Friday 1st of May 2026 01:41:24 PM
Page 19

Pretend play is a magical part of childhood. New research suggests it can also help mental health

By -

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Fotini Vasilopoulos, Postdoctoral Researcher, Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance Use, University of Sydney

Pretend play is a significant and often magical part of childhood.

Children have huge imaginations and use these to turn rocks into spaceships, tables into forts or pens into fairies. They might pretend to be “mum” or to “cook dinner”. Or they may invent their own characters, worlds and concepts that have no bearing on anything adults are able to come up with.

The ability to pretend play generally first emerges at 15-18 months. By about 20 months children start to imitate life around them. By the time they are four or five the play is complex and involves interacting with others and acting out characters.

But apart from being a part of development, are there other benefits? Our study suggests pretend play can also help mental health.

Our research

According to the World Health Organization, about around one in seven children and adolescents are affected by mental health conditions. Most interventions target problems after they emerge, rarely addressing the developmental foundations that could prevent them.

In our study, we analysed data from more than 1,400 Australian children taking part in the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children.

Their pretend play ability was assessed by early childhood educators over a one-year period, when children were aged between two and three. This related to how well a child was able to:

  • do simple pretend play like feeding a doll or stuffed animal

  • pretend one object is a substitute for something else, like using a towel as a blanket or a box for a house

  • do peer pretend play like using materials to role-play in costumes and playing house.

Mental health outcomes were then measured using parent and educator reports on emotional and behavioural difficulties, submitted when participants were aged between four and five and again between the ages of six and seven.

What we found

We found stronger pretend play ability among two and three-year olds was associated with fewer emotional and behavioural difficulties at four-five and six-seven years of age. Some of these difficulties could include having many worries or often having temper tantrums.

The findings held even after accounting for participants’ socioeconomic background, the mother’s mental health, language ability and the security of their relationship with their parents.

Why is this so?

Emotional regulation – the ability to manage and respond to emotions – has been linked to mental health in childhood and adolescence.

It has been suggested that if a child is better at pretend play, they will have better emotional regulation because pretend play allows one to practice this skill.

But when we examined this link, we did not find an association between pretend play, emotional regulation and mental health outcomes later on. This suggests other, less understood developmental processes may be involved.

So in our study, we suggest something called “embodied cognition” could explain the link between pretend play and mental wellbeing.

Embodied cognition is the idea that thinking isn’t something that happens only in your head. Your body and the way it moves through the world are also involved in thinking.

For example, when children learn to count with their fingers, the physical action is part of how the mathematical concept takes shape in their minds.

Similarly, playing, imagination and acting things out aren’t just fun. They are helping children learn how to think, feel and respond to their environment. This in turn is possibly what is leading to better mental health.

But more investigation is needed before we can be certain.

How can parents encourage pretend play?

In the meantime, there are several things you can do to encourage pretend play in your child.

  • Let play unfold for its own sake, rather than turning it into a “teaching moment”. If a child makes a mistake while counting or naming things during play, the priority is to keep the play going rather than interrupting to correct them.

  • Follow the child’s lead when joining in, much like a game of tennis. Waiting for the child to “serve” first, helps keep play child‑led, though gentle prompts can help if a child is unsure how to begin.

  • Respond to children’s play with simple observations or open‑ended comments instead of instructions. Describing what is happening in the play, or wondering aloud what might happen next, can enrich play without directing it. For example, “what could that leaf do?” Rather than, “that leaf can be the house for the pig”.

  • Step “inside the play” rather than directing it from the sidelines. Adults can ask children what role they would like them to take on, or suggest being a low-power character, such as a confused visitor or a forgetful customer.

Keep in mind, play doesn’t need to be complicated or instructional. It just needs to encourage children’s imaginations. And as our study suggests, it can also protect their mental health in the process.

Lucinda Grummitt, Sasha Bailey, Louise Birrell, Iroise Dumontheil, Gill Francis, Eliza Oliver, Olivia Karaolis, Robyn Ewing, Michael Anderson, Maree Teesson and Emma L. Barrett were also authors of the research study discussed in this piece.

– ref. Pretend play is a magical part of childhood. New research suggests it can also help mental health – https://theconversation.com/pretend-play-is-a-magical-part-of-childhood-new-research-suggests-it-can-also-help-mental-health-281121

Tinkering with the capital gains tax discount isn’t enough. Here’s why it needs to go

By -

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Evans, Emeritus Professor, School of Accounting, Auditing and Taxation, UNSW Sydney

It looks increasingly likely Treasurer Jim Chalmers will make changes to the capital gains tax (CGT) discount in the federal budget in May.

Under the current system, a person who has held an asset for at least 12 months receives a 50% reduction in the capital gains tax bill they would otherwise pay when they sell the asset, such as shares, real estate or crypto.

Reports suggest the discount may be cut to 33% or 25%, or that it might even be abolished entirely. This comes after a parliamentary committee found the 50% discount distorted investment decisions and skewed home ownership towards investors.

At the same time, there is speculation about some clawback on the generous negative gearing benefits that – together with the CGT discount – may have helped to turbocharge speculative investment in property and produced inflationary pressure on housing prices.

Why was the discount introduced and did it work?

The capital gains tax discount was introduced over a quarter of a century ago by then-Treasurer Peter Costello. The aims were to:

  • encourage investment (particularly in shares)
  • compensate for inflation and
  • improve international competitiveness to attract investors.

These were dubious aims and were never likely to be achieved. Instead, research over the past 25 years shows the discount has produced outcomes that substantially diverge from the original policy intent. The 50% discount rate introduced in 1999 has produced significant inequities, inefficiencies and revenue losses, while failing to meet the principles of a well-designed tax system.

The current CGT system was introduced by then Prime Minister John Howard and Treasurer Peter Costello in 1999. Paul Miller/AAP

In a nutshell, those are the three reasons the discount must be wound back at a minimum, if not entirely abolished: it is unfair, inefficient and too costly.

Why should it be wound back or abolished?

In terms of fairness, the discount promotes inter-generational inequity. Those at the top end of the income and wealth scales are far more likely to be older and to make large capital gains compared to those who are younger and who make much smaller, if any, capital gains.

There is also a problem with “horizontal equity”. People with income from different sources (earnings, business profits, rent, interest, capital gains) should pay the same amount of tax, no matter what the source of the income.

Currently, people with income from selling an asset (a capital gain) pay half the tax of people with salary or other income.

The discount is inefficient because it distorts investment decisions. People are more likely to invest in a safe asset such as an investment property where only half the gain is taxed rather than in a productive investment, such as a new business, where they face tax on the full amount.

Combined with negative gearing, these two tax breaks tilt the housing market significantly in favour of investors over owners, particularly first-home owners, according to the parliamentary committee report.

And, finally, we come to cost. The discount is one of the biggest giveaways in the budget, costing taxpayers up to A$23.7 billion a year.

A range of options for change

Clearly, a reduction in the amount of the discount – whether to 33% or 25% – is a step in the right direction. But all that does is tinker with the problem; it does not solve it.

The better option would be to abolish the discount entirely and replace it with the system that prevailed before 1999, when only the gain in the asset above inflation was taxed. Before 1999, house prices didn’t rise much more than inflation. After the tax change, house prices surged as investors moved into the housing market and pushed prices up.

But that may still be too generous. After all, we don’t inflation-proof any other parts of the tax system, so why should we give preferential treatment to capital gains? This is most starkly seen in the way inflation is allowed to steadily erode the value of the income tax-free threshold (so-called “bracket creep”).

Another option might be to adopt the solution that prevails in many other countries and simply provide an annual exempt amount. This would be like a tax-free threshold, but specifically for capital gains. This exempt amount might be something like $10,000 per individual, regardless of the size of the capital gain.

Are transitional measures needed?

One of the main problems that will arise if changes are made to the CGT discount is the complaining that will inevitably occur if the government seeks to reduce or abolish it. Taxpayers, and particularly the well-heeled, are very vociferous when losing a long-enjoyed perk.

An immediate reduction or withdrawal might also cause unintended consequences. If a limited grace period is offered before the change takes effect, the market may be flooded with properties that investors are attempting to sell to take advantage of the 50% discount.

By the same token, if existing property investors are allowed to keep the full discount as long as they own the property (in other words their property is “grandfathered”) then they may decide never to sell.

Neither outcome is desirable and so some transitional messiness may be inevitable and worthwhile in order to remove an unfair, inefficient and costly aberration in the Australian tax system.

Perhaps the most sensible compromise may be to phase out the discount over a number of years, reducing it to 33% in, say, July 2027, 25% in July 2028, 10% in July 2029 and finally removing it completely in July 2030.

In that way, the perverse outcomes of a sudden change are carefully neutralised. Property investors will make decisions over time based on rational economic drivers, rather than allowing tax factors to determine the outcomes. The tax tail should never be allowed to wag the commercial dog.

– ref. Tinkering with the capital gains tax discount isn’t enough. Here’s why it needs to go – https://theconversation.com/tinkering-with-the-capital-gains-tax-discount-isnt-enough-heres-why-it-needs-to-go-280577

Australian company plans $3b lignite-to-fertiliser plant in Southland

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

File photo. The company says it could deliver 1.5 million tonnes a year of urea fertiliser. 123RF

An Australian-led project could see Southland’s lignite, or brown coal, reserves developed into urea fertiliser.

Victorian Hydrogen is proposing a $3 billion plant to be located 30km northeast of Invercargill.

The company says it could deliver 1.5 million tonnes a year of urea fertiliser, making New Zealand’s agricultural sector fully self sufficient.

Urea created using natural gas is by far the most widely traded fertiliser in the world, and while New Zealand produces some locally, the bulk is imported.

Victorian Hydrogen’s plan would involve building a facility that can turn the Southland lignite into gas that can then be transformed into urea.

Executive director Allan Blood said it was a proven technology that was already being used in a new plant commissioned in Zambia in late 2025.

Blood expected the project, which would not involve accquiring farms, would seek fast track consenting approval.

He said environmental managment would be central to the project’s design and the company was committed to mitigating greenhouse gas impacts before the projects proceeded.

Former government owned company Solid Energy investigated a similar lignite-to-gas plan in Southland but dropped the idea in 2013.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Person dies in SH1 crash, section of highway closed in Waikato

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

One person died and a second person was seriously injured. RNZ / Kim Baker Wilson

One person has died in a crash in south Waikato.

Emergency services arrived about 11.20pm after two vehicles crashed on State Highway 1 near Humphrey Road.

The person was pronounced dead at the scene.

Another person was taken to hospital with serious injuries.

State Highway 1 was closed between State Highway 30 (Ongaroto Rd) and State Highway 30 (Upper Atiamuri) while the Serious Crash Unit investigates.

Police advised motorists to avoid the area and expect delays.

State Highway 1 was closed between State Highway 30 (Ongaroto Rd) and State Highway 30 (Upper Atiamuri). Waka Kotahi / NZTA

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Football Ferns rise in rankings after World Cup qualification

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Rebekah Stott of New Zealand runs in to congratulate Katie Kitching of New Zealand on her goal, New Zealand Football Ferns v Papua New Guinea, Final of OFC Qualifiers, 2026. Andrew Cornaga/www.photosport.nz

The Football Ferns are up two spots to number 33 in the latest women’s world football rankings.

Last week the Ferns qualified for the 2027 FIFA World Cup by winning the Oceania series.

Papua New Guinea, who were the beaten finalists, are the next best ranked team in Oceania at number 57.

The biggest climber in the rankings, which haven’t been updated since December, was American Samoa who are up 17 places to 120.

There is no change at the top of the rankings with Spain number one from the USA and England, who move up one from fourth replacing Germany.

The rest of the top ten is Japan, Brazil, France, Sweden, Canada and the Netherlands.

A team have bowed out of the standings, with the British Virgin Islands no longer featuring.

The Concacaf minnows relinquish their place after having gone four years without a fixture, bringing the pool down to 197 teams.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

NZ Post concerned for Philip Sutton, employee missing since Wellington storm

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Missing man Philip Sutton NZ Police/Supplied

NZ Post is supporting its staff who are coping with the disappearance of one of their colleagues in this week’s flooding in Wellington.

Chief operating officer Brendon Main has confirmed Philip Sutton, who has been missing since Monday after floodwaters surged through a South Karori Road address, is a staff member.

NZ Post has also extended its sympathy to the family and loved ones of the missing employee.

“We are very sad to confirm that a NZ Post team member has been reported missing in Wellington following the recent flooding,” Main said.

“Our thoughts are with our colleague, their family, friends and loved ones in this very difficult situation. We are also supporting our team in Wellington.”

As the search for Sutton was continuing, NZ Post would not comment further, Main said.

Flash flooding heavily damaged the studio where Philip Sutton was staying. Samuel Rillstone

Police plan to resume the search on Wednesday after efforts yesterday were suspended due to safety concerns.

Officers will be joined by canyon search and rescue, the dive squad, search dogs and drones when they scour the small, semi-rural valley.

It is clogged with silt, fallen trees and debris.

Police are urging the public not to take matters into their own hands after a social media post called for volunteers to help find Sutton, who is in his sixties.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Weather: Localised flooding, high river levels across lower North Island

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Flooded Ruamahanga River, taken from hillside at Morisons Bush looking down on the South Wairarapa. Pockets of native bush and windbreaks are now islands among flooded paddocks. Mike Laven

River levels have been dropping in Tararua District since an emergency mobile alert was issued over the threat from the Wainui River, upstream from Herbertville.

Civil Defence Manawatū Whanganui said the alert stopped broadcasting just after 3.30am on Wednesday.

Also overnight the Moutoa floodgates, between Foxton and Shannon, were opened after levels in the Manawatū River got high enough just after 2am.

Carterton’s mayor said on Tuesday night a handful of homes were evacuated in Gladstone as a precaution due to rising levels in the Tauweru River.

