The Front Page

District health boards have anti-vaxxers in their sights, saying diseases almost eradicated in New Zealand are being seen again. DHB members went to Parliament to answer health select committee questions, including why increasing numbers of parents are refusing to have their children immunised. Bay of Plenty DHB chief executive Helen Mason says they have achieved five of the six health targets set...

The New Zealand Medical Association is the latest to join the chorus of voices pleading for more affordable dental care. The association represents doctors including GPs and specialists. On Monday the Herald revealed Waitematā DHB wants a "comprehensive dental service for all New Zealanders", after concern about desperate Kiwis queuing at hospital pain clinics, showing up at ED, or even performing...

The Kiwi jihadi Mark Taylor has sparked a political backlash, with Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters particularly going on the offensive. Taylor, a former New Zealand soldier who only has New Zealand citizenship, is being held in a Syrian prison. He surrendered to Kurdish forces because life under Isis had become unbearable. Taylor previously earned notoriety and was dubbed the 'bumbling jih...

A Kiwi who joined Islamic State has surrendered to Kurdish forces and is being held in a Syrian prison. Mark Taylor, a former New Zealand soldier, says he was a border guard for Isis after joining the terror group in 2014. The former Hamilton resident was infamously dubbed the "bumbling jihadi", after mistakenly revealing his location in the Middle East on social media. Now there are questions ove...

A police officer has been charged with indecently assaulting a fellow cop. The 28-year-old accused appeared this afternoon in the Auckland District Court before Judge David Burns. The policeman was arrested this morning and charged with indecent assault and sexual violation by unlawful sexual connection. He pleaded not guilty to both charges. The alleged offences occurred on February 5 in Northlan...

Police have charged almost five people a day with strangling or suffocating their partners since a new family violence law came into force criminalising such acts in December. New Zealand has the worst rate of family and intimate-partner violence in the developed world and police are called to an incident every four minutes. The new legislation criminalising strangulation and suffocation was broug...

Residents have been told to evacuate immediately as a new fire spreads rapidly in the Tasman region. The new fire near the Moutere Highway is north of Pigeon Valley where huge wildfires began three weeks ago. Earlier today, Mayor Richard Kempthorne confirmed a decision has been made to allow the state of emergency to expire. Pictures posted on social media show a section of forest engulfed in larg...

Former Prime Minister Dame Jenny Shipley has been found liable for millions in damages by the High Court, along with other Mainzeal directors The failed building giant had been trading while insolvent despite its high profile - and creditors would have been better off if the company had been put into liquidation earlier, according to the High Court. The four directors have been found liable for a...

Opinions are divided on the Government's new healthy home standards, with landlords saying they need exemptions or will go elsewhere, while renters and advocacy groups applaud it. New Government rules will require every rental home in New Zealand to have a heater in the living room and an extractor fan in the kitchen and bathroom. The standards set minimum requirements for heating, insulation, ven...

Malcolm Rewa, after an almost unprecedented third trial, has been found guilty of murdering Susan Burdett in her South Auckland home in 1992. The jury took just under four hours to return their unanimous verdict today after hearing two weeks of evidence and arguments in the High Court at Auckland. Rewa will now be sentenced on March 26. Burdett was raped and bludgeoned to death in her Papatoetoe h...

The Tax Working Group has recommended the Government implement a capital gains tax - and use the money gained to lower the personal tax rate. The suggested capital gains tax (CGT) would cover assets such as land, shares, investment properties, business assets and intellectual property. Any profit on the sale of these assets would be added to the seller's overall yearly income, and then be taxed un...

The Government's announced a new builder for KiwiBuild - and another 100 homes in West Auckland and Christchurch Home builder and developer Mike Greer has been given the contract to build 104 homes, including the first in Canterbury, which are also the cheapest KiwiBuild announced so far. That will include 11 two-bedroom standalone homes in Kaiapoi, for $360,000 dollars each. Other homes will be b...

An acknowledgement from the Prime Minister today that there are issues with China. The Chinese ambassador to New Zealand Madam Wu XI said in Wellington last night both countries needed to build a more resilient relationship and handle differences properly to avoid the rocks. Madam Wu Xi alluded to news headlines about strained relations while speaking at a reception hosted by the New Zealand – Chi...

