >> Incredible. >> Yeah, >> I've got a card here called 12 Prime
00:46:36
Ministers. I thought we could just run through and get some thoughts on each of them. I feel like you you've sort of
00:46:40
touched upon Robert Mun like we we did at the beginning. Um, but that was your first sort of introduction to
00:46:44
Parliament. Um, did you [ __ ] yourself first few sort of encounters with him like being being a young journalist in
00:46:50
Parliament? Well, I I first encountered Moldin outside of Parliament and I was working on the Wic Times and I was given
00:46:58
the assignment because Barry Coleman who went on to great things in the media, Barry and I worked together and we were
00:47:04
always terribly competitive which with each other and I'm sure Barry won't mind me saying that and but I got this uh
00:47:11
interview to go out and talk to Moldun in the Glen View pub and uh I was so nervous and turned up with these written
00:47:20
list of questions which with Moldune you can't do. So I he could see me looking down at the question. I ask him a
00:47:27
question. No no no no that won't do no load of rubbish. So I looked down THE NEXT NO THROW THOSE BLOODY questions
00:47:34
away. So I did this interview and then ran the story and said and in the story I said these were the questions that I
00:47:41
wanted to ask the prime minister but he made me throw them away. So I told the story outside the story of simply
00:47:48
interviewing Mulun. He probably remembered me when I got into parliament as that smartass young reporter from
00:47:55
Hamilton. >> From from the stories you told earlier, like about him calling you up, Mr.
00:48:00
Ciper, would you consider him a friend by the end? >> Yeah. Yeah. He um he's bit of a
00:48:05
confidant really. He um would tell me a lot that I'm sure that because he didn't
00:48:11
have Colin McGloin was a very close friend of his the transport minister and was never a great minister but Moldun
00:48:19
always supported him because he wasn't a senior military man in the past I guess
00:48:24
uh and um Keith Allen the ministry of silly walks the guy who got pissed at parliament walked home and then blamed
00:48:31
someone for trying to rob him which was rubbish and that's mold um was going to throw me out of the gallery for asking
00:48:38
questions about it, sent me to the speaker. Um, and um, but then David Long, who was a totally different kettle
00:48:46
of fish and even the secretary of the cabinet, I remember him giving me a ride home from Parliament one night and he's
00:48:52
the secretary for Moldin's cabinet and for Long. He said it's like a breath of fresh air that Moldin was a very tough
00:48:59
man to work with. Um, and Longi was quite the opposite. But Longi's biggest problem was he wasn't a very good
00:49:07
manager of people and and that showed that his cabinet was in total array um after the second election in 1986.
00:49:17
>> He he that's probably my first um memory of politics in New Zealand 84 with long
00:49:22
there was there was a song at the time. Do you remember Hey Mr. Longy, it's been
00:49:25
a long long time since we've had a big man in power. It'll be our finest hour. Don't let us down.
00:49:29
>> It was a take off of old Norman and Kirk Big Norm. Yeah, it was even a song and I
00:49:33
remember at the time being like 11 and it just feeling like quite a transformational moment for New Zealand.
00:49:39
What was he like? He was a great orator, wasn't he? >> He brilliant or um and he had a very
00:49:45
quick witted sense of humor >> and cuz I remember once and there's a line that I say and it's one of those
00:49:52
ones that probably sums up Longie pretty well. He was on his way into caucus and
00:49:57
the media always stopped them on the way into caucus to ask them questions and um
00:50:01
one young journalist made the mistake of calling out to Longie, Mr. Longie, Mr. Longie. Uh a word, a word, Mr. Longi.
00:50:09
And Longie looks around as quick as a flash and goes wombat and walks into caucus. And that is that is long to a
00:50:17
tea that he you know and you yeah because he couldn't be bothered talking to anybody then. But you know the one
00:50:23
thing he would never really get flumxed or tied up uh wordwise when he was talking to the media. He was always very
00:50:31
astute. Although when you got back to your editing bench he would say a lot but really say nothing.
00:50:37
>> And he was he was a bit of a showman prime minister but you know I went on a very long trip. His first big trip uh
00:50:44
through the black African frontline states. Um and it was long a long trip. And then he made a dog leg at the end of
00:50:52
it to go up and see his mate in New Delhi Rajiv Gandhi. So after Africa we went to India and um I won't tell you
00:51:00
the stories because they're all in the book but you know they were fascinating the stuff that Longi would get up to and
00:51:07
uh there was just one story I'll tell you. You may have even known you may have even known the person. It was a guy
00:51:12
who used to work for me called Fraser Folster. And he was he had a law degree from um from Oakland. Very bright guy.
00:51:20
And Longie always liked him. He was uh of Smon um extraction, but he was brought up by Palangi parents um in
00:51:30
Oakland. And he got cancer unfortunately. And um Longie went to see him one Sunday afternoon and said to him
00:51:39
as he was partying he said oh and by the way Fraser I'm resigning tomorrow and um
00:51:46
Fraser goes oh okay see you master off he went. Well, the next day the murmuring started at Parliament on the
00:51:53
Monday morning and after stories were being run that something was happening. Uh Fraser said, "Oh my god, he is
00:52:01
resigning." And of course he resigned. And I remember walking past our office, you know, um happy as Larry had resigned
00:52:09
until Naomi got on the phone to me old mate Fred Tallet, uh who was a journalist on the Sunday Times. And the
00:52:18
phone goes probably a week or so after and um he picks up the phone and it goes, "Oh, it's Naomi Long here." And
00:52:27
Fus, what? He said, she said, "You know, the real reason why uh David got out of
00:52:32
here is having an affair." >> AND OF COURSE, WE all knew it. We all knew it. >> With Margaret Pope, his speech was
00:52:38
>> Margaret Pope. Absolutely. So, you know, um, uh, Fred had got the scoop of his
00:52:44
life by, uh, a disgruntled woman, not unlike a disgruntled woman with Chris Hipkins, but not quite the same.
00:52:53
>> Social media, a woman scorned, you know, just beware. >> Didn't you meet um, Yoko Ono with David
00:53:00
>> Longi? Yeah, that um, >> it's an unlikely trio. >> Well, yeah. Well, Longi Longi was never
00:53:05
invited to the White House, which was unusual. Uh New Zealand prime minister normally goes to the White House
00:53:10
although justinda Adun was never invited either but Longi went to the states quite a lot and when we got to Los
00:53:17
Angeles would always lose him. So where the hell's long gone? You'd lose him for
00:53:21
a day and it subsequently became apparent that he was going to Disneyland. So he loved he's a big kid
00:53:28
>> with who? >> On his own star. >> Oh yeah. >> And um he was only 41. >> Yeah. >> And so he goes Disneyland have a great
00:53:35
time. But um then y because of the anti-uclear stance that New Zealand had taken um they decided uh Yoko decided
00:53:44
that she would like to meet David Longi. So um the meeting was arranged and it was arranged at the Dakota um on the
00:53:53
edge of uh Central Park in New York. Now the Dakota was the that was where John Lennin her husband was shot and Longi
00:54:01
went up and had a cup of tea with Yoko and there's a Strawberry Fields that's where the song emanated from in um
00:54:08
Central Park. So um they came down after the their meeting and they were obviously getting on very well and Longi
00:54:16
knew that I was a bit of a Beatles fan AND Y BASH COME OVER HERE. SO I went over and there's a photo in the book of
00:54:24
David Long and Yoko standing in the middle and me laughing, you know, laughing like a drain thinking that all
00:54:31
the Beatles fanatics would say, "DON'T EMBRACE THAT WOMAN, YOKO." Oh no. But anyway, and then we went for a walk
00:54:38
through Strawberry Park and um you know, that was one of those nice moments that
00:54:43
um and Longie himself sent me a framed uh signed photo of him, Yoko, and I. So that's a sort of guy long he was
00:54:53
although a difficult character but that's the sort of person he was. >> That's a great story. So that would have
00:54:58
been um like fairly recently after John's death in 1980 like four five six years afterwards
00:55:03
>> it would be um yeah it would have been incredible. >> And it was we would where we had the
00:55:08
photo taken was right at the spot that Lennon was shot. So you know terrible. >> Also have you seen the Peter Jackson
00:55:15
Beatles documentary? Um, Yoko didn't break the band up like >> Oh, yeah. The band was still getting.