In Hawke’s Bay, Civil Defence said overnight emergency crews were on the ground supporting people and properties caught in localised flooding in parts of Hastings District.

North of Wellington, State Highway 2 at Remutaka Hill was reopened.

Repair works after a washout forced the road to shut have been completed.

But NZTA warns that river levels at Ruamahanga River are still high.

State Highway 53 at Waihenga Bridge remains closed.

Torrential rain over the weekend caused flooding and damage to parts of the lower North Island.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Explainer: Why do we commemorate Anzac Day?

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

On 25 April each year, New Zealanders at home and around the world mark Anzac Day. The date marks the first big military action by Australian and New Zealand soldiers in Gallipoli in 1915.

From dawn services to parades and ceremonies at RSAs, people will gather to reflect on the atrocities of war, remember those who died, and honour the contributions of returned service personnel.

But how did Anzac Day come to be?

Soldiers landing horses at Gallipoli, 1915.

Supplied / Alexander Turnbull Library

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

The long goodbye: ‘I’m not sure what love looks like now’

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

It’s the laughter that surprises you. Rumblings of mirth that move around the table as an anecdote unfolds. A woman is telling a story about how her husband asked their doctor to prescribe him cayenne pepper. He had watched an AI-generated YouTube video and was convinced the pepper had health benefits. He asked the doctor to take him off all his medications and instead give him a teaspoon of cayenne pepper every day.

Another woman says her husband has lost most of his words. “But he can still say two things very clearly: ‘chocolate biscuits’ and ‘bloody hell’.”

Other stories have become legendary: the one about the man who swapped his leather coat for a grubby high viz jacket worn by a roadworker after the roadworker admired the coat. Or the man who buried a freshly cooked casserole in the garden before guests arrived.

Robyn Riddle who runs the dementia support group in Hamilton.

Venetia Sherson

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Ōwhiro Bay man believes family ‘lucky not to die’ in terrifying flood

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Less than 48 hours after a terrifying escape in the dead of night reality is starting to bite for a flood-hit family in Ōwhiro Bay.

The Wellington south coast suburb was among the worst hit in a thunderstorm overnight on Monday, that saw flash-flooding in low-lying homes while people slept.

Barnaby Bocock back at his property in the daylight. RNZ / Mark Papalii

Wellington, Lower Hutt and Wairarapa remain under a state of emergency on Wednesday morning after Monday’s flash flooding.

Wellington City Council says it is dealing with about 20 homes that are uninhabitable.

Surveying the devastation caused by floodwaters that reached more than a metre-high inside his home, Barnaby Bocock just feels lucky the family made it out alive.

“I could just hear water, rain … So, I stood on the toilet in the ensuite and looked out the window and at that moment, water just started flowing.”

Items lying in the water at the home. RNZ / Mark Papalii

Waters ‘crazy loud, crazy fast’

The “crazy loud, crazy fast” water rose with dizzying speed leaving the family barely enough time to toss belongings onto beds and couches.

With pet rabbits held aloft, Bocock, his partner, and three teenage children forced their way through floating furniture and chest-deep water to the relative safety of Happy Valley Road.

The family spent a few minutes trying to lift smaller items up high. RNZ / Mark Papalii

It was just after 4am – only 10 minutes beforehand, they’d been asleep.

“It felt very isolated at the time,” Bocock said.

“And then, you see the whole area, and it’s like, ‘Oh no, we were lucky not to die’ … I find it odd to say that afterwards, but it’s like, ‘No, we were lucky not to die.’”

By Tuesday afternoon, the shock of getting out with little more than the clothes on his back was wearing off and the enormity of the clean-up loomed large.

A huge clean-up lies ahead. CHARLOTTE COOK / RNZ

Mud – 30cm deep – covers the paving around the house and inside Bocock showed RNZ the mess which was overwhelming.

Laptops, bed linen, kitchen and bathroom paraphenalia were scattered everywhere and furniture, lifted and shifted by the water, was in incongruous places.

Bocock said an artbook collection which was the culmination of decades of work wasn’t spared and neither were photographs.

“We chucked stuff on the bed. These are my photo albums from high school and university. They’re just destroyed.”

Mud and debris surrounds Barnaby Bocock’s family home in the Wellington south coast suburb Ōwhiro Bay hit by flash flooding after torrential rain on Monday. RNZ / Mark Papalii

The high-water mark – a line of debris about a metre off the ground – delineated what could be kept and what was likely a write-off.

And it was starting to smell.

“I just don’t know where to start.”

Bocock’s sister Lucy Pope was helping him figure out where to begin.

But she said they still had more questions than answers, such as where to dump ruined furniture and mud.

“It’s a disaster zone to be honest. My brother did paving out here … what do we do with all this silt? What a shitshow.”

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Funding falls short as father tries to get a lift for his disabled daughter

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

The stairs that Dinson Thomas has to carry his daughter up in order to get inside their home. SUPPLIED

A dad who has been lifting his teenage daughter from her wheelchair up the stairs to their front door says the funding for a lift to their house falls short of the expected cost and the project is on hold.

The Thomas family live on a steep section in Newlands, Wellington, with seven steps to their front door.

Dinson Thomas said they park the car near the steps and he then carries his 13 year-old daughter, who weighs close to 40 kilograms and has cerebral palsy and complex needs, into the house.

“It’s really hard…and it’s not for a short time, it’s a long time because they stopped the work and I don’t have any other options. She needs access to the house right, that’s the only way she can come inside the house now.”

They bought the house when their daughter was three and carrying her was much easier.

Thomas said he recently had a close call, slipping on the stairs and falling while carrying her.

“When I carry her up the steps she just moves around, when I’m holding her then I lost my balance. It’s really scary it’s a safety thing right, it’s health and safety.”

He said he received the maximum funding to have a platform lift installed at their back steps, just over $15,000, through Disability Support Services (DSS).

Enable provides equipment and oversees installation within the funding criteria set by DSS.

Correspondence between Thomas and Enable shows the work started last February but a month later Thomas was advised the quote came in close to $4000 over the funding – long story short, Thomas put the work on hold till March this year because he could not afford that at the time.

The back door of their home where the lift was supposed to be installed. SUPPLIED

The quote had lapsed in that time and came in another $2200 over, bringing Thomas’ contribution close to $6200.

The lift is still not built.

It comes as Carers NZ prepares to release its second annual survey of 17,000 people who care for disabled, sick of injured family members or friends, which shows a third had cut back on food or heating to make ends meet.

Carers NZ chief executive Laurie Hilsgen said it can be very expensive installing a lift and not all households can afford to pay thousands.

“For some people just paying for it is their solution but not everyone can do that so it is an equity issue. It’s not fair that some are asked to pay and others just wait and wait and wait and don’t have the money to pay and what you’ve got is people who have needs who aren’t being as well supported as they should be.”

Carers NZ has released a snapshot of its second annual survey to RNZ, showing 31 percent are struggling to make ends meet and 16 percent are in debt because of caring.

It also shows 37 percent had been injured while caring for a loved one.

Hilsgen said she has great sympathy for the Thomas family’s situation.

“That’s a big ask to carry someone up and down the stairs. We have a public health system in New Zealand, we have an ACC injury prevention scheme, there should be mechanisms in place so we do not rely on people to do that level of physical effort. It’s probably unsafe for both of them.”

DSS acting general manager for commissioning and funding, Michael Hiscox, said disabled people who need support to live in their own home may be eligible for funding to get free or subsidised equipment or modifications.

“When people need to access funding for housing modifications, an equipment and modification service qualified housing assessor will work with the family or individual to look at the modifications that will best suit their needs and whether they are eligible for funding through DSS.”

He said depending on a disabled person’s individual situation, DSS may be able to pay the full cost or a contribution, meaning some of the cost would need to be covered by the household.

“We acknowledge this is a difficult situation for Mr Thomas and his whānau.”

Thomas raised his concerns about the costs he would need to cover with the Health and Disability Commissioner, who asked Enable to respond.

In a letter to Thomas, Enable’s chief operating officer Jane Wenman acknowledged his concerns regarding the cost contribution required for the remaining work on the lift, in particular the $2200 dollar increase above the close to $4000 – and said the contractor had agreed to soak up the $2200, leaving $4000 for Thomas to pay.

“Following receipt of your recent correspondence, we undertook further review and discussion with the contractor. Through this process, the contractor identified that the original quote had omitted some necessary components,” Wenman said.

“We have agreed that this earlier omission will be absorbed by the contractor and will not be passed on to you. Therefore, the cost contribution will return to the $3,945.75 as originally advised.”

But Thomas believed they should honour the original price given when work began, within the $15,000 funding limit.

“She can’t walk at any stage, she needs access to the house but she’s out. It’s totally unacceptable, they agreed to do something, they have to do that.”

Enable said it is reviewing its internal processes to understand how the work began before the full quote had been finalised, to ensure their expected standards are consistently met.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Survivor wants good character discounts scrapped from sex offender sentencing

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Ken Clearwater and Sam Troth. RNZ / Louis Dunham

A survivor of childhood sexual abuse is calling for good character discounts to be scrapped in sentencing sex offenders.

Sex offenders should not get credit for their supposed good character, Road to Healing Aotearoa director Sam Troth says.

Several Australian states have already changed sentencing laws to reflect that concern.

Troth had been collecting signatures for a petition calling for changes to New Zealand’s Sentencing Act. So far he had gathered about 8850.

The campaign had the support of Chief Victims Advisor Ruth Money and Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith said he was open to looking at possible reforms.

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith said he was open to looking at possible reforms. RNZ / Samuel Rillstone

Criminals can have their sentences reduced by up to 40 percent at present for mitigating factors, including previous good character.

But Troth said people abusing their positions of influence to groom victims should not then be entitled to credit for their character.

“Basically I see a huge issue in sentencing here in New Zealand for sexual violence – the sentences are not reflecting the severity of the crime,” he said.

“Some of those reasons are for discounts that are given at sentencing time and one of those – probably the most offensive discount of all – is this good character reference, where a victim or a survivor needs to listen to a judge taking into account that this person that did these horrific things to them is of good character and discounting their sentences, sometimes up to 20 percent, because of the said good character.

“An organisation in Australia made-up of advocates and survivors are doing some amazing work over there and I’m fortunate enough to have been able to reach out to them and sort of become the New Zealand ambassador for this and they’ve gotten it over the line in three states in Australia so far.”

Sam Troth. RNZ / Louis Dunham

The ACT, Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria had either changed sentencing law or were investigating potential changes so previous good character was not a mitigating factor for sex offenders.

Former deputy police commissioner Jevon McSkimming avoided jail last year for possessing child sexual exploitation and bestiality material after receiving a 50 percent discount, which included a discount for good character.

Former knight James Wallace received 89 letters of support that were an important consideration in a High Court judge sentencing him to only 28 months’ jail for sexually assaulting three young men and trying to pervert the course of justice.

Troth said those cases and others highlighted his concerns around so-called good character discounts.

In some cases the offender’s good character was the difference in them avoiding jail time, he said.

“Howard Temple from Gloriavale … sexually offended against … six survivors … over 20 years of sexual offending – he didn’t spend one day in prison,” Troth said.

“When we look at these cases, there is no justice and there’s no reflection of the severity of the crimes that these people are committing. So if we can make changes – small changes to things like character references – I think it’ll make a difference.”

Abuse survivor and advocate Ken Clearwater said he supported Troth’s petition.

“If you have a look at all the cases lately of people who are in positions of power getting good character references – it’s just absolutely appalling,” Clearwater said.

“You’re not a good character if you’re out raping women or children, or looking at child pornography.”

Abuse survivor and advocate Ken Clearwater. RNZ / Nate McKinnon

Survivors of childhood sexual abuse that went on to commit crime were often dealt harsher sentences than the people that abused them, Clearwater said.

“A lot of our guys have been through the boys’ homes, through the Catholic Church, have been in and out of prison and … they’re getting three to five years for burglary and the person that sexually violated them – who just happens to be a minister of a religion – because of good character in the past he’s getting 24 months and out in 18. So it’s really traumatising for those guys,” Clearwater said.

Chief Victims Advisor Ruth Money had advised the government to scrap good character discounts for child sex offenders.

However, she told RNZ she supported Troth’s call to go even further.

“I find good character references problematic for all offending,” Money said.

“Why I say that is that the court isn’t informed as to why the person actually wrote the reference. There’s no policing, so to speak, no due diligence over do they actually know why they are writing the letter and what it is all about.

“So I think that good character references and the way that they are submitted to the court makes no sense. It absolutely makes no sense and the court can’t base a safe sentencing decision based on a letter written by someone – allegedly written by someone even – that didn’t actually know why they were writing the reference in the first place.”

She was particularly concerned by people using positions of power to access and abuse children.

“We see time and time again … people using positions of good character to access their victim/survivors and certainly I have not met one person who believes that you are of good character if you are sexually assaulting children, which is why my advice is saying that there absolutely should not be good character discounts,” Money said.

Chief Victims Advisor Ruth Money. RNZ / Niva Chittock

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith said he would consider possible reforms.

“We are aware of concerns raised and will consider potential reform options as we progress through our busy justice work programme,” Goldsmith said.

“It is something I have discussed with Chief Victims Advisor Ruth Money.

“I’d note we’ve recently passed legislation that allows victims of sexual assault to have the final say over whether offenders receive permanent name suppression, as well as making stalking a criminal and jailable offence.”

Troth’s petition closes at the end of April.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Child Protection Investigation Unit struggles with agencies not sharing information

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

The Child Protection Investigation Unit has run into the same problem that contributed to the murder of five-year-old Malachi Subecz. Supplied

The country’s newest child abuse investigation unit has run into the same problem that contributed to the murder of five-year-old Malachi Subecz – agencies not sharing information with each other.