Google and Facebook are among the internet giants facing a surprise tax. That's news that has just been broken by the New Zealand Herald and Newstalk ZB, and confirmed by the Prime Minister. The issue is multinational companies selling good or services online, and then running profits through low-tax countries. It's been a looming issue in New Zealand for several years. The Herald tax gap investig...

New Zealand's biggest seafood exporter Sanford is having issues getting salmon through Chinese ports. It comes as suspicions grow that China is turning up the heat on this country because of the Huawei saga. Sanford is not attributing its recent administrative issues getting shipments cleared to the deteriorating New Zealand-China relationship, but chief customer officer Andre Gargiulo says no rea...

Reserve Bank Governor Adrian Orr is warning the Government's flagship KiwiBuild policy could "crowd out" the private sector. But Finance Minister Grant Robertson disagrees, saying Orr's forecast was "certainly challengeable". This morning, the Reserve Bank published a discussion document. It says KiwiBuild could contribute 100,000 affordable houses over 10 years, but it's unlikely that will be ach...

The country's 16 polytechnics are set to become one, under a radical shake-up of the tertiary sector. Education Minister Chris Hipkins has released a wide-ranging plan, aimed at getting more school leavers into good jobs. It will see a single national body to take over all polytechnics, apprentices and industry trainees. The institutes will merge to form the New Zealand Institute of Skills and Tec...

The New Zealand-China relationship continues to come under the microscope as it's thought diplomatic links have plummeted to a new low. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was scheduled to visit China early this year, but the invitation has been put on hold. And this morning, the Herald revealed the 2019 China-New Zealand Year of Tourism was meant to be launched with great fanfare at Wellington's Te Pap...

Malcolm Rewa has gone on trial today - charged for the third time with killing Auckland woman Susan Burdett 27 years ago. Chief High Court judge, Justice Geoffrey Venning, acknowledged many in the jury would have heard parts of the case before, particularly because of the high-profile connection to Teina Pora. The case found infamy when Teina Pora was twice wrongly convicted for murdering Burdett....

The country's polytechnics are in for a shake-up. Jacinda Ardern gave her 'State of the Nation' speech to a business audience this morning, outlining the economic challenges facing New Zealand, and foreshadowing a major restructure of polytechnics and institutes of technology. The restructure is to be released next week. It's expected to recommend turning the vocational education sector into a fle...

The Prime Minister says as she flew into Nelson she could see the true scale of the massive Tasman bush fire. Jacinda Ardern has met emergency services battling the blaze in Pigeon Valley today. Ardern says trying to control the fire is a massive undertaking. Incident controller John Sutton says it's almost certain the fire was the result of agricultural machinery. He says it was a highly accident...

A massive blaze in Tasman continues to ravage the district. And, authorities are scrambling after a second fire has broken out in the region, at Rabbit Island. The fire in Pigeon Valley started yesterday afternoon but doubled in size overnight, spreading to cover 1870 hectares within a perimeter of 20kms by 3am. A Civil Defence state of emergency has been declared. Sources have told the Herald the...

Politicians from all parties were greeted with a rousing powhiri as they were welcomed onto Waitangi's Upper Marae this morning. For the first time all MPs, including Jacinda Ardern and National's Simon Bridges, arrived in one group. Last year, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told those gathered to hold her and the Government to account. Today she has acknowledged there’s still more work to do. She...

The Government is ploughing more than $100 million into regional employment, focused on Māori and Pasifika people. It's one of a series of announcements made in the lead-up to Waitangi Day. The lion's share of the funding will go to five regions the Government says need extra help. They are Northland, Bay of Plenty, Tairāwhiti, Hawke's Bay and Manawatū-Whanganui. Those regions face issues includin...

Wage and salary earners paid out $1.7bn in what's been called "stealth" tax last year. According to advice to the Tax Working Group, it was after inflation increases pushed workers and their pay packets into higher tax brackets. Officials have warned the public could see the money as having come through a stealth tax and Government may want to change it as a "value judgement". They've also said if...