Fact Checking David Seymour Again

David Seymour fronts Act, New Zealand's libertarian party that also embraces elements of populism. Libertarians believe that Governments should be small, property rights supplant human rights and market forces are all we need to ensure a thriving economy. Taxation should be limited and people should be able spend their money where they choose for their health care, education and core services. Public services are an anathema to them, especially public broadcasting.

Despite advocating for free speech, Seymour can be quite a snowflake when criticisms are directed at him or his party's policies. He is also well known for making sweeping generalisations and promoting disinformation to support his case. My personal interactions with him have confirmed his blind support of corporate thinking and his flippant dismissal of anything outside his narrow ideology.

I challenged him about his disastrous school lunch programme being delivered by an overseas corporate. His initiative destroyed a local social enterprise that trained disabled people to grow and prepared food for school lunches. I tried to explain the importance of supporting local enterprises that provide value well beyond the high quality lunches they provided to school children, he responded by explaining that corporates and economies of scale provide the best option for feeding the world. His assertion that if we have an obesity problem, we don't have a food shortage, is totally oblivious to the fact that obesity is largely a poverty issue through a lack of access to high quality, fresh produce. Poor communities are saturated with fast food outlets that rely on massive advertising campaigns and an addiction to their products through their deliberate mix of addictive sugar, salt and fat. 

The rightwing in New Zealand generally dislike public media and Radio NZ in particular. David Seymour refuses to be interviewed on RNZ's Morning Report because of perceived unfair treatment and he particularly expressed dismay at the appointment of John Campbell to the programme. John Campbell interviewed him over a year ago regarding the Treaty Principles Bill and the Regulatory Standards Bill. An Act staff member also videoed the interview as evidence of bias (from their perspective) and it makes interesting watching.

Seymour became particularly touchy when Campbell challenged him regarding the fact that the vast majority of submitters opposed both of his bills and questioned his claim that most submissions were organised by minority interests. He also became defensive when Campbell read out the objections to his bill from the Law Society. There was a tense exchange regarding 'colonisation' and Campbell rightly challenged his logic on this issue. The Act video of the interview was titled: WEIRD John Campbell interview: can the media be trusted.

The angst expressed by rightwing politicians when they are challenged or fact checked reminds me of the Stephen Colbert quote, "Reality has a well-known liberal bias". Donald Trump's first term advisor Kellyanne Conway justified obvious lies by explaining them as "alternative facts". 

Paul Goldsmith's announcement earlier this month that the government planned to abolish the Broadcasting Standards Authority appears to me as a cynical move to limit challenges to the disinformation, false narratives and alternative facts that rightwing politicians love to peddle. 

Public Radio in New Zealand is funded by the state but the Law prohibits ministers and the government from directing editorial decision, specific programming or news gathering. The separation is intended to protect editorial freedom and impartiality. Labour led governments tend to increase funding for public broadcasting and National led governments cut.

In the 2025 budget the Coalition Government cut funding for RNZ by $18 million, however they increased funding for local journalism by $4.6 million a year. Their claim that they wanted greater journalistic scrutiny on local government seemed reasonable on the face of it, but when you consider the government's continual attacks directed at local councils it does seem like a way of shifting scrutiny to local issues to distract from their central government failures. 

When Jack Tame interviewed Seymour regarding his public statements criticising the appointment of John Campbell he exposed numerous examples of disinformation. Just over a year ago I fact checked Seymour's statements around the Treaty Principles Bill and I felt this interview provided another opportunity to challenge his deliberate twisting of the truth.

1. Radio New Zealand's "listenership and, more recently their trust has been in a decline"
   
   The true story is that during the pandemic RNZ saw a large growth in listenership and this dropped afterwards with the lowest slump occurring mid 2025. However by the end of 2025, RNZ National had reversed the trend considerably and Morning Report contributed to a 5.1% increase in overall listenership. 
   
   The Trust in News Aotearoa New Zealand 2026 Report showed that public trust in the media had improved and the most trusted news brand was Radio New Zealand. 
   
   Seymour's claim was false on both accounts.
   
   
2. Regarding resignation of RNZ Chief Executive Paul Thompson: ."..when so many of the key metrics have been going in the wrong direction (he) might move on" 
   
   Seymour again provides a false narrative of overall decline and his reference to key metrics was deliberately misleading. RNZ's linear listenership was declining but this was more of a reflection of how the public now engage with media rather than the failing of RNZ to keep them. Other metrics tell a different story, RNZ's content on third-party platforms like YouTube and social media has shown a dramatic increase and those audiences now exceed its radio audience.
   According to 2024 audience research 80% of New Zealanders engage with RNZ content every month. Hardly evidence of overall failure and no other broadcaster could claim that level of engagement. Paul Thompson had led RNZ to a huge increase in public engagement, not decline. 
   
   
3. With reference to Seymours critical public statements about RNZ's management and John Campbell's appointment: "Even when people have gone to legal experts, the best that they have been able to say is that I have breached the, quote, 'spirit of the law' which is a way of saying - haven't broken the law, haven't given a direction."
   
   By speaking out negatively against Paul Thompson using false information and publicly criticising appointments, Seymour may not have broken the law but he has clearly wanted to put pressure on management and fuel doubts about RNZ's impartiality. 
   
   In an interview on the Platform (a favoured right wing online platform that claims to address topics ignored by a mainstream media that has been "poisoned" by the Public Interest Journalism Fund), Seymour stated: "that guy's (Thompson) got an awful lot to answer for and I suspect he won't be answering the call at RNZ for much longer." 
   
   Jim Mather, chair of the RNZ board, stated: "Paul and the board agree. given the current circumstances, that it is appropriate to make his announcement earlier to avoid further conjecture and distraction." While Mather claimed that Seymour's statements hadn't impacted on the decision he obviously was a big influence on the 'current circumstances' that involved external pressures. 
   
   His breaching of the spirit of the law is no minor discretion as Seymour contends, it essentially created enough attention to force the early retirement of a competent CEO and create the impression of incompetence and failure based on disinformation. A great example of highly effective dirty politics. 
   
   
4. "They (RNZ) seem to believe that the shareholders who actually fund them, being the taxpayers, have to sit back meekly and have their representative completely muted, masked and muzzled - while they get on and do whatever they like. I'm sorry that's not how it works, if your performance isn't that great and you make questionable decisions your shareholders will have something to say about"
   
   Seymour claims he was just representing taxpayers in holding RNZ to account for below par performance. However, I bet he wasn't inundated with taxpayer concerns when survey's show RNZ is the most trusted news source and 80% of New Zealanders engage with its content. He was totally motivated by his own self-interest. For a party where the most recent poll showed that 94% of voters don't support it, he needs to tilt the playing field. Diminishing trust for RNZ and allowing the likes of the Platform to thrive would be an ideal outcome for him.
   

Seymour is actually following the Trump playbook, continually misrepresenting reality and attacking the most effective news forums that expose him. He is much more articulate and intelligent then Trump, he doesn't simply shout 'fake news!' but disingenuously feigns concern about performance and trust. Seymour is a master of the dark arts of politics. 


My previous Seymour fact checking: https://localbodies-bsprout.blogspot.com/2025/04/fact-checking-david-seymour.html