Opposition parties slam ‘secret’ critical minerals talks

February 2, 2026

Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick. RNZ / Samuel Rillstone

Opposition parties are criticising the coalition for having “secret” talks with the United States about the supply of rare and critical minerals.

New Zealand is in discussions with the US about the supply of rare and critical minerals, as Donald Trump seeks to reduce America’s reliance on China for material it sees as pivotal for tech innovation and national security.

While no decisions have been made, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade confirmed officials are working through analysis, targeted consultation and providing advice to relevant ministers.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon stressed no Cabinet decisions have been made but said the government would “develop in [its] own brutal self interest”.

The Minerals Council – the industry association representing mining in New Zealand – said the country should scale up mining, arguing it can be done responsibly.

Opposition parties weigh in

Labour’s energy and resources spokesperson Megan Woods said mining opportunities shouldn’t be exploited at the expense of the environment, especially country’s conservation estate.

“We are not against mining as long as it is done in an environmentally sustainable way. Under the Labour government, we were doing work on critical minerals that would help us decarbonise and move away from fossil fuels like coal in a way that ensures jobs in the long term.

“However, the government’s plans as outlined in the MineraIs Strategy for New Zealand, combined with the Fast Track law and refusal to phase out fossil fuels, have lead to greater environmental and climate risks with no public scrutiny.

“Most New Zealanders would be upset that talks about mining and exporting critical minerals are taking place without transparency or accountability.”

Labour’s energy and resources spokesperson Megan Woods. RNZ / Samuel Rillstone

Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick said the critical minerals discussions were happening “largely in secret and on terms dictated by the United States”.

Luxon’s government had not campaigned on this, she said.

“When exactly did we agree as a country to be in Trump’s corner? There are far better decisions that we can be making if we are to, even for sake of argument, be thinking about mining more of these rare earth minerals.

“If we return to some of the rhetoric used by both Christopher Luxon and even Shane Jones last year, as they were trumpeting doing more of this kind of mining, they were telling everybody that it was about our clean, green energy transition.

“So it doesn’t take much to put two and two together and figure out that this is a house of cards.”

Te Pāti Māori was approached for comment.

Coalition parties’ positions

New Zealand First’s and self-proclaimed “pro-mining Minister” Shane Jones said the talks followed the coalition releasing its mining strategy and critical minerals list.

“Then there was an invitation for us to sign a global accord shared by the Koreans last year and now America has invited a whole host of nations to work with it and enter into a compact or an accord.

“The status of those negotiations and the final result lies with Cabinet and that’s covered by confidentiality.”

Shane Jones. RNZ / Samuel Rillstone

Asked exactly what the government had signed up to in the global accord, Jones said it was about cooperation.

“This is the puzzling thing. We’ve got all these sort of frothy milk fed critics of mine but basically contemplated a lot of cooperation in terms of research, technology, opportunities for nations to work together, both financially and strategically, and boost the availability and access to these valuable minerals.”

The ACT Party’s resources spokesperson Simon Court said his party supported expanding mining in New Zealand.

“We want high paid jobs and we want an economy that can pay our own way so yes, ACT supports more mining, including for these critical minerals.

“That’s why we secured the coalition commitment to create a critical minerals list that provides a simplified pathway for essentially prospecting, getting mining permits and eventually consenting mineral developments.”

ACT was also supportive of New Zealand’s critical minerals talks with the US.

“The United States is a key defence and security partner and it’s important that we are responsive to the markets when we have something to sell.

“We’d also be hypocritical to try and stop it. We all use and benefit from these devices made from these minerals so restricting mining here just means that [if] the US can’t get those minerals from New Zealand, they will be dug up somewhere else, probably somewhere with poor environmental oversight and more child labour.”

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

Her agency crushed her K-pop idol dreams. Her reinvention brought them back to life

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Her voice defeated soul-eating monsters during the emotional finale of the blockbuster animated film KPop Demon Hunters.

But for Korean American singer EJAE, the triumph gave her something beyond fame and fortune.

Validation.

Ejae accepted a Golden Globe for Golden, which she co-wrote and sang for KPop Demon Hunters, on 11 January in Beverly Hills, California.

Christopher Polk/2026GG/Penske Media/Getty Images via CNN Newsource

. Starting at age 11, she had endured over a decade of demanding round-the-clock practice. It’s a common path for K-pop wannabes: Sign with an agency, train in dancing and singing, then hope the agency selects you to debut as an artist.

EJAE never debuted; her agency let her contract run out without ever selecting her for a group.

“I worked hard. I tried my best to make sure my voice sounded cleaner or dance better and to look a certain way. But I think I just didn’t make my mark,” EJAE told CNN in a recent interview. And when the constant competition and pressure began to affect her schoolwork, “I just felt like I was failing at everything.”

“For a long period of time after (leaving the agency), I did feel very hopeless,” EJAE added. She’d risked it all, spending her youth on a dream that hadn’t panned out.

But EJAE wasn’t done with the K-pop industry just yet. She took one more risk: She reinvented herself as a songwriter.

That path led her back to New York and, eventually, to KPop Demon Hunters.

The movie, the most-watched Netflix original film ever, centres around a Korean girl group that hunts demons with their songs to protect the world. EJAE co-wrote and recorded demos for the chart-topping soundtrack — most notably its uplifting anthem, Golden, which won a Golden Globe for Best Original Song in January. (EJAE is also the singing voice for the film’s purple-haired protagonist, Rumi.) It’s also up for an Oscar in March.

And this week, Golden became the first K-pop song ever to win a Grammy, landing the award for best song written for visual media.

“It’s pretty rare for someone like EJAE, who’s a former trainee, to really blow up this big,” said Claire Marie Lim, an associate professor at Berklee College of Music and K-pop expert.

Lim, who was a K-pop trainee around the same time as EJAE, said most people she knew left the professional music world if they didn’t debut as K-pop idols. Some current K-pop stars might be involved in songwriting and production, but it was more unusual a decade ago — especially for former trainees.

“The attitude at the time, like 10-plus years ago, was: ‘You’re meant to sing, dance, rap, model, do a lot of forward-facing things, but not really take part in the creative process behind the scenes,’” Lim said. EJAE was pursuing a “super rare” path that she would essentially have to create herself.

Ejae arrives at the CFDA Fashion Awards in New York in November 2025.

Carl Timpone/BFA.com/Shutterstock via CNN Newsource

The grueling K-pop machine

Ironically, the movie that made EJAE a star is an ode to the Korean pop music machine that disillusioned her all those years ago.

KPop Demon Hunters reflects how K-pop artists, also known as idols, bask in the glow of light sticks and fan chants. But in real life, their fame comes with a high price: harsh beauty standards, 3 am call times for broadcasts, public backlash for dating and more.

Even becoming a K-pop star often requires years of intense training, spending “hours a day dancing and singing and rapping,” Lim said.

On The Zach Sang Show, EJAE described going to vocal and dance practices after school and staying until midnight. (She also wasn’t the first in her family to pursue a career in entertainment; her grandfather was a famous actor and producer in South Korea in the 1960s and ‘70s.)

The massive K-pop machine is notorious for its artist development and production programs. Agencies meticulously plan out public debuts, coordinate every detail of schedules and fan interactions and even oversee many parts of stars’ personal lives.

Trainees are also heavily scrutinized for their skills and appearance, often starting when they’re very young. EJAE was 11 years old when she joined SM Entertainment, one of South Korea’s biggest entertainment companies.

“There’s a lot of competition, a lot of critiquing. There were competitions within the training system where I’ve failed a lot and was rejected a lot,” EJAE told CNN. “I’d constantly been hearing, ‘You’re not good enough, you’re not good enough.’”

In KPop Demon Hunters, K-pop stars Rumi, Mira and Zoey secretly protect the world from demons with the power of music. Ejae is the singing voice of Rumi.

Netflix via CNN Newsource

When her contract ended in 2015, EJAE was in her early 20s — already old for a K-pop trainee.

It’s an exceptional case when agencies do debut older idols, “and I didn’t meet that exception,” she said.

With ‘Golden,’ she went platinum

EJAE described her departure from SM as a breakup: a mutual breakup, but heartbreaking nonetheless. She had spent her formative years enmeshed with the company, and now she was on her own.

“I didn’t know what to do with my life,” she said.

She’d developed an interest in producing while at New York University, where she studied music during a break from training. Encouraged by her mom and brother, she would go to DJ performances in New York and ask them questions after shows.

“‘If you want to get something, you have to be proactive’ — that’s always been instilled in me, and that was honestly the start of my journey of discovering myself as a writer, whether it be producing or not,” EJAE said.

She spent hours each day teaching herself to use music software and how to make beats. She was intrigued by production, in part because she didn’t see many women in that side of the industry.

While figuring out her next move after SM, she did a studio session with a Korean producer. She thought they were going to make beats. Instead, he wanted her to write a song.

“The last song I’d written…like actually wrote the melody and lyrics — was in college for a project, and it was a Christmas song and it was terrible,” she recounted. “So I was like, ‘What?’”

But she gave it a go, and to her surprise, she fell in love with writing pop songs. The song she wrote that day was picked up and released as “Hello” by K-pop singer Hani.

Although EJAE never debuted as an idol, the training helped her understand the structures and melodies that would work for songs. Andrew Choi, who would become her mentor, heard “Hello” and brought her onto his team and to SM songwriting camps. (Choi is the singing voice for Jinu in KPop Demon Hunters.)

“I think he saw potential in me, which I didn’t see,” she said. “Sometimes it just takes other people to see something in you for you to believe in yourself, too.”

Since then, she has co-produced or co-written for a string of big-name K-pop acts, including Twice, Suzy and Aespa. Perhaps her most recognisable hit is Psycho, by Red Velvet.

For KPop Demon Hunters, she’s credited on four tracks, including Golden.

Maggie Kang, the movie’s creator and co-director, said she contacted the songwriter at the suggestion of her husband. EJAE was initially brought on as a songwriter in 2019 and offered the lead singing role around 2022.

“We cast EJAE first. We had the demos and knew that we wanted EJAE to do the vocals,” Kang told Forbes last July. In a social media post, she said the demos helped the film get the green light.

EJAE, for her part, was more hesitant. She had never been cast in a movie before, and, at the time, no one knew KPop Demon Hunters would go on to become a global phenomenon. She enjoys being behind the scenes, where there’s less pressure, she said in an interview with The New York Times.

“What made me say yes is the efficiency,” she said. “I wrote the song; I know the nuances and how to sell it. I was confident about that.”

Now audiences are belting out her lyrics, and the music has given the movie a life beyond the screen. Golden held the No. 1 spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 for weeks last year, heard everywhere from grocery stores to dentist offices. Other KPop Demon Hunters songs similarly dominated the charts worldwide, with hundreds of millions of Spotify streams.

It’s a full-circle moment for EJAE. Twenty years after she hoped to be a K-pop star and 10 years after her dream was crushed, her voice and lyrics are reaching listeners across the world.

“Golden” even found its way into global affairs: The leaders of Japan and South Korea recently played the song on the drums together in an usually loud display of diplomacy.

When Golden won its Golden Globe, EJAE referenced her time as a trainee – and her reinvention.

“This award goes to people who’ve had their doors closed at them,” she said, accepting the accolade with her co-writer and producers. “I can confidently say rejection is redirection, so never give up.”

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

View from The Hill: Littleproud and Ley turn on the music for another attempt at the two step

By The Conversation -

February 2, 2026

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

Nationals Leader David Littleproud easily saw off a token move to spill the party leadership on Monday. But he is now under immense pressure to reach a deal with Liberal leader Sussan Ley to put the Coalition together again.

With talks scheduled for Monday night, Liberal frontbencher Dan Tehan flagged reunification as a top priority, proposing codifying the arrangements for future behaviour, with a mechanism to resolve disputes.

Littleproud split the Coalition after Ley sacked three Nationals frontbenchers who crossed the floor on the hate legislation, breaking shadow cabinet solidarity. Nationals sources said reinstating the three was a condition of a deal.

Ley’s numbers man, frontbencher Alex Hawke, delivered a strong call for Littleproud to return his party into a coalition with the Liberals.

Hawke told Sky: “We are urging him not to break the Coalition, because it will be the biggest own goal. It will be bigger, or as big, as the DLP split in the Labor Party [in the 1950s].

“If there’s any chance or prospect of turning away from this [divided] course, David Littleproud needs to turn away from scoring the biggest own goal of all time in the centre-right of Australian politics.”

The unsuccessful spill motion at the Nationals meeting came from backbencher Colin Boyce, a strong critic of how Littleproud handled events leading to the Coalition’s split that happened less than a fortnight ago. Boyce knew his motion would not succeed but wanted to make a point.

The meeting carried a motion moved by Victorian MP Darren Chester, to authorise the Nationals leadership team “to negotiate in good faith” and urgently with the Liberals’ leadership to re-establish “a Coalition for the duration of the 48th Federal Parliament”.

Chester said later, “After a very constructive discussion my motion was overwhelmingly supported because it’s in the best interests of the nation for the Coalition to reform and hold this government to account. I hope the negotiations are successful.”

A deal would strengthen Ley’s position in the short term against defence spokesman Angus Taylor, undermining any argument he might mount that only a change of leadership could reunite the Coalition.

Littleproud initially said his shadow ministers – who all quit after the three were sacked – could not serve in a Ley shadow ministry.

Hawke dismissed this as “a moment of anger. I haven’t heard him repeat that claim.”

Not all Liberals are anxious for a quick rapprochement, believing the party can better appeal to inner city voters if not tied to the Nationals.

The pressure on Littleproud to re-form the Coalition has been increased by a Redbridge poll in the Australian Financial Review showing One Nation polling 26%, well ahead of the Liberals and Nationals combined on 19%.