00:55:21
It's worth watching. But if you're a Beatles guy, you >> I think I think if you go and talk to
00:55:25
Tom Scott, who was a great John Lennon fan, who's a very good friend of mine, he would dispute that.
00:55:32
>> Oh, no. It's well, it's very very long, but I I it could have even been longer
00:55:36
as far as I'm concerned. Three part um Peter Jackson thing that he made. I think it's on Disney. Um but it's them
00:55:41
recording their last album which where where they were all at each other's throats. the um the interplay between
00:55:47
John and Paul then and Yoko just being being there sitting on a chair next to him.
00:55:52
>> I didn't sense any animosity between the Beatles and and the other Beatles and
00:55:56
her. >> Um >> it's worth watching. Check it out. >> Well, I will now. I'll suffer it.
00:56:00
>> I Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I haven't heard an interview that Howard Stern did with um
00:56:03
Paul McCartney and he said, "Oh, over the years I've sort of built up this narrative that other people have created
00:56:07
and he said seeing Peter Jackson's old footage again reminded me of just how much John and him loved each other."
00:56:12
>> Oh, good. Yeah, >> that's good. >> Um, the next prime minister was Jeffrey Palmer.
00:56:17
>> Yeah. Well, you know, um, it's hard to write about a person that's been in the
00:56:21
business a relatively short time. Certainly as prime minister. >> Um, lovely man. Um, Jeffrey Palmer would
00:56:29
walk down a Wellington Street, nobody would notice him, you know, they go, "Who's that gray old guy?" Um, had a
00:56:36
formidable brain, you know, but he was a law law professor. And I guess um when a
00:56:41
law professor is unleashed on politics, it's not a good mixture because everything is so academic. And with
00:56:48
Jeffrey, it was and I traveled with him when he was prime minister. Um and there's a couple of stories in the book
00:56:54
about that. But um not a momentous time. Uh Jeffrey Palmer, I always remember the
00:56:59
first manifesto he wrote. I think it was about 360 pages. I think the only, as I
00:57:05
said at the time, the only person who would spend time reading this would be Bill Bur from the National Party and
00:57:10
that would be about it. Nobody else would understand it. But >> I I get the feeling I mean, I could be
00:57:15
completely wrong and correct me if I, but I feel like you're more attracted to like difficult or flawed people.
00:57:21
>> Oh, totally. Yeah. I mean, well, I'm, you know, people are interesting. And I
00:57:26
find all sorts of people interesting, but I like the flamboyant, unusual. Um, although Helen Clark, you couldn't say,
00:57:36
was either flamboyant or that unusual. I mean, she was a a bit of an academic herself, but was a brilliant leader. She
00:57:43
knew how to lead people. And um, you know, to be the prime minister, it's a hell of a job. And, uh, you know, it's
00:57:50
life in a goldfish pole, and you've got people like me fishing over the bowl all
00:57:54
the time. So, it's not an easy uh path to take to become the prime minister, but you know, she handled it very well.
00:58:03
Uh Jeffrey Palmer um she was don't forget Helen K was the deputy prime minister under Jeffrey Palmer. So, you
00:58:10
know, she was on her way up then. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. She's very unique. One thing I
00:58:17
liked about her is she she was always unapologetically herself and that like she she had no interest in the All
00:58:22
Blacks. like she liked a bit of rugby league and to be a New Zealand prime minister and not even fake interest in
00:58:27
the All Blacks like our national team, our national sport, I think that's quite courageous.
00:58:31
>> It's the way Helen is, you know, she's um she was uh I mean she groomed herself, I think, to become prime
00:58:40
minister and one thing she despised about parliament was the smoke filled rooms.
00:58:45
>> But to do what she did, she had to have meetings in them. and Mike Moore was forever hanging off the end of a [ __ ] So
00:58:54
um so you know Helen had to persevere with that. Um but on becoming prime minister of course cigarette smoking was
00:59:02
outlawed in parliament. Um you know they used to smoke in the debating chamber and I mean it was unbelievable those
00:59:10
days. I mean they at midnight because Parliament would sit all night on a number of occasions, there would be a
00:59:16
food trolley come around for the um gallery up the up the um top and it was laden with toast and I remember a few of
00:59:24
my piss mates once started wheeling toast into the gallery below to the politicians. Not very good behavior.
00:59:33
>> Okay. So, um yeah, after Jeffrey Palmer, it was Mike Moore. Um, and you were sort
00:59:38
of like a a marriage counselor for him and his wife. >> I don't know whether Ivonne would um
00:59:45
Ivonne's still around and uh she's she was an extraordinarily nice woman. It was just it was look it was one of those
00:59:52
things that Mike lost his rag on a trip and um thought that his wife had been spending too much time on a drive from
01:00:02
Hungary to Venice uh after having a morning of schnaps uh in Hungary and singing. We were singing old songs and
01:00:11
what have you and Tom and Ivonne were sitting together and Tom you know straight shooter and up and down but um
01:00:18
to um Mike obviously got annoyed at that and to cut a long story short he blew a
01:00:23
stack and this was in front of business people and um uh he wasn't prime minister then he was overseas trade
01:00:30
minister but it was just after the Berlin wall came down so he wanted to go to um the Eastern European countries
01:00:38
behind the iron curtain So, we did that trip with him. Um, and he was, cut the long story short, he was meant to be uh
01:00:46
after the final night of the trip going on to London. And Ivonne confided in me that she couldn't be bothered going to
01:00:54
London with this man. She's coming back with us. And I said to Yvon, if you do that, Ivonne, um, what happened on the
01:01:00
bus? It'll be blown up out of all proportion >> and it'll become a story. So I was
01:01:06
interested when I was outside our hotel watching people load onto the bus. Yvonne wasn't one of them. She had
01:01:13
obviously went to London with Mike and they were a great couple. I mean they in general terms they got on but Mike was
01:01:20
obviously quite possessive. >> It was a generous act of you. Um >> well because um
01:01:26
>> you could have put the story first. Well, those sorts of stories. kind of, you
01:01:30
know, I've covered them, but you know, they're nothing more than salacious and uh title and I mean, you know, I I mean,
01:01:40
I've been the subject of those many times. And I remember once having a go at the editor of Rachel Glucina, the
01:01:47
crap that you used to run totally inaccurate about me and uh what was going on in my life used to get up my
01:01:55
nose every Sunday and I threatened to sue and that stopped it. What what sort of things? I I I couldn't find really
01:02:02
any scandal about you online. There was a DIC charge like 20 years ago or something. And
01:02:06
>> yeah, that was bad. I was I was 414. I was 14 over the limit and somebody said, "God, I'll drive better at that
01:02:15
rate." But I think because it was a booze bus and I was funnily enough, Jeffrey Palmer I blame for this. Um
01:02:21
because Jeffrey, you remember, came up with a recipe on how much you're allowed to drink before you got behind the
01:02:27
wheel. I drank exactly that, no more, and then drank water for the last hour. Booze bus was around the corner. Heather
01:02:34
offered to drive me and I said, "No, no, I'm I'll be fine." And um so um pulled up. They said, "Well, sir, you've blown
01:02:43
negative in the back." And I went, "Oh, really?" And so I was shocked and never worried about being pulled up.
