The Front Page

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...

A report on how to address fair pay is out, but it's led to division; with Labour versus National, and employers versus unions. The working group was led by former National Prime Minister Jim Bolger, and has come back with 46 recommendations, including that fair pay agreements cover all employers and that workers should be able to initiate a Fair Pay Agreement if they have a minimum group of 1000...

Air New Zealand's boss is vowing to be directly involved in looking at the airline's books. The national carrier has cut its pre-tax earnings guidance to a range of $340 million to $400 million for the June year, due to slower-than-expected revenue growth. The previously announced guidance was for underlying earnings before tax of $425m to $525m. Air New Zealand's share price took a tumble in the...

The Government is reassessing its targets for the troubled KiwiBuild scheme. It now looks like they could not only miss targets for this year, but the next ten. As well as targeting 1000 KiwiBuild homes by July 2019, Twyford had previously committed to building 10,000 in 2020/21 and 12,000 every year after that until 2028. Addressing media at the post-Cabinet press conference this afternoon, Prime...

Former KiwiBuild boss Stephen Barclay says he is pursuing a case of constructive dismissal against Ministry of Housing and Urban Development. This comes after the Ministry revealed earlier today that Barclay resigned amid an employment investigation that revealed complaints from employees, contractors and stakeholders regarding his "leadership behaviour". In a statement, again through a private pu...

Police are keeping quiet on the investigation into a text allegedly sent from the phone of National MP Sarah Dowie to Jami-Lee Ross. The investigation was apparently sparked by a call to the Crimestoppers hotline. Newstalk ZB Political Editor Barry Soper says the text contains the words "you deserve to die". There was no immediate show of support for the Invercargill MP. Anne McCracken, who is reg...

Racism, sexism, and severe threats of violence have all been uncovered as part of a bullying culture in Fire and Emergency New Zealand. A new report into the organisation says bullying and harassment often came from the very highest levels of the service, including from fire chiefs who called people racial names. The report made 33 recommendations for change. And PM Jacinda Ardern continues making...

The man jailed for the Ashburton Work and Income double-slaying is appealing his conviction and sentence. Russell John Tully's appeal will be heard at the Court of Appeal in Wellington in March. Tully was found guilty in 2016 of being the masked gunman who stormed the Ashburton centre in 2014 and shot dead 67-year-old receptionist Peggy Noble, from point-blank range and shot 55-year-old case manag...

Could it be true? Members of the family of British tourists that have caused a storm up and down New Zealand were at Auckland International Airport with luggage this morning. A source has told the Herald that at least four of the group were expected on an international flight due to leave this afternoon. The true identities of the group also came to light today. And New Zealand and Britain have si...

Tauranga has been named the eighth most expensive housing market in the world, heading off cities like London and San Francisco. That's according to a global study out today, the 15th annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Study, which measures average house prices against average income. The world's most expensive city is Hong Kong, followed by Vancouver, Sydney, Melbourne, Santa...

Two English children will spend their Christmas stranded in New Zealand after a crash that killed one of their mothers and left the other with critical injuries. Six-year-old Ben Sargent and his nine-year-old sister Olivia were holidaying with their mothers Kerry and Jules Sargent in October, when the family were involved in a head-on collision. 42-year-old Kerry, from Gloucester in England, was k...

A damning IPCA report into police deputy commissioner Wally Haumaha has called his behaviour inappropriate and unprofessional. But it's not quite bullying. It's led to calls from National for Haumaha to be fired, but that looks unlikely to happen. And a new report finds increasing the price of tobacco works to reduce smoking, but it can result in low income families going without food, or not payi...

A woman who sold her teenage daughter to strangers for sex will now serve more time in prison. In March, Kasmeer Lata was jailed for six years and 11 months for dealing in slaves, dealing in a person under 18 for sexual exploitation, and receiving earnings from commercial sexual services from an underage person. The 36-year-old had first forced her daughter to have sex for money with a man on her...

A damning report confirms Government agencies used private investigators for spying on New Zealand citizens. It's being called an affront to democracy, and could lead to police action. The report comes from State Services Commissioner Peter Hughes, who details a list of breaches of the State Service Code of Conduct, including potentially illegal recordings of insurance claimants, public sector emp...

Immigration officials and police have arrested a man for what they're calling modern-day slavery. A 64-year-old Samoan New Zealander has been arrested and charged after allegedly bringing Samoans to New Zealand to work illegally in the horticultural industry since the 1990s. Allegations made by the victims include not being paid for work completed, having their passports taken, and being subjected...

A close family friend of Grace Millane is so concerned ongoing suppression breaches could jeopardise a trial she's written to UK media asking them to stop naming the accused killer. And the papers have explained why they defied the Auckland judge's order. The Telegraph and the Daily Mail were two of several British media organisations to name the 26-year-old man charged with Millane's murder, days...

Internet giant Google has breached suppression on the identity of the 26-year-old man accused of murdering British backpacker Grace Millane. The company sent an email to certain subscribers, showing that New Zealanders had searched for the man's name 100,000 times. But the Google email itself put the man's name in its subject line, and linked his name explicitly to Grace Millane's death. It also i...