Ewww

National's fundamentalist christian leader is telling kiwis to breed for New Zealand:

National Party leader Christopher Luxon has encouraged people at an infrastructure conference to have more babies in an effort to reverse the nation’s declining birthrate.

In a question and answer session after the announcement, Luxon encouraged more people to have children in what he described as a tongue-in-cheek comment.

“We need people,” he said. “Here is the deal – New Zealand stopped replacing itself in 2016. I encourage all of you to go out there and have more babies if you wish, that would be helpful.”

Which quite apart from the ick-factor of a religious bigot sticking his nose into other people's reproductive choices, also has unpleasant echoes of racist "great replacement" thinking. After all, if you accept that "we need people", why babies? Why not immigration? Which suggests Luxon is concered about what people we get, rather than just the usual shallow business obsession with make number go up.

Luxon has now wheeled out his deputy Nicola Willis to make the defence of every arsehole caught out, and claim that it was all a "joke". Which is telling in and of itself: he's too frightened even to make the defence himself, and of being asked about his beliefs.