01:02:49
>> And um so of course they thought, "Oh, this is got bloody Barry Soaper. Bring
01:02:54
him down a peg or two." I'm not saying the cops are corrupt and cops generally are great. Uh but I was driving my
01:03:00
bloody sype jag and and I wasn't a smart ass. I you know but things happen in your life and I was
01:03:08
totally ashamed of it >> and working in parliament was terrible because they were at the time discussing
01:03:14
something to do with drink driving. I remember and feeling very ashamed about it. But
01:03:19
>> you know one of those things those mistakes you make in life. >> You live and you live and learn.
01:03:23
>> You do. Yeah you do. >> Yeah. What was Glucina writing about you? >> Well, she would write about uh Heather
01:03:28
and my um relationship. Uh and before that, she was writing stuff as well. And um in Templeton that I mentioned
01:03:36
earlier, uh when his 40th year at Parliament came up, I said, "En you came here in 1957." And this was um what 200
01:03:45
oh no, 1997. And I said, "Mate, you've been here 40 years." So I organized a black tie
01:03:52
dinner for him in the in the grand in the big uh beehive banquet hall and it was a wonderful night. Jim Bulier was
01:03:59
the prime minister and nice things were said about Ian and you know it was a lovely night and then um 10 years later
01:04:06
he was there 50 years in 2007. So I said oh my god I you've been here 50 years. So 50th anniversary I did the same and
01:04:15
it was a lovely night as well. Well, on that particular occasion, Rachel Glucina
01:04:20
wrote a story about um uh cheap wine being served up and them running out of it before the evening was through and
01:04:28
Barry Soaper disappearing with a blonde chick. >> And this is what she wrote and it was
01:04:37
absolute and utter boulder dash. um the um at the time I was actually seeing I was before Heather actually Heather
01:04:45
wasn't um part of it then but uh and I was seeing a blonde woman and it was she was sitting at our tables all up front.
01:04:53
So I rang my dear old friend and I love him dearly is Shane Curry and said to me
01:04:59
he was her editor and I said Shane I've got to the end of my tether with this woman it's got to stop uh because some
01:05:05
of the stuff she writes is just made up. And I told him that story and um he then
01:05:11
offered after talking to her he then offered um to write an apology I said don't bother it'll just raise it again.
01:05:19
No, it just moved on. And that's the thing people have to remember about, you know, if they are at the center of a
01:05:26
story in journalism, you know, it's fish and chip paper as they say tomorrow. And
01:05:30
it generally is, people forget. >> Oh, you bloody raised it. So, you know, >> and it can seem like a big thing thing
01:05:37
at the time, but also media is so fragmented now, the chances are like you might be like, "Oh my god, everyone's
01:05:42
reading this, but no one's reading it." >> No one's doing it. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Um, no, thanks for sharing that.
01:05:47
Yeah. Um, yeah. It must be funny when when your job is to report on other people and then suddenly you're being
01:05:52
reported on. >> Yeah. It's gassy. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Um, okay. Back to the prime minister.
01:05:56
Oh, Jim Bulge is the next one. >> Yeah. >> Um, he did he did he tell you to [ __ ]
01:06:01
off once? >> I did. Yeah. And that was um he had a um uh press secretary who was Africans
01:06:07
Theres Anders and spoke Africans as Heather does. Um and um it was great. We went to Nelson Mandela's um inauguration
01:06:17
uh and I had introduced I won't go into it but I had introduced Mandela to Jim Bulier and Harare uh a few years earlier
01:06:26
before he was president and um Jim Bulier had once called him a terrorist but of course
01:06:33
when he went to the inauguration uh he was nothing he's nothing but the president of South Africa and um I got
01:06:40
him to sign photos in the book of Mandela signing for me his inauguration address. Bulgier was a bit reluctant uh
01:06:48
when I said I just want to after you meet him I want to get him pull him aside because I had met him on several
01:06:54
occasions and uh and he was more than happy to do it and I gave it to a charity was canteen charity back here
01:07:00
and it sold for several thousand which was a lot of money and and somebody said to me why would you give it away and I
01:07:08
said well look uh the photo is more important to me the photo of him signing it was more important to me than it's
01:07:15
now in the Reuters Museum I think in New York. So one of the Reuters postc but when did he tell you to [ __ ] off?
01:07:23
>> Oh that was it was over a Christmas thing and >> it was very unprivial. >> Yes. I can't Oh Jim I mean the
01:07:32
parliament flows quite freely but um I can't remember but it was heated this one and it was about uh some interview
01:07:40
that he had uh said that he was going to give me. I think it was probably the end
01:07:44
of the year interview or something and Theres was there and um Jim uh when I when I remmonstrated with him and I said
01:07:52
well hang on you've made an agreement to do this so you know let's do it and he said no [ __ ] off so um I said no you
01:07:59
[ __ ] off you make an agreement you stick to it he didn't stick to the agreement
01:08:03
and I [ __ ] off um just before we move on um Mia Mandela you see you he's one of one of these characters I'm
01:08:14
I'm intrigued by whenever I have um All Blacks on the podcast like Frank Bunts a
01:08:17
couple of weeks ago who was involved in the 95 World Cup. I always ask for their
01:08:21
Mandela stories and most legal blacks don't have much. It's just like a ceremonial sort of handshake. Um but you
01:08:26
you had dinners with him. You had a big you you first met him before he was president after his release from Robin
01:08:33
Island. Yeah. What's he like an aura about him even when you met him before being president?
01:08:37
>> He had an aura with me because you know his him liking me, talking to me, me being a
01:08:45
white man. And I thought this man spent 20, and I put it to him once, spent 27 years incarcerated by the white regime
01:08:54
in South Africa. But being Mandala, because he was a genuinely nice, open person. And being him, he got on, you
01:09:02
remember, with one of his prison guards very well who was white. And um I said to Mandala once I said you know why why
01:09:10
would you come out of prison and be civil to people like me and embrace me and and what have you and he said you
01:09:18
know in life Barry there's no there's no room for holding grudges. He said, "I've
01:09:23
got a mission in life." And this was before he was president. And that was um obviously to become president to South
01:09:29
Africa. But unfortunately for Mandela, I think he became president too late in life. I think it was in his 70s. And um
01:09:38
the the change that he wanted affected has never been uh never occurred in South Africa. And South Africa today
01:09:48
would not be the South Africa that Mandela would have envvisaged. And that's quite sad, I think. But, you
01:09:54
know, I went to his um inauguration, his funeral, his um you know, he had him for
01:10:01
dinner at the 125th anniversary of the press gallery. Um and I I got that by going through the ANC and not through
01:10:09
foreign affairs. And Jim Bulier, there's a story in the book about it which I won't tell you, but Jim Bulier got a bit
01:10:14
pissed off at me not using the normal channels, but we got what we wanted and it was Mandela. Um yeah and you know
01:10:22
there was lovely stories about Desmond Tutu. I went to see him on that Africa trip with Longi. Uh we went south of the
01:10:29
border to interview Bort and we had a 2-hour layover in um Johannesburg and and I thought being a Kiwi I thought oh
01:10:39
I wouldn't mind seeing Mandela to sort of balance the stories. So can you believe this? Look in a telephone book.