One Nation’s Barnaby Joyce on Monday flagged the party would announce on Tuesday a high profile recruit defecting from another party.

If the Coalition re-forms this would be the second time since the election. The post-election split was also brief.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. View from The Hill: Littleproud and Ley turn on the music for another attempt at the two step – https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-littleproud-and-ley-turn-on-the-music-for-another-attempt-at-the-two-step-274835

Efforts to salvage capsized Black Cat Cruises tour boat in Akaroa halted

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

The Black Cat Cruises catamaran had more than 40 people on board when it began to smoke, then take on water, according to witnesses. Everyone on board was rescued after other boaties came to their aid. Canterbury Regional Council

Salvage efforts for a stranded catamaran on Canterbury’s Akaroa Harbour are being temporarily halted ahead of bad weather, the Canterbury Regional Council says.

The cleanup had been continuing after the Black Cat Cruises vessel ran aground on Saturday, prompting the rescue of more than 40 passengers and crew.

The Transport Accident Investigation Commission (TAIC) had begun an investigation which was expected to take between 12 months and two years.

On Monday, local authorities attempted to recover the vessel and quell the impact of thousands of litres of spilled diesel on the harbour.

Part of the recovery operation included moving the vessel into deeper waters, in a bid to protect its structural integrity.

The regional council’s on-scene commander Emma Parr said this was unable to be achieved.

“The hull has settled hard on a large rock and was unable to be moved into deeper water as planned. Forecast bad weather for the next two days means recovery efforts will be paused,” she said.

“All efforts have been made to retrieve hazardous and loose materials from the wreck.”

All responding agencies remained committed to the removal of the wreck in its entirety, Parr said.

“Debris collection and environmental monitoring will continue, and the exclusion zone remains in place. We ask all water users to respect these restrictions to ensure the safety of responders and the public.”

The Black Cat Cruises catamaran sank in Akaroa. Canterbury Regional Council / SUPPLIED

Wildlife worries

The Department of Conservation (DOC) said it was concerned about the effects of the diesel spill on wildlife.

Operations Manager for the Mahaanui District Andy Thompson told Midday Report strong smells of diesel had been coming from the nearby marine reserve on Sunday.

“We’re always worried about any sort of substance, like diesel fuel, hydraulic fluid, and engine oil in the marine environment. And even more so when it’s in the marine reserve environment, which is there for the protection of marine life,” he said.

“We have been fortunate in this case in that we don’t have a lot of hydraulic fluid and engine oil, like you get on some boats.”

Spilled diesel had been “evaporating rapidly” and DOC would continue to monitor the situation, Thompson said.

Long-standing tourism business Pohatu Penguins said the South Island Wildlife Hospital were prepared and ready, should any of their birds be impacted.

Pohatu nature guide and penguin rehabber Averil Parthonnaud said it had been told by the regional council that no animals “were in trouble”.

“It’s also at the perfect time of the year because the penguins are moulting (shedding feathers) right now. So they’re pretty much at home in their nest and not in the water a lot right now,” she said.

“It kind of happened at the right time for penguins, but I don’t know about other native birds.”

Parthonnaud told RNZ there was a lot of sympathy and support among the community for their fellow tourism operators Black Cat Cruises.

“Everyone knows the Black Cat crew, and everyone will be feeling sad that they lost their boat,” she said.

Coastguard unit being trialled at Akaroa

Before the weekend’s events, it had already been a busy summer in Akaroa for the Coastguard.

Volunteers had responded to “several incidents” since December, including a fatal diving incident earlier this month.

Coastguard said it was undertaking a trial in the Banks Peninsula settlement to see whether a permanent unit could be established there.

“Since December, volunteers from a range of Southern units have been spending their Saturdays and Sundays on Ihenga Rescue, providing cover for what’s become an increasingly busy boating community.

“It’s already been a full-on summer,” a spokesperson said.

The nearest Coastguard stations to Akaroa were based in Sumner and the Canterbury Coastguard unit at Lyttelton.

Coastguard southern operations manager Rob Greasy said volunteers were already training on the Akaroa Harbour on Saturday, which meant a quick response time.

“The vessel was taking on water and the boat was trying to evacuate passengers and put them onto any nearby vessels,” he said.

Coastguard volunteers tried to pump water from the Black Cat, but the rate of water entering the vessel was too great to keep up with.

The summer trial would consider the number of incidents it responds to in Akaroa and their seriousness, the uptake of local volunteers and local community feedback, Greasy said.

The trial ends in late February, followed by a Coastguard review.

A follow-up trial in Akaroa could also be arranged.

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

Pilot, passenger killed in Paekākāriki Hill helicopter crash named

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

RNZ/Samuel Rillstone

The pilot and passenger killed in a helicopter crash near Paekākāriki Hill last week have been named.

They were Cole Christopher Ritchie, 25, from Wharepapa South, and Joseph Mark Keeley, 54, from Tauhara.

The pair were pest control contractors working on Transmission Gully.

Kāpiti Mana Area Commander Inspector Renée Perkins said emergency services, aviation authorities, local iwi and regional partners have worked closely in extremely challenging terrain.

The are where the helicopter crashed. RNZ/Samuel Rillstone

The helicopter wreckage was removed on Friday.

Perkins said police, Civil Aviation Authority and Victim Support are supporting the families affected.

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Modern windows suspected of being behind rise in serious Kererū injuries

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

A Dunedin wildlife hospital suspects modern windows could be to blame for an increasing number of serious injuries in Aotearoa’s native wood pigeon/Kererū.

Window strike is the most common reason for the Kererū ending up in its hospital, with hundreds over the past few years – but they’re not the only birds taking a hit.

Survival rates were also down due to the severity of the injuries and the people treating the Kererū believe double glazing could be the problem.

Dunedin Wildlife Hospital general manager Suzanne Stephenson told Checkpoint the number of Kererū deaths was rising

“When we started eight years ago … we saved about 64 percent of the Kererū that we saw, that’s sort of 37 out of 57, we were able to give a second chance and get back out there into the wild.

“But last year that basically halved, we’re down to 34.7 percent or 17 out of 49 birds.

Stephenson said the most common injury they saw was a coracoid dislocation or fracture, which is a bone in the chest.

She said the injury could also directly impact the heart, which was catastrophic for the native wood pigeon.

Stephenson said modern homes, with bigger windows and double glazing could be to blame for the rise.

An imprint left behind after a Kererū flew into a window. Supplied / Chris Murray

“Now the difference is down the track, we used to have single glazing and that glass had a bit of give, so if a Kererū saw a line of flight through your windows it would possibly fly through that, it would break the glass, but with an injury that was probably quite survivable.

“… Obviously, you know double glazing protects us, keeps us warm, but what it does is give a very hard surface and our very large wood pigeons of course, some of them weigh up to about 650 grams, hits that with great force.”

Stephenson said she understood the practical use of double glazing, but encouraged people to work together with native wildlife to reduce serious injuries.

She said while birds had far greater eyesight than human, they see a flight line path through the window, with reflections also proving difficult.

Stephenson said their hospital had a couple of injured Kererū being looked after, but there were also other types of birds being affected.

Shining cuckoos and kingfishers were also renowned for window strike, she said.

The size of the Kererū didn’t help with injuries, with the force of impact being larger as a result.

“They’re the largest species of pigeons in the world and I think any bird that goes straight into a window, no matter what its size, that impact is going to be huge for them,” she said.

“… People will tell us that they’ve seen a bird on the ground not moving and they’ve watched it for a couple of days to see if it’s okay.”

Stephenson warned that was not natural behaviour and advised people to ring the DOC hotline as soon as possible.

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

NSW is ditching good character references in sentencing. Will the rest of the country follow?

By The Conversation -

February 2, 2026

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vicki Lowik, Adjunct Research Fellow, School of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Sciences, CQUniversity Australia

New South Wales is set to become the first jurisdiction in the country to end the use of good character references in the sentencing of convicted criminals.

The government will introduce a bill this week to amend the state’s sentencing laws. The amendment will stop people submitting references of their “good character” to lobby for more lenient sentences.

References attesting to the convicted criminal’s prospects for rehabilitation and their likelihood of reoffending will still be permitted.

The move acknowledges the potential re-traumatisation faced by victims when unsubstantiated character references from family and friends are submitted for consideration during sentencing hearings. Victims have stated the process can make them think the courts don’t care about or take seriously the harm they have experienced.

It’s a decision that aligns with expert evidence, so might other states follow suit?

What is a good character reference, exactly?

Good character references are letters presented to a court during the process of sentencing someone convicted of a crime. They are often provided by friends and family members, though references may be sought from employers, priests and other respected community members.

The references usually describe how the person is a valuable family or community member, has a good work record and no criminal history.

Character evidence can help a judge more fully understand the person they are sentencing and decide if they can be rehabilitated. Demonstrated prior good character enables the judge to ensure the appropriateness and fairness of the sentence.

But contemplating the subjective opinions of non-professionals regarding the possibility of rehabilitation can be problematic.

Such references have promoted people being sentenced for sexual assault and rape as having “high moral values”, being a “kind-hearted, loving father” or having a “good work ethic”.

Since 2009, NSW hasn’t allowed good character references for child sexual offenders who used their position of influence to gain access to victims.

But two sexual abuse victims, Harrison James and Jarad Grice, have led a campaign for more substantial change. Called Your Reference Ain’t Relevant, the campaign protested against convicted child sex offenders being able to produce glowing character references to reduce their sentence.

What does the evidence say?

The Australian Law Reform Commission has been reviewing justice responses to sexual violence. In its 2025 final report, the commission said it received submissions describing the provision of good character references for convicted sexual violence offenders as a “problematic” practice.

The commission noted the NSW Sentencing Council was reviewing the use of character evidence. It said the outcome of the NSW process would inform any suggestions for future reforms at a national level.

The New South Wales Sentencing Council’s report was released on February 1. It recommended legislation to prevent the court from using evidence that goes solely to a finding of good character. This legislation, however, may permit the court to consider other relevant evidence in sentencing.

The report states “there is no settled definition of what good character is, or what it reflects”. The council said the concept “has been criticised as being vague and incoherent […] lacking a settled definition”.

The council’s recommendations go beyond child sexual offences. They apply to all convicted offenders.

And for NSW at least, they would overrule a 2001 High Court decision allowing character to be considered in providing “some leniency” in sentencing.

Will other states do the same?

A report by the Queensland Sentencing Advisory Commission into the sentencing of sexual assault and rape recommended that some types of good character evidence be limited. It said good character evidence should only be used to assist the court in deciding on the rehabilitation or the potential recidivism of the convicted criminal.

The report recommended that courts have the option, depending on the nature or seriousness of an offence, to disregard character references when determining sentencing.

In September 2025, Queensland parliament passed legislation addressing the recommendations. The references can now only be considered to inform a judge’s assessment of the likelihood of rehabilitation or recidivism.

But as some frontline sexual assault services submitted in consultations this left open ways to circumvent the rule. Friends and family could provide references mentioning the prospects of rehabilitation.

So while there’s some movement on the issue in Queensland, if the NSW recommendations are to lead the way in nationwide reform, the task will not be easy.

Significant differences exist between the states. This is because apart from Commonwealth offences, criminal law remains primarily a state matter. This has produced divergent offence labels, maximum penalties and sentencing regimes.

Even on the specific issue of character evidence in child sexual offence proceedings, there are substantial differences in laws and contexts across the country.

These contrasts in approach to legislating the use of good character references in sentencing will, as observed by the Law Council of Australia, likely result in similar cases attracting different outcomes in different states.

But sometimes it just takes one bold attempt at reform to inspire action in others. As advocates have succeeded in NSW, it’s likely others will attempt similar change. State and territory governments have been put on notice.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. NSW is ditching good character references in sentencing. Will the rest of the country follow? – https://theconversation.com/nsw-is-ditching-good-character-references-in-sentencing-will-the-rest-of-the-country-follow-274842

New data show where the parties got their money from in the lead-up to the 2025 election

By The Conversation -

February 2, 2026

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Griffiths, Democracy Deputy Program Director, Grattan Institute

Australia’s political parties set new records in funds raised and spent in the lead-up to the 2025 federal election. Now, nine months later, Australians finally get a look at who funded the parties’ election campaigns.

Data released today reveal that big money matters in Australian elections, and political donations remain highly concentrated among a small number of powerful individuals and interest groups.

The big spenders

Money matters in Australian elections because it helps spread political messages far and wide. The Coalition substantially outspent Labor in the year leading up to the 2025 election, declaring $212 million in expenditure compared with Labor’s $160 million. In fact, the two major parties together spent three quarters of a total $489 million in 2024–25. These figures include electoral communication, as well as party operating expenses and salaries, but there is no breakdown.

Clive Palmer’s Trumpet of Patriots party came in third, declaring $53 million in expenditure, well below the $123 million and $89 million his United Australia Party spent in the 2022 and 2019 election campaigns, respectively. The Greens declared $40 million and One Nation just $3 million in expenditure in 2024–25.

Australia’s political parties collectively exceeded their 2022 election budgets in 2025, raising $490 million, compared with $402 million in the lead-up to the 2022 election, and coming very close to the half-a-billion mark for the first time.

The Coalition has long led the fundraising “arms race” between the major parties, with Labor taking a substantive lead only once on record – in the lead-up to the 2007 election that saw Kevin Rudd’s Labor Party defeat John Howard’s Coalition government.

The big donors

So who’s stumping up these whopping sums? A few big donors dominate the picture.

Clive Palmer’s Mineralogy – which donated almost exclusively to the Trumpet of Patriots – was by far the largest donor in the 2024–25 financial year. While Palmer’s $54.3 million in donations this electoral cycle is lower than his record-breaking intervention in 2022, it still shows the substantial sway a single donor can have in an election year.

