Exclusive: Journalist who became the voice of the victims of Australia’s punitive detention system granted a visa after seven-year ordeal
Behrouz Boochani, the Kurdish Iranian exile and journalist who became the voice of those incarcerated on Manus Island, has had his refugee status formally recognised by New Zealand, and granted a visa to live there.
He said he finally felt secure “knowing that I have a future”.
Continue reading...Exits of an MP and a minister might signal a new attitude in a nation where politicians’ private lives have traditionally been off-limits
After a New Zealand MP quit and a minister was fired in successive days over allegations of sexual misconduct or inappropriate relationships, New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, was asked by a reporter whether it was “open season” on any member of parliament who had “ever had an affair”.
“I don’t want to get drawn into hypotheticals,” Ardern replied as she faced questions about the sacking of Iain Lees-Galloway, her minister of workplace relations and safety, over his workplace relationship with a former staffer in his office.
Continue reading...Exclusive: some say it’s ‘unfathomable’ to only have three months to prepare for the Royal Australasian College of Physicians exam amid a heavy pandemic workload
Hundreds of trainee physicians who were told an exam they must pass to be eligible for specialist training would be deferred until 2021 due to Covid-19 are distressed after the Royal Australasian College of Physicians said on Monday the exam will in fact be held in about three months’ time.
The decision will affect around 700-800 physician trainees in Australia and around 100 in New Zealand who are eligible to sit the exam, which involves a written and clinical component.
Continue reading...New Zealand's prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, has fired her immigration minister after being told he had engaged in a 12-month-affair with a staffer in his office.
Iain Lees-Galloway's affair took place over a 12-month period and Ardern was concerned that an abuse of power may have taken place.
Continue reading...The country’s requirement that expats must visit at least once every three years should be reviewed in these changed times
Early last year, in what now seems like another world, I nabbed bargain flights from London to Sydney. My parents were already there, visiting, so my sisters flew from Wellington to join us.
We spent a pleasant two weeks together, with the unspoken understanding that it would be another couple of years before we saw each other again – such was the frequency of visits I’d fallen into since leaving New Zealand in 2015.
Continue reading...Two months out from the polls, the new National leader is hoping to come from behind by painting her popular rival as all appearance and little substance
The starting gates in New Zealand’s 19 September election race are finally full. Labour’s prime minister Jacinda Ardern is the bookies’ favourite and the opposition took a long time to settle.
All the same, punters may still want to hedge their bets.
Continue reading...Researchers claim system could save lives in situations like the Whakaari/White Island eruption in 2019, which killed 21 people
New Zealand scientists say they have invented a warning system to predict volcanic eruptions that may prevent future tragedies such as the blast that killed 21 people on White Island/Whakaari in 2019.
University of Auckland academics David Dempsey and Shane Cronin say their research “shows patterns of seismic activity before an eruption that make advance warning possible”.
Continue reading...Only once in the past hundred years has a party formed government after changing leader in an election year, but that was Ardern in 2017
According to conventional wisdom, it’s electoral suicide for political parties to change leaders in an (ordinary) election year. But what about in extraordinary election years? And what about changing leaders twice in the midst of the first global pandemic and recession in a hundred years? When the much-needed rule book is written on this, central to its exposition will be whether Judith Collins, the New Zealand National party’s fifth leader in four years, was able to pull off one of the biggest upsets in the country’s electoral history.
Only once in the past hundred years has a party formed a government after changing its leader in an election year, and that was three years ago in 2017. Confronted with his party in opinion poll freefall, then Labour leader Andrew Little stood aside seven weeks from election day to see if his more publicly popular deputy, Jacinda Ardern, would be able to stem the flow of voters leaving it for the Green party. It was an audacious move, and it paid off.
Continue reading...Creators say robot dolphins provide an alternative to keeping cetaceans in captivity and could be rolled out in Chinese aquariums
They can respond to questions, swim happily in shopping mall display tanks, and withstand close contact that would usually be harmful to real animals – without any ethical problems. And they could soon be coming to aquariums in China.
Entrepreneurs in New Zealand are working with American creators of some of Hollywood’s most famous creatures to develop animatronic dolphins that look almost identical to their living counterparts.
Continue reading...Australian man who pleaded guilty to 51 counts of murder will be sentenced in August
The Australian man who pleaded guilty to killing 51 Muslims in a terrorist attack in Christchurch in March 2019 has chosen to represent himself at his sentencing next month.
Brenton Tarrant pleaded guilty in March to 51 counts of murder, 40 of attempted murder and a terrorism charge after dozens of worshippers were gunned down at two mosques in New Zealand last year.