01:10:47
Tutu looked at the telephone book uh the right reverend Desmond Tutu Suetto and I
01:10:54
thought oh [ __ ] that's old T. So I ring up and I go um is that Bishop Tutu? And
01:10:59
he said hey it is it's me. And I said, "Well, look, I'm a journalist from New Zealand." And journalists from New
01:11:06
Zealand had very um high empathy with because we all uh reported on the spring tour and stuff and they knew it in South
01:11:14
Africa how opposed most of the country was to it and certainly opposed to a partaid. And I said to I said, "Oh, can
01:11:22
I come out AND SEE YOU?" "YEAH, YOU COME OUT. You come out. I would like to see you." And there was um me and one other
01:11:28
journalist. two stayed behind but we got a cab out to Suetto and spent time with
01:11:33
um Desmond Tutu and then there was a story which I won't recount now but um meeting up with him at Mandela's
01:11:40
inauguration and it was just wonderful. is such a lovely man and you know I mean
01:11:45
here I am married to a South African and I never knew the country until I got together with Heather and we went back
01:11:53
every year for a month in the early part of our marriage for 10 10 years we went
01:11:58
back cuz her Omar was alive and um I learned about South South Africa loved the country magnificent country but with
01:12:08
major issues >> yeah yeah >> that's So cool having that connection with Mandela. Did Did you ever have any
01:12:15
like banter or small talk or >> Oh, totally. Yeah. What what did you joke? What sort of things did you joke
01:12:20
about? >> Sort of thing, you know, about um Oh, you know, I mean, um the for you know,
01:12:27
the fing over Mandela. Mandela found it, I think, quite off-putting at times that, you know, because he had spent so
01:12:35
far in so long incarcerated that to be, you know, deified virtually by the world. Um, I think he was quite amused
01:12:44
by it. Uh, because he did have a mission in life. He wasn't, you know, he may have been deified. But look, old Winnie
01:12:51
Mandela, I talked to her his ex and um you know, if you talk to her, she's she didn't recount him as one of the
01:12:58
greatest husbands. And of course, he wasn't because he was a rabid protester against a partaid and during their
01:13:05
course of their relationship was spent more of his time in a hotel bed, sorry, a prison bed than a um home bed. So, you
01:13:13
know, not an easy man during that period. So, um, the next prime minister in this, um, stack was Jenny Shipley,
01:13:19
who you sort of talked about. It sounds like you had a good relationship with her.
01:13:22
>> Yeah, pretty good relationship. Yeah. Although she was uneasy with the media,
01:13:25
but you know, >> just the way she is. >> She she wasn't elected. She rolled bul.
01:13:32
>> So, she's the first female prime minister. >> Well, she'll always lay claim to being
01:13:36
the first female prime minister in New Zealand. And that's true. But the first elected um female prime minister is of
01:13:42
course Ellen Clark. And I remember when those two were running against each other in the election, and I I'm sure I
01:13:50
said it publicly, it's a pretty bland affair because, you know, they weren't a a longy, they weren't, you know, a mold.
01:13:58
There were these two very serious women running against each other. And it was not a not a um campaign that you would
01:14:08
be excited about, but you know, um Helen Clark was true to what she had always been and was a handsdown winner and it
01:14:17
was to be absolutely expected that um she was going to be the prime minister. Although a lot of people forget that um
01:14:24
Helen in 2005 uh came within a fraction of losing the prime ministership to Don Brash who was
01:14:32
the leader of the National Party and you remember he made a speech at Oi and talked about New Zealand being a one
01:14:40
country the same for all and he shot up in the polls and come polling day Helen was obviously a bit worried in the
01:14:48
leadup to it and at the 11th hour she said, "We'll make student loans interest free."
01:14:56
And I had a student working for me and a man who went on to become a national broadcaster, Corin Dan. I'm sure Corin
01:15:04
won't mind me mention mentioning his name, but Corin said, "Oh, bugger that. She's got my vote." And and of course,
01:15:11
because he had a student debt that he was loaded with interest, so he was paying interest on it. though Helen did
01:15:17
that and the vote swung back to her but only just I can't remember the percentage but it was within within a
01:15:23
few percent that Don Brash came from toppling Helen Clark in 2005 >> from from your book um you seem to quite
01:15:31
like her I I get the feeling um and this might be completely wrong but but you're
01:15:36
sort of right leaning >> me >> well no I you know I'd say probably center I'd like to see myself although
01:15:44
>> oh you're on you're on ZB Oh, yeah. Well, I've been accused of being a bloody right-wing fascist, a
01:15:49
racist, a left-wing, you know, I mean, you get in my business, you get accused of doing everything, but uh my even my
01:15:56
kids don't know how I vote. And and they've always guessed how I vote, but they don't know. And um and I'd never
01:16:04
tell anyone the way I vote. I vote every time assiduously, but I don't tell people the way I vote because I think if
01:16:11
you're in my business, um, you know, commentating on politics like a John Campbell, if you come out and say you're
01:16:18
a lefty, then you're you're categorized as a lefty, but if you I mean, a lot of people call me left or right,
01:16:25
>> but mainly right, I must say, and you're probably right because of ZB. But, um,
01:16:30
no, I have, you know, views like anyone else. Um but with Helen Clark, a lot of people um uh don't realize just how good
01:16:40
that government was and the change that it affected. We all remember David Longi
01:16:46
and Roger Douglas. And I still believe that Roger Douglas, excuse me, will go down in history as one of the best
01:16:53
finance ministers this country has ever had. And it's amazing. He's still going.
01:16:57
He rang me the other day. Barry's Roger here. Yeah. Oh, hi Roger. AND HE SAID, "OH, LOOK, I'VE COME UP WITH AN
01:17:05
ALTERNATIVE BUDGET. I WANT TO WANT YOU TO run your eyes over it." Amazing. He's still writing stuff and he's well into
01:17:11
his 80s, but he's always an enthusiast. Um, so he was remembered for the long era, but um Michael Cullen has largely
01:17:20
forgotten, but as finance minister, don't forget the Cullen Fund, which is now worth $70 billion, and that was his
01:17:28
doing. He decided on that. Um, uh, Kiwi Bank wasn't Cullen's idea. He had to be drag kicking and screaming, uh, into the
01:17:38
bank. Never opened an account at the bank. Uh, it was Jim Anderson from the alliance that started that. Uh, but that
01:17:43
was another achievement. There were many, many achievements, uh, during the Clark era that people tend to forget
01:17:49
because it wasn't exciting politics. It was pretty bland, but it was exactly what uh, what the country needed. And uh
01:17:57
don't forget it was the um Clark government that negotiated the China free trade agreement and old John Key
01:18:04
coming in in 2008. Uh he he was facing the global financial crisis helped though by the China free trade agreement
01:18:13
that I went up to Beijing with Helen and they signed it. Uh it's what two-way trade is now $35 billion a year and
01:18:22
it'll be the same with the um the India free trade agreement. I mean these things for a tiny little trading nation
01:18:29
are very very important. >> Did you ever socialize with Helen or anything? Did you what did you have in
01:18:34
common? >> A lot you know I mean she Helen's a great sort. Great sense of humor. Um you
01:18:42
know a bit of invective flows uh gossipy. Yeah. She's and she's just a regular a
01:18:51
regular woman you know. She's um and you know I tell a story and I won't repeat it here but you know there was a
01:18:57
compassionate side to Clark as well. One story I didn't tell in the book and I thought that it was one of those things
01:19:03
that came to me afterwards that when my mother died who was beloved you know I loved her a lot and very close to her
01:19:11
when she died. Helen was the prime minister before I made it to the airport. She was on the phone. God only
01:19:18
knows how she knew that my mother had died because she died on my sister had a vineyard in Malbra and um I don't know
01:19:26
who told her but I was literally on the way to the airport and um Helen rang and
01:19:33
said look I'm terrible and that's that's a side of Clark that a lot of people don't um don't she wrote the forward to
01:19:39
the book interestingly so did John Ke >> cover your bases there >> well yeah but they they don't know what
01:19:46
I've written about them but they wrote the forward. >> How old was your mom when she passed?
01:19:51
Have you got long duty? >> She was 79. >> 79. Okay. Yeah. >> What about your dad?
01:19:55
>> Uh 59. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Not a long lot of long jubilee. >> My paternal grandfather was 45.