Climate 200 was the second-largest donor over the period, with the organisation making $6.6 million in donations to a range of independent candidates and campaign groups. Donors to Climate 200 – including Scott Farquhar, William Taylor Nominees, and Mike Cannon-Brookes – were among those stumping up the largest individual donations.

One new player this cycle was Coal Australia, a lobby group founded in 2024 to represent coal mining interests. The group made more than $4 million in donations to electoral campaign groups such as Australians for Prosperity, and Jobs for Mining Communities.

The single biggest donation to the Coalition came from philanthropist Pam Wall, who gave $5.2 million to the Liberal Party of South Australia in 2024–25, in memory of her late husband, Ian Wall. Other major donors to the Coalition included the Cormack Foundation (an investment arm for the Liberal Party), Oryxium Investments (linked to the Lowy family), and DoorDash Australia.

Labor’s single biggest donor was Labor Holdings (an investment arm of the party), which donated $4 million, followed by the Mining and Energy Union ($3.3 million). SA Progressive Business, a fundraising arm of the Labor Party, donated $1.4 million.

Anthony Pratt’s paper and packaging company Pratt Holdings made big donations to both Labor and the Coalition, as it has done in previous years, with Labor benefiting to the tune of $2 million, and the Coalition $1 million.

What about the rest of the money?

There’s a lot of hidden money in Australian politics. Declared donations made up only a quarter of political parties’ total income in 2024–25. Public funding made up another quarter, and “other receipts” a further 20%. That leaves about 30% ($144 million) in undisclosed private funds.

The Coalition’s funding is a little more murky: 36% of Coalition income in 2024–25 was undisclosed, compared with 23% for Labor. Only donations bigger than $16,900 need to be declared under the current rules, so substantial donations remain hidden.

Reform is coming, but there’s still more to do

Fortunately, the rules are changing soon to provide much more transparency. From July 1 this year, the donations disclosure threshold will be lowered to $5,000, and donations data will be released much more quickly. Donations will be required to be disclosed within seven days during an election period, and at other times, within 21 days following the month the gift was received.

That means Australians will finally know who’s donating while policy issues – and elections – are still “live”.

The new rules also introduce caps on donations and electoral expenditure, helping to reduce the influence of money in politics. But the new rules unfairly advantage major parties over independents and new entrants.

The new total cap of $90 million for electoral expenditure by a political party is too high, keeping too much money in politics. And the per-seat spending cap of $800,000 is too low, advantaging incumbents over new entrants. There is also a loophole in the design of the donations cap that advantages major parties by allowing the cap to apply separately to each branch of a party.

The new legislation should be reviewed and amended to close the loopholes before the next federal election.

The Grattan Institute began with contributions to its endowment of $15 million from each of the Federal and Victorian Governments, $4 million from BHP Billiton, and $1 million from NAB. In order to safeguard its independence, Grattan Institute’s board controls this endowment. The funds are invested and contribute to funding Grattan Institute’s activities. Grattan Institute also receives funding from corporates, foundations, and individuals to support its general activities as disclosed on its website.

Matthew Bowes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. New data show where the parties got their money from in the lead-up to the 2025 election – https://theconversation.com/new-data-show-where-the-parties-got-their-money-from-in-the-lead-up-to-the-2025-election-274739

More interest rates relief coming for homeowners

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

RNZ

Interest rates might have started to rise but what home loan borrowers pay in interest is likely to keep falling through this year.

BNZ chief economist Mike Jones said while 2025 was the “year of the refix” – with 81 percent of fixed-rate mortgage borrowers refixing, the highest percentage in 13 years – there was still more activity to come this year.

Over 2026, 68 percent of fixed rate loans were due to come up for renewal.

“It’s the coming six months in which mortgage term expiries are the most pronounced relative to average,” he said.

“There’s approximately $132 billion worth or 34 percent of total borrowings. The long-run average is 27 percent.”

He said there would mean cash flow improved for many borrowers.

“A hypothetical one-year $300,000 loan locked in a year ago at 5.74 percent could currently be refixed for another 12 months at a rate of around 4.5 percent. That would result in an interest saving of a little over $300 a month.”

He said, in November, the average rate being paid was 5.17 percent.

“It has been a slow 14-month descent from the 6.39 percent peak in October 2024.”

He expected it could get to 4.5 percent by the middle of the year.

“It’s kind of a weird time because you’ve got mortgage rates seemingly bottoming, starting to turn higher but for the average person coming up for renewal they will still most likely be experiencing or be facing a menu of options lower than what they were previously paying, just by virtue of the slow-moving nature of the refixing beast.

“That is obviously a key plank of the economic recovery last year and also this year… we think we’re about 80 percent of the way through that process of refixing on to lower rates with roughly 25 points’ worth of easing still to come through that pipeline over the next six months.”

He said many people were choosing to pay off their mortgages more quickly rather than using their savings to spend.

“There’s a strong element of that, keeping your repayments perhaps similar to what they were but applying the extra relief from lower interest rates just to principal. We’re seeing quite a bit of that. I think there’s quite a lot as well that’s just been soaked up more or less immediately by the higher costs that households are staring into.”

Some was going into discretionary spending, he said.

“It’s helping turn that retail sector but it’s certainly not turning with any great force which I think speaks to the fact of some of those pressures that households are still under.”

The reduction in debt would be good for long-term sustainability, he said.

He said the average home loan rate being paid by households would probably hit the bottom of this cycle in the middle of the year.

“It take some time to turn and it will stay at a relatively supportive level for a period of time and probably all of 2026.”

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Does coffee raise your blood pressure? Here’s how much it’s OK to drink

By The Conversation -

February 2, 2026

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Collins, Laureate Professor in Nutrition and Dietetics, University of Newcastle

Coffee first entered human lives and veins over 600 years ago.

Now we consume an average of almost two kilos per person each year – sometimes with very specific preferences about blends and preparation methods. How much you drink is influenced by genes acting on your brain’s reward system and caffeine metabolism.

Coffee can raise your blood pressure in the short term, especially if you don’t usually drink it or if you already have high blood pressure.

But this doesn’t mean you need to cut out coffee if you have high blood pressure or are concerned about your heart health. Moderation is key.

So how does coffee affect your blood pressure? And if yours is high, how much is OK to drink?

What is high blood pressure?

Blood pressure is the force blood exerts on artery walls when your heart pumps. It’s measured by two numbers:

the first and biggest number is systolic blood pressure, which is the force generated when your heart contracts and pushes blood out around your body
the lower number, diastolic blood pressure, is the force when your heart relaxes and fills back up with blood.

Normal blood pressure is defined as systolic blood pressure of less than 120 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg) and diastolic blood pressure of less than 80 mm Hg.

Once your numbers consistently reach 140/90 or more, blood pressure is considered high. This is also called hypertension.

Knowing your blood pressure numbers is important because hypertension doesn’t have any symptoms. When it goes untreated, or isn’t well-controlled, your risk of heart attacks and strokes increases, and existing kidney and heart disease worsens.

About 31% of adults have hypertension with half unaware they have it. Of those taking medication for hypertension, about 47% don’t have it well-controlled.

How does coffee affect blood pressure?

Caffeine in coffee is a muscle stimulant that increases the heart rate in some people. This can potentially contribute to an irregular heartbeat, known as arrhythmia.

Caffeine also stimulates adrenal glands to release adrenaline. This makes your heart beat faster and your blood vessels to constrict, which increases blood pressure.

Blood caffeine levels peak between 30 minutes and two hours after a cup of coffee. Caffeine’s half-life is 3–6 hours, meaning blood levels will reduce by about half during this time.

The range is due to age (kids have smaller, less mature livers so can’t metabolise it as fast), genetics (people can be fast or slow metabolisers) and whether you usually drink it (regular consumers clear it faster).

The impact of caffeine on blood pressure from coffee (and cola, energy drinks and chocolate) varies. Research reviews report increases in systolic blood pressure of 3–15 and a diastolic blood pressure increase of 4–13 after consumption.

The effect of caffeine also depends on a person’s usual blood pressure. An increase in blood pressure may be more risky if you have hypertension and existing heart or liver disease, so it’s best to discuss your coffee consumption with your doctor.

What else is in coffee?

Coffee contains hundreds of phytochemicals: compounds that contribute flavour, aroma, or influence health and disease.

Phytochemicals that directly affect blood pressure include melanoidins, which regulate the body’s fluid volume and activity of enzymes that help control blood pressure.

Quinic acid is another phytochemical shown to lower systolic and diastolic blood pressure by improving the lining of blood vessels, allowing them to better accommodate blood pressure rises.

Can coffee cause hypertension?

In a review of 13 studies that included 315,000 people, researchers examined associations between coffee intake and the risk of hypertension.

During study follow-up periods, 64,650 people developed hypertension, with the researchers concluding coffee drinking was not associated with an increased risk of developing the condition.

Even when they examined data by gender, amount of coffee, decaffeinated versus caffeinated, smoking or years of follow-up, coffee was still not associated with an increased risk of developing hypertension.

The only exceptions suggesting lower risk were for five studies from the United States and seven low-quality studies, meaning those results should be interpreted with caution.

A separate Japanese study followed more than 18,000 adults aged 40–79 years for 18.9 years. This included about 1,800 people who had very high blood pressure (grade 2-3 hypertension), with systolic blood pressure of 160 or above or diastolic blood pressure of 100 or above.

Here, risk of dying from cardiovascular disease, including heart attack or stroke, was double among those drinking two or more cups of coffee a day compared to non-drinkers.

There were no associations with death from cardiovascular disease for those who had either normal blood pressure or mild (grade 1) hypertension (systolic blood pressure 140–159 or diastolic blood pressure 90–99).

The bottom line

There is no need to give up coffee. Here’s what to do instead:

know your blood pressure, health history and which food and drinks contain caffeine
consider all factors that influence your blood pressure and health – family history, diet, salt and physical activity – so you can make informed decisions about what you consume and how much you move
be aware of how caffeine affects you and avoid it before having your blood pressure measured
avoid caffeine in the afternoon so it doesn’t affect your sleep
aim to moderate your coffee intake by drinking four cups or less a day or switching to decaf
if you have systolic blood pressure of 160 or above or diastolic blood pressure of 100 or above, consider limiting to one cup a day, and talk to you doctor.

Clare Collins AO is a Laureate Professor in Nutrition and Dietetics at the University of Newcastle, NSW and a Hunter Medical Research Institute (HMRI) affiliated researcher. She is a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Leadership Fellow and has received research grants from NHMRC, ARC, MRFF, HMRI, Diabetes Australia, Heart Foundation, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, nib foundation, Rijk Zwaan Australia, WA Dept. Health, Meat and Livestock Australia, and Greater Charitable Foundation. She has consulted to SHINE Australia, Novo Nordisk, Quality Bakers, the Sax Institute, Dietitians Australia and the ABC. She was a team member conducting systematic reviews to inform the Heart Foundation evidence reviews on meat and dietary patterns and was Co-Chair of the Guidelines Development Advisory Committee for Clinical Practice Guidelines for Treatment of Obesity 2025.

– ref. Does coffee raise your blood pressure? Here’s how much it’s OK to drink – https://theconversation.com/does-coffee-raise-your-blood-pressure-heres-how-much-its-ok-to-drink-270955

Farms ‘smashed’ in East Coast storms

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Farms at the top end of the East Coast have been “smashed” by recent storms, with stock isolated and extensive damage to land and infrastructure.

A clearer picture of the level of damage is starting to emerge after huge downpours hit the region last month.

Representatives from Beef and Lamb and Tai Rāwhiti Whenua Collective have been going farm to farm doing damage assessments.

Beef and Lamb’s Pania King said the damage is isolated to Hicks Bay down to Te Araroa and slightly inland.

“We’ve seen everything from erosion and landslides through to debris and silt throughout paddocks, water systems and culverts are gone and a huge amount of fencing is down – so it’s quite extensive the amount of damage that has happened on those farms and on that whenua.”

King said farms were cut off, and even within farms, farmers could not access their stock.

“This is step hill country farming – farmers will jump on their horse and get out there if they really have to, but stock should have feed and water.”

She said farmers and contractors were waiting for the land to dry out before getting heavy machinery in to start the cleanup.

“It’s still raining here on Monday, so we are hoping by Wednesday we will be able to get machines in to start reinstating access to farms – that’s step one.”

King, alongside others involved in the recovery, also took to the air to assess the damage.

“It was quite emotional actually because I did the farm assessments in Gabrielle and it was going through the back of my head how many gains we have made, how much work has gone into rebuilding the infrastructure on their farms and how much capital has gone in – and now its all back to square one.

“I was feeling disheartened for our farmers, because for many this is the second or third time they’ve been hit hard in recent years.”

She said five farms had been listed as a priority.

“They’ve been really smashed – the destruction on those farms is actually quite unreal.”

King said the morale on farms was something everyone was keeping a close eye on.

“As you can imagine, it’s only natural to be feeling pretty down in the dumps when you’ve done this two or three times – this is not their first rodeo.”

She said the damage assessment should be with the Ministry for Primary Industries by end of Tuesday, so she was hoping a package of support would be organised to help farmers recover.

“We need to recover pastures and get some crops growing ahead of winter for feed otherwise that will bring a whole other issue for our farmers.

She says the farms hit were 95 percent whenua Māori, so the farmers would rebuild and stay on their land.

“This is a close-knit community, and everyone is looking out for each other and helping where they can.”

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Seven people injured in two-car crash in north Auckland

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

The crash happened on the arterial route of Whangaparāoa Rd. RNZ/Nick Monro

Seven people, including pedestrians, have been injured after two cars collided in north Auckland’s Whangaparāoa Peninsula.

