The Labour leader says New Zealand needs an honest conversation about paying for its future.

Our newsroom understands party delegates will vote on whether to support a capital gains or wealth tax at its annual conference this weekend.

Chris Hipkins says about 70% of government tax revenue comes from personal income taxes - while the OECD average is half as much.

He told Kerre Woodham that's because New Zealand doesn't have other forms of tax like capital gains, which is very common elsewhere.

Hipkins says it's treated as if it's a big radical idea, but we are one of the only countries in the world without some form of taxation in that area.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins has reflected on his ‘frenemy’ relationship with Nikki Kaye.

Reacting to news of her death while speaking to Kerre Woodham, Hipkins said the pair both had a passion for education and tended to agree more than they disagreed.

He said he hadn’t been in touch with her for a number of years and said her death was “a bit of a shock”.

“Really sad news. I just heard about Nikki Kaye as I was coming into the studio this morning. Nikki and I arrived at Parliament at the same time. We had a lot of common interests. I think you could say we were ‘frenemies’ for the time we were in Parliament. Opponents, but we actually got on well together.”

Kaye was Minister of Education in 2017 under Sir Bill English. Hipkins would succeed her as the minister when Labour took power after the 2017 election.

“I thought Nikki was a really passionate member of Parliament, very diligent, did her research, liked to know what she was talking about, didn’t rush to decisions until she had actually done the analysis of understanding the situation,” Hipkins said.

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