01:20:02
>> Yeah. So I'm an old I'm an old survivor in the family luckily. Touch wood. >> So after Helen came John K. Um again as
01:20:12
you said wrote the forward to your to your book along with Helen. Um, yeah, >> color is a colorful character. I think
01:20:19
the biggest strength that John Key uh had when he was prime minister was being self-deprecating.
01:20:27
You know, he he loved taking the piss out of himself and you remember mincing up uh runways,
01:20:33
>> Rugby World Cup 2011, trying on the jersey >> all and and um you know, he was like
01:20:39
that. And somebody once asked me when I was giving a speech to a dinner and one of John Key's most senior people was was
01:20:46
there and somebody said if John Key was at this dinner uh what would it be like?
01:20:52
Would it be any different? I said it would be exactly the same because John Key and I've sat around many a table
01:20:57
with John Key. He doesn't lord it uh like somebody you would think in that position could. He's just one regular
01:21:05
bloke, you know, did the business, liked the business, always been successful. And I think in this country, we should
01:21:13
um celebrate success much more than we do. I remember one of the first questions that Luxon was asked um when
01:21:21
he became prime minister, you've got seven properties. Isn't that a bit much for a prime minister to have? Well, the
01:21:29
thing is this man was earning several million dollars a year before he got into politics. If he didn't have seven
01:21:35
properties, you would ask the question, >> where's Exactly. Exactly. You know, >> yeah. Um, yeah, I've had some dealings
01:21:43
with K and I I said to people that have been on the podcast that uh that would describe themselves as like hard
01:21:48
lefting. I said, you would struggle not to like John Key if you met him. >> Yeah. Just a regular guy.
01:21:53
>> He's a great guy. Um, after him came Bill English. Yeah, lovely guy. >> You know, although you
01:21:59
>> I said I made one mistake. I'll tell you one story about Bill English that um
01:22:03
when he was rolled as leader, you remember in 2002 he had I think they got 20% of the vote.
01:22:11
>> Terrible result. And uh so he was disgraced really as the leader of the National Party. So the knives were out
01:22:19
and of course he was um finally rolled. But at the time he was rolled in the early 2000s, um I'd done the numbers
01:22:27
around his caucus and I knew I knew that he was going to be rolled on this Tuesday morning at caucus and you know
01:22:35
the problem with leadership and when it comes to rolling people that all his colleagues will say yes we support you
01:22:42
when he's the leader because if they say no we don't support you then you're not
01:22:46
going to get any promotion through the party. So, and these votes are secret votes, always secret ballots, so they're
01:22:52
wiped. So, nobody actually except for the scrutiners knows the numbers. And um so, Bill English u when I was talking to
01:23:00
Paul Holmes on air about him on that Tuesday morning, um Paul just concluded the interview with a light-hearted
01:23:08
remark. So, bears, is he a dead man walking? And I said, more like a twitching corpse, homesy. Well, within 5
01:23:17
minutes the phone was ringing. It was Bill. Well, you've never heard an effective flow like I had from Bill. And
01:23:24
I said, "Bill, you'll be gone by lunchtime. Believe me." And he was. >> When you make a comment like that
01:23:30
publicly and then the phone rings and it's him, are you anxious about answering?
01:23:34
>> No. Cuz if you know you're right, if you know you're right, and there's a story
01:23:38
about Margaret Pope in the book, and if you know you're right, you know, what you say, and being being honest is the
01:23:46
best defense in anything. And the lawyers went through my book and they pointed to a number of things. And I
01:23:53
said, "Hang on, you know, the basic tenant, and I've been a journalist so long, never been sued in my life because
01:24:01
I know what you can say. I know what the defamation laws are. And I said to the lawyers that scrutinize the book, the
01:24:09
points that they raise, I said, "It's true. >> It's come from my mouth. It's true what
01:24:14
I've said." So if you know you're speaking the truth, you can't be sued. >> Yeah.
01:24:20
>> The next prime minister on the list, Dame Justindra Adern. Um, were you unnecessarily mean or pity to
01:24:27
her in your book? >> Yeah. Well, look, do do you do you have any remorse about I have no remorse at
01:24:33
all, but you know, there are look, I understand there there are a lot of people out there and I'm going to the
01:24:39
Oakland Writers Festival and you know there will be a lot of uh Ardun loveies and because literary people love Ardun
01:24:48
think she's fantastic and she's a you know she's a nice person there's no doubt about that but as a prime minister
01:24:55
hopeless >> why >> and why she was more of a poser than a prime minister. And you only had to
01:25:02
look, somebody sent me a nasty text about me not being kind to Justinda Adun. And these people tend to forget
01:25:08
that I worked with her daily. So I knew her and traveled with her. So I got to know her very very well. And this person
01:25:15
sent me a text and um it had uh when I said basically she did nothing to speak of in her first nine years in
01:25:22
parliament. And this person uh sent me this photograph of Justinda Adurn on the front page Vogue in the year before she
01:25:30
became prime minister. Magnificent looking. She looked like a model as if to say, "Well, that's justind." Do you
01:25:38
know what that person who criticized me was absolutely right because that was Justind Dardun. And if you only you only
01:25:44
have to watch the movie that's now online for an Emmy to understand Justinda Adun was an actor in the role
01:25:51
but never a real participant. She never understood politics. She never understood power even though she says
01:25:59
new kind of power. Most certainly was because there was no power. And and to this word kindness comes up time and
01:26:06
time again. I won't go into it now. I go into it in the book. You only have to remember, particularly in Oakuckland,
01:26:13
the way people suffered in the city. Um I was sent a photo after the book came out, sent a photo of um it was a
01:26:22
broadcaster. He said, um this was my mother on her deathbed. He he shot the photo out on uh in a garden at a
01:26:34
hospital outside and all you could see was a window. the person inside that window in a looked like a astronaut suit
01:26:43
and his brother and his sister-in-law standing outside with her hands pressed to the window looking in.
01:26:50
>> That was the mother's deathbed. And um he took the photo and he said that was
01:26:56
the hardest time that we've ever had in our lives. Now if you're not moved by a story like that and if you don't believe
01:27:04
that the person who inflicted that on the country is not kind please you know have a reflection on
01:27:13
that and it's not just that it's what um and she will say I save of tens of thousands of lives nobody can prove that
01:27:22
nobody knows that um you know the the death thing the uh going to the birth of a child thing the uh she once said uh
01:27:31
gave us permission to have a barbecue with our neighbors and uh I said to her she said but don't go inside you can
01:27:39
it's mixed with your neighbors and I said and I said to her at a press conference what about if you need to go
01:27:45
for a pee prime minister what do you do then she went she hadn't thought of it please you know don't go inside
01:27:55
um but that's look that's superficial about but I'm sorry to me she was a superficial prime minister there was no
01:28:04
there was not the depth I knew her very well to the point and somebody say how disgusting you are there was a photo
01:28:11
that was run in the Herald of me touching our Durn's pregnant stomach and that was early on when she was prime
01:28:18
minister was after a dinner at Annette King's place and I actually like the idea of a young liberal female prime
01:28:27
minister I liked it. I thought, great. So, I embraced her at the beginning cuz I thought this is good. Even though Bill
01:28:33
English won that election hands down, he got 7% more of the vote than what Labour
01:28:39
did, but Winston decided otherwise and decided to um put Justinda in that role. So, she was appointed prime minister.
01:28:48
Trevor Meard's come out recently, not a particularly pleasant person, but has said they never expected to lead, so
01:28:54
they had no idea. And I think that sums up that first uh incarnation of the Labor government. Even worse though was
01:29:03
when they had unbridled power in the last 3 years. Look what happened then. >> The country was driven to bankruptcy.