A police spokesperson said the crash happened on the arterial route of Whangaparāoa Road, Manly, just before 4pm.

The spokesperson said people have received minor injuries.

Pedestrians were hit in the crash. RNZ/Nick Monro

Two Fire and Emergency crews were called to the scene. FENZ shift manager Paul Radden said on arrival, firefighters saw a crash involving pedestrians and two cars.

One crew has since left, and one remained in attendance working alongside St John and the police.

The road is closed while the scene is cleared.

Whangaparāoa Road. Google Maps

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Police criminal probe into Pike River nearly finished

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Credit: NZ Police

Police are nearing the final stages of their criminal investigation into the Pike River mine disaster, in which 29 men were killed.

A methane-fuelled explosion ripped through the mine in the rugged Paparoa Range on the South Island’s West Coast on 19 November, 2010.

Detective Superintendent Darryl Sweeney said the nationally significant and unique investigation was legally complex, and police had been working with the Wellington Crown solicitor for more than 18 months.

“We acknowledge this year will be 16 years since the disaster. Before any decisions can be made, we will be conducting a further investigation phase,” he said in a statement.

“To protect the integrity of the investigation, we will not be providing specifics. However, I can say any further update is likely to be several months away.

“We appreciate questions over the time this investigation has taken but police are committed to exploring all possible lines of inquiry out of respect for the 29 miners and their families.”

Last November the lawyer for Pike River families Nigel Hampton KC told RNZ police had enough evidence to lay manslaughter charges over the disaster.

The Department of Labour laid health and safety charges against Pike River Coal Ltd, its former chief executive Peter Whittall and contractor VLI Drilling Ltd in 2011.

The charges were dropped in 2013 in exchange for a $3.41 million payout to the victims’ families, which was later declared unlawful by the Supreme Court.

The 29 men died from the blast or from the toxic atmosphere underground, while two others in the stone drift managed to escape.

RNZ / Anneke Smith

Efforts by Pike River families, including Anna Osborne and Sonya Rockhouse, ultimately led to police being able to re-enter the mine and recover further material and evidence from inside the drift.

In September 2022, police announced they were reopening the borehole drilling operation as part of the investigation and 10 boreholes were drilled, imaged and resealed. Human remains were found in the mine in 2023.

The 15th anniversary of the disaster followed the release of the Pike River feature film, which brought the families’ ongoing fight for justice back into focus.

Osborne and Rockhouse met Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden at Parliament on 19 November to warn that her workplace safety reforms risked another Pike River disaster.

Unions are calling on the government to support corporate manslaughter legislation, arguing it would ensure that the most extreme breaches of health and safety obligations result in criminal liability.

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith last year said there were no plans to introduce a corporate manslaughter charge.

A 2012 royal commission of inquiry found that New Zealand’s old safety laws lacked teeth and there were catastrophic failings in the mining company’s systems, despite numerous warnings about a potential disaster.

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ASIC flags $40 million in refunds after review of risky financial products

By The Conversation -

February 2, 2026

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Lee, Associate Professor in Property and Real Estate, Deakin University

Australia’s corporate regulator has secured refunds of A$40 million to more than 38,000 investors in risky financial products, following a review of the industry.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) raised concerns that marketing of high-risk products known as “contracts for difference” or CFDs, failed to clearly explain the risks involved.

This is just ASIC’s latest intervention in more than 15 years of ongoing concern with the potential harm of CFDs to retail investors.

Fine-tuning the marketing of these complex financial products to a suitable audience remains an unfinished task for the regulator.

What are CFDs?

In its report, ASIC said thousands of Australians lose money trading CFDs every year. In 2023-34, over 133,000 people, or 68% of retail clients, lost more than $458 million.

Contracts for difference are a type of financial instrument known as derivatives because they follow the price of an underlying asset, such as stocks, the Australian dollar, and other financial products.

They are traded “over-the-counter” (meaning not on a public exchange) on platforms run by CFD providers.

Investors can profit from both upward or downward movements in financial assets with CFDs. Unlike buying shares, investors need only pay a fraction of the price (the margin) up front to enter into a CFD to track a financial product, with the hope of making a profit.

CFDs are leveraged products, which means an investor is borrowing money to speculate on the price of an asset. A small price change in the underlying stock or commodity can have an amplified effect by increasing the gain – or the loss – on the CFD.

For example, this can be as little as paying $1 upfront to gain the same trading power as $100.

Let’s say you buy a CFD on one Apple share. As you only need to pay a fifth of the Apple stock for the CFD, you can buy five Apple CFDs for the price of one Apple share. So if the price of Apple rises by $1, you could make $5. But if it falls by $1, you could lose $5 dollars.

CFDs are therefore popular with investors as they can trade many financial instruments (betting on rises or falls) and magnify their trading power.

The downside is that trading on margin also amplifies losses if the market goes against the bet that a price will rise or fall. This has led to financial distress and cases of attempted self-harm.

ASIC has been particularly concerned about issuers offering “margin discounts” to clients on particular trades, to reduce the amount or “margin” that the investor pays up front.

This contravenes ASIC’s 2021 product intervention order. ASIC published a further warning to CFD issuers in 2024 to stop this practice.

The complexity and risk of CFDs has meant they are effectively banned in the United States. In Singapore, prospective traders need to pass a customer knowledge assessment before they are allowed to trade CFDs.

Who are the products being marketed to?

CFDs are not for the faint of heart and would only suit investors who are very knowledgeable and have a large appetite for risk. Despite this, retail investors (regular people) are the dominant market targeted by CFDs issuers in their marketing and advertising.

In ASIC’s recent report, the regulator found that CFD issuer websites misled consumers.

Some examples were promoting the underlying instruments, such as shares or commodities, rather than actual CFDs, and overstating the benefits of trading CFDs and understating the risks.

ASIC has forced 46 issuers to rewrite their websites by removing misleading content and making them clearly state that they are offering CFDs, among other changes. One issuer amended 1,000 web pages.

ASIC chair Joe Longo last week floated the idea of banning advertising for high-risk financial products, which would also include CFDs.

The underlying concern is that unsophisticated investors are being attracted to complex financial products that carry great risk of financial loss.

Indeed, ASIC’s report found that only 32% of retail clients made money from CFDs after fees. Of those that traded the most per month (over 50 trades), only 19% were profitable after fees.

Fears vulnerable investors still slipping through the cracks

The key difference is between retail and wholesale clients.

Wholesale clients are generally institutions or sophisticated investors, highly experienced and more likely to trade complex derivatives and make a profit.
Wholesale clients are defined in law based on certain tests.

Wholesale clients also lose some of the consumer protections that apply to retail investors, such as receiving product disclosure statements and having access to dispute resolution.

Yet, ASIC found that even wholesale clients lost money, with only 30% making profits.

This raises concerns for ASIC of whether some retail clients were misclassified as wholesale clients by the CFD issuers.

So, it is not the laws that need changing, which clearly define sophisticated investors. What is needed is more scrutiny of how issuers misclassify potentially vulnerable investors.

The statistics are concerning as this means the large majority of investors are losing money trading CFDs, driven largely by paying fees. On the flip side, this means CFD issuers are profiting from some of these losses as they earn the fees.

This raises questions of whether CFD issuers are attracting suitable clientele through advertising, as the losses by investors seem excessive. This suggests that advertising should carry warning labels, similar to advertising for other risky activities, such as sports betting.

Walking a fine line

CFDs have existed for over two decades, with a market that is predominantly comprised of retail investors.

ASIC has managed the fine balance of permitting their access, while regulating issuers on their marketing and operations without banning them outright. Potential investors would be wise to do their own homework to carefully assess the costs and risks of CFDs before wading into the market.

Adrian Lee receives funding from the Australian Research Council. The author is working on a separate ASIC project related to crypto trading.

– ref. ASIC flags $40 million in refunds after review of risky financial products – https://theconversation.com/asic-flags-40-million-in-refunds-after-review-of-risky-financial-products-274426

Fertiliser a possible pawn in global chessboard – Rabobank

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Rabobank senior animal proteins analyst Jen Corkran said the outlook for New Zealand’s agribusiness sector this year was mostly positive. 123RF

A new report has alerted that geopolitical risks, like further escalation of tensions in Iran, could affect prices for key items used on New Zealand farms like fertiliser.

Prices for key commodities and farm inputs were often vulnerable during times of volatility, like the sharp increase in grain prices at the start of the war in key producing nation Ukraine, in 2022.

Widespread [https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/583713/why-are-iranians-protesting-and-what-does-it-mean-for-the-regime anti-government protests were held across Iran throughout January, in response to economic and social crises.

It came as the key producer of urea and ammonia fertilisers also faced a sharp increase in tensions with the United States.

In a new annual report titled Keeping One Move Ahead, Rabobank senior animal proteins analyst Jen Corkran said the outlook for New Zealand’s agribusiness sector this year was mostly positive from a farming point of view.

She said stable supply of our key exports coupled with good international demand should keep farmgate prices high this year, especially for dairy, red meat and horticulture.

“The mood out there in the agri-food and fibre spaces is quite buoyant and I guess positive, and this is driven largely by above average farmgate pricing across the board really.”

However, Corkran said geopolitical risks could push farm inputs prices even higher this year, like further escalation in tensions involving key fertiliser producer Iran.

Jen Corkran.

“Perhaps some softening in the later part of this year in terms of some of those farm input costs,” she said.

“But of course, some of these inputs are affected by some of the geopolitical situations globally, such as in the Middle East, in terms of the costs of some of the stuff we’re bringing into New Zealand.”

Iran was a major global exporter of urea in particular.

Iranians gather while blocking a street during a protest in Tehran, Iran on 9 January 2026. AFP/MAHSA

Corkran said urea and phosphate prices were already elevated for farmers – with urea highly volatile throughout last year, and possible further increases in the near-term.

“Certainly at times challenging around fertiliser prices, and we are expecting to see a bit of volatility continuing. It will be something we keep an eye on.”

She said fertiliser prices increased 8 percent for urea last year compared to the year prior, up 14 percent for phosphates and 22 percent for potash.

However she said with farmgate pricing for commodities well above five-year averages, this will help off-set rising costs.

Report co-author Emma Higgins said the “global chessboard” shifted again in 2025, with a steady tightening of trade blocs, industries policies and geopolitical manoeuvring.

“As we enter 2026, the pieces are still moving, and the pace hasn’t slowed,” Higgins said.

“Major economies are making assertive ‘opening moves’ on trade, technology and security, turning commerce into a tool of leverage more than cooperation.

“For New Zealand, this isn’t distant noise. It is the environment in which our farmers, processors and exporters must operate – in addition to usual supply and demand fundamentals.”

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Man charged over fatal Dunedin crash

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

RNZ / Nate McKinnon

A 24-year-old man has appeared in the Dunedin District Court over a crash that killed one person and seriously injured another near the city on Friday night.

Emergency services were called to the single-vehicle crash on Wickliffe Road in Port Chalmers shortly after 9pm.

One person died at the scene and two others were hurt, one seriously and one with minor injuries.

The man faces charges of driving dangerously causing death and failing to stop to ascertain injury or death after crash.

The investigation is ongoing.

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Taranaki surfers thrilled over return of world’s surfing elite to NZ

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Paige Hareb competed at the Women’s Championship Tour when it was hosted in New Plymouth. (File photo) Katrina Clarke

Taranaki’s surfing community, -the only region in New Zealand to have previously hosted the globe’s elite surf competition, is stoked for its Raglan cousins who will hold a combined men’s and women’s World Surf League event in May.

The Women’s Championship Tours stopped at Fitzroy Beach in New Plymouth between 2010 and 2013 sparking a surge of interest in the sport – particularly women’s surfing.

Craig Williamson was event director for the Taranaki Surf Festival which included what was then the ASP Women’s Dream Tour.

Reflecting on the groundbreaking event ahead of the World Surf League coming to Raglan, the Surfing Taranaki chief executive said the idea was to give a local favourite a leg up.

Craig Williamson was event director when the WSL’s predecessor the ASP brought the Women’s Dream Tour to Taranaki between 2010 and 2013. ROBIN MARTIN / RNZ

“Paige Hareb had just qualified for the world tour, the first New Zealand female to ever do so. She was young at the time.

“So, that was a huge deal for surfing in New Zealand and in Taranaki and we thought that perhaps we could pull something together here and give her a home town advantage.”

Williamson said the festival – which was pulled off with the help of 60 community partners – had left a lasting impression.

“It was incredibly inspiring for young surfers all around the country. I bump into people who are young adults now a lot of them and they are still surfing and they talk about what an effect it had on them to actually see the world best here.”

He said the impact of the visiting athletes went beyond what they demonstrated in the surf.

Promotional poster for the Taranaki Surf Festival. ROBIN MARTIN / RNZ

“I remember vividly when we had Bethany Hamilton, the Hawaiian who’d lost her arm in a shark attack, speaking to like a whole classroom, a whole group of youngsters – mostly young girls.

“I’m sure they remember that and it had an impact on them, you know, in terms of what you can do in spite of obstacles that can be put in you’re way.”

Now based in Australia, Paige Hareb remembered the competition fondly.

“Yeah it was pretty cool. At the time I and probably didn’t realise how good I had it, but yeah looking back now it was definitely a special moment to be able to surf in front of friends and family in your home breaks and show it off to all the other girls and the rest of the world is pretty special.”

She said the New Zealand stop was popular with her fellow competitors.

