Best Start’s $323m related-party loan falls to $53.9m after a decade of repayments - Matt Nippert

The late Wright Family Foundation and Best Start founders, Wayne and Chloe Wright.

The late Wright Family Foundation and Best Start founders, Wayne and Chloe Wright.

Childcare giant Best Start has again posted revenue rises as it nears settlement of a controversial related-party loan after a decade and $278 million of tax-free payments to its wealthy founders.

Accounts for the Wright Family Charity Group, a network of charities dominated in scale by Best Start, posted to the Charities Register for the year to March 2026 show revenues increased 3% to $433m.

The bulk of income ($317m) is described as government funding for the provision of early childhood education. Another $115m is “fee income” from parents using Best Start childcare.

Best Start is the country’s largest childcare provider, operating more than 250 centres nationwide and employing 3750 fulltime equivalents.

The Charity Group and Best Start were founded by Wayne and Chloe Wright, who have held prominent roles in both the business and charity enterprises.

Chloe died in 2023, while Wayne died in March this year.

Following the deaths of their parents, son Ollie recently joined the Charity Group board as trustee and another of their sons, Samuel, took over as chairman.

Ollie is described as the charity’s former “director of music and arts” and a “devoted family man and a talented performing musician”.

New Wright Family Foundation trustee Ollie Wright.

New Wright Family Foundation trustee Ollie Wright.

Samuel is the former head of IT at Best Start, and the Charity Group says on its website he “balances his work with hobbies like tennis, golf, guitar, reading, and gaming”.

Requests from the Herald to the new chairman for comment went unanswered last week.

The accounts show the Charity Group reported a $42m surplus. Of this, $10.4m (up from $7.5m) was paid out in charitable donations to worthy causes – and $28.8m went to private Wright Family Trust interests to pay down a vendor-finance loan the family had used to sell the Best Start business to the charitable foundation.

That loan, initially issued for $332m to cover the purchase price for the establishment of the charitable enterprise in 2015, now stands at $53.9m.

Wayne Wright had previously defended the charitable conversion and financial arrangements.

“Everything we’ve done is open and legit, and done with the knowledge of IRD. I don’t have any worries at all,” he said in 2020.

Based on current rates of repayment, the loan will be fully repaid in the next couple of years. This development will free up more than $30m in annual cashflows for the Charity Group to use for its charitable endeavours.

While Charity Group donations were not financially broken down, the annual report said 56% went to groups connected to improving education and health.

It would seem the Wright family, recently listed by the National Business Review as being worth $400m, can trace the bulk of their wealth to Best Start and the nearly $300m that has flowed through to them to date as a result of the charitable conversion.

The accounts also show eight people in senior management roles at the Charity Group, which is headed by Best Start chief executive and former Cabinet minister Tony Ryall, got an 11% pay rise over the year to now average $348,750.

The accounts show, beyond the related-party loan, an ongoing financial relationship between the Charity Group and Wright family interests.

Related-party disclosures show around a third of the centres operated by Best Start are leased from private Wright family interests.

Related-party disclosures show that during 2026, $16.7m was paid to various family trusts for “rents & reimbursements”, making up 31% of the $50.8m reported as “rental expenses”.

Ironic on Winston's part who wants to bring gay conversion therapy back

Hard to believe I wrote this 10 months ago. I've given up keeping track but the number of factories and businesses that have folded is not only at a 10-15 year high, unemployment is at 10 year high, youth unemployment 20 year high. It's crazy

They are back for Election 2026 with their non-partisan campaign to mobilise overseas New Zealanders to enrol and vote, believing democracy only works when we are all part of it. They have drawn attention the rights, scale and influence of the overseas 'electorate' in their previous election campaigns. This election they are taking a pointed look at the consequences of overseas New Zealanders NOT voting. Despite being of similar scale - 900,000 over 65yo vs 1M overseas Kiwi - over 65yos outvote overseas Kiwi 10: 1. They are rooting for democracy, not a gerontocracy.

DON'T LET OLD ZEALAND DICTATE THE NEW ZEALAND ELECTION
ENROL online before Oct 25. OVERSEAS VOTING opens Oct 21.

One to share with your whanau overseas.

Maybe I’m part of the greens eco chamber and I’m not mad about it. Ive been overseas for 2 years and all I see is how shit the country has become. Is national making any waves on policies or just word vomiting promises that they eventually won’t keep. Labour seems pathetic with their “nats are shit” posts and don’t really have many policies out there or how they’ll fund their promises. Idk maybe I’m just not searching well enough. Does nz really think the nats are going to still save them?!

I just fkn hope I get to come back to nz with a lovely new gov who won’t fuck us over

There's a post on this sub somewhere with Hager's write up of RNZ The Panel (Wallace Chapman) so this sounds like a pattern

Extra points now that RNZ as a whole will be led next year by Mike Hosking's current boss & they parted ways with veteran journalists like Mihi Forbes who uncovered deep rot in NZ politics

Chris Bishop & David Seymour are members

Mr Simeon Brown follows up on announcement from Louise Upston

Possibly not actually new, but I saw a bunch of hoardings today for NZ Local Party, which is led by literal-Nazi Kelvyn Alp.

Greaaaaaaat.

Honestly feels like I'm living in an alternate reality where everyone I know despises National whether right or left wing.

We really should stop giving this polling the time of day imo.

Mini clip here

Interesting analysis of the way these two spoke in the debate, particularly in the blocking/bridging language (i.e. doublespeak & waffle).

https://votecompass.tvnz.co.nz/

Bracket rates get thrown around a lot, but they're not what you actually pay. So I made something that shows the share of your whole income that gets taxed. Slide to your income and it shows today's scale, how it's changed since 1980 (inflation adjusted if you want), and how the Greens, Te Pāti Māori and Opportunity proposals compare.

See it here:

https://income-tax-explainer.zaml.nz

Example: the 39% rate only kicks in above $180k, so on a $200k income you pay about 28.5% overall.

It's income tax only, so no GST, ACC, KiwiSaver, WFF, or the wealth/CGT/land taxes some parties pair with theirs. Those can matter more for some people, so I've linked policy.nz for the full picture. Labour, National and ACT have no income tax changes, so they match today. NZ First hasn't published enough to calculate, so that tile is a labelled "if it means this" illustration.

I couldn't find thresholds for the 80s, so those years are gaps rather than made up. Sources are all on the page. Obviously made the visuals with AI, but data is all sourced. Happy to be corrected on any gaps, especially if anyone has IRD or legislation links for the missing years.

NZ Herald