01:29:11
>> Yeah. And anyone that's annoyed by your thoughts, they they need to remember it's just an opinion. So for some for
01:29:16
some people, she'll be our greatest prime minister ever, and that's that's fine, too. I've got my daughters who
01:29:21
I've got two daughters living in um Australia and they say oh can you send us your book can you so I sent it and
01:29:28
both both of them go we don't like what you said about Junda and I said to them my and I love them and I said look we
01:29:37
live in a democracy you're totally entitled to your view I've got one outspoken daughter here Alice who's um
01:29:45
>> she writes for the spin-off which is quite a woke publication She is a lefty.
01:29:50
Yeah. And um Alice once she rang me and she was apologizing for a column that she was she writes for the Herald was
01:29:58
about to write in the Herald and she said look people always think that I you know everything you say dad that I'll
01:30:03
agree with. And I go and she said I'm I've just thought I'd warn you about this column I'm going to run. I said
01:30:09
Alice you don't have to warn me. We live in a democracy. You're totally entitled
01:30:14
to your view. It might be different from mine but welcome to it. M >> you need a thick skin, eh?
01:30:20
>> Totally. Totally. And you know, I'm criticized uphill and down. Good luck. You know,
01:30:26
>> um the next prime minister on this list, um Chris Hipkins, what was the story
01:30:30
with with you and Chippy and Cocaine, >> you got to smash a bag together. I had this um amazing farewell from
01:30:41
Parliament and it was a black tie dinner in the um Grand Hall and it was they put
01:30:47
it on for me. Well, my company put it on for me, which I thought was very generous of them and um so we had, you
01:30:55
know, former prime ministers there and it was just one of those very special nights and um Jerry Brownley was one of
01:31:02
the early speakers and took the merciless piss out of me which everybody thought was so funny, so good. And then
01:31:10
the last speaker of the night, uh, I was the last, I think. I think I had the final say, but I was sitting next to
01:31:16
Chris Hipkins because he was the prime minister. And, um, Kevin Milm from Fair Go fame is been a friend of mine for 50
01:31:26
plus years. >> The carpet core guy. >> Yeah. Yeah. Carpet mill. >> Carpet mill. >> Synthetic carpet. No less. But, um,
01:31:34
Kevin's a great mate of mine and we have been since we were young men. And um so
01:31:39
Kevin was giving um a mate speech um and Kerry Wooden was the um the MC for the evening and they done up a number of big
01:31:50
framed photos of me and over my career and Kerry was like the auctioneers's [ __ ] sort of walking around as Kevin
01:31:57
was talking about these photos and the last photo that was displayed to this room of law makers was me with this very
01:32:06
bloated face. And um Kevin goes, "Uh, you may wonder why we're showing this photo around this
01:32:15
audience tonight, but some of you will know BEZ WAS BROUGHT UP in gore and it snowed a lot in gore. But old Baz
01:32:24
decided rather than sweeping the snow away, he would sniff it." And this is what happened. And of course, everybody
01:32:31
burst out laughing. And Chippy said to me, the prime minister said to me, "What's it like?" I said, "For [ __ ]
01:32:38
sake, look at it. That's what it's like." So for those of you who think about drugs, don't do them.
01:32:45
>> Also, if Barry's cardiologist is listening to this, he's never done it. Never plans on doing it. Um,
01:32:52
>> yeah. Oh, that's quite a What you did? You have you had much to do with Chippy?
01:32:55
You like Chippy? Well, he Chippy was, you know, again, a bit of an accidental prime minister because Grant Robertson
01:33:02
was asked to do the job and Grant his health wasn't great and decided not to do it. Uh, so Chippy stepped up to the
01:33:10
plate. Um, he I think spent most of his time trying to divorce or remove himself
01:33:17
from the draconian policies that the Arun government had run and said, "Ah, it's not me. It's not me.
01:33:24
And yet he was right at the center of it. Co minister, health minister, police minister, you know, he was right in the
01:33:32
center of it. So he he may be think he can divorce himself from it, but he can't. Nevertheless, you look at the
01:33:38
opinion polls now, he's doing in opposition quite well, but I still don't believe that they'll take the Treasury
01:33:46
benches because they got too much flatsom and jets further down the line in the Green Party and the Maui party,
01:33:53
>> but he's a thoroughly nice person. Always have a yarn to him. He knows I don't think much of his politics, but
01:34:01
you know, that's as we said earlier, that's democracy. >> Yeah. Y >> which brings us to the current day prime
01:34:07
minister Christopher Luxon. Why don't why don't people like him? Why isn't he resonating with
01:34:12
>> Kiwis? It's pretty simple really Tom that you know he he took a for a start he was a rookie prime minister a rookie
01:34:20
politician in the job basically he'd been in parliament what three years first term end of the first term was
01:34:27
prime minister. So, you know, by any chalk of the imagination, uh that is a hard role then to do with uh any greater
01:34:36
plum as soon as you take over. But, um Andy had a dreadful situation uh where $60 billion had been borrowed through co
01:34:46
and now we're spending $10 billion a year in interest alone on the loans that were raised. So the economy was an
01:34:54
absolute basket case and New Zealand's always done pretty well economically, but that was a basket case that he
01:35:00
inherited and he moaned on and on and on and on and promised too much I think at
01:35:05
the start thinking he could turn it around, but you can't. Not in that time. And he's had the um the double whammy of
01:35:13
the madman in the White House, Donald Trump. Uh first of all the tariffs flip them on and then um then he invades
01:35:22
Iran, oil goes through the roof. So you know it was a hell of a row to hoe and he's still hoing that row and will be
01:35:30
doing so for some time. But I think he still will be the prime minister at the end of this and I hope he will be
01:35:36
because I think the man has got much more substance than what people actually um they dismiss him as being a fairly
01:35:45
flaky person. He's not he's uh he he worked his way up through the ranks in business was a successful businessman to
01:35:52
the point that just not that she knew him very much but she appointed him to the head of her business committee and a
01:35:59
lot of people forget that Chris Luxon so he had to resign when he decided he' come into parliament but um
01:36:04
wellrespected businessman came in and I think give him time and you'll have me in 10 years time uh probably saying that
01:36:13
he's one of the better prime ministers we've I've had him on the podcast. He's a
01:36:18
perfectly lovely man, isn't he? Lovely. >> Very easy to >> Didn't he um have you had much social
01:36:23
interactions with him? He doesn't drink at all. You wouldn't have had a scotch with him.
01:36:26
>> No. I went to Mark Mitchell's wedding and he was there >> um and on the Corantal recently and um
01:36:33
look, people were going up to him having chats and he was chatting away very easily. In fact, I talked to his wife,
01:36:40
Amanda, who I'd never really met uh or got to know that well, and she was fantastic. I thought, you know, what a
01:36:46
good prime minister's wife, down to earth, sort of out there partying, having a lot of fun. No drinking, but
01:36:52
having a lot of fun, and uh just a charming woman. As I think Luxon, he was talking to the old um uh Lo, the old uh
01:37:00
coach, what's his name? Graeme Low. Lowey. >> Sir Graeme. Yeah. And I was talking to
01:37:04
the to the two of them. and old Loey I mean marvelous rack on tour and Luxon was loving it all and the three of us
01:37:12
were sort of recounting Loe's old days and stuff and you know he mixes in pretty well so I hope that he gets the
01:37:19
opportunity uh which I think he will do on November 7 to continue and make something of himself that he's been
01:37:27
unable to make to this point >> like these are great stories what a career in parliament um yes so you
01:37:33
yourself and um Heather Dupy Ellen one of my favorite broadcasters, phenomenal New Zealand. I put her up there with
01:37:38
with the hes like Holmes, Hosking, Henry. >> Oh, good. >> And Heather. Um, yeah. How did you guys
01:37:45
meet? >> We met um at Parliament, which is in the press gallery. She was working for Radio
01:37:51
Live in the press gallery. And um Heather always looked like this very youthful but feisty woman. I remember,
01:37:59
you know, press conferences she would ask questions and people would be takenback by this innocent looking young
01:38:05
woman being so feisty. Um, and uh, Heather and I just got on very well. She once applied to me for a job. I can't
01:38:13
remember it, but she says she did. And I thought she was too inexperienced, but I
01:38:18
ru the day of course, but um, no, we um, we went to parties. I was a single man and um and we went to parties, but I was
01:38:27
much older than her. But anyway, we got we got on really well and then we went out for a date and it was at at the pub
01:38:36
just the Midland Hotel just down from Parliament. It's on a Saturday night and um and we met and Heather had put she
01:38:46
had her dark glasses on and she had put um I think nail polish remover. She thought it was a eye thing in her eye.