Paige Hareb in action during the 2022 Nias Pro in Indonesia. (File photo) PHOTOSPORT

“Everyone loved it. I know there was a lot of hype about it before they even went there and I think the worst part of it was that it was maybe too cold for them some days, but we got really good surf and everyone loved it the sea and the mountain I guess is pretty spectacular for anyone who doesn’t live there.,

She saw evidence of the Taranaki Surf Festival’s legacy every time she comes home.

“When I was growing up I was one of the only girls in the water and now I go home and there’s at least one other girl out every time I surf there, so yeah, there’s definitely a lot more females into surfing and out in the water which is cool to see.”

Hareb – who would compete for a wildcard into the Raglan competition – expected the Waikato settlement to be pumping during the 10-day event window.

Bruce Gatwood-Cook was media manager for the Taranaki Surf Festival.

A member of the New Plymouth Surfriders Club for about 20 years, he said the audience for WSL events was mammoth.

“It’d be in the millions of the reach we’d be getting because we provided packages to sports networks in Australia and America, Hawaii, South Africa to Europe.

“So, it would be impossible to quantify exactly how many people we reached, but we were reaching a global audience.”

He said WSL events were a marketer’s dream.

“At the same time as livestreaming footage of the heats and highlights of the heats, we also provided b-roll of mountain shots and scenics of the arena.

“So, typically as you see with sporting events like that they’ll have cutaways of the beach and local mountains and scenics like that of the country which really help destinations.”

As a surfer himself, Gatwood-Cook was also taken with the impact the surfers had with fans.

“We just had throngs of young girls idolising Paige Hareb let alone all the other superstars on the women’s circuit and it really created an aspiration for them that I could be that person and I could do that and also seeing how they surfed giving them inspiration to surf like that.”

Meanwhile, Izaro Williamson Sasia was a just a toddler when her dad ran the Taranaki Surf Festival.

Izaro Williams Sasia can’t wait for the world’s elite surfers return to New Zealand in May. ROBIN MARTIN / RNZ

Now a national under 18 and women’s longboard titleholder, she was stoked the world’s best surfers were returning to New Zealand.

“I don’t have any memories of it when it was here in Taranaki because I was only little, but I just can’t wait it would be such a cool experience to see it live and it’s been something I’ve always wanted to do, so I can’t wait. Like there’s no way I’m not going.”

The New Zealand Pro, which had attracted government major events funding, would run from the 15t-25 May at Manu Bay, Raglan.

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Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s expulsion breached dispute process and tikanga, lawyer argues

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Te Pāti Māori MP, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi speaking in the House. VNP / Phil Smith

MP Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s lawyers have claimed Te Pāti Māori’s co-leaders were also projected to overspend their parliamentary budget, and there was discussion of a settlement proposal during the hearing to consider the Te Tai Tokerau MP’s expulsion.

Kapa-Kingi’s lawyers are arguing Te Pāti Māori’s constitution was not upheld during a process that resulted in her expulsion from the party, with Mike Colson KC saying a “political party which was created to fight injustice has visited a serious injustice”.

The substantive hearing is taking place at the High Court in Wellington on Monday, and follows a period of turmoil for the party that resulted in the expulsion of two of its MPs, Kapa-Kingi and Tākuta Ferris.

Kapa-Kingi challenged her expulsion late last year, resulting in a temporary reinstatement prior to the party’s AGM in December, allowing her to attend.

At the time, Justice Paul Radich said there were “serious questions to be tried” on the manner in which Kapa-Kingi was expelled from the party.

Both party president John Tamihere and Mariameno Kapa-Kingi were present in the courtroom on Monday morning.

Kapa-Kingi’s lawyer Mike Colson KC begun the hearing by saying the Speaker had not been properly notified by Te Pāti Māori about Justice Radich’s decision late last year, and she remained an independent MP, pointing out this could be in contempt of court.

Colson went on to summarise his client’s key argument: that the party’s National Council did not have the power to expel Kapa-Kingi, and that it breached the dispute process and tikanga.

“And I suppose thematically, that we are now seeing a revisionist approach to the decisions that were made, in which there seems to be an emphasis that there was not actually an expulsion, but a cancelation of the membership.”

Colson then referred to Te Pāti Māori’s constitution, outlining the importance of tikanga, arguing “tikanga should be part of the lens” through which the case is considered.

He then highlighted various clauses, pointing out relevant parts of the Constitution to the case.

In particular, Colson highlighted a clause he said did not allow the National Council to “cut across independently” a separate clause specifying a Disciplinary Disputes Committee.

Colson said Kapa-Kingi was given “no notice whatsoever” that there was going to be a hui where her expulsion would be considered.

He referred to various parts of the party’s constitution, claiming the party hadn’t adhered to it.

Colson provided documentation including a range of emails discussing the projected parliamentary overspend, a key reason for Kapa-Kingi’s expulsion.

Colson acknowledged the judge would not be able to resolve who was right or wrong on the issue of the budget, which he said didn’t “particularly matter”.

But Colson said Kapa-Kingi was entitled to “additional payments” due to the additional work she had undertaken.

In relation to the forecasted overspend, he said the party had argued Kapa-Kingi used those funds for her “personal gain”, which he rejected.

He explained “a fix” was arranged between various parties – including a parliamentary representative – in relation to her forecasted overspend of $133,000.

He then outlined Te Pāti Māori’s co-leaders were also forecasted to overspend their budget.

“It’s a bit ironic that the party to say this forecast overspend was misuse when we know at the time the co-leaders office was also in a budget deficit situation,” referencing the Te Pāti Māori co-leaders who had an overspend of around $40,000.

He also mentioned a “level of unsatisfactoriness” of evidence from the respondents, referencing affidavits that “seem incorrect”.

A settlement proposal was referred to during the hearing, which is expected to be addressed later.

Tamihere’s lawyers will respond Monday afternoon, but their initial arguments during the interim injunction last year stated the National Council did in fact have the authority to expel her.

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Cyclist dies after crash on SH1 in Marlborough

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

The road was closed between Lake Grassmere and Taimate (file photo). RNZ

One person has died after a crash between a bike and a car on State Highway 1 in Malborough on Monday morning.

Police say the cyclist died at the scene.

Another person has moderate injuries

The road has since reopened between Lake Grassmere and Taimate.

The circumstances of the crash are being investigated.

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First GP prescriptions for adult ADHD patients issued

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

ADHD medication was “life-changing” for many people, patient Adam Currie said. 123RF

Adam Currie became one of the first people in the country to be prescribed ADHD medication by a GP at an 8.30am appointment on Monday.

He told RNZ he booked the first available doctor’s appointment for February after he heard about the upcoming changes “many months ago, hoping the doctor would prescribe it”.

Not every GP would choose to offer the service, with some lacking the capacity to offer 90-minute ADHD assessments and the required follow-up sessions and questionnaires, which did not fit into the usual 15-minute appointment slot.

However, Currie – who already had his diagnosis – said his Monday morning appointment was “really smooth”.

Under the previous process, following his assessment and diagnosis (which cost thousands of dollars), he would have needed another psychiatrist appointment to have the medication prescribed. That would have cost more money and involved waiting several months.

On Monday morning he simply provided a urine sample and the doctor was able to prescribe him the medication.

ADHD medication was “life-changing” for many people, making it easier to hold down jobs, maintain relationships, and focus on tasks, contributing to a “far better quality of life”, Currie said.

“I think it’s really exciting that people are able to get the support they need,” he said.

Lack of funding ‘discriminatory’- advocate

The rule change allowing GPs and some nurse practitioners to diagnose ADHD and prescribe stimulants has been widely welcomed by many in the sector as a way to remove some barriers in terms of cost and access.

However, it is unlikely that every practice will have the capacity to offer ADHD assessments – and those which do will have to charge patients for their time, which could run to hundreds of dollars.

Aroreretini Aotearoa convenor Kent Duston, who represented adults with ADHD, said his organisation had been working alongside Pharmac, the Ministry of Health and Medsafe for years to get policy changes.

Poor access to diagnosis and treatment was “a long-standing and persistent issue in New Zealand”, and the lack of funding to support the rule change was disappointing, he said.

Government agencies had made “very timid progress towards addressing these problems”.

“The Ministry of Health’s refusal to fund anything of any description for the ADHD community really is a pretty significant piece of discrimination. in that I can’t think of any other issue that would affect 5-7 percent of the population that has life-long implications that the Ministry of Health would say. ‘We’re not going to do anything about that and we’re not going to allocate a single dollar to it.’

“So we think that the health system as it’s configured at the moment for the ADHD community is highly discriminatory.”

He dismissed fears of “over-diagnosis” or “over-prescribing” as unfounded.

Between 250,000 and 350,000 New Zealanders were likely to have ADHD, based on international estimates, but only 60,000 people had been prescribed medication, Duston said.

Even taking into account that medication was not suitable for everyone and that some people did not want it, “that’s still hundreds of thousands of people who are not getting the help they need”.

Both the Ministry of Health and Health NZ have been approached for comment.

Health authorities have been criticised for not allocating extra funding for the new service. RNZ / Angus Dreaver

Change brings ‘both opportunity and risk’ – psychiatrist

The College of Psychiatrists said allowing doctors and nurse practitioners to also prescribe ADHD medicines would help reduce barriers for some people.

ADHD spokesperson Dr David Chinn, a child and adolescent psychiatrist, told Nine to Noon the change brought “both opportunity and risk”.

Firstly, there were significant risks associated with undiagnosed and untreated ADHD, and having a wider range of clinicians able to do that would be hugely beneficial.

Many went undiagnosed, particularly Māori, Pacific, Asian and people from deprived communities, Chinn said.

“In terms of risks, we want to make sure that assessments continue to be of a good standard, that the right people are diagnosed with the right conditions and prescribed the right medication, whether that’s ADHD or otherwise,” he said.

Primary health providers were highly skilled at treating many mental health conditions, but it was important that they had sufficient time to carry out ADHD assessments and also access to “escalation pathways”, if patients required more complex interventions.

A thorough assessment typically took about two hours.

None of the features of ADHD – including attention problems, impulsivity, difficulties with emotional regulation – occurred only with ADHD, and it was important to rule out other problems, like mood disorders, anxiety, substance abuse problems etc.

“Stimulants can be life-changing for some people. Psychiatrists are quite supportive of these changes to ensure people aren’t encountering extra barriers in accessing them.”

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‘Avoid the area’: Report of person with firearm in Napier suburb

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

A police car seen behind a cordon as officers attend an incident. RNZ

Police say nothing of concern has been found after a report of a person with a gun in the Napier suburb of Marewa.

Cordons have been lifted on Nuffield Avenue in Marewa.

There will be an increased police presence in the area.

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‘Avoid the area’: Person with firearm seen in Napier suburb

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

A police car seen behind a cordon as officers attend an incident. RNZ

Police are asking people to stay away from Nuffield Avenue in Napier after reports of a person with a gun.

Cordons are in place in Marewa.

Police say people should avoid the area and follow instructions from emergency services.

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ER Report: A Roundup of Significant Articles on EveningReport.nz for February 2, 2026

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on February 2, 2026.

Some companies claim they can ‘resurrect’ species. Does that make people more comfortable with extinction?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Lean, Research Fellow in Philosophy, Centre of Excellence in Synthetic Biology, Macquarie University Ross Stone/Unsplash Less than a year ago, United States company Colossal Biosciences announced it had “resurrected” the dire wolf, a megafauna-hunting wolf species that had been extinct for 10,000 years. Within two days

NZ’s $2.5 billion shoddy building bill: how to fix the ‘build now, fix later’ culture
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Kirby, Construction Industry Consultant, Auckland University of Technology Getty Images New Zealand’s residential construction industry contributes roughly NZ$26 billion annually to the economy and employs around 70,000 workers. Yet despite its significance and scale, the sector’s productivity levels have flatlined since the mid-1980s. In housing construction,

PNG govt defends using tear gas, force to evict illegal settlers in capital
RNZ Pacific Papua New Guinea’s government has defended the use of force to evict residents of an informal settlement in the capital Port Moresby. Police used tear gas to move people out of the Two-Mile settlement last week, while heavy machinery was used to tear down homes and two people were killed in clashes. Acting

Why the Voice referendum failed – and what the government hasn’t learned from it
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gabrielle Appleby, Professor of Law, UNSW Law School, UNSW Sydney More than two years on, you’d be forgiven for thinking the story of the failure of the referendum on an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice has been neatly folded away and filed as a story of

The only remaining US-Russia nuclear treaty expires this week. Could a new arms race soon accelerate?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tilman Ruff, Honorary Principal Fellow, School of Population and Global Health, The University of Melbourne The New START treaty, the last remaining agreement constraining Russian and US nuclear weapons, is due to lapse on February 4. There are no negotiations to extend the terms of the treaty,

Household rat poisons found to be ‘unacceptable risk’ to native animals. So why aren’t they banned?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John White, Associate Professor in Wildlife and Conservation Biology, Deakin University John Smith , CC BY-ND The Australian authority that regulates pesticides has finally released its long-delayed review of the rodenticide poisons used by millions of Australians to combat rat and mice infestations. As researchers who study

Gay ice-hockey players, lesbian space princesses, and cute dogs: what to watch in February
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Howard, Senior Lecturer, Discipline of English and Writing, University of Sydney As summer has well and truly set in, we hope you’re able to while away some hours in the comfort of air-conditioning. And what better way to spend that time than with some new treats

Caitlin Johnstone: Our rulers are psychopaths and they’re making everything awful
Report by Dr David Robie – Café Pacific. – COMMENTARY: By Caitlin Johnstone I don’t know what to say today. We are ruled by abusive monsters. The US is preparing for war with Iran. They’re going in for the kill shot on Cuba. The latest batch of Epstein emails looks horrifying. The US is full

Leaders of PNG’s Enga province plagued by violence – vow to weed out illegal guns
By Johnny Blades, RNZ Pacific bulletin editor Political leaders in a Papua New Guinea province plagued by gun violence are making a collective stand to stop it. There is a new sense of political will among Enga Province’s political leaders and police to come down hard on the use of illegal weapons. But they are

ER Report: A Roundup of Significant Articles on EveningReport.nz for February 1, 2026
ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on February 1, 2026.