The Child Protection Investigation Unit was set up to look into serious harm to children who are in state care and identify systemic failures to fix systems and practices at Oranga Tamariki (OT).

It began its first inquiry a year ago and for at least the first three months lacked enough visibility to investigate properly.

“Due to limited visibility into the activities and operations of certain work groups, the unit is unable to investigate all the issues it is expected to address,” said a report newly released to RNZ.

“This lack of oversight compromises our ability to fulfil our strategic objectives.”

The unit reports to the OT chief executive.

It had so far completed three investigations, while two others awaited sign-off and 15 others were on the go as of the end of February.

RNZ obtained the 10-person unit’s monthly status reports through the Official Information Act (OIA). Its individual investigation reports are not made public and even their titles were blanked out of the OIA.

The status reports from July to February this year repeatedly raised an issue of “high severity” with a risk level that remained “high” even after mitigations.

“There are systemic issues that are preventing cases from progressing as expected,” they said again and again.

“These delays have impacts on progressing cases.”

Earlier this year, a coroner said changes made by relevant government agencies since Malachi’s death were “not sufficient to reduce the likelihood of further deaths occurring in similar circumstances”. Supplied

The September report spelled it out. “We are currently experiencing delays progressing some of the cases due to issues with information sharing.

“If the unit fails to deliver timely or meaningful reports their recommendations may not have a positive impact,” it added.

The consequences were “reputational damage to the organisation or team and/or lost opportunities and/or delays” as well as “staff frustration, due to inefficiencies, unclear priorities, or increased workload”.

The October report said, “This continues to be a live issue.”

In February, “This is still being worked through.”

Elsewhere the reports said the delays increased the risk the unit would fail to put out investigation reports on time, or meaningful ones, so “their recommendations may not have a positive impact”. The investigations manager was in charge of quality and timing.

It was one of four matters arising out of its three completed investigations – “issues with information sharing between both government agencies and NGOs cause delays and compromise accuracy in risk assessments”.

The unit began recruiting from late 2024. It was set up to improve safety of children Oranga Tamariki was involved with, and was independent of the Children Ministry’s day-to-day operations.

However, the status reports showed its struggles.

“The unit currently lacks visibility into the activities and operations of certain work groups where we should be exercising oversight of serious cases and concerns,” its status reports said in July, August and September.

The unit’s directer Peter Douglas told RNZ the lack of visibility was fixed in October.

He said an information-sharing protocol had been drafted and was currently being reviewed.

“This protocol will ensure appropriate information sharing with partner agencies.”

The unit’s brief included cutting down on “systemic failures” highlighted by the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State Care.

The failure of information-sharing by agencies was one of five critical gaps identified in the 2022 investigation into agencies’ interactions over Malachi Subecz.

“Everyone has a piece of the jigsaw but no one has the full picture,” wrote Dame Karen Poutasi in that inquiry.

Dame Karen Poutasi in 2022. RNZ / Angus Dreaver

She made two recommendations aimed to turn this around.

One of the new investigation unit’s first recommendations picked up on that: “Dame Karen Poutasi’s recommendation relating to information sharing across child protection agencies is progressed,” said the recommendation.

Work was going on into that this year. The other two recommendations were mandatory clinical supervision for all front-line OT staff; and training in “critical analysis”.

The government did not accept all 14 of Poutasi’s recommendations until last October. By then, only a couple had been completed.

A coroner in February this year said, “Changes made by relevant government agencies since Malachi’s death are important, but not sufficient to reduce the likelihood of further deaths occurring in similar circumstances in the future.”

The new investigation unit’s status reports showed in October it was trying to draft an information-sharing agreement. Its investigators, advisors and managers had meetings with social workers, Police, the Ministry of Social Development, youth justice facility managers and non-government organisations.

In January Oranga Tamariki set up a multi-agency hub in January connecting it, Police, Corrections, the Education Ministry and Health NZ. In February the hub began reporting any tamariki whose sole parent was remanded in custody or imprisoned, setting a 48-hour clock ticking for the hub to share all information the various agencies held on the child.

The independent Children’s Monitor Aroturuki Tamariki was pleased to see the hub but added its concern “if the hub is not sufficiently resourced”.

As well as individual investigations, the unit continued to do three wider reviews, one into deaths of children known to the ministry between January 2023 and June 2025; another of youth homicide in the year prior to October 2025 that had completed a “thematic review of the 13 young people’s lives”; and the third into complaints by children in care and protection or youth justice facilities.

The three individual investigations it had finished in its first year found four main issues:

  • Frontline social workers needed ongoing professional development and training on topics such as sudden unexpected death in infancy (SUDI) and critical risk analysis;
  • They needed regular external clinical supervision to support their welfare;
  • Sustained high workloads could undermine effective decision-making and staff wellbeing;
  • Info-sharing problems could delay and compromise risk assessments.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Why sharemarkets are still hitting records – and why NZ’s left out

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Share markets around the world have hit records this week. 123RF

Share markets around the world have hit records this week, undeterred by war, rising interest rates and pressure on fuel supplies.

The S&P500 and Nasdaq have been hovering around all-time highs, the FTSE 100 is not far off its February record, and the Russell 2000 is at a high.

Almost all global sharemarkets are looking exceptionally healthy, given the geopolitical tension – with the notable exception of New Zealand’s.

So what is going on?

Koura founder Rupert Carlyon said markets were having a great time, despite the upheaval happening around the world.

“I think there are a couple of things going on.

“One is the US economy. That continues to be stronger than anticipated. I think there is continued belief that the US economy is strong. There is not any sign of recession in the short term.

Rupert Carlyon, founder of Koura KiwiSaver. Supplied

“That continues to help … over the last four years we seem to be consistently oscillating between is the economy about to take a dive or not. But with the tax refunds that have come out of the US people are expecting actually that we could see another acceleration in the economy.

“The other piece is that we like tech again. We didn’t like tech two or three months ago. The big tech names and the AI names, I think we’re starting to see with Claude and others a massive realisation and recognition of what these tools are going to do and what they can do.

“Microsoft is up 15 percent in the last couple of weeks. We’re just starting to see that come through again … all of a sudden the worst case scenarios around oil and energy aren’t quite coming rue and we’ve got good news around tech in the economy which is driving things higher as well.”

Generate investment specialist Greg Smith said markets in Europe and Asia were doing well, too.

Generate investment specialist Greg Smith. Supplied / Generate

“Equity markets are looking through the current tensions, to a de-escalation and looking through to the broader resilience of the economy. The US earnings season has got off to a pretty good start. There’s still plenty of optimism around the growth that AI and tech-related companies are delivering.”

He said the resilience of equity markets was notably different from what had been seen in commodity markets, particularly oil. “Oil has had huge volatility and has been up as much as 80 percent. It’s been down, it’s been up, it’s been down … it’s been up again with the latest deadline approaching.”

He said equity markets seemed to have a glass half full approach while bond markets were taking a half-empty stance. “They’re more focused on the long-term inflationary outcomes.”

He said things could change if the conflict in the Middle East dragged on.

“Equity markets will probably reprice it more if the conflict is a longer lasting one … but overall the equity market is pretty resilient.”

Mike Taylor, founder of Pie Funds, said he thought market participants put a lot on hedging through March.

Mike Taylor, founder of Pie Funds. Supplied / Pie Funds

“Then as oil prices didn’t move to the worst case scenario and the S&P500 rallied, those shorts had to be covered, which has caused the market to rally like a home-sick angel.

“I agree that it does seem odd give that inflation is higher and growth is lower as a result of the war, but you could have said the same after the tariffs.”

But what about NZ?

New Zealand is a notable underperformer.

Carlyon said the country’s economy was highly leveraged to interest rates.

“Whether that be because they’ve got the dividends … the utilities are kind of largely there for dividends, and then we’ve got the property companies all there for the dividends. We’ve got a very weak property market which also relates to it.

“The third thing impacting the New Zealand market right now is there is a lot of nervousness around the gentailers and what happens there. They make up a big chunk of our market.

“If you think about what’s working off shore at the moment, it’s technology, defence and energy. The only thing we’ve got out of those three is clean energy. Bu that’s actually domestic electricity and that’s got a whole lot of regulatory risk floating around it.

“There is probably a strong argument that the politicians cannot let electricity prices get much higher before they are going to have to intervene so that … caps the upside for those gentailers.”

Smith agreed New Zealand had not yet caught up. “We’re around 6 percent from the record highs we saw in January.

“We were quite different economically. We’re running below par growth and were just coming into a mini recovery as the conflict hit. We haven’t [got] the same tech exposure in our markets and we’re a net importer of oi l… There’s economic headwinds there.

“I think if our economy can get going, if we see a relatively short war and if the conflict sort of comes to its conclusion in the coming weeks, then maybe New Zealand can get by without rate hikes. I think that will help the picture a lot.”

Sign up for Money with Susan Edmunds, a weekly newsletter covering all the things that affect how we make, spend and invest money.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Six ways your smartwatch is lying to you, according to science

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

You check your smartwatch after a run. Your fitness score has dropped. You’ve burnt hardly any calories. Your recovery score is really low. It’s telling you to take the next 72 hours off exercise.

The worst bit? The whole run felt amazing.

So why’s your watch telling you the opposite?

Ultimately, it’s because smartwatches and other fitness trackers aren’t always accurate.

Smartwatches and other fitness trackers aren’t always accurate.

Unsplash

Polytechnics to carry hundreds of unfunded students that subsidies won’t cover

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Some polytechnics will carry hundreds of unfunded students. 123RF

Some newly-independent polytechnics will carry hundreds of unfunded students as they enrol more than the Tertiary Education Commission can subsidise.

The Tertiary Education Union warns it is happening after extensive cuts and staff across the sector are stretched and stressed.

Eleven institutes left super institute Te Pūkenga and became stand-alone entities at the start of this year though two, Manukau Institute of Technology (MIT) and Unitec, were considered one organisation under a single governing council.

They told RNZ they were forecasting financial surpluses this year and most reported enrolments similar to the same time last year.

Several including EIT and the Open Polytechnic said total enrolments for the year were expected to exceed the number the commission had agreed to fund but they had approval to enrol un-subsidised students.

Universities reported a similar situation last month.

Meanwhile Te Pūkenga said enrolments were down six percent across the four institutes remaining within the organisation and it had budgeted for a $16-million deficit.

It said enrolments at Northtec and Western Institute of Technology at Taranak (WITT) were about the same as last year, but enrolments at Whitireia and Weltec were down eight percent, and Tai Poutini on the West Coast of the South Island had fewer than 100 students.

Tertiary Education Union national secretary Amy Ross said its members reported high workloads.

“Ultimately, our polytech members are feeling extremely under the pump. There is a crisis in terms of staffing in many areas because they’re being asked to do more with a lot less in many situations and they’re exhausted, the constant restructure and change has been incredibly debilitating for members,” she said.

Tertiary Education Union national secretary Amy Ross. Supplied / TEU

Ross said the institutes were under pressure from the Tertiary Education Commission and government which expected them to run like a business.

She said carrying unfunded enrolments put more pressure on staff.

“It means bigger class sizes because there’s no accompanying funding to get more staffing, which puts our members under huge pressure,” she said.

“There’s no extra pastoral care, learning support staff, any of the structures put in place because they’re not funded.”

Ross said no staff felt safe in their jobs because of recent cuts at polytechnics.

EIT balancing enrolments

The Eastern Institute of Technology, EIT, forecast one of the highest levels of un-subsidised enrolments.

It had 2444 domestic equivalent full-time students (EFTS) to date and expected to exceed the number of enroments agreed with the Tertiary Education Commission (TEC) by about 10 percent which would give it 210 unfunded EFTS.

It said enrolments at degree level and above had increased and enrolments in level 1-2 certificates had fallen.

EIT chief executive Lucy Laitinen said unfunded enrolments created a dilemma for the organisation.

“We don’t want to turn away students. So as much as we can, we try to bring students in anyway and we effectively just absorb the costs,” she said.

“But in terms of what hits the bottom line, that’s the equivalent of about $2.2 million of funding that we’re not receiving. So we have to weigh up all the time ‘can we afford to absorb those extra costs’.”

The situation was complicated by the fact students in degrees would be enrolled at the institute for three years, creating the risk that it would have to carry unfunded students for multiple years.

Laitinen said EIT talked regularly to TEC about the issue.

“They know that our demand’s well above what our allocation is and we think that we’ve got a special case to plead there too considering that we’ve had quite a bounce back now since Cyclone Gabrielle,” she said.

However, the commission did not have any extra funding.

“They’ve made it clear there’s no new funding, but if there are other institutions that are not using up their allocations, there may be an argument, I guess, to shift funding. We’d definitely have our hands up for that,” she said.

EIT chief executive Lucy Laitinen. Supplied

EIT had 459 international EFTS, some at a campus in Auckland, and further students enrolled in partnership with two Chinese universities.

Other institutes reported enrolments similar to the same time last year though several did not indicate whether they expected to exceed agreed enrolments or carry unfunded domestic students.

The Open Polytechnic said it had 5194 domestic EFTS at the start of April.

It expected all its non-degree enrolments would be subsidised by the commission, but it expected to exceed agreed enrolments at degree level and above by six percent with four percent unfunded.

MIT and Unitec in Auckland had 3449 and 3291 domestic students respectively and a further 407 international students at MIT and 1026 at Unitec.

Waikato institute Wintec said it had 3047 domestic EFTS and 718 internationals.

It said its new enrolments were up six percent on the same time last year with more school-leavers and more enrolments in Māori and Pacific Trades Training.

Toi Ohomai, the institute covering Bay of Plenty and South Waikato said it had 3107 domestic EFTS, 2.2 percent more than the same time last yaer with approval to enrol to 113 percent of its agreed EFTS at diploma and degree level giving it about 100 unfunded EFTS.

It expected to enrol to 102 percent at qualification level 3-7 (certificate and diploma), all of which would be funded.