Continue reading...Former New Zealand prime minister says WHO director general said during early days he was ‘screaming every day but no one is listening’
A former prime minister of New Zealand whose leadership was defined by stability and thoroughness has been appointed to investigate if the World Health Organization failed to adequately warn of the coronavirus pandemic.
In global circles, Helen Clark became known as a “fighter” and has described the WHO investigation as “exceptionally challenging” and a “very tough gig”, given the review would be conducted in the midst of a pandemic. Speaking to the Guardian from her home in Auckland, Clark said she had to start immediately – “before another pandemic is upon us”.
Continue reading...Man in his 50s is the third person to abscond during quarantine, as the nation battles with influx of returning citizens
New Zealand’s government has revealed that a third person has absconded from a managed isolation facility, saying a man cut through a fence so that he could go to buy some alcohol.
On Wednesday a man, aged in his 30s absconded from his managed quarantine hotel in central Auckland to visit a supermarket and later tested positive for coronavirus. It came after a woman jumped over a hedge to get out of quarantine. Later, she got lost and asked a passing policeman for directions back to her hotel.
Continue reading...Figures show 65% rise in Americans thinking of emigrating to land where coronavirus has been effectively eliminated
American interest in moving to New Zealand has spiked during the coronavirus crisis, with the number of people seeking information on how to emigrate climbing by 65% during May.
New Zealand went into lockdown on 25 March and by May was beginning to loosen restrictions, with the disease effectively eliminated by shutting the borders to non-New Zealanders and enforcing strict stay-at-home orders.
Continue reading...Company says it has ‘paused’ its relationship with the social media company as part of global movement against hate speech
New Zealand’s largest newspaper group has temporarily quit Facebook in a bold “experiment” aligning itself with a global boycott of the social media site, which has been condemned for failing to crack down on escalating hate speech.
Stuff is the biggest news media website in New Zealand and owns dozens of newspapers around the country, employing more than 400 journalists.
Continue reading...New Zealand’s handling of coronavirus was besmirched by health minister’s blunders, so a pre-election salvage operation was needed
New Zealanders had been confined to their homes for more than two weeks when photographs emerged of David Clark’s campaign van parked at a mountain-biking track in Dunedin.
His vehicle was the only one there.
Continue reading...Picture of Hemi Pomara posing in London in 1846 was discovered at the national library of Australia by researchers
The oldest surviving photograph of a Māori person has been discovered in the national library of Australia, a historical “scoop” being lauded on both sides of the Tasman.
Hemi Pomara was kidnapped from his home on the Chatham Islands in the early 1840s by British traders, after his family were slaughtered by a rival Māori tribe.
Continue reading...Country records biggest coronavirus case jump in two months after four returning travellers diagnosed
A review of New Zealand’s managed isolation and quarantine facilities has found that the system is under “extreme stress” as more and more Kiwis return home. It came as four more returnees tested positive to Covid-19 in the biggest one-day jump in cases in two months.
The review found “resources required to support the managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) function have failed to keep pace with the increased volume of returnees”.
Continue reading...Shoppers at NZ supermarket chain Countdown will no longer see euphemistic language like ‘sanitary’ to describe pads, tampons and menstrual cups
Shoppers at a New Zealand supermarket chain will no longer see euphemistic language like “sanitary” or “feminine hygiene” products to describe pads, tampons and menstrual cups after the chain said it would be the first in the world to use the word “period” to describe the items.
No other local or international retailer used the word “period” to describe the products shoppers buy for menstruation, according to a spokesperson for Countdown, a major supermarket chain in New Zealand that operates 180 stores.
Continue reading...Australia and New Zealand were celebrating on Friday as the nations awoke to the news that their joint bid had won the race to host the 2023 Women’s World Cup, with the success being hailed as a historic moment for women’s sport in the region.
“We did it. We freakin’ did it,” said Sam Kerr, the Matildas captain whose image had been projected onto Sydney’s Opera House in the buildup to the announcement in the small hours of Friday morning.
Continue reading...Talent agency job ad lists long skinny limbs, acne scars, facial lines, missing bones and large eyes as desirable features
Have an overbite, ears that stick out, small eyes, or a “bulbous or interesting” nose? Hollywood has finally come calling.
A New Zealand talent agency is looking for actors to appear in the big-budget Lord of the Rings television adaptation, due to resume filming in the country shortly, and is seeking urgent applications from people they have euphemistically deemed “funky looking” in an unusual job advertisement.
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