01:38:55
So, cuz I said to her, "Thises, you afraid to be seen with me or what?" And anyway, no, she explained it. And
01:39:01
anyway, we chatted and basically we came to the resolution which was a good one in my mind then that the age gap was too
01:39:09
big >> and cuz we and we talked quite platonically about it and we really liked each other but the age gap was too
01:39:16
big and um that you know we'll always be mates but that was it. and we parted. I
01:39:23
kissed her on the cheek, then went home to my daughter who was the same age as Heather um who was living with me at the
01:39:29
time uh with her man and um didn't tell them the young woman I'd been out with. But it was such a short really an hour
01:39:36
and a half maybe sit down, have a yarn, then we're off. And that it sort of started from there.
01:39:42
>> Yes. A 32 year age gap. >> Yeah. >> Um I've got a quote from her. I don't think our relationship is any different
01:39:49
to two people of the same age, though there are some challenges we have that other people don't have.
01:39:54
>> What you mentioned such a long time now, like 20 years or something. Um, yeah.
01:39:58
What are the challenges now that that couples the same age don't? >> Well, you know, I think her biggest
01:40:02
challenge would have been me getting sick, >> you know, which must be so stressful.
01:40:07
>> Well, yes, of course. And I wasn't really aware of it because um after that first stint in the public hospital, I um
01:40:15
they let me out and then they said, "You have to go and see a cardiologist." So I
01:40:18
went to the cardiologist and he said, "We're getting into hospital next week. You've got a very badly blocked aotic
01:40:25
artery, 95% blocked." And he said, "You would have you would have killed over." Imagine outr running. And I reckon a lot
01:40:32
of people, they don't realize that if you've got a blocked artery like that and it blocks off totally, you're dead
01:40:39
because you can't suddenly have an operation and unblock it. Your heart's not going to get the blood. So, a lot of
01:40:45
people I think when they have heart attacks, they die because of that sort of problem. But I was lucky that I'd um
01:40:51
had a bit of a warning and at the urging of Heather, I had to go to hospital. you
01:40:56
know, I had to go to my cardiologist and um so then the rest is history. I was three months in hospital, eight
01:41:04
operations. Um Iggy, my four-year-old now, was uh he was under two and I I was um eating ice only for the last two
01:41:15
months in hospital. Eggy, >> not a drug. >> Eggy loved it. No, no, >> it's crunchy ice. And um Eggy loved it
01:41:23
because he would uh go come into the hospital, there' be bloody ice everywhere. By the time he left, he'd be
01:41:29
crunching away. Still quite likes ice. >> When when when you guys started seeing
01:41:33
each other, um yeah. What was the reaction like from family or friends or the public?
01:41:38
>> None >> really. >> I was honestly the thing that surprised me. Maybe they think I'm just a
01:41:43
youngster, >> but I had no reaction. No, honestly, never a negative reaction, which I
01:41:50
thought was great. M >> um nobody's ever made anything really of it, although everybody knows, you know,
01:41:56
like all Heather's friends. Um they're all about my daughter's ages. Um and all my friends are septtogenurians or
01:42:06
octogenarians and we're going out with a table of oxygenarians this week at the Northern Club, of course. And Heather's
01:42:14
there as this young person, but I tell you what, she's not afraid to give her a view. And uh you know no she she's she's
01:42:21
quite intimidating. Does she wear the pants? >> Does she >> does she wear the pants?
01:42:26
>> Who would you say? >> If I'm honest, I'd say Heather is the boss. Yes, absolutely. But um which I
01:42:31
don't mind actually because I probably need a bit of bossing. >> 100%. >> Yeah. >> So you you got married in uh
01:42:38
Parliament's Grand Hall in 2009. She was 24 at the time. You're 57 which seems like a big age gap at the time. When you
01:42:44
see you guys together, it doesn't you don't really notice it. You don't you don't nobody honestly nobody's ever
01:42:49
thought about it. Yeah. >> The only thing I get commonly now and I got it today when I was out I pushed my
01:42:55
baby as you said >> for several kilometers and I always get like ladies my age saying aren't you a
01:43:01
lovely granddad and I'd go I always smile and go uh dad actually like oh sorry sorry and of course of course you
01:43:10
you're going to get that but um no um the age thing is hasn't meant that much although I am getting older um and you
01:43:19
hitters out running and stuff like that and I think that's great but um yeah I mean you're you're as old as you feel
01:43:27
and I feel pretty good at the moment. >> Are you Yeah. How do you feel about about dying? Like are you are you are
01:43:32
you scared of dying or like do you think about legacy and the kids and stuff? >> Oh I like you know I'd like the book's a
01:43:38
great thing for me because at least they may not know the characters but when little Iggy and Mai my baby girl grow up
01:43:46
they can at least see how I thought. >> Yeah. Um but Harper Collins wants me to write more now. I may do but um and but
01:43:55
you know they they would like me to do a biography and >> I the biography thing is too hard I
01:44:01
think for anybody to do because there are elements of your life where you know I mean I've been married as my third
01:44:08
wife and I don't want to talk about the other women that had been they were lovely lovely women but I don't want to
01:44:15
you know go rake up stuff like that. So biographies I think are hard. This is more of a memoir of politics and um
01:44:24
that's I think is the best thing to do if you're a bit sensitive about how other people might think. My kids though
01:44:30
I just hope they look back on their dad and say he was a wreck on tur. >> He was um people generally liked him
01:44:38
which is what I like. And it's funny old John Key I once said to him you like being liked don't you John? John said
01:44:44
yes I do. And that's why I like what I liked about Ke because he was honest and of course people like being liked.
01:44:50
>> And those stories that we talked about for an hour about this incredible life
01:44:53
you've led. Um yeah, it must have been hard to maintain those first two marriages and to have that big life and
01:44:59
big career. Something's got to give. >> Well, yes. I mean, you know, it's really
01:45:03
interesting now that um with my two little kids now, being an old dad, I love it
01:45:10
>> because I've got the time to spend with them, which I never had. Yeah. >> When I was younger with um I had three
01:45:16
girls and then two boys. Never had the same time. We I was hands-on. I was always a hands-on dad when I was at home
01:45:22
and loved them implicitly, but um never had the time to devote as I do to the two little ones now.
01:45:30
>> Yeah. When you look at your future now, what are you most determined not to miss?
01:45:36
>> Well, the hard thing is that, you know, I would love I would love to see my little daughter who's under two
01:45:45
>> but grow up maybe into a teen teenage years and see what you know hopefully that our life is taking the right
01:45:52
direction. And similarly with little Iggy whose name is actually Finnbar but he's never known as Finnbar and Finnbar
01:46:00
is Ga for Barry. So and the Mai was uh Heather's decide on the Mai that my mother would have
01:46:09
been uh 100 almost to the day that Mai was born and she was a Mai. So Heather said why don't we call her Mai and I
01:46:17
thought I've grown up with Mai it's a surname and but Heather said I really like it. So she's Miy and it'll be a
01:46:24
nice story for her to remember that her grandmother would have been 100 years old.
01:46:30
>> So you you're in the the last quarter of your life, would we assume? >> Yeah.
01:46:34
>> The kids are in the the first quarter. How do how do you feel about the world
01:46:37
they're inheriting? >> Very different from the world. I I I perish what the future might hold for
01:46:47
kids because of social media. M uh you know I think I think the world of social media is so horrible and people the
01:46:54
keyboard warriors love to have a go at somebody. There was one woman had a go at me about the book and me writing a
01:47:02
book and what I I'll tell you what I've done in the past and I did it to this woman. uh I text them back or write them
01:47:10
back and say, "I'm so sorry you think I'm an oath, but uh you know, because I don't mean to be." And if I'm an oath to
01:47:17
you, I'm really sorry for it. Never get a reply because I'd be so nervous. They go, "Oh my god." You confront anybody
01:47:26
that's a keyboard warrior sitting in a dark room, they will never come back aggressive at you because and and a lot
01:47:33
have replied to me saying, "Oh, what a nice man you are for replying." >> You say these things, they don't realize
01:47:39
it's a human on the other end with feelings and people don't. And see, that aspect of life worries me. Um, people
01:47:45
like Trump being in power worry the hell out of me. ever since I'm too paranoid about it, but it does worry me because
01:47:52
the world order is a very different one. Um, I grew up post war and the war was forever in our memory. um you know that
01:48:01
we our parents talked about the war a lot and my grandfather was in Gallipoli fought in the war and and he I remember
01:48:08
him talking to me about the war which is why I'm a pacifist and I I just um you know the the instability of the world at
01:48:17
the moment worries me a bit >> but you know like things are cyclical I mean you've had madmen and I won't name
01:48:24
them but there are many madmen that have been ruling the world in the past and um
01:48:31
they fade into the distance and hopefully the world is a better place for it. >> What are your best and worst habits?
01:48:38
>> Oh god. >> Or if if Heather was here, what would she say? You >> she say um I don't know. Oh um Oh, not putting the
01:48:46
c coffee cup away. Honestly, I go sweat the small stuff. I'll have the coffee cup and I'll
01:48:55
remember and I'll put it on there. I say don't mention it. Look, I it's 2 in to the dishwasher and she hates me not
01:49:04
putting my coffee cup away and I can't believe it. But anyway, that's um life. So, I've learned to put my coffee cup
01:49:10
away. Do you know what I did this morning? >> What's that? >> And I hope she knows she probably won't.
01:49:15
I put her cup away that she hadn't taken out of the bedroom. So, I carried it up
01:49:21
the front, put it in the dishwasher. >> Be interesting to see if she notices. Oh, you got to make a big note about a
01:49:27
big song and dance about it. >> I'm not going to say a thing. >> Um, when was the last time you cried
01:49:32
>> um recently actually um it was about my mother. I sobbed. I was by myself and um
01:49:38
because I love my mother so much and it was the fact that this book has come out
01:49:42
and I've done so many interviews about it. It's been now the best seller for two weeks in a row. And I just think I
01:49:50
would have loved my mother to have been here to enjoy it cuz she loved me to bits and uh you know I think it's a bit
01:49:56
sad but she'll be up there somewhere hopefully. >> What what's your relationship like with
01:50:00
aging? I I always wonder about this when I see because I'm >> because you're aging.
01:50:04
>> Yeah. I'm looking at my future self like 20 years older than me. When I when I
01:50:07
see people in their 70s radioies that are living big lives like yourself or Winston Peters or [ __ ] MC Jagger, Lord
01:50:14
Stewart, whoever, I always think this that they're still loving life and getting so much out of life.
01:50:19
>> Well, you've got to you you you know, you've you reflect on life a lot. Uh nobody
01:50:26
likes getting old. As they say, uh getting old is not for sissies. And it's true. Nobody likes getting old. But but
01:50:34
it's the part of the evolutionary process and I know that you know I'm going to die. Uh and you go well okay
01:50:42
and the thing is like my brother said you don't know after you did it anyway and hopefully people will when they
01:50:48
remember you will always remember the nice things about you not the horrible things. So, you know, um it life is a
01:50:56
cycle and um I I tried to talk to David Longi about this when I knew he was very
01:51:01
very sick. But I had to do it in a roundabout way. And I said, "Do you ever think you will make it back to your
01:51:08
beloved India?" He loved India. >> And he said, "No, I don't think I will." And that to me said much more than you'd
01:51:16
say, "How sick are you?" >> Cuz he knew he was very sick. >> Are you scared of dying?
01:51:20
>> No. No. What about the FOMO aspect? >> Um, what? Not being here for Oh, yeah.
01:51:26
Oh, yeah. No, no, that pisses me off. I mean, you know, I'd like to go and lie by the pool and have a pin colada and
01:51:33
um, but you don't know. You're not going to know about it anyway. So, why fret about it? I mean, you come and you go. I
01:51:40
I'll feel sorry for the people who love me that won't have like I cried for my mother that won't be around. Um, you
01:51:48
know, you're not around for them. But you know that's life. And they know that I won't be. And not my little kids
01:51:53
don't. They just see me as dad. And although um Iggy calls me Barry, >> does he got a problem? He keeps calling me
01:52:02
Barry. >> What are you most afraid of then? >> What is your biggest fears? >> Not a lot really. No.
01:52:07
>> No. I'm not I'm not frightened of I don't think anything really. >> Regrets. >> Oh, regret having been married three
01:52:15
times. I just wish I I wish things could have worked out differently, >> but they they didn't. Um, so I certainly
01:52:24
regret that. Um, I have no regrets about my beautiful children as a result of them. And we're all all fortunately all
01:52:32
my kids and uh me are very close and they love me like I love my mother, I'm sure, if you ask them.
01:52:40
>> Um, so I'm lucky, really lucky from that aspect. And you can't get to your mid-70s without a few scars on your
01:52:46
back, can you? Oh, >> no. Why would you want to anyway? >> Yeah. Well, exactly. Yeah, exactly.
01:52:51
>> Um, and I've got to go. >> Okay, last question. >> Um, yeah. Sorry. Oh, sorry. Yeah, we we
01:52:58
Yeah, this has been a great chat, by the way. >> Thank you. Three words that family and
01:53:02
friends would use to describe you. >> Oh dear. Um, fun, >> m, >> loving, and good to have a yarn with.
01:53:15
>> Hell of a life. Are you proud of yourself? >> Yes, I am. Now, you know, I mean, you go
01:53:20
through periods of doubting yourself as well. >> Um, and when I had that argument with
01:53:25
Duncan Garner, I did. Not that he had the big influence on my life. It was just something that happened to me that
01:53:30
was very unattractive. But um no, I think you know you you should make the most of life, enjoy life and uh if you
01:53:39
I've talked to a lot of men and I was part of the men's health week uh last year. Uh men having heart issues always
01:53:46
go and have a checkup every year and I've been pretty good at that really. But um don't be afraid and if you've got
01:53:53
to have heart surgery, don't be afraid because when I came through the first triple bypass, fantastic. I thought
01:54:01
great until I collapsed. >> So perhaps I was too enthusiastic. >> We save that for another podcast. Hey,
01:54:06
by by the way, if Heather and Duncan ever do a reunion of their TV three show story, it's going to be very awkward for
01:54:12
you. >> Um, no. I warned Duncan before he went on air with Heather. I said to him, rang
01:54:18
him. Heather didn't know this. And I said, "Listen, Duncan, don't be a bully to that woman because I tell you what,
01:54:26
>> she's more than your match. Not as a bully, but she's more than your match intellectually.
01:54:32
>> Yeah, 100%. >> Hey, Barry So, thank you so much for your time, mate. You're a legend.