Toi Ohomai also had 453 international EFTS.

Lower North Island institute Universal College of Learning (UCOL) said it had 2149 domestic EFTS, more than the same time last year, and 137 international EFTS.

It said it was on track to meet its funded targets and had no planned unfunded enrolments.

Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology (NMIT) said its 1701 domestic EFTS was very close to the same time last year and it had a further 232 international EFTS.

Ara in Canterbury said it had 5602 domestic EFTS and 451 internationals. It expected to exceed its agreed domestic enrolments by three percent.

“The extent to which any EFTS may be unfunded is still being assessed,” it said.

Otago Polytehnic had 3784 domestic EFTS, four percent more than the same time last year and 113 international EFTS with a further 367 at its campus in Auckland.

Southern Institute of Technology (SIT) said it had 2685 EFTS, about the same as at the same time last year, and 225 international EFTS.

It was aiming to enrol to 102 percent of its agreed domestic students, all funded by the government, with a budgeted surplus of $660,000.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

‘Another level of worrying’: Violent attacks being planned and filmed for online content

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Police are investigating at least five assaults across Auckland over a one month-period. RNZ / REECE BAKER

Police are investigating at least five assaults across Auckland over a month-period, all involving teenage offenders and victims – with a couple that were filmed and circulated online.

Some of the attacks happened in public places where a group of young people reportedly targeted a single victim.

Police said while there was no immediate data to suggest an increase in this type of offending, they were concerned.

“We are aware of footage circulating online of at least two recent incidents in different parts of Auckland,” said Inspector Jacqui Whittaker.

“These videos certainly amplify the impact of this violence and can make it feel more prevalent to the wider community.”

Do you know more? Email lucy.xia@rnz.co.nz

In mid-March, a group of teenagers assaulted another teenager at a beach in Devonport.

Police said they had spoken to three young people – one had been referred to Youth Aid Services and another two would appear in youth court later this month, charged with assault with intent to injure.

They were still working to identify others involved.

Police said the incident was filmed and uploaded to social media.

“We have always encouraged people not to share these videos wider, potentially removing any notoriety that might be associated with it,” Whittaker said.

Last week, police received a report of a group of young people assaulting another young person outside an eatery on Whangaparaoa Road in Stanmore Bay.

Police said they attended at the time and spoke with a number of those present.

“Since then, Police have exhausted all lines of enquiry and at this stage the matter has been filed”.

They said they remained open to looking into new lines of enquiry should those come to light.

Meanwhile, Police were also investigating an assault in Mount Roskill on 27 March, when a teenage boy was beaten up outside his home around 11.30pm.

The boy was taken to hospital for treatment of his injuries.

RNZ understands that the teenager was lured out of his home and surprise-attacked by others who were hiding nearby.

Police said an investigation was ongoing and no arrests had been made yet.

On the same night of the Mount Roskill assault, a party in Mount Albert’s Phyllis Street turned into a violent brawl that resulted in several people injured.

Police said a car had been driven at partygoers, and there were reports of machetes being involved.

Police said the incident was filmed and also circulated online.

A 17-year-old male was arrested and had appeared in Youth Court, and police continue to seek others involved.

He has been charged with wounding, aggravated assault, unlawfully taking a motor vehicle and driving without a license.

In a disorder incident in Takanini on 2 April – involving a mix of teenagers and adults – police said they were also investigating reports that suggested a vehicle was driven at a group in a dangerous manner.

One person was hospitalised with moderate injuries and two others also suffered minor injuries.

Police said a person was arrested, and later released without charge.

“Enquiries are ongoing to establish the exact circumstances surrounding the incident, which includes reviewing CCTV footage,” said police.

Netsafe noticing ‘staged’ videos of violent assaults

Netsafe chief online safety officer Sean Lyons. RNZ

Without referring to specific cases, Netsafe’s chief online safety officer Sean Lyons said he was aware of violent videos that look like they were made to get clicks online, that had been appearing in recent years.

Lyons said the sharing of filmed violent content had always been a problem, however whereas in the past they were mostly opportunistic filming by people who happened to be there, Lyons said he was noticing nowadays videos that appeared to be made to be shared.

“At times we see things that appear to me more synthesised if you like – so maybe more planned in their nature, and at times that can look like people are instigating a violent attack in order to record it … I can hardly believe I’m saying that, but in terms of the staged or the artificial nature of what’s going on, we certainly see that from time to time,” he said.

“There’s definitely some changing nature of what’s been going on … if anybody’s engineering this kind of thing, if it’s being seen as ‘content’, then that has to be, it’s another level of worrying,” he added.

Lyons said it was unfortunate that some people saw violence as a type of ‘content’ and felt that they could build a reputation by sharing it.

He said the videos could have broad-ranging harmful impacts – on the victims of harm and ridicule, and the potenital to trigger copycat behaviour or vigilante action.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Benefit warning for KiwiSaver withdrawals

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

In March, there was more than $49 million withdrawn from KiwiSaver for financial hardship reasons, by 5610 people. RNZ / Quin Tauetau

People receiving a benefit may not realise the impact a KiwiSaver hardship withdrawal could have on their entitlements, one provider says.

Graham Allpress, group general manager of client service delivery at the Ministry of Social Development, said every situation would be different but anyone who was thinking about making a KiwiSaver withdrawal should check to understand how it could affect their benefit payments.

In March, there was more than $49 million withdrawn from KiwiSaver for financial hardship reasons, by 5610 people.

Both the number of people withdrawing and the total amount were higher than in March 2025.

There were more than 60,000 hardship withdrawals in the year to March, about three times the typical pre-pandemic rates.

Allpress said a one-off KiwiSaver withdrawal would not generally be considered income for benefit purposes.

“However, if a person made periodical withdrawals from their KiwiSaver due to hardship, for example, every three months, such payments could potentially be considered income for benefit purposes.

“Under the Social Security Act 2018, a person’s income includes any periodical payments made to the person from any source and used by them for income-related purposes whether or not the payments are capital.

“The withdrawn amount will also be considered a cash asset, which may affect benefits such as Accommodation Supplement or Temporary Additional Support.

“The amount someone can withdraw before it impacts their payments will depend on any income they are also receiving from other sources and any cash assets they already have.”

Ana-Marie Lockyer said the rules could catch people out because they were not likely to be top of anyone’s mind when they were making a withdrawal decision.

“I looked into it and it isn’t a KiwiSaver-specific rule-it’s how the benefit system works. Once money is withdrawn from KiwiSaver, it’s treated like any other income or asset. The issue is that people don’t naturally think of their KiwiSaver that way, which is where the disconnect happens.

“Where it could become an issue is for people making regular or staged withdrawals, particularly if they’re also receiving accommodation support. What feels like a sensible way to manage their savings could unintentionally affect their entitlements. It’s a good reminder that decisions around KiwiSaver-especially withdrawals-don’t happen in isolation. Understanding the downstream impacts, including on benefits, is really important.”

Allpress said people should also contact MSD to see whether they could access any other help without needing to tap into their KiwiSaver accounts.

Sign up for Money with Susan Edmunds, a weekly newsletter covering all the things that affect how we make, spend and invest money.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Government’s plans for LNG terminal didn’t model international price spike

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

The government announced in February it would proceed with plans for a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import facility in Taranaki. RNZ

Modelling done for the government on its plans for an LNG terminal did not consider the effect of an international price spike, documents show.

A climate advocate said the decision not to model price volatility was “remarkable” and raised further questions about whether the planned facility was a good idea.

However, officials said although the current conflict in the Middle East had created volatility in LNG prices, longer-term price projections were still in line with the information the government based its decision on.

The government announced in February it would proceed with plans for a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import facility in Taranaki, with the billion-dollar plus cost paid for through an electricity levy.

The proposal, widely criticised at the time, has attracted renewed opposition after Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz prompted the price of fossil fuels – including LNG – to spike.

Gentailer chief executives expressed doubts at the energy sector’s conference last month, prompting Prime Minister Christopher Luxon to say the government would not proceed if the business case did not stack up.

The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) said in a statement last month that the LNG terminal was selected from a shortlist of five options that it considered “timely, feasible and of sufficient scale to meet dry year needs”.

It would also be beneficial to major industrial gas users, who had been forced to limit production or shut up shop altogether in recent years as domestic gas supply dwindled, the ministry said.

The announcement had already had an effect on the prices electricity suppliers were paying for supply later this year, MBIE said.

“While forward prices will move around in response to a range of factors, electricity forward prices dropped substantially in the weeks following the government’s LNG announcement.”

Documents released to RNZ under the Official Information Act outline how consultants contracted by the ministry modelled the effect of an LNG facility on New Zealand energy prices.

The variables they tested included whether two or three coal- and diesel-burning Rankine turbines at Huntly are working over winter, how fast future renewable generation is built, and whether a private joint venture to build gas storage beneath the Tariki gas field in Taranaki goes ahead.

The model tested various scenarios with two international LNG prices: $20 and $25 per gigajoule.

It did not look at any higher pricing.

“[This] modelling has not considered the potential impact of international fuel price volatility,” the document said.

Undertaken before the current fuel crisis, the modelling said that, at the moment, New Zealand’s electricity system was currently “relatively insulated” from international energy prices.

That had been beneficial when international prices, especially LNG, spiked during 2021 and 2023 – when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine affected supply.

International natural gas prices have now increased again, after Iran blocked the Strait of Hormuz, and Goldman Sachs recently said prices could increase by another 50 to 100 percent if the conflict with Israel and the US dragged on.

Lawyers for Climate Action executive director Jessica Palairet said the modelling reinforced “real questions about whether the LNG import facility is going to deliver”.

“The analysis did not consider the risk of international LNG price … which is quite remarkable.”

The model also assumed that supply of LNG would be unlimited and uninterrupted, an assumption that was being tested by the current situation, she said.

An MBIE spokesperson said the current conflict had created only “short-term volatility” in LNG markets,

“LNG futures prices for 2028/2029 remain consistent with the price assumptions that fed into earlier Cabinet analysis on LNG,” they said.

“Importantly, events in the Middle East do not impact the cost of the LNG import facility itself, nor the benefits of having reliable dry year cover in New Zealand.”

The modelling documents showed that having access to LNG had the greatest effect on New Zealand’s electricity system in scenarios where electricity demand was much greater than supply, the Tariki gas storage project did not go ahead, and LNG prices were low.

“If LNG is significantly higher priced than NZ gas, LNG will likely result in cost,” the documents said.

Savings were also much lower when supply and demand was in balance, and if there was additional gas storage available through Tariki – which emails between officials and consultants concluded would have a “high impact”.

An agreement to develop the Tariki project was signed by NZ Energy Corp and Genesis late last year, and early work has begun.

A Genesis spokesperson said there was no timeline yet for “this potential project”.

Significant parts of the documents were redacted, including the introductory pages of the final presentation outlining the results.

Jessica Palairet said what appeared to have been redacted was the full executive summary, including any conclusions the Concept Consulting consultants – who she said were “rell-regarded” – had drawn from the modelling.

“We don’t have the interpretation of the consultants of their own modelling, In some ways, they’re … the most important information in the entire analysis.”

“What’s been redacted appears to be what the modellers actually thought about their model.”

MBIE said those sections of the document, along with multiple smaller redactions, were held back to prevent the “free and frank exchange of opinions”.

Official Information laws allow for such redactions, provided that they are not outweighed by the public interest.

Palairet – who also received a redacted version of the same documents – said her organisation was challenging that decision with the Ombudsman.

“There’s a really strong public interest in releasing the full document. We’re talking about a huge expenditure in the middle of an energy crisis.”

RNZ has laid a separate complaint with the Ombudsman, asking for the redactions to be reconsidered.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Demand for AI-related skills has grown and older workers are acing the pivot

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

A wave of layoffs in the tech sector has been attributed to AI implementation. RNZ

A global report forecasts a wave of layoffs in the tech sector, attributed directly or indirectly to AI implementation and workflow automation, is expected to continue through to the end of the year.

The report estimates nearly 80,000 tech-sector jobs were lost world-wide since the beginning of the year, including 4450 in Australia.

“Automation, artificial intelligence integration, and sustained cost-discipline measures continue to drive much of the downsizing, with entire departments restructured or eliminated in favour of leaner, AI-assisted workflows,” United States-based personal finance and trading education platform RationalFX said.

Microsoft ANZ chief technology officer Sarah Carney said AI-related skills were in high demand, with LinkedIn, which was part of Microsoft, seeing a 300 percent increase in job ads emphasising AI skills.

Carney said Microsoft was working to address an industry shortage of skilled workers with 200,000 training opportunities in New Zealand, in addition to 100,000 previously announced.

“So 300,000 new AI skill sets in New Zealand, but really focused on how do we help people evolve skills for the work of tomorrow,” Carney said.

“We like looking at AI skills across the spectrum, and particularly for entry level skills. Because what we need to be thinking about is, how do we transform the workforce we have.

“We know that there will be changes to how people work. So now we need to actually think about how do we give them the skills for those new jobs that we see evolving, as they evolve.”

She said older people were in a strong position to make the most of AI tools.

More experienced workers were able to figure out faster how to make the most of AI than others who were born in the digital age and had little or no experience with analogue processes.

Carney said older people appeared to have little trouble adapting to AI.

She said younger people were experimenting with AI, while older workers were using it to best advantage.

“It turns out the older generation is actually really good at AI because they know what their job involves. They know where the value sits, and it’s really easy for them to offload things to AI — the admin, the pieces that they never loved doing but had to do, and they can find value in a fundamentally different way.”

A recent SEEK report also pointed to an increased demand for AI specialists.

“The demand for AI-related skills in job ads has more than quadrupled over the last decade,” the Seek AI Gauge report said.

The type of skills related to AI jobs included machine learning and large language models with the prevalence of terms related to Agentic AI and AI governance.

