Some retailers are giving inaccurate advice to shoppers in states where it is illegal to ride e-scooters on public roads or footpaths
Retailers are preparing for a Christmas boom in the sale of electric scooters, even though it is illegal to ride them on public roads or footpaths in several states.
Federal and state regulation has struggled to keep up with the technology, leaving consumers at risk of inadvertently breaking the law.
Continue reading...After six hellish years inside Australia’s offshore detention regime, Boochani reflects on the country that rejected him, his new-found freedom and the friends he left behind
“One day,” Behrouz Boochani said, observing the bleakness of the abandoned Manus detention centre, its dark form illuminated by wood stripped from the buildings being burned for light, “we will meet in some other place, far away from here.”
That was two years ago, in the middle of a warm November night, when Boochani helped smuggle this reporter into the decommissioned Manus Island detention centre where 400 men were holding out against being forcibly removed: rationing their dwindling supply of food and medicine, guarding against the violent police crackdown they knew was coming, repairing the freshwater wells that had been deliberately spoiled by the retreating guards.
Continue reading...Survivors are given a voice at first public hearings of investigation into historical abuse of thousands of children in state and faith-based care
On the morning Annasophia Calman is due to testify in public about a childhood destroyed at the hands of her father and the state, she eats scrambled eggs on toast and paces back and forth in the hallway outside her hotel room.
“My daughter rang up and she goes, ‘Mum, I’m so proud of you. You’re finally going to do it. It’s going to be over for you,’ ” Calman says. “But I knew it wasn’t over until I actually did it.”
Continue reading...How poignant that Behrouz was freed from Australia’s grip and welcomed by Christchurch, a city that knows prejudice only too well
Today our world is a little freer, a little fairer, and a little more hopeful. Today, one less innocent man is incarcerated in Australia’s detention camp on Manus Island, guilty only of seeking refuge from persecution. Behrouz Boochani was no ordinary detainee. The Iranian Kurdish journalist and author became the voice of Manus detainees, and with it the persistent conscience of us all as we learned of the atrocities committed by the Australian government on its remote Pacific island detention camps.
How poignant that he was finally freed to visit Christchurch, a city that knows only too well the violence and suffering borne of prejudice. A city that wrapped its arms so warmly around its refugee community after a terror attack just seven months ago, to heal their wounds and stand for inclusion. Behrouz has said that Christchurch has taught the world about kindness this year. He is also quick to note that the prejudice that leads to violence against refugees is the same that underpins policies allowing cruel treatment of them by governments such as Australia’s. For him, the plight of refugees and displaced persons across the globe right now is connected to the fear-mongering politics of Donald Trump and Scott Morrison.
Continue reading...Official reception highlights New Zealand’s differences with Australia over immigration
The city of Christchurch has welcomed Behrouz Boochani with a civic reception and a traditional Māori mihi whakatau – a formal welcome – as his presence, and liberty, in New Zealand once again underscores the country’s political differences with Australia over immigration.
Boochani was formally greeted from the plane by the mayor of Christchurch and the city’s Māori leaders, who told him he was welcomed by the mountains, the rivers, and the people of the city.
Continue reading...Kurdish Iranian refugee and