Former rower Les O’Connell’s Olympic gold medal stolen in home burglary

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Les O’Connell, Shane O’Brien, Conrad Robertson and Keith Trask celebrate winning gold at the 1984 Olympics. Photosport

A former Olympic rower is hoping there is some honour among thieves after his gold medal was stolen from his Christchurch home while he was away for the weekend.

Les O’Connell won the medal at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, rowing in the men’s coxless four, and was appealing to whoever pinched it to give it back undamaged.

He said the medal was gold coated but was largely made of silver.

O’Connell’s home was robbed over the weekend, with thieves stealing a vehicle full of work tools, as well as entering the house and rifling through his belongings.

He was yet to return home after the robbery and did not yet know the extent of what had been stolen

However, he told Checkpoint that no loss was stinging harder than the medal.

“All those other items, that’s what they are, they’re just pure items that can be replaced, this can’t.”

“All of that pale’s comparison to the gold medal.”

O’Connell said the years of work he put in prior to getting the medal was part of what had made the loss hit even harder.

“It’s something I’m not going to win again and it’s a whole process. You know, I was a world champion for two years before the Olympics, so it was a whole build-up to winning a gold medal… it was hard fought.”

Despite having championship medals displayed in his home, it was only the Olympic medal that had been hidden that was stolen.

“I had those in frame, I had this one hidden purely because I didn’t want it hanging on the wall and I didn’t want it stolen. So we hid it behind some books on a bookcase.

“I’ve been told that all the drawers have been opened and that sort of thing. So, yeah, they’ve had a good look around.”

O’Connell said he doesn’t believe the thieves knew what they had found initially and is now worried they might think the medal is worth more than it actually is.

“As time goes on, they’ll probably look at them and think, well, you know, what do we do with this?

“What scares me the most is that they might go and do something stupid like try and melt it down or disfigure it or something like that, which really destroys the whole thing.

“I don’t know what the monetary value is, it never had a value, but it’s more of a collector’s item.”

O’Connell was holding out hope that the thieves would see some sense and return the medal back to its home.

“If they could put it somewhere and let someone know or phone into something and say, it’s here. Even if they just hide it somewhere and later on they let someone know… even post it back somewhere.

“I just don’t want it disfigured or thrown away and lost forever.”

New Zealand Police have been contacted for comment.

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

Watch: PM Christopher Luxon and Education Minister Erica Stanford on reporting students’ progress

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Education Minister Erica Stanford have unveiled changes to how students’ progress is reported.

The government says the new reports will give families clearer information about their children.

It says the reports will ensure all primary and intermediate schools describe children’s achievement in reading, writing and maths twice a year in the same way.

They will rank children’s achievement on a five-point scale – emerging, developing, consolidating, proficient and exceeding.

The reports will also provide an overall percentage score and describe what the child can do in each of the three subjects .

The government says schools will report on other subjects and on student behaviour as they do now.

It comes as schools are opening up again for 2026 and must use new maths and English curriculums for students in Years 0-10 this year. Draft curriculums for other subject areas are out for consultation until mid-April.

By the end of 2025, nine percent of students in Year 13 and 15 percent of Year 12s had not achieved the literacy and numeracy co-requisite, figures provided to RNZ by NZQA show. The achievement rates were the lowest in the past five years.

They equated to about 5000 Year 13s and 10,000 Year 12s who would not receive any NCEA certificates because they had not yet met the requirement.

Watch the announcement live at the top of this page.

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

Some companies claim they can ‘resurrect’ species. Does that make people more comfortable with extinction?

By The Conversation -

February 2, 2026

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Lean, Research Fellow in Philosophy, Centre of Excellence in Synthetic Biology, Macquarie University

Less than a year ago, United States company Colossal Biosciences announced it had “resurrected” the dire wolf, a megafauna-hunting wolf species that had been extinct for 10,000 years.

Within two days of Colossal’s announcement, the Interior Secretary of the US, Doug Burgum, used the idea of resurrection to justify weakening environmental protection laws: “pick your favourite species and call up Colossal”.

His reasoning appeared to confirm critics’ fears about de-extinction technology. If we can bring any species back, why protect them to begin with?

In a new study published in Biological Conservation, we put this idea to the test. We found no evidence people will accept extinction more readily if they’re promised de-extinction. But it’s important to communicate about de-extinction efforts with care.

The ‘moral hazard’ of de-extinction

Since the emergence of de-extinction technology, critics have argued it potentially undermines support for conserving existing species.

In other words, de-extinction technology poses a “moral hazard”. This is a situation in which someone is willing to behave in riskier ways than they would otherwise, because someone or something else will bear the cost or deal with the consequences. Behaving recklessly because you have health insurance is a classic example.

The moral hazard of de-extinction technology is that if we believe extinct species can be brought back, we may be more willing to let species go extinct in the first place.

Photo of a white wolf with the word extinct crossed out above it. — TIME magazine cover featuring the dire wolf ‘de-extinction’ story.
TIME

This concern mirrors debates in other areas of environmental policy. For example, critics of carbon capture and solar radiation modification worry that believing we can later fix climate change may weaken the incentive to reduce emissions now. However, most studies investigating this claim found these technologies don’t reduce people’s support for also cutting back carbon emissions.

Our study is the first to investigate whether de-extinction technology reduces people’s concern about the extinction of existing species.

What we found

We presented 363 people from a wide range of backgrounds with several scenarios. These described a company doing something that yields an economic or public benefit, but results in the extinction of an existing endangered species.

For example, in one scenario a company intended to build a highway for a new port through the last habitat of the dusky gopher frog, a critically endangered species. The construction would lead to the frog’s extinction.

A medium sized spotted frog with golden eyes held up to a camera. — Endemic to the southern United States, the dusky gopher frog is critically endangered because its native habitat, longleaf-pine forests, are almost entirely destroyed.
ememu/iNaturalist, CC BY-NC

There were two versions of each scenario, differing in how the company would compensate for the species’ extinction.

In the “environmental compensation” version, a large investment would be made to preserve other species. In the “de-extinction” version, de-extinction technology would be used to reintroduce the DNA of the extinct species into a related species at a later date.

For each scenario, people were asked: did they think the project was good for the public? Was the species extinction justified? Did compensation make the company less blameworthy for causing the species extinction? Should we allow projects like this one in the future?

Finally, in cases where de-extinction was proposed, we asked if the respondent believed the companies’ claims that genetic engineering could be used to successfully recreate the extinct species.

A warning against spin

We found no evidence that proposing de-extinction makes people more accepting of extinction than compensation for environmental destruction would.

Therefore, moral hazard alone is not a reason to outright reject the ethical deployment of de-extinction technology. Further, overemphasising potential but unsubstantiated hazards of de-extinction research may undermine the development of effective tools for preserving current species.

We did, however, find one reason for caution.

There was a correlation between a person’s belief that de-extinction could resurrect the species and the belief that causing its extinction would be acceptable.

This is a correlation, so we can’t tell which belief comes first. It could be that these people already think extinction is justified to gain access to economic benefits, and then adopt the view that de-extinction is possible to excuse that belief.

A more worrying possibility is the reverse: believing that de-extinction is possible could have led to these individuals viewing extinction as acceptable. A strong belief in de-extinction’s success could either act as an excuse for extinction, or a reason for extinction.

This creates a major risk if those who develop de-extinction technology overstate or mislead the public about what this tech can achieve.

Avoid misleading claims

It’s crucial the companies and scientists working on de-extinction efforts communicate accurately and without hype. Claims that de-extinction can reverse extinction are misleading. Genetic engineering can introduce lost traits from an extinct species into a closely related living species and restore lost ecological functions, but it can’t re-create the extinct species.

Problems arise when companies present these limits cautiously within the scientific community but make stronger claims in public-facing communication.

Doing so encourages the false belief that extinction is fully reversible. This risks undermining the ethical justification for any de-extinction efforts.

This risk can be avoided. For example, the de-extinction project attempting to restore aurochs (ancient cattle) to Europe clearly states it’s creating aurochs 2.0. It’s an ecological proxy for the extinct species, not the species itself.

Colossal Biosciences attracts widespread controversy for publicising its projects, which include “resurrection” of the woolly mammoth, the dodo, and the thylacine.

Our results show claims that de-extinction will necessarily create a moral hazard are unjustified.

However, de-extinction advocates bear a burden to be cautious and clear in their communication about what their technology offers – and what it can’t do.

Christopher Lean receives funding from the Australian Government through the ARC Centre of Excellence in Synthetic Biology (project number CE200100029).

Andrew James Latham has been supported by a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship.

Annie Sandrussi receives funding from the Australian Government through the ARC Centre of Excellence in Synthetic Biology (project number CE200100029).

Wendy Rogers receives funding from The Australian Research Council. She is a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence in Synthetic Biology (project number CE200100029), funded by the Australian Government.

– ref. Some companies claim they can ‘resurrect’ species. Does that make people more comfortable with extinction? – https://theconversation.com/some-companies-claim-they-can-resurrect-species-does-that-make-people-more-comfortable-with-extinction-273583

Patient touched while sleeping, watched while washing during recovery at Hutt Hospital

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

The woman was in Hutt Hospital, recovering from a leg amputation. RNZ / REECE BAKER

A woman recovering from a leg amputation in Hutt Hospital was repeatedly harassed by a male patient who touched her while she slept and watched while she was being washed.

The Health and Disability Commission says the hospital failed to keep her safe during her 2022 stay.

The hospital took a week to assign someone to watch the male patient, 11 days to give the woman a security guard, and did not remove the man from the ward.

The woman, known as Mrs B, was being cared for in a room with other women but in a mixed gender ward, deputy commissioner Carolyn Cooper said in her report released on Monday.

Over the course of her stay, the confused man gave her “unwanted attention”.

That included “touching her when she was sleeping, watching her as she was being washed or changed, making inappropriate sexual comments, and going through her belongings”, the report said.

She was so badly impacted, her family discharged her early to finish her recovery at home and she became frightened to return to hospital.

The harassment began soon after the woman was admitted following her amputation.

For the first three days, the hospital used its confused patient protocols to manage the man – including medication, an alarm bracelet, regular checks and using nurses to help redirect him.

His behaviour escalated and a psychiatrist was consulted.

Health NZ told the commission it was unable to move the man from the ward to a place where his behaviour could managed better because of “resourcing constraints”.

On the eighth day of the woman’s stay, staff made an incident report and healthcare assistants were assigned to watch the man around the clock.

But the next day there was a “further incident” when the man entered the woman’s room.

She was offered a private room but declined because she felt safer in a shared room, saying it took 15 or 20 minutes for her call bell to be answered.

The family complained and met with staff to discuss safety measures.

It was not until another incident on day 11 that a security guard was posted outside the woman’s room and she was moved to a bed further from the door.

Her family told the commission the guard did not initially realise he was there to stop the male patient entering the room.

They decided to take her home early and her son complained to the commission.

She had post traumatic stress disorder as a result of her experience.

Deputy commissioner Carolyn Cooper. Supplied

Hospital criticised

Deputy commissioner Carolyn Cooper said the hospital did not provide the woman with the safe environment she was entitled to.

Health NZ had taken steps to address the behaviour of the man towards her but they were not effective – and incidents continued until she was discharged, Cooper’s report said.

The report noted the hospital’s comments that it could not move the man because of “resourcing constraints”.

“Despite this, I have concerns that the male patient remained in the ward when it was clear that his behaviour was escalating and could not be managed adequately by the measures taken to minimise the risk of harm to Mrs B,” she said.

The hospital also under-reported the number of incidents, the report said.

Health NZ responds

Heath NZ told the commission it took reasonable actions to provide appropriate care to the woman.

But it accepted that it had ultimately failed to provide her with a safe environment.

“Health NZ apologised for this and for the emotional distress this caused,” it said.

The hospital had considered moving the man to another ward but decided not to because of the complexity of patients on that ward and that they may have increased the confusion the man was experiencing.

It had made a series of changes since the woman’s stay.

It was increasing staff education, including for security guards, orderlies and minders on the risks of sexually inappropriate behaviour.

The hospital was looking into same-gender bays in wards to “enhance patient dignity, privacy and safety” and changing wards to include low-stimulation spaces for patients who are confused or agitated.

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

Tauranga City Council votes for independent review into fatal Mt Maunganui landslide

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

The six victims of the Mt Maunganui landslide – Måns Loke Bernhardsson, 20, Lisa Maclennan, 50, Susan Knowles, 71, Sharon Maccanico, 15, Max Furse-Kee, 15, and Jacqualine Wheeler, 71. Supplied

Tauranga City Council has voted to commission an independent external review into the fatal Mount Maunganui landslide.

Six people died in the slip, and the police had finished their recovery efforts, with all the victims now recovered and identified.

Mayor Mahé Drysdale earlier said the council would arrange its own review into the slip, despite the fact the government was also likely to hold an inquiry.

In an emergency meeting held on Monday, councillors decided an independent external review would take place – opting for that instead of a “rapid internal assessment”.

“This is very much around establishing the facts, understanding what happened, and… whether the actions of Tauranga City Council were appropriate in the circumstances,” Drysdale said.

It was important any lessons would be delivered as soon as possible to protect the lives of residents and visitors, he said.

Tauranga mayor Mahé Drusdale speaking at the scene of the landslide. RNZ

The council would now finalise the terms of reference, appoint the independent reviewer, and decide on the timeframe.

The option to do nothing was discounted “as it is not prudent governance to ignore an incident of this scale and the need to provide assurance, transparency, and organisational learning,” the agenda document said.

A rapid internal assessment run by a senior staffer would be quicker and cheaper, but with weaker “perceived independence” given community expectations and scrutiny, it said.

An independent external review would be slower and more costly, but with greater public confidence, the paper said.

Monday’s meeting was held in “tragic circumstances”, following events that had changed the city forever, Drysdale said.

“We’ve had a number of questions, and as governors, we need to answer those questions.”

The cordon in Mt Maunganui following the deadly landslide was covered in tributes for the people who lost their lives. RNZ / Lauren Crimp

Councillors noted the fact the council owned the Mount Maunganui Beachside Holiday Park meant there was inherent conflict.

That was cause enough for an independent Crown inquiry, Councillor Steve Morris said.

“But in the meantime we’re responsible for the lives of nearly 170,000 people, so we’ve got to learn and implement any changes as soon as possible, because a future natural disaster isn’t going to give us the courtesy for the Crown or its agencies to complete their inquiries.”

Councillor Hemi Rolleston urged the council to balance haste and care.

Tauranga City Council chief executive Marty Grenfell said he fully supported an external review.

Public scrutiny had been growing following the landslip.

A camper who contacted emergency services on the morning of the landslide said she saw a local council representative drive through the campground and directly past three slips about two hours before the deadly landslide.

The council would not comment on that before any review took place, emergency controller Tom McEntyre said.

It was also revealed last week that geotechnical engineers told Tauranga City Council two decades ago buildings should not be allowed in the “runout” zones of potential landslides unless they had specially constructed protection like a retaining wall.

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

Schools fear uptick in absences for Lunar New Year

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

RNZ/ Dan Cook

A number of schools in Auckland have expressed concern about an uptick in absences at the start of the year as students travel overseas to visit families during Lunar New Year celebrations.

New Zealand’s state and state integrated schools begin the first term of 2026 between Monday, 26 January, and Monday, 9 February.

The upcoming Lunar New Year falls on 17 February this year – about three weeks after some schools resume classes.

That gap has prompted concern at schools with large numbers of Asian students that some families may miss extended periods of school.

Auckland’s Macleans College begins Term 1 on 2 February, with principal Steven Hargreaves acknowledging the absences the school typically records around Lunar New Year each year.

Hargreaves said some students stayed in China over the New Zealand summer holidays and only returned after Chinese New Year.

Lunar New Year fell a little later than usual this year, he said, noting that students who missed about three weeks of school could struggle to catch up.

“The first few weeks of school are always so important because that’s where the classroom routines are established,” Hargreaves said.

“If a student is away for three weeks, they miss some of the fundamental outlines of the course,” he said.

“They haven’t had a chance to review their timetable, the whole classroom dynamic and the establishment of routines is missed. It does put them behind their classmates for achievement.”

Macleans College principal Steven Hargreaves stands alongside international students from Germany, Italy, Kazakhstan, Russia, China, Vietnam, Thailand and Brazil. Macleans College/Supplied

Hargreaves said about half of Macleans College’s students were of Chinese heritage.

The school’s average annual attendance rate was close to 95 percent, he said, and students of Chinese descent had the highest attendance of any ethnic group.

Even so, he said, the small number of students who missed classes during Lunar New Year remained a source of frustration.

He said some families cited medical reasons to justify absences when students were abroad, which he said was problematic.

“We take the family’s word for it, even if we have our doubts whether that’s true or not,” he said.

“It’s often an excuse given to be absent,” he said. “But it just seems too coincidental that there’s a group of students away for a week or two all at the same time of year.”

Hargreaves said New Zealand law clearly stipulated that students could be absent only for specific reasons, and that family occasions or reunions did not qualify.

Several primary schools on Auckland’s North Shore shared similar concerns about possible absences this year related to the Lunar New Year.

Browns Bay School said it had set its 2026 start date as late as possible – on 9 February – to give families more time over the holidays, and reminded parents that students were expected back on the first day of term.

In a newsletter sent to families, the school said it had seen an increase in absences at the beginning of the school year around Lunar New Year, along with more parents citing medical reasons during that period as families travelled overseas to celebrate.

RNZ has approached the school for comment.

Pinehill School also planned to start the new term on 9 February but admitted that attendance could be affected this year.

“Last year, the first day of Lunar New Year was Wednesday, 29 January,” said the school’s principal, Carla Veldman.

“To acknowledge this special time for our Chinese families, we started the school year [in 2025] at the latest possible date, Monday, 10 February. Attendance was not an issue, and all students were back on Day 1.”

“This year is a bit more challenging,” she said.

“We are starting at the latest possible date again … but Lunar New Year falls later, on Tuesday, 17 February. We anticipate that this may affect attendance for some families.

“Extended absences at the start of the year can affect how students settle in, build relationships with teachers and peers, understand routines and systems, and complete beginning-of-year assessments.”

Supplied / Ministry of Education

Veldman said about 60 percent of the school’s students identified as Chinese.

She said the school followed its attendance follow-up procedures to communicate the importance of regular attendance to all families.

“We include messages such as, ‘Missing one week of school each term adds up to missing a whole year of learning by the time your child is 16’,” Veldman said.

“Regular attendance helps students get the most out of their education.”

For families who needed to travel for Lunar New Year, she said, the school encouraged parents to let staff know in advance so teachers could provide learning resources and support, helping students return without feeling overwhelmed.

“We understand that Lunar New Year is an important cultural occasion for many families,” she said.

“Our advice is to plan travel around the school calendar where possible, keep absences to a minimum and communicate with the school so we can support students to stay on track with learning.”

Pigeon Mountain Primary School in East Auckland starts the new term on 3 February.

Principal Phebe Rossiter said the school had noticed fluctuations in attendance at the start of the year.

In 2025, she said, the school recorded 85 percent regular attendance in the first week and 90 percent in the second, which coincided with Lunar New Year, compared with a typical weekly average of about 96 percent in Term 1.

She cautioned, however, against attributing higher absence rates solely to cultural celebrations.

Rossiter said regular attendance in the first weeks of school was critical but noted it was also important to bring culture into school life.

“A student’s culture is incredibly important to us,” she said.

Rossiter said the school was planning to mark Lunar New Year with decorations and classroom-learning activities, as well as a lion dance performance.

For families weighing attendance against cultural obligations, she encouraged parents to contact the school for support.

“We want parents to know that if they plan a holiday during term time, their child may miss out on key learning or a fun event they had been really looking forward to,” she said.

“However, we also lead with empathy. We understand that traveling home to see family for special events is not usually a regular occurrence, and important part of life.”

Phebe Rossiter, principal of Pigeon Mountain Primary School, says a student’s culture is incredibly important at school. Supplied

Rossiter said the school’s target of having 80 percent of students attending regularly was achievable.

Helen Hurst, acting leader of operations and integration at the Ministry of Education, said the legal expectation for state and state integrated schools was clear: Students were required to attend whenever school is open.

“Regular attendance is generally understood as attending school for more than 90 percent of the term, which means students could be absent for fewer than five days in a term,” she said.

Hurst said the ministry could identify the number of students on holiday in Term 1, but could not attribute those absences specifically to Lunar New Year, since families travelled for many reasons at that time of year.

She said the ministry acknowledged Lunar New Year was a significant annual cultural occasion and reunion for many families, similar in importance to Christmas.

For families who are unavoidably away during term time, she said the ministry advised parents to notify the school early; discuss options to maintain learning, such as learning packs, online access or adjusted timing for assessments; agree on how progress will be checked while the student is away; and make a plan for re-engagement and catching up on their return.

The government has taken a tougher line on school attendance in 2026, with schools mandated to begin the year with an attendance management plan that set out how they would respond when attendance started to slip.

Associate Education Minister David Seymour said school attendance rates were trending upward, and the plans could include schools contacting families after five days of absence, organising a meeting when absences reach 10 days and referring students to truancy services after 15 days.

The government’s goal is for 80 percent of students to attend school more than 90 percent of the time by 2030.

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

NZ’s $2.5 billion shoddy building bill: how to fix the ‘build now, fix later’ culture

By The Conversation -

February 2, 2026

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Kirby, Construction Industry Consultant, Auckland University of Technology

New Zealand’s residential construction industry contributes roughly NZ$26 billion annually to the economy and employs around 70,000 workers. Yet despite its significance and scale, the sector’s productivity levels have flatlined since the mid-1980s.

In housing construction, “productivity” isn’t a simple measure of output per worker; it refers to the industry’s ability to deliver the right quantity of high-quality homes without significant delays or flaws.

If a builder spends ten hours rectifying avoidable mistakes, for instance, their productivity for the day is effectively zero. And this has become all too common within the sector.

A 2014 study by the Building Research Association of New Zealand (BRANZ) confirms 92% of new houses surveyed had compliance defects.

Subsequent analysis carried out for BRANZ by the New Zealand Institute for Economic Research estimated the annual cost of defective building to the overall economy:

The results show that economy-wide effects of an increase in productivity would see New Zealand’s GDP rise by $2.5 billion, as the industry’s overall costs of production decrease.

That means nearly 10% of the sector’s total value is lost to systemic quality failure. Based on the average construction cost of an Auckland house, that loss represents around 5,000 missing homes every year.

Recognising the productivity problem, the government last year introduced major reforms aimed at speeding up consent processes and allocating financial liability for defective buildings to those responsible.

But while poor productivity is often blamed on procurement methods, technology or labour, our research suggests better quality management is key to remedying the industry’s “build now, fix later” culture.

Commercial viability before quality control

We surveyed the views of 106 residential construction professionals, including general managers, construction managers, site managers, project managers and subcontractors.

They were asked about the influence of quality management on improving residential construction productivity, and about the effects of government policy. The views expressed suggested a culture prioritising time and cost over quality is a systemic norm at the industry level.

We then traced the industry’s problems back to the major policy shifts that began in the mid-1980s. Before then, building quality was anchored in the prescriptive standards set by the Ministry of Works.

By specifying how to build, the ministry acted as a national governor of technical standards. But by 1988, those standards were viewed as a barrier to efficient market operation, effectively ending the era of the state as master builder.

The New Zealand Building Code subsequently replaced the previous prescriptive system with a performance-based model focused solely on outcomes.

Without strict procedural guidance, the industry moved towards a culture that prioritised speed and commercial viability over rigorous quality management.

A ‘tick-box’ culture

To understand why industry performance stalled, we refer to what’s called the “theory of constraints”, which argues a system is only as strong as its weakest link.

In New Zealand’s residential construction sector, we argue, the weakest link is not just poor quality control but the absence of a quality-focused culture in general.

The 1980s shift to a hands-off, self-regulated model helped foster a “tick-box” culture rather than genuine organisational reform. This has meant that with every step forward, the industry is pulled back by the need to fix previous errors, stalling productivity.

On the building site, this manifested as a disconnect between the “work as imagined” (the manuals and checklists from head office) and the “work as done” by builders and subcontractors.

The worst outcomes are well known. New Zealand is still paying for the nearly $47 billion legacy of the leaky homes crisis, which peaked in the early 2000s. Poor quality, damp and mouldy housing contributes to respiratory illnesses costing $145 million annually in hospitalisations.

While policies such as the healthy homes standards for rental properties now exist, such measures mainly treat the symptoms of a deeper problem.

In Auckland alone, one-third of all projects fail their final inspection. The high volume of remedial work required chokes the entire system’s throughput.

The government must lead

Fixing an annual $2.5 billion problem requires a structural shift. Our research proposes a framework where the state, as the primary funder and driver of major construction, sets the standard the rest of the industry must adopt.

The proposed framework is underpinned by “lean principles” designed to minimise waste and encourage continuous improvement through a “plan-do-check-act” cycle. It uses the ISO 9000 standards New Zealand already has in place for exports.

To help achieve this, we argue the government would need to do two things.

Establish a national construction, productivity and quality commission. This would be a nonpartisan body staffed by industry and academic experts to ensure reform survives beyond three-year election cycles.
Mandate quality management systems that align with existing ISO 9000 standards for all government-funded residential projects.

The aim is to create a trickle-down effect, driving culture change throughout the industry. To win stable government contracts, subcontractors would be forced to up-skill and formalise standards-based oversight of their work.

Improved quality and productivity should not be aspirational. New Zealand has 2.5 billion reasons to create the genuine structural reform required.

The author acknowledges the contributions of Senior Lecturer Funmilayo Ebun Rotimi and Associate Professor Nicola Naismith of AUT to the research described in this article.

Mark Kirby does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. NZ’s $2.5 billion shoddy building bill: how to fix the ‘build now, fix later’ culture – https://theconversation.com/nzs-2-5-billion-shoddy-building-bill-how-to-fix-the-build-now-fix-later-culture-272145

Grammy Awards 2026: All the winners as they are announced

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

It’s music’s biggest night, and we’re waiting to see who will take home those golden gramophones.

Going into the night, Kendrick Lamar leads with nine nominations, including for album of the year for his GNX.

Lady Gaga, Bad Bunny and Sabrina Carpenter all follow close behind with nods for album, record and song of the year.

Bad Bunny made history by becoming the first Spanish-language artist to simultaneously snag nominations in the coveted best album, record and song categories in the same year with Debí Tirar Más Fotos (I Should Have Taken More Photos).

The Grammys, hosted once again by Trevor Noah, will see performances from Gaga and Carpenter, as well as Justin Bieber and all eight best new artist nominees – Addison Rae, Alex Warren, KATSEYE, Leon Thomas, Lola Young, Olivia Dean, SOMBR and The Marías.

Below is a list of nominees, with the winners denoted in bold as they are announced on the telecast:

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

Does your self-worth go down when the weather heats up?

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Unsurprisingly, summer is peak season when it comes to body dissatisfaction, says science writer David Robson.

To alleviate self-consciousness about not having a perfect “beach body”, it can help to develop body neutrality, he says.

Instead of their appearance, learning to focus on the function of our bodies and how they enable us to do the things we want is key, Robson tells Sunday Morning.

“These anxieties are really shared by everyone, including the people you’d think would be least likely to experience them.” – David Robson.

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PNG govt defends using tear gas, force to evict illegal settlers in capital

By Asia Pacific Report -

February 2, 2026

RNZ Pacific

Papua New Guinea’s government has defended the use of force to evict residents of an informal settlement in the capital Port Moresby.

Police used tear gas to move people out of the Two-Mile settlement last week, while heavy machinery was used to tear down homes and two people were killed in clashes.

Acting Prime Minister John Rosso said the forced eviction was necessary to protect law-abiding citiizens from long-running criminal activity in the community.

The National reports him saying the settlement was on state land which had been unlawfully occupied for years.

“The settlement has, for far too long, been a major source of law and order problems, resulting in numerous attacks on city residents and police, as well as injuries to innocent people,” Rosso said.

“This eviction is not happening without reason. It is the direct result of repeated criminal activities and serious threats to public safety.

“The state has a responsibility to protect law-abiding citizens and restore order.”

Rosso, also the Minister for Lands, Physical Planning and Urbanisation expressed sympathy for the hardworking people who had been living at Two-Mile, saying that not everyone there had been involved in criminal activities.

The eviction operation prompted unrest and clashes between some settlers and police.

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

Two-Mile settlement . . . cleared by police with force, tear gas and 2 killed in clashes. Image: PNG Post-Courier

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Australian mining giant Santana Minerals granted road mine road access despite protest

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Central Otago District Council chief executive Peter Kelly and Santana Minerals chief executive Damian Spring. Santana Minerals / supplied

Central Otago District Council (CODC) has granted road access to an Australian company planning an open-cast gold mine near Cromwell.

Santana Minerals will be able to use two roads linked to the Bendigo-Ophir Gold Project in exchange for an annual payment of about $1.25 million, adjusted for inflation, once gold production begins.

The company submitted a fast-track consent application for the open-cast-mine in November.

Panel convenors have indicated a decision could take 120 working days.

In a message to shareholders on Monday, Santana Minerals described the access agreement as endorsement from the council and said it would deliver multi-generational benefits to the district.

However, Central Otago district Mayor Tamah Alley said the council had not taken a position for or against the project and acknowledged the community was divided.

“This agreement ensures that if the project goes ahead, the Central Otago community receives tangible, long-term benefits, while maintaining transparency and public accountability,” she said.

“Our focus is on ensuring decisions are made objectively, lawfully and with full consideration of the information available.”

Santana Minerals said the agreement covered Thomsons Gorge Road and Shepherds Creek Road – a paper road – including a 20-metre strip on either side of each.

Any future road stopping – where the roads cease to exist as public roads and become private use only – would still require Public Works Act or Local Government Act approval, the company said.

“If any roads are stopped, replacement routes would be built to ensure continued public access,” Santana said.

Santana Minerals chief executive Damian Spring called the approval a material step forward for the project.

“This agreement resolves a long-standing statutory access requirement, provides durable clarity around roading and access arrangements and establishes a transparent framework for long-term community benefit.”

A Wine not Mine event organised by Sustainable Tarras on Saturday. Sustainable Tarras / supplied

Council excluded the public – advocacy group

In a statement, advocacy group Sustainable Tarras said the access agreement was disappointing.

“We believe there are considerable legal pitfalls to granting such access and we have repeatedly pointed these out to CODC and cautioned them to take time to consult, consider the consequences and involve the wider community. Today, in announcing this behind-closed-doors decision, they’ve made it clear that community is secondary to their private negotiations with Santana.

“We do not understand the urgency with which CODC has decided to conclude this agreement with Santana. From the information we have so far, it again excludes the public and local community impacted and fails to take into account what Santana has clearly stated it will do with these roads.”

On Saturday 150 people attended a lunch to raise money to fight the mine, including actor Sam Neill and artist Grahame Sydney.

The Wine not Mine event organised by Sustainable Tarras was supported by 12 local wineries and held close to the proposed mine site.

Neill described the mining plans as ruinous for the region and said a growing community of ordinary, hard working people were joining together to fight a “very large, very powerful, very well-funded Australian mining company”.

Actor Sam Neill speaks at the Wine not Mine event. Sustainable Tarras / supplied

Sydney spoke of the “breathtaking, mystical, pristine and ever-changing” landscapes of Central Otago and urged people to fight against the “madness” of an open-cast gold mine.

Sustainable Tarras said funds from the event would cover expert fees and legal support costs as the group made submissions to the fast-track process.

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

Former owner of luxury Te Anau lodge thankful fire didn’t completely destroy building

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Firefighters at Fiordland Lodge over the weekend. Supplied

The former owner of the luxury Fiordland Lodge near Te Anau is relieved a weekend fire did not completely destroy the building.

Guests were evacuated when the fire broke out late on Saturday night, with crews from across Southland battling the blaze.

Fire and Emergency investigators were examining the cause of the fire although it was not being treated as suspicious.

Former owner Robynne Peacock and her late husband Ron, built the lodge in 2002 and ran the luxury accommodation for years until Peacock and her business partners sold it late last year.

Peacock arrived at the lodge on Sunday afternoon where a fire inspector showed her the damage.

The lodge was still intact despite part of the roof collapsing. Supplied

She said most of the building was intact, despite part of the roof collapsing and damage to the kitchen and conference room, where the fire was believed to have started.

“I did not want to see it burning,” she said.

“It all looks quite fixable and some of the lodge hasn’t been touched at all so we were pleasantly surprised and thrilled to see it’s not catastrophic.

“The fire inspector assured us that the structural integrity of the building was good in most areas.”

Peacock said it was a terrible blow for the new owners and she wished them well as they recovered from the fire.

Owner Vicki Onions previously confirmed no one was injured but all guests were moved to local hotels in Te Anau as a safety measure.

She was grateful for the swift response and support of emergency services, Onions said.

A Fire and Emergency spokesperson said the fire had badly damaged the building.

“However, firefighters were able to contain the fire which prevented some of the structure from being destroyed,” they said.

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

Auckland Transport chief Dean Kimpton to resign ahead of agency’s reform

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Dean Kimpton. RNZ/Calvin Samuel

Auckland Transport’s (AT) chief executive is stepping down from May, after almost three years leading the beleaguered agency.

Dean Kimpton took on the role in 2023, when AT faced a major shake-up.

Board chair Richard Leggat said since then the organisation had put a strong focus on delivering outcomes for Aucklanders, customers and communities.

“We are grateful for Dean’s commitment to AT and Aucklanders over the past three years. I’d like to thank him for his significant contribution and wish him the very best for his future endeavours.

“Under his leadership, we have seen two years of delivering our biggest ever capital programmes, the introduction of new ways to pay on public transport, more frequent services, innovation as we use technology to improve network productivity, and an organisation focused on delivering agreed outcomes for Auckland Council.”

As of next month, reforms mean AT will focus solely on public transport.

Leggat said with the reform, the board agreed this was the appropriate time for a change in leadership.

Auckland Council chief executive Phil Wilson acknowledges Dean’s contribution to AT and the wider Auckland Council whānau.

“I have known and worked with Dean for many years, both in his role at Auckland Transport and prior to that when he was chief operating officer at council and appreciate his commitment to delivering for Aucklanders in all his work. There have been measurable improvements at AT during his tenure.

“We wish Dean the very best and thank him for his work and leadership, and in particular in working closely with us to set transport arrangements up for the future.”

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

Long-running Wellington fish-and-chip shop Rice Bowl Burger Bar to close

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

A notice posted to Facebook from Rice Bowl Burger Bar announcing its closure. Rice Bowl Burger Bar / supplied

A long-running hole-in-the-wall fish-and-chip shop in Wellington is closing its roller door for the last time at the end of this month.

Rice Bowl Burger Bar’s current owner, Wawa Shen, said the small kitchen and serving counter – which opens out onto Riddiford Street near Wellington Hospital – had run since the early 1970s.

She said her family had owned the business since 2009, but now the building’s landlord planned to redevelop the site.

A notice posted to Facebook from Rice Bowl Burger Bar announcing its closure. Rice Bowl Burger Bar / supplied

On a notice posted to the shop’s Facebook page, they thanked their customers for their “continued love and support over the last 17 years” .

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

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi hopes to be back in Te Pāti Māori following court hearing

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. VNP / Phil Smith

MP Mariameno Kapa-Kingi says she hopes today’s court hearing will secure her reinstatement to Te Pāti Māori and pave the way for a reset of the party’s leadership.

Last year, she contested her expulsion from the party and was temporarily reinstalled in an interim judgement. A substantive hearing is now taking place at the High Court in Wellington.

Speaking outside on Monday morning, Kapa-Kingi told reporters she hoped the court could finalise the matter so everybody could move into 2026 “fired up and good to go”.

“I’m hoping that the reinstatement is secure and proper, and then we’ll see what happens from that point. But the reinstatement is key.”

Kapa-Kingi said she was also asking the court to require Te Pāti Māori to conduct a “proper full and open and honest process” regarding its leadership through a special general meeting.

“Good strong leadership is open … it’s about respect. It’s about love. It’s about kindness. It’s about all of those things that that we value as Māori and those things need to be obvious and apparent in the leadership. And I don’t know whether that’s so right now.”

Kapa-Kingi said she had never departed from the party’s kaupapa and was intending on visiting Waitangi for the annual commemorations later this week.

She said she was not sure how the party’s co-leaders Debbie Ngarewa Packer and Rawiri Waititi would be received up north given they had declined to attend a hui called by Ngāpuhi in November.

“We were disappointed and wished that they had turned up.”

Arriving at the court, Te Pāti Māori president John Tamihere said he was feeling “pretty chipper”.

“[Let’s] just see how the game goes,” he said. “There’s a lot of things at play, so let’s just await the finding.”

In an interim ruling published in early December, Justice Paul Radich said there were “serious questions to be tried” on the manner in which Kapa-Kingi was expelled from the party.

He said there were “certainly tenable arguments” that the expulsion was founded upon “mistaken facts and procedural irregularities”.

Te Pāti Māori’s lawyers had argued reinstating Kapa-Kingi was likely to “create extreme tension within Te Pāti Māori’s MPs and leadership”.

They argued the national council did have authority to expel Kapa-Kingi as it was the “primary heavy-lifter of hard decisions” in that context.

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

Crash closes SH1 in Marlborough

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

The road was closed between Lake Grassmere and Taimate (file photo). RNZ

State Highway 1 is closed near Lake Grassmere in Marlborough because of a serious crash.

Police said one person was badly injured in the crash at about 7.30am on Monday.

The road was closed between Lake Grassmere and Taimate.

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

Waitangi Day 2026: What’s open, what’s not, and when you have to pay a surcharge

By Evening Report -

February 2, 2026

Source: Radio New Zealand

Shops, restaurants, cafes and other hospitality and retail venues will be open as usual on Waitangi Day, but they can choose to close if they wish. 123rf

Every year on 6 February, the country recognises Waitangi Day, New Zealand’s national day to mark the first signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi in 1840.

Waitangi Day falls on a Friday this year, meaning workers are entitled to a paid day off.

But, unlike Easter holidays, Christmas, or before 1pm on Anzac Day, trading restrictions don’t apply.

What’s open?

Shops, restaurants, cafes and other hospitality and retail venues will be open as usual on Waitangi Day, but they can choose to close if they wish – so it pays to check opening hours beforehand.

Supermarkets and malls will be open too, but some may operate with shorter hours.

When do I have to pay a surcharge?

On a public holiday, businesses often have surcharges, an additional charge, to cover the extra costs, such as paying employees time-and-a-half. Employees get paid time-and-a-half and an alternative day off under the Holidays Act when they work a public holiday if it’s a usual working day for them.

Hospitality businesses that decide to open on a public holiday, including Waitangi Day, may add a 15 percent surcharge to their services.

If a business does charge a surcharge, they must have clear signage communicating this to the customer. These can include the display of signs detailing the surcharge, a message on the business’s website, or by verbally letting the customer know at the time of purchase or before they order.

If customers believe they have been misled about a surcharge, they can complain to the Commerce Commission.

What’s on?

Every year, a public festival is held on Waitangi Day at the Waitangi Treaty Grounds in the Bay of Islands. It starts at 5am with a dawn service in Te Whare Rūnanga.

The dawn service on Waitangi Day 2025. RNZ / Jo Moir

For those not at the Treaty Grounds this Waitangi Day, there are still many events across the country.

Government funding has been provided to 29 community events across New Zealand to commemorate Waitangi Day this year. You can find an event near you here.

Councils also tend to organise Waitangi Day events.

Auckland City Council said Aucklanders are encouraged to make the most of the free events, cultural exchanges, great atmosphere, music and delicious kai on offer at Waitangi ki Manukau (Manukau Sports Bowl), Waitangi ki Ōmaru in Glen Innes (Point England Reserve) and Waitangi@Waititi at Parrs Park (West Auckland).

Wellington City Council has several Waitangi Day events, such as Te Rā o Waitangi, a free event that includes live music, dance and cultural performances at Waitangi Park.

Christchurch City Council said Waitangi Day activities in the Garden City and Canterbury include the 50th anniversary celebration at Okains Bay Māori and Colonial Museum with hāngī and performances, alongside a family event in Kaiapoi at Trousselot Park.

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