The SEEK report also said marketing and communications roles featuring AI terms had grown sharply in recent years.

“Despite this increase, the total number of ads asking for AI-related skills remains relatively small,” SEEK said.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Government finally to cover full cost of showering under home care program

By -

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

From October people will no longer have to pay to receive help with showering, dressing and support in managing continence, in changes to home care packages to be announced by Health Minister Mark Butler on Wednesday.

Under the aged care reform program brought in by the Albanese government, clinical care is free but showering and similar personal help fell into the category of services for which the person is charged a co-payment.

From the start, it was pointed out by stakeholders that showering is essential and should belong in the free category.

The government says in a statement, “The changes respond directly to feedback from older Australians, their families, advocates and providers, who have made it clear that these personal care services are essential for people’s independence and ability to stay at home”.

When he was asked on The Conversation podcast last year why showering wasn’t being entirely funded as a necessity, Aged Care Minister Sam Rae said: “We’ll be monitoring this very closely.

“We want to make sure that every single older person gets the care that they need and that they deserve. So there are very modest co-contributions associated with some services, such as showering, that we are asking people who have the means to contribute to, to do so.”

In the statement announcing the changes, Rae says:“Showering, dressing, continence care – these aren’t optional extras. They’re the basics of ageing with dignity, and no older Australian should miss out because of cost.

“Older Australians, their families and providers told us these services needed to be protected. We’ve listened, and we’re acting.

“As our population ages, we’ll keep doing the work to make sure the system is strong enough, and fair enough, to meet the moment.”

Butler will announce the cost of the aged care changes on Wednesday, when he appears at the National Press Club to outline the government’s overhaul of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

The NDIS changes are to cut the scheme’s unsustainable growth in cost and number of entrants. Currently the cost is growing at 10% annually, even after earlier reforms to rein it in. The government wants to cut this to 5% annually.

On Tuesday Treasurer Jim Chalmers met his state counterparts in a virtual conference for preliminary talks about managing the scheme. The states need to take extra responsibilities for disability services as the Commonwealth pulls back, but they have proved difficult to persuade.

Queensland has not signed up to the “Thriving Kids” program that followed earlier reforms to shift some of the burden for disability services to the states.

The states said after Tuesday’s discussion that they had been given little detail of the coming round of changes.

– ref. Government finally to cover full cost of showering under home care program – https://theconversation.com/government-finally-to-cover-full-cost-of-showering-under-home-care-program-281140

Politics with Michelle Grattan: former minister Ed Husic on why Labor must ‘stare down’ gas companies over tax

By -

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Next month’s federal budget is an even tighter balancing act than usual, with Treasurer Jim Chalmers facing global economic uncertainty, a fuel crisis and the need to juggle cost-of-living relief with combating inflation.

The government has been weighing up changes to negative gearing, capital gains tax, a gas export tax and cost-saving reforms to the National Disability Insurance Scheme. It is also facing calls to increase Australia’s sovereign capability to produce things locally, including more action to boost fuel security.

On this podcast we’re joined by former industry minister and outspoken Labor MP, Ed Husic.

On gas exports, Husic said the country is being sold short and that Australia should “stare down” arguments from the sector to avoid tax changes in the middle of the current crisis.

I think a compelling statistic [is] the Australia Institute believes $170 billion of LNG has been exported in four years, to which we’ve hardly received a skerrick of a royalty or PRRT [Petroleum Resource Rent Tax] revenue. How does that happen?

We should, with the natural benefit of our resources, that should confer on us economic, commercial advantage […] I just think we are selling the country short. And I think it’s good, finally, that we have had an open discussion about what is the best deal for the nation from the resources that we’ve have. Can we get an even better one? […] We have, I feel, seemingly opened the door to others to plunder our resources without us necessarily getting the best outcome.

Husic said he welcomes the current Senate inquiry on the taxation of gas resources and says the Albanese government shouldn’t be cowed by threats from multinational gas companies to invest elsewhere.

We should stare them down on that. It’s been done before. I’ll point out that then [Western Australian] premier Alan Carpenter, when he proposed a west coast gas reservation scheme, was told by some of the biggest players on the planet that they would not invest. And then they came back to the table. And I think the same approach should be used.

On artificial intelligence (AI), Husic said the government should be doing more to regulate and build trust in the technology now, rather than adopting a light-touch approach now and having to play catch-up later.

With a technology that promises to touch every part of our lives, I can’t see how we sustain a hands-off approach to regulation […] I think we need to have a thorough approach. It cannot be piecemeal. It cannot be based on lurching from one shock to another about what AI can do.

I very much leaned towards the establishment of a national AI Act that would spell out the type of risks we would be looking for, the type of approach to mitigate that risk, and to have a body that would be able to help us with that.

[…] We had an approach before on things like the NBN rollout: our predecessors messed around with that […] And we said: ‘do it once, do once with fibre, get it right, and get it done for the good of the country long term’. I adopt the same approach. Get this act done. Put the guard rails in place, get it all sorted out at once, and build confidence in the technology.

Husic, a Muslim and a consistent critic of Israel’s attacks on Gaza, said more should be done to combat Islamophobia, as well as antisemitism – and the Bondi royal commission should broaden its focus to include that.

I’ve spoken with Muslim Australians who want their concerns heard on this, and they have also voiced their concerns on this. And I’m just really uncomfortable with it: I genuinely hold the view that Islamophobia has kind of become a form of acceptable racism, and we need to deal with that.

[…] I think it’s within the ability of the royal commission to look at Islamophobia within the social cohesion element and to be able to recognise that. I think we should also, as a government, respond to the Human Rights Commission’s development of the anti-racism framework.

I think we should be responding to the special envoy’s report on Islamophobia. And I also think that we have made a commitment as a party that we would bring in anti-vilification laws that would, in part, give people protection from Islamophobic behaviour and attack, and we should be progressing that.

– ref. Politics with Michelle Grattan: former minister Ed Husic on why Labor must ‘stare down’ gas companies over tax – https://theconversation.com/politics-with-michelle-grattan-former-minister-ed-husic-on-why-labor-must-stare-down-gas-companies-over-tax-281124

Pukunui population climbs sharply after controversial 1080 drop on Stewart Island

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

A pair of pukunui. DOC

A controversial 1080 drop on Stewart Island has led to a 52 percent population boost for threatened Southern New Zealand dotterel/pukunui.

The birds, which only breed on Stewart Island / Rakiura, have been teetering on the brink of extinction, with 40 to 50 adult birds being killed by feral cats each year.

The population has now grown from 105 to 160, the largest increase since recovery efforts began 32 years ago.

The goal is to increase the population to 300 by 2035.

Department of Conservation Rakiura Operations Manager Jennifer Ross said the aerial drop of 1080 completed by DOC and Zero Invasive Predators made the difference.

“We managed to reduce feral cats to very low levels in the operational area. This protected adult birds while they nested and raised their chicks on the mountain tops.”

Ninety one out of 97 previously known adult birds survived along with 56 newly banded juveniles, one new adult, and five unbanded birds. As in previous years, 5 percent was added to account for birds that weren’t present during the count.

Year round trapping had failed to control feral cat numbers. DOC rangers have previously told RNZ an abundant rat population on the island meant rats stole trap baits before feral cats came across them.

The strategy to use 1080 was based on a “secondary kill” approach. Cats don’t eat the cereal 1080 baits, but rats do, and cats eat rats.

The 1080 operation, completed in August 2025 covered 40,000 hectares and included half the known pukunui breeding areas on the island, as well as surrounding forest, ahead of the breeding season.

No further aerial predator control operation is planned on Rakiura this year, and feral cats will continue to be closely monitored.

“The big question is how long it will take feral cats to reinvade pukunui breeding sites in the operational area,” Ross said.

A feral cat with a rat DOC / Department of Conservation

A member of the Ngāi Tahu leadership group involved in Predator Free Rakiura Dean Whaanga said the birds are far from safe.

Trail cameras have detected feral cats at the edges of the operational area, and they are present at breeding sites elsewhere on the island.

“It’s critical we continue to take action, not just for pukunui, but to uplift the mauri of Rakiura and enable other taonga species like kākāpō and tīeke to safely return,” he said.

Protest signs on Stewart Island RNZ / Mark Papalii

Opinions on the remote island were split about the 1080 drop, with some opposed to the poison.

There’s been subsequent concern after it was discovered white-tail deer on the island are more vulnerable to the toxin than expected.

White-tail deer were not a target species for poisoning, although there is footage of the deer eating dotterel eggs out of nests.

Bait pellets containing deer repellent were used in hunting blocks, while standard 1080 bait pellets were used elsewhere in the operational area. Trail cameras monitored deer before, during and after the predator control operation.

On average, there was a 75 percent reduction in deer detections by cameras in the deer repellent area, and a 97 percent reduction where standard 1080 bait pellets were used after the 1080 was dropped. Additionally, hunters found four dead deer after the operation.

A trial of the deer repellent before the drop took place was conducted, but the results were inconclusive as other pests ate the baits before deer encountered them.

When the trail camera results were released after the 1080 drop, president of the Rakiura Whitetail Trust, Adam Fairmaid said the trust wanted a viable population of deer on the island and DOC had assured the trust a solution would be found.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Homes evacuated near Carterton due to rising river levels

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Flooded Ruamāhanga River on Tuesday looking down on the South Wairarapa. Mike Laven

Five homes have been evacuated in Gladstone near Carterton due to rising river levels.

The homes, on Gladstone Road, were not far from the Tauweru River, an emergency operations spokesperson said.

The residents will stay either with friends or family, or a welfare team will support them into accommodation, the spokesperon said.

It comes as the state of emergency had lifted for other parts of the Wellington region.

It’s now ended in Upper Hutt, Porirua City and the Kāpiti Coast, but is still in place for all other parts of the Wellington region, including all of Wairarapa.

According to Wellington Region Emergency Management it will remain in place while damage, needs, building safety, and recovery assessments continue.

Meanwhile, a campground in the Tararua district was preparing to possibly self-evacuate, with the council saying Wainui River levels are “very high.”

The district was still under a heavy rain warning until midnight.

Herbertville Campground manager Chris Cawsey said he was up all last night in case he and the six people staying at the site needed to leave.

“The flood alert alarm sounded at about 1am this morning and that’s when it hit five and a half metres. At six and a half metres it’s bursting its banks, but we’re pretty much sitting at the vege of that now.”

Cawsey said Cyclone Gabrielle was an eyeopener and they also experienced some flooding at the camp about seven or eight weeks ago.

“It’s all in the back of our mind, we don’t want to get trapped here, we don’t want to get flooded, we don’t want to wake up in the morning or through the night to a wet bed!”

Tararua Mayor Scott Gilmore said the council is in constant communication with the campsite.

He urged people in the district to remain vigilant.

Meanwhile, Ākitio has received 206mm of rain in the last 24 hours.

Earlier, the council said the community is currently isolated as Coast Road and River Road are both closed from slips and flooding.

Gilmore said there has since been some four-wheel drive access for emergency vehicles restored.

A total of eight roads across the district are closed due to slips, flooding and fallen trees – another four roads are reduced to single lane.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Police launch homicide investifation after man found dead in house fire

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

File photo. RNZ

Police have launched a homicide investigation after a person was found dead in a house fire in Rangataua last week.

Fire and Emergency New Zealand were alerted to a house fire on Kaha Street at 6.40pm on Thursday.

Detective Senior Sergeant Varnia Allan said a man was found deceased during a scene examination the next day.

He was 62-year-old John Alan Seymour from Rangataua.

Today, police confirmed the fire appeared to be deliberately lit and Seymour’s death was “of a suspicious nature”.

After emergency services were notified of the fire, a two-vehicle crash on State Highway 49 was reported to police.

Jason Savage, 35, died in the crash.

Police have since confirmed the vehicle and Savage were connected to the Kaha Street address.

“While a homicide investigation is under way, Police would like to reassure the community that we are working to identify those responsible,” Allan said.

Anyone with information which they believe could assist in police enquiries was encouraged to make a report through 105, referencing file number 260417/7386.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Public ‘strongly advised’ against searching for missing Karori man Philip Sutton themselves

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Samuel Rillstone

Wellington police have called for people not to take matters into their own hands after the search for missing Karori man Philip Sutton was suspended yesterday.

But locals said volunteers had been searching the area and had located a bag and an article of clothing this afternoon.

Sutton was reported missing at 7.15am on Monday after floodwaters surged through a South Karori Road address in the early hours of the morning.

The sudden flooding heavily damaged a small studio Sutton was staying in and left the area submerged in silt and strewn with fallen trees and debris.

Shortly before 5pm today, Inspector Fleur de Bes said the police search for Sutton was unable to continue due to safety concerns.

“The search is now due to recommence on Wednesday, as the stream water levels drop and weather conditions improve.

“Today, police focused on establishing areas of interest to be searched tomorrow – these areas are significantly damaged, leaving multiple hazards including the stability of the stream, variable water levels, and debris.

“Police strongly advise against members of the community searching themselves due to the many hazards there may be at this time. Unstable ground, flood waters and poor communications may divert necessary resources from this significant operation if anyone gets into trouble.”

Samuel Rillstone

De Bes said police staff would be joined be joined by multiple specialists including canyon search and rescue, dive squad, search dogs and drones when searching resumed and that Sutton’s family had been informed.

“They are understandably very concerned but would like to thank the public for all their support,” de Bes said.

Ahead of the police statement some people in the area had responded to a post on social media calling for volunteers to search for the missing man.

“The family would be very grateful for willing and able volunteers if you are interested,” it said.

“It is important to use the daylight we have – in case Philip is lying somewhere unable to walk we are keen to look while it is daylight. His car that is usually parked in front of the studio was gone in the morning, his family think that he tried to get away in his car in the night when the waters were rising.

“Who can volunteer, and what times are people available?” the post read.

A local – who did not want to be named – said three people searching downstream from where Sutton was staying had found a bag and a mudsoaked article of clothing.

Samuel Rillstone

They said the searchers were told to take the items to members of Sutton’s family but “they could have been anyone’s”.

The local said the searchers had not entered the still-flooded stream and stopped moving through the area when they would have had to enter private property to continue.

“We’ve put our safety first and these people did the same. We’ve been keeping an eye out but it’s pretty horrific down there,” they said.

The local said they were aware that Sutton was staying in the small studio on the property but said had little contact with him and described him as “a very private man”.

Wellington City councillor Ray Chung was also on South Karori Road today.

He said he’d been in contact with the people who made the post and understood they were friends of Sutton’s sister.

NZ Police/Supplied

Chung said it was important for people who wished to help, to work with police.

“I don’t want people going into the water or getting lost and causing even more problems,” he said.

Chung said he understood that the organisers were concerned that not enough was being done to find Sutton.

“They’re very concerned that if they leave it for another day before people go out and search for him that it lessens his chance of survival out there. They were very concerned that he was out there somewhere and no one was out there looking for him or trying to help,” Chung said.

Quinn Wright worked in construction and lived a little further down the stream from the address where Sutton was staying.

Samuel Rillstone

He said he was heading to work on Monday morning when he came across the heavily flooded section of South Karori Road.

“We took the gear back home and brought the digger down to start clearing the mess.

“We just cleared the bulk of the big stuff off the road so the vehicles could get through and just freed up the blockages under the culvert so the water could start flowing across the road.”

He said the sudden deluge which surged down from the Long Gully catchment and tore the small building open came as a complete surprise.

“We’ve had far worse storms in Wellington and this area’s never been touched. It’s the worst bit of weather I’ve ever seen in the area but I was surprised that it flooded so badly,” Wright said.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Indonesia’s human rights body to investigate deaths of 12 Papuans in military operation

By -

RNZ Pacific

Indonesia’s National Commission on Human Rights says it is investigating deaths of a dozen West Papuans in a military operation.

The commission, known as Komnas HAM, says the incident took place last Tuesday in Kembru District in Puncak regency of Central Papua

Komnas HAM said 12 civilians, including women and children, died as the result of gunshot wounds sustained in an Indonesian military operation.

It said any operation that results in civilian casualties “cannot be justified on any grounds”.

Komnas HAM said that dozens of other civilians suffered serious injuries.

Indonesia’s military told local media its forces killed four Papuan pro-independence militants in an armed exchange in Kembru.

However, the West Papua National Liberation Army has denied that there was any exchange with the Indonesian military in Kembru.

Restraint urged
Urging the head of Indonesia’s military to investigate the incident, Komnas HAM has urged restraint from all parties.

It also urged both Indonesia’s national government and the Papua regional government to ensure measures are taken to protect civilians, treat those injured and recover bodies of those killed.

The human rights body also noted the risk of mass displacement of villagers impacted by the military operation.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Blood Cancer New Zealand says country not keeping up with treatments internationally

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Annual deaths from blood cancer in Aotearoa have risen by nearly 40 percent since 2008. 123RF

A charity campaigning for blood cancer patients has argued the country isn’t keeping up with treatments available internationally.

Blood Cancer New Zealand has a released a new report into the experience of blood cancer patients and healthcare workers in Aotearoa

The report looked at national data and the experiences of 744 patients and carers, and 85 healthcare professionals.

Around 27,000 New Zealanders are living with the disease and more than 3000 are diagnosed each year.

The report identified gaps in treatment compared to countries with a comparable demographic and health system – such as Australia, where many more blood cancer medicines are funded.

It found that while blood cancer is now New Zealand’s third leading cause of cancer death, the country still lacks a coordinated national focus on blood cancer care.

Annual deaths from blood cancer in Aotearoa have risen by nearly 40 percent since 2008.

The report said advances in diagnostics and treatment have transformed outcomes for patients over the past two decades, from the early use of chemotherapy to immunotherapies and cellular therapies that harness patients’ own immune systems to destroy cancer cells.

However, it said these therapies remain unavailable in New Zealand, and patients here are faced with significant personal costs and reduced survival rates.

When data on all types of blood cancers in New Zealand are combined, it doesn’t show an improvement in age-standardised mortality over the past 15 years, the report said.

The report highlighted that Australia’s five year survival rate for several types of blood cancers are higher than New Zealand – including Leukaemia (66.4 percent compared with 57.7 percent in NZ), Hodgkin Lymphoma (88.6 percent compared with 80.2 percent in NZ), and Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma (77.4 percent compared with 68.4 in NZ).

The report also raises other constraints, including workforce shortages in haematology and specialist roles, limited diagnostic capability, infrastructure gaps for delivering advanced therapies and barriers to medicines and clinical trials.

Blood Cancer NZ is calling for the country to form a national Blood Cancer taskforce to coordinate efforts across medicines access, workforce, research and policy settings.

The report is being launched at an event on Tuesday, which will be attended by patients, healthcare professionals and the health minister Simeon Brown.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Rahui in place at Auckland’s Shelly Beach as search continues for missing man

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Shelly Beach is in the Kaipara Harbour. (File photo).

A rahui is in place at a North Auckland beach as police and coastguards continue their search for a man who went missing on Sunday afternoon.

Emergency services were called to Shelly Beach about 1pm, after a man went into the water and failed to return.

Coastguard Kaipara said in a social media post that a rahui was placed on the Shelly Beach area by local iwi and hapu.

It said the Royal New Zealand Navy’s hydrographic team was also helping with the search.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

View from The Hill: It’s a chilly campaign for Matt Canavan in Farrer

By -

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Nationals leader Matt Canavan is giving the concept of the political “ground game” a new twist in the Farrer byelection.

Canavan is literally camping out in the southern New South Wales electorate, despite the Nationals seemingly having no chance of victory on May 9, when the tussle is set to be between One Nation and Independent candidate Michelle Milthorpe.

After spending a couple of nights camping earlier, last Saturday night saw Canavan in his swag at Hay, then at Griffith on Sunday and Monday nights.

With overnight temperatures around zero, he’s had to upgrade his sleeping bag – the old one was only suited to the benign temperatures of his home state of Queensland – and get a semi-tent structure for more protection.

Canavan says he sets up in caravan parks so he can shower and shave – as he says, on the campaign trail you have to look respectable in the morning.

He has a political metaphor for camping out. “Opposition should be uncomfortable,” he tells The Conversation. “[This says opposition] is not a permanent residence.”

Nationals candidate Brad Robertson is not sharing the camping experience.

Despite needing a miracle, Canavan refuses to write off the Nationals’ chances. With the vote on the right splitting between One Nation, the Liberals, the Nationals and micro candidates, Canavan says there is always the chance of coming up through the middle.

Matt Canavan in a tent in Farrer. provided by Matt Canavan, Author provided (no reuse)

Poll shows One Nation and Independent Milthorpe almost level pegging on primary votes

A uComms poll done for Milthorpe on April 9-10 showed One Nation’s David Farley leading her by a whisker, 30.9% to 30.0%, on primary votes.

The electorate-wide poll of 1116 people, with an error margin of about 3%, had the Liberals’ Raissa Butkowski on 16.1% and the Nationals’ Brad Robertson polling 7.1%.

One Nation leads Milthorpe in the estimated two-candidate preferred vote 52.7-47.3%, based on respondents’ preferences.

The results show the dramatic extent to which the voters have deserted the Liberals. Asked how they voted last election, 41.4% said they voted for the Liberals’ Sussan Ley (her actual vote was 43.4%), while 23.1% said they voted for Milthorpe (her actual vote was 20%). Only 13% said they voted last time for One Nation. Some are misremembering – in fact One Nation received only 6.6% at the 2025 election.

People were also asked for their opinion of Donald Trump. Half (50.7%) had a “very unfavourable” opinion, with another 9.8% having an “unfavourable” opinion. Only 11.4% had a very favourable view of Trump and another 13.2% had a favourable opinion.

One Nation supporters were much more likely than average to have a favourable (26.6%) or very favourable (24.6%) attitude to Trump.

GetUp advertising campaign

Meanwhile, GetUp is launching an advertising campaign against One Nation in the electorate. It has produced a TV ad called Trump’s War, showing “the links between Trump and [Pauline] Hanson in light of the recent fuel crisis”.

Appealing for funds to finance the ad campaign, which will also include digital ads “targeted at the persuadable voters who will decide the race”, and billboards, GetUp said: “If One Nation wins Farrer, it will be a huge boost to their momentum and could change the political map of this country”.

Getup ad being played in Farrer.

– ref. View from The Hill: It’s a chilly campaign for Matt Canavan in Farrer – https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-its-a-chilly-campaign-for-matt-canavan-in-farrer-280583

NRL: Chanel Harris-Tavita named for 100th NZ Warriors appearance against Dolphins

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Chanel Harris-Tavita scores a try for the Warriors against Sydney Roosters. Andrew Cornaga/Photosport

Five-eighth Chanel Harris-Tavita has been confirmed for his 100th NZ Warriors appearance, while Taine Tuaupiki will return to fullback against the Dolphins in Wellington on Saturday.

Harris-Tavita, 27, made his club debut in 2019 against Gold Coast Titans, but ruptured a testicle in 2022 and took a hiatus from the game the following season, as he travelled the world.

He returned to the Warriors in 2024 and seems to have cemented ownership of the No.6 jersey with a series of outstanding performances this year, including a try double in the opening win against Sydney Roosters, a powerful defensive display against Melbourne Story and another key try against the Titans last weekend.

He becomes the 32nd player to log a century of games for the Auckland club, joining current teammates Adam Pompey (123), Roger Tuivasa-Sheck (155) and Wayde Egan (128).

Coach Andrew Webster has made only one change to the line-up that started against Gold Coast, handing Tuaupiki the No.1 jersey, with Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad aggravating a neck injury, suffered against Cronulla Sharks three weeks ago.

Egan was placed on report for a high tackle last week, but escaped with a fine and will start at hooker for the Anzac clash.

Tuivasa-Sheck retains his spot at centre, but incumbent Pompey returns to the reserves, after a two-game suspension, and may yet work his way into the playing squad. Alofiana Khan-Pereira, who scored two tries against his old club last weekend, has been named on the wing.

Warriors: 1. Taine Tuaupiki, 2. Dallin Watene-Zelezniak, 3. Roger Tuivasa-Sheck, 4. Ali Leiataua, 5. Alofiana Khan-Pereira, 6. Chanel Harris-Tavita, 7. Tanah Boyd, 8. James Fisher-Harris, 9. Wayde Egan, 10. Jackson Ford, 11. Leka Halasima, 12. Kurt Capewell, 13. Erin Clark

Interchange: 14. Same Healey, 15. Mitchell Barnett, 16. Demitric Vaimauga, 17. Jacob Laban, 18. Marata Niukore, 20. Luke Hanson

Reserves: 21. Eddie Ieremia-Toeava, 22. Adam Pompey, 23. Makaia Tafua

Meanwhile, Dolphins coach Kirstian Woolf has promoted Brad Schneider into five-eighth, replacing former Warrior Kodi Nikorima, who was suspended two games for dangerous contract that left Penrith Panthers hooker Mitch Kenny with a broken leg.

Dolphins: 1. Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow, 2. Jamayne Isaako, 3. Jake Averillo, 4. Herbie Farnworth, 5. Selwyn Cobbo, 6. Brad Schneider, 7. Isaiya Katoa, 8. Tom Gilbert, 9. Max Plath, 10. Francis Molo, 11. Connelly Lemuelu, 12. Kulikefu Finefeuiaki, 13. Morgan Knowles

Interchange: 14. Ray Stone, 15. Thomas Flegler, 16. Felise Kaufusi, 17. Trai Fuller, 18. Lewis Symonds, 19. Tevita Naufahu

Reserves: 20. Brian Pouniu, 21. Oryn Keeley, 22. John Fineanganofo

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Analysis: Luxon puts even more pressure on himself with confidence gamble

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Analysis: Without probably realising it the Prime Minister has just put more pressure than ever on himself to perform and lift his party polling.

By calling a formal motion of confidence vote in caucus on Tuesday morning, the caucus were presented with a ‘back him or dump him’ option and chose to back him.

But in backing him there is an expectation that the National Party do better, and that includes the Prime Minister.

Yet, in recent months self-reflection has been missing from Christopher Luxon’s comments – instead he’s concentrated on the party needing to do better.

New Zealand is still a country where a large number of people vote based on personalities and the popularity of a leader goes a long way to securing a party vote.

Luxon almost got to a point of reflecting on his own weaknesses in his Monday morning media round when he acknowledged not everyone would want to invite him to a barbecue.

He’s not John Key, and he seemed to have finally realised that, yet after confirming the confidence of his caucus on Tuesday he then fronted media and single-handedly blamed “speculation and rumour” and a “media soap opera” for the position he had found himself in.

There’s always room in those moments for a bit of self-deprecation and reflection, and it would have gone a long way toward acknowleding those in the caucus and wider party who have been questioning Luxon’s leadership.

Those people exist whether Luxon chooses to believe it or not, but instead of letting them know he had heard them by publicly saying he too needed to improve his personal performance, he blamed others.

By blaming the media reports he’s by extension blaming those MPs who felt they had no choice but to talk to journalists about how bad things had got.

Simeon Brown heading into the Tuesday morning caucus. RNZ / Craig McCulloch

National’s campaign chair Simeon Brown told RNZ on his way into that caucus meeting that MPs who were leaking to the media should either stop, or quit the party.

Senior MP Mark Mitchell told RNZ the caucus was a safe and comfortable place for MPs to air their concerns and be heard. He said caucus was where robust discussion could take place.

However, it’s clear some MPs haven’t felt safe to raise concerns, or have been shot down when they have. Senior whip Stuart Smith appears to be one of those people.

Multiple media outlets, including RNZ, have confirmed the reports originally published in the NZ Herald on Friday morning that Smith had unsuccessfully tried to contact Luxon ahead of Easter to speak to him about caucus concerns over his leadership, but that Luxon had effectively ghosted him.

On Tuesday morning ahead of the caucus vote Smith, via the prime minister’s office, provided a written statement saying he wouldn’t be at the caucus meeting due to a “longstanding personal appointment”.

Stuart Smith. RNZ / Angus Dreaver

He said he didn’t contact the Prime Minister or his office “seeking a meeting” and that he was “disappointed by recent speculative media coverage”.

Smith’s statement and denials needed to have landed on Friday if he and Luxon wanted them to be believed.

It’s not credible to wait four days to put out that statement, especially when nobody from the prime minister’s office has disputed the story in the interim.

The statement read as if it had been written by the prime minister’s office and when Brown was asked whether he or the prime minister had put pressure on Smith to make that statement, he refused to answer the question multiple times.

The relationship between the senior whip and the prime minister, and by extension his office, is pivotal. It’s Smith’s job to keep Luxon and his chief of staff abreast of caucus morale and any issues that crop up.

Luxon confirmed on Monday neither he nor his office had contacted Smith since the story broke on Friday morning, which shows the traditional closeness of that relationship doesn’t exist in this caucus.

It’s unclear whether Smith had planned to be at Parliament on Tuesday, and was told not to bother turning up – he hasn’t returned RNZ’s calls.

Smith may have lost the prime minister’s trust at this point, and if he had been at caucus he would have, as senior whip, been tasked with the job of scrutineer alongside his junior, Suze Redmayne.

That would have meant Smith would have been one of just two people to know how many in the caucus supported Luxon. In his absence party president Sylvia Wood counted the votes with Redmayne.

The next caucus vote could end up being for a replacement senior whip.

Luxon made the right call holding the vote on his leadership. His error was not doing it sooner.

The speculation around his job security has been going on for months and the party has been hurt in the polls because he didn’t stem the blood loss sooner.

Now that he’s called the vote, and won it, he is relying on his caucus backing him and keeping any concerns they have in the coming six months either to themselves, or airing them in the privacy of caucus meetings.

It’s a big gamble and if the leaks start again then Luxon has set a precedent and could find himself repeating a confidence vote before the year is out.

New Zealand First leader Winston Peters has already warned of those consequences, and he would know having seen the inner workings of the National Party for himself in a former life.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Who is breaking international law in the Strait of Hormuz? It’s not Iran, says scholar

By -

Democracy Now!

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, I’m Amy Goodman.

As we continue to look at the US and Israeli war on Iran, we’re joined now by Dr Maryam Jamshidi. She is an Iranian American associate professor of law at the University of Colorado Law School and a nonresident fellow at the Quincy Institute. She has written a new piece for The Nation magazine headlined “Only One Side Has Clearly Broken the Law In the Strait of Hormuz: And it isn’t Iran.”

Professor Jamshidi, explain.

MARYAM JAMSHIDI: Hi, Amy. Thanks for having me.

So, you know, what I was trying to get at in that piece is that, you know, there’s been a lot of international outcry about what Iran has done in the strait, specifically its efforts to regulate passage of ships through the strait and to charge certain ships a fee for going through the strait.

The international rhetoric has been that what Iran is doing is completely and clearly illegal. And from my perspective, that’s not entirely true. This is not a black-and-white issue. Iran does have a reasonable legal argument to regulating the Strait of Hormuz, as well as to charging fees.

By contrast, the criticism of what the United States and Israel has done to Iran, which is an aggressive and illegal war, has been more muted, in particular from Western states, as well as from some of the regional Arab states. And I think this contrast between these two reactions is very telling — on the one hand, total condemnation of Iran on legal issues that are far from clear, and very more muted criticism, more limited criticism of the United States and Israel when it comes to actions they’ve taken that are very clearly unlawful under international law.

I think this says a lot about the ways in which international law is being deployed in this moment as a way of restraining and regulating Iranian behavior, while effectively allowing the United States and Israel a free hand to do what they want against the Iranian government.


Who is breaking international law in the Strait of Hormuz?   Video: Democracy Now!

AMY GOODMAN: What do you think this unprovoked war that Israel and the US — this war of choice, as it’s called — have engaged in with Iran has done to international law and people’s perspective view of it around the world, and the consequences when people want to apply international law?

MARYAM JAMSHIDI: Yeah, I mean, it’s a great question. I mean, you know, over the last few years, we’ve seen the ways in which Israel, in particular, with support from the United States, as well as with support from much of the rest of the West, Western governments, has eroded and violated and scoffed at international law, in its actions towards the Palestinians, its actions in Lebanon, its actions in Syria, its actions in Yemen, its other actions in Iran.

And I think that, you know, these actions that Israel has taken has understandably led many to question the utility and importance of international law, whether or not it still exists or not. And, you know, now with this war against Iran, that, those concerns, those fears that international law is really meaningless, have only increased.

In this moment, though, I think what’s also important to understand is that states like Iran are also at the same time saying, “No, international law matters very much, and we expect to be treated as equals under international law.”

Iran, in this moment, is framing a lot of what it’s doing in international law terms, because it understands that if international law is truly going to be thrown into the dustbin, then it’s going to be far more vulnerable on the international stage.

So, we basically see a battle. We see a battle between, on the one side, states like Israel and the United States, states that are, by and large, Western, you know, basically saying, “International law doesn’t apply to us. We can do what we want,” and then other states, like Iran, states of the Global South, saying, “No, we want international law. We value international law. International law is necessary to ensuring that we are sovereign and equal to other states on the international scale. And so, we are not going to let international law just be taken away from us.”

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk more about the UN Security Council? You’ve noted multiple resolutions have been introduced to condemn Iran’s regulatory actions in the strait. Who is behind these resolutions? Meanwhile, the Iranian Parliament is reportedly considering legislation that would formalise its regulatory system, including the fee system, as part of its domestic law.

MARYAM JAMSHIDI: Right. So, there were — there have been multiple resolutions brought before the Security Council since the war started. They have mostly been focused on Iran and Iran’s actions in the Strait of Hormuz. The states that have been the real force behind these resolutions appear to be the Arab Gulf states, in particular Bahrain and the UAE, who have also been the subject of the most attacks by Iran.

What’s, again, very interesting and, I think, important to understand about these resolutions is that they very clearly and absolutely condemned Iran for its regulatory actions within the Strait of Hormuz. As I mentioned, even though those actions do have a legal basis, those resolutions presented them as being fully unlawful.

And one of those resolutions, which, thankfully, was vetoed by China and Russia, would have effectively authorised all UN member states — that’s over 190 states — to go to war with Iran in order to open the Strait of Hormuz. I mean, that is a very radical proposition, to basically validate and allow states to engage in armed conflict against another state simply for the purpose of opening a waterway.

So, you know — and again, there were no resolutions that were brought to the Security Council to explicitly condemn the US and Israel for their actions against Iran.

In terms of the domestic legislation inside Iran, you know, that the Iranian Parliament appears to be contemplating, as you mentioned, this legislation would basically make the regulatory scheme within Hormuz, in the Strait of Hormuz, a part of Iranian law.

It’s not entirely clear what the terms of that law are, you know, what the basis for it is, what kind of regulation it will in fact implement. But it does seem to have a fee system as a part of it. So, the Iranians are trying to take this ad hoc fee system that they have developed over the course of the last few weeks and actually institutionalise it within domestic law.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to end by asking you about [US President Donald] Trump’s comments. On Saturday, he told a reporter at Fox News, “If Iran doesn’t sign this deal, the whole country is getting blown up.” That followed two weeks before, when he warned, “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.” Professor Jamshidi?

MARYAM JAMSHIDI: These comments are absolutely unacceptable. I mean, they are borderline genocidal in their intent and in their implications. To say to the world that you’re going to obliterate an entire civilisation is, in fact, to make very clear that you desire to destroy an entire people.

You know, I don’t know if he thinks that this is an effective negotiating tool, but certainly from a legal perspective, from a moral perspective, it’s beyond the pale.

This article is republished from Democracy Now! under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States Licence.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Coked to the gills? Cocaine-laced wastewater can make salmon roam twice as far

By -

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marcus Michelangeli, Lecturer, Environmental Sustainability and Management, Griffith University

Fish or sharks on cocaine might sound like something dreamed up in a Hollywood writers’ room, but the reality is far less entertaining. Increasingly, scientists are detecting cocaine and other powerful drugs in aquatic environments, and even in the brains and bodies of wildlife.

A 2024 study from Brazil made headlines after finding cocaine in the muscles and liver of wild sharks caught off the coast of Rio de Janeiro. While this may seem surprising, it reflects a broader and growing issue: human drugs are making their way into rivers, lakes and oceans around the world.

In our new study, published today in Current Biology, we set out to understand what this means for wildlife.

Tracking ‘cocaine’ fish in the wild

We explored how environmentally relevant concentrations of cocaine affect the behaviour of fish in the wild. We also looked at the effect of a chemical called benzoylecgonine, which is the main thing left over after our bodies break down cocaine.

To do this, we conducted an experiment in Lake Vättern in Sweden, the country’s second largest lake, where we tracked juvenile Atlantic salmon over eight weeks.

Using slow-release chemical implants, we exposed fish to either cocaine or benzoylecgonine, then followed their movements using acoustic telemetry. This allowed us to monitor how fish behaved in a natural environment, rather than in laboratory tanks.

What we found was striking. Fish exposed to benzoylecgonine swam up to 1.9 times farther per week than unexposed fish and dispersed up to 12.3 kilometres farther across the lake. Fish exposed to cocaine showed a similar pattern, but the effect was weaker and less consistent.

From wastewater to waterways

So how do these substances end up in aquatic environments?

After cocaine is consumed, the body rapidly breaks it down, mainly into benzoylecgonine. Chemicals such as this – leftovers from the body’s use of a different substance – are called metabolites. Both the original drug and the metabolite are excreted and enter wastewater systems.

However, wastewater treatment plants are not designed to fully remove these compounds, meaning they pass through treatment and are discharged into rivers, lakes and coastal waters.

This is not a localised issue. Cocaine is now one of the most detected illicit drugs in aquatic environments worldwide.

A global analysis found average surface water concentrations of about 105 nanograms per litre for cocaine and 257 nanograms per litre for benzoylecgonine, with maximum concentrations reaching into the thousands of nanograms. While these levels are low, they remain a concern because the compounds target brain systems shared across many animals, meaning even small amounts have the potential to affect wildlife.

Why behaviour matters

Changes in behaviour are often one of the earliest and most sensitive indicators that something in the environment is affecting wildlife. These changes can affect everything from how animals find food and avoid predators to how they interact, reproduce and survive.

When contaminants alter behaviour, they can have ripple effects that extend well beyond the individual. Small shifts in how animals move, feed or respond to threats can scale up to influence the dynamics of whole populations, interactions between species, and the way entire ecosystems work.

The changes we saw in how fish move through their environment after cocaine exposure could mean they use more energy, enter poorer-quality habitats, or expose themselves to greater predation risk.

For species such as Atlantic salmon, which are already under pressure from climate change, habitat loss and other pollutants, even subtle behavioural disruptions could add to the challenges they face.

Why the metabolite matters

One of the most surprising findings from our study was that benzoylecgonine had a stronger effect on fish behaviour than cocaine itself. This is important because environmental risk assessments typically focus on the substances humans put into themselves, such as cocaine, rather than the chemicals they put out afterwards, such as benzoylecgonine.

These metabolites are often more abundant and persistent in waterways. Our results suggest we may be underestimating the ecological risks of these pollutants.

Our study focused on behaviour, not long-term health outcomes. We have not yet tested whether these changes affect survival or reproduction.

However, previous research shows cocaine and related compounds can alter brain chemistry, increase oxidative stress, and disrupt energy metabolism in aquatic animals. These processes are closely linked to health and fitness, suggesting the potential for broader impacts.

The idea of “fish on cocaine” may grab attention, but it points to a much bigger issue. Aquatic environments are increasingly contaminated with complex mixtures of human-derived chemicals, from pharmaceuticals to illicit drugs. Many of these substances are biologically active at very low concentrations, and we are only just beginning to understand their effects.

– ref. Coked to the gills? Cocaine-laced wastewater can make salmon roam twice as far – https://theconversation.com/coked-to-the-gills-cocaine-laced-wastewater-can-make-salmon-roam-twice-as-far-281126

The NRL has just taken a giant step forward with brain injury prevention. Other leagues must follow

By -

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Townsend, Research Fellow, UQ School of Human Movement and Nutrition Sciences, The University of Queensland

In a significant development in the battle against brain injury in sport, teams from the National Rugby League (NRL) and the National Rugby League for Women (NRLW) are now required to restrict the amount of body contact during training sessions.

While the policy has been broadly described as a way to reduce exposure to all injuries, it is clearly targeted at reducing concussion and repetitive brain trauma.

This is the first official contact training limit by an Australian contact sport governing body. It shows that despite decades of rule changes, research and claimed advances in player safety, brain trauma remains a central concern for sport organisations.

What are the new limits?

The new policy makes a distinction between the men’s and women’s competitions.

NRL players are restricted to 100 minutes of contact training during a seven-day period between games – for example, between games that are scheduled on consecutive Saturdays. For shorter turnarounds (for example a team playing on a Sunday and again the following Friday), they will be restricted to 40 or 50 minutes of contact training during the intervening period.

Players in the NRWL can engage in no more than 85 minutes per week on a seven-day turnaround, with the same contact restrictions as the men applying for shorter breaks.

This is undoubtedly a response to emerging research showing women tend to have more adverse reactions to concussion than men.

There are greater allowances for contact training in the pre-season period, when games do not contribute to weekly exposure to head trauma: 200 minutes for men and 115 minutes for women.

A small step forward

While there are currently no published figures that quantify the amount of contact training in Australian professional rugby league, a 2024 survey conducted by the Rugby League Players Association estimates most professional clubs engage in two to four contact sessions per week, with each session usually lasting no more than 30 minutes.

A 2023 study conducted in the UK Super League found similar figures.

So, this new limit may reduce exposure to contact from about 120 minutes to 100 minutes per week, which is positive but not extreme.

The limit will also serve to curtail a reported upward creep in the amount of contact training in professional rugby league.

What is the scientific basis for this new policy?

Emerging evidence internationally is showing it is not necessarily concussion injuries that are the driving risk factor for the long-term brain disease known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE).

While concussion itself has its own set of concerns, the greater issue is exposure to repetitive sub-concussive impacts. These can be bumps, tackles and minor collisions.

These “smaller” impacts still have the capacity to induce forces enough to stretch and shear the brain tissue, releasing a protein that is implicated in developing CTE.

Further, no protective equipment has been able to mitigate the risk of CTE. Only the reduction in contact exposure has shown to be effective.

Why now?

The NRL itself has not announced these changes. The policy has reportedly been under consideration for at least two years and was implemented before the start of the 2026 season.

It came to be known publicly through an ABC report in which the NRL confirmed the new guidelines.

But the likelihood that repetitive head trauma in sport causes neurodegenerative diseases has been acknowledged in Australia since at least the 1930s.

While there is a growing body of research that shows a strong relationship between low-grade brain trauma and neurodegeneration, there is not yet a proven pathological cause for this relationship.

So, these new NRL guidelines are not a response to new research.

Rather, this policy is most likely driven by a combination of factors, including the aforementioned weight of epidemiological evidence, calls from players to reduce contact sessions, and fears about the increasingly litigious nature of the concussion crisis in Australian sport.

Read more: When insurers walk away from concussion risk, who protects athletes?

What’s next?

The NRL’s decision not to publicly announce these seemingly laudable changes is intriguing.

A cynical assessment suggests the league may have wanted to ensure its policy could not be preempted by other football codes, particularly the Australian Football League (AFL), which is also considering the introduction of limits on contact training.

The “quiet” introduction of contact training limits therefore shows rugby league to be taking the lead on concussion by heeding calls from researchers and advocates to reduce cumulative head impact exposure through structural changes, at a time when the AFL is facing criticism for promoting an unproven helmet design.

A new frontier

Regardless of these rhetorical factors, and the relatively conservative changes the new policy is likely to elicit in practice, this is a positive development for brain safety in one of Australia’s premier contact sports.

It is also a clear sign that Australian sporting leagues have breached the next frontier of the brain trauma crisis in sport, where the focus will be on the consequences of repetitive and often-invisible low-grade brain trauma, rather than solely on acute concussive injuries.

The next challenge will be ensuring contact reductions can be effectively applied to community sport as well as the elite level.

– ref. The NRL has just taken a giant step forward with brain injury prevention. Other leagues must follow – https://theconversation.com/the-nrl-has-just-taken-a-giant-step-forward-with-brain-injury-prevention-other-leagues-must-follow-281119

A Golden Bay coastal estate could be the home of an ‘End of the World Library’

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Westhaven Estate was formerly a luxury lodge, in Mangarākau, Tasman. The 15-bedroom property overlooks the Whanganui Inlet. NZ Sotheby’s Realty

An advertisement calling for an intellectually curious librarian or curator at a multi-million-dollar remote coastal estate in Golden Bay has sparked widespread interest.

The job? To build and furnish an “End of the World Library” at a sprawling property overlooking the Whanganui Inlet near the top of the South Island.

More specifically, entrepreneurial couple Eva and Toni Piëch, want an “intellectually curious librarian or curator” to build a collection that will help them survive if the world ends.

Eva founded medicinal cannabis clinic CannaPlus+ in 2022, while Toni, the great grandson of Porsche founder Ferdinand Porsche, co-founded electric vehicle manufacturer Piëch Automotive in 2017.

The 330-hectare property near the Whanganui Inlet in Mangarākau, Tasman, is a three-and-a-half-hour drive from Nelson.

The 15-bedroom home made of Otago schist and Tasmanian Oak was formerly a luxury retreat and was on the market for six years before it was sold last year for $20 million to the Piëch’s and became their private home.

The job, posted on the Library and Information Association of New Zealand Aotearoa website, was calling for someone to curate a library collection “that would remain meaningful and useful under extreme long-term scenarios” with a focus on essential knowledge, foundational literature and practical survival.

Association chief executive, Laura Marshall, said the role wasn’t a traditional library one, it was the kind of listing occasionally seen overseas and the first time the organisation had advertised a job in a private library.

“Perhaps they’re building a bunker to hunker down because New Zealand’s such a fabulous place, or they are just really organised? Perhaps they’re going to build a fabulous garden and do everything from scratch by themselves,” she said.

Marshall previously worked in the rare book market and said she had been called upon to help build private libraries, which were often stylised, coming with a brief that might require metres of leather books and first edition classics.

“I actually think this is a fabulous idea to call upon a library professional to help build a library that’s based on substance rather than looks,” she said.

She could not say how much interest there had been in the role because applications were sent directly to Westhaven Estate.

Golden Bay journalist and author Gerard Hindmarsh, who has written extensively about the area, said the “spectacular” property encompassed 330 hectares including extensive native forest and around eight kilometres of coastline.

He visited it many times when it belonged to former owners, Monika and Bruno Stompe, who built the lodge and called the property home for 27 years.

“It’s a very special place, it’s got the second biggest nikau forest after the Heaphy Coast, it’s just spectacular and the limestone formations are just something else.”

He said the South Head of the Whanganui Inlet was part of the Te Tai Tapu Estates, which was purchased from the Maori in the 1880s, before being separated off into coastal farms in the 1920s.

It would be a bolt-hole for the new owners, he said, who it’s understood intend to spend half the year there and the other in Europe.

“I think that for them it’s a property they can escape the wilds of the world, really and I think to have a library that can withstand some sort of Armageddon is an expression of that.”

Hindmarsh said a local real estate agent had spoken of the increasing demand from people looking to escape the Northern Hemisphere and move to New Zealand.

That’s something Baz Macdonald, who produced the 2019 VICE documentary, Hunt for the Bunker People, had also noticed.

The documentary delved into why New Zealand was attracting wealthy millionaires and billionaires who were looking at for a bolt-hole, and whether or not they were also burying survival bunkers in some of Aotearoa’s most scenic country.

While there was little evidence of billionaire bunker construction, Macdonald said New Zealand was clearly seen as an attractive safe haven to some of the world’s most wealthy as it offered a form of “apocalypse insurance”.

“It verified that a lot of wealthy people around the world right now are definitely looking at New Zealand, thinking about New Zealand, thinking about the context of what’s happening around the world and what New Zealand might offer them if something does go wrong.

“We’re also seen as a sort of self-sustaining nation, we have the ability to grow our own food, we are stable governmentally and seen as good people, supportive people with collaborative communities.

“So there’s just a whole bunch of factors that make us seem really appealing if something were to go wrong elsewhere in the world.”

Macdonald said the concept of an end of the world library was a smart one.

“It would be a shame if a library like this went in with a particular political slant or a philosophical slant, but certainly the idea of having a collection of knowledge that would allow you to be self-sustaining, to rebuild, to know how electrical systems work and agriculture and all these sorts of things is a really important one.

“I’m not entirely sure what the merit of having your own personal version of this is, because I would hope, especially in New Zealand, that we have those resources available and as a community we would collectively bring our skills and resources to bear on solving a problem if there was some kind of collapse.”

RNZ’s attempts to contact Eva and Toni Piëch had gone unanswered.

Applications to curate the Westhhaven Estate library close on 30 April.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Air New Zealand considering setting up aviation engineering school in Northland, MP says

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Kerikeri in the Bay of Islands was being considered for an aviation engineering school. (File photo) RNZ / Peter de Graaf

Air New Zealand is considering setting up an aviation engineering school in Kerikeri, Northland MP Grant McCallum says.

The MP said the company was working with high schools, local hapū Ngāti Rēhia, and aviation industry stakeholders to decide whether a vocational training school would work.

McCallum said it would be “a major shot in the arm for Northland” if it went ahead, and could help ease staff shortages in the country’s aviation sector.

He said the school would likely be built near Bay of Islands Airport, but details of the potential timeline or student numbers were not yet known.

Bay of Islands Airport in Kerikeri. (File photo) Supplied

“They want to take investment into the wider regions, rather than just the big centres. They feel there’s an opportunity to help Northland, particularly younger people who haven’t has got as many educational opportunities as people in other parts of the country.”

He said the feasibility study was considering student demand, delivery options, facilities, regulatory requirements and employment pathways.

It would go ahead only if a viable, sustainable and appropriately governed model could be found, McCallum said.

Northland MP Grant McCallum. (File photo) RNZ / Samuel Rillstone

Air New Zealand chief executive Nikhil Ravishankar was in Kerikeri on Sunday to discuss the proposal.

The proposal comes amid a major shakeup of vocational training in Northland.

NorthTec, the region’s biggest training provider, had been cutting jobs and courses as it tried to become financially viable.

NorthTec is the region’s biggest training provider. (File photo) RNZ / Peter de Graaf

Last week the government announced funding of $34.7 million to help NorthTec move from its present Raumanga campus to a proposed Whangārei Knowledge Education and Arts Hub in the central city, subject to a successful business case.

Last year Northland’s biggest hospitality training provider, QRC Te Tai Tokerau, shut down in Paihia after a decade of operation.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Alleged assault at the Mackenzie District Council office

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Mackenzie District council. Google Maps

The police are looking into allegations of an assault at the Mackenzie District Council office.

There are media reports that the assault involved a Mackenzie District Councillor, but the council has not responded to inquiries.

A police spokesperson said they have received a report of an alleged assault at the council office and enquiries are in the very early stages, but they could not provide any further information.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

As it happened: Highway washed out, flights cancelled as rain, wind hit Wellington, Wairarapa

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Wellington and Wairarapa have spent the night under a red heavy rain warning, with downpours expected to continue.

Wellington was hit by widespread, damaging floods and landslides overnight on Sunday.

Authorities are urging lower North Island residents to stay off the roads and evacuate if they feel unsafe as the rain continues.

MetService said with continued rain over several days there was a possible threat to life from dangerous river conditions, significant flooding and slips.

See what happened during the day in our blog below:

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Cheap blackmarket cigarettes with no health warnings concerning for experts

By -

Source: Radio New Zealand

Facebook

No graphic images of damaged lungs and hearts, no health warnings of impotency, gangrenous feet and emphysema – experts say blackmarket cigarettes are undermining the efforts of health authorities to convince smokers to quit the potentially fatal habit.

An RNZ investigation into the tobacco blackmarket found packs of cigarettes and loose tobacco being sold brazenly over the counter at heavily discounted prices.

By law, cigarettes have to include pictures and health warnings covering at least 75-percent of the front of the packs. But the cigarettes being sold on the blackmarket are a throw back to the 1990s of glossy, embossed packaging and no ugly health warnings.

It took Ann about 25 years before she swapped cigarettes for a vape.

She was supportive of young people being priced out of the habit, but had concerns about the alternatives.

“I think it’s a good idea, but I don’t know if vaping’s a good alternative in the long run,” she said.

Ann said the warnings and images on the packet did make a difference in helping her quit, but the cost convinced her to make the swap.

Illicit cigarettes are being sold in Auckland without the warnings, with some going for as cheap as $13 a pack, less than a third of the price of a packet that includes excise tax.

An East Auckland shop visited by RNZ is selling 15 different packs of cigarettes. Only one carried the mandated health warnings.

Chief executive of the Asthma and Respiratory Foundation, Letitia Harding, said the grim warnings made a difference.

“They do deter people,” she said.

“I think it’s a reminder that cigarettes do have a long lasting negative impact on your health and can cause death.”

Harding said cheap tobacco often hit low income communities the hardest.

“People who are smoking, they can get these products cheaper, they can get products that we don’t actually know what’s in them because of the labeling, we don’t know how they’ve been produced, but they’re certainly not going to help people quit,” she said.

“They may actually have people be able to just start smoking because they’re cheap.”

She wanted to see hefty fines for those caught selling illicit cigarettes.

It was illegal for retailers to sell blackmarket smokes, with offenders facing a six-month prison sentence, a $20,000 fine or both.

“I think that’s the biggest way we can counter-act this, is just you’ve really got to fine these people that are selling them,” Harding said.

A Ministry of Health spokesperson told RNZ a lack of labelling and appropriate packaging is the primary tool health authorities used to identify and act against illicit products.

“In practice, tobacco products sold unlawfully in the domestic market most commonly present as non-compliant with packaging, labelling, or health warning requirements,” they said.

The spokesperson said evidence from the World Health Organisation showed prominent, graphic health warnings prompted quit attempts and cut back on the number of smokers, including among young people.

Public health research fellow Calvin Cochran from Otago University said warning labels helped hit home the consequences of smoking.

“It’s another missed opportunity for potentially another prompt for people to quit smoking or to ring quitline,” he said.

Cochran said illicit cigarettes were undercutting retail price, and that risked young people being able to afford to take up the habit.

“If you’ve got cigarettes on sale at dairies for a third of that price, half that price, again it puts cigarettes back into the disposable income bracket of young people,” he said.

“It’s really a dangerous thing.”

Manufacturers, importers, and distributors who fail to meet the requirements faced a fine of up to $600,000.

Large retailers could be met with a $200,000 dollar fine, while other smaller retailers risk a fine of $50,000.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

1...181920...1,335Page 19 of 1,335
Listen on Apple Podcasts

- Advertisement -
© Copyright 2024 EveningReport.nz and Multimedia Investments Ltd. All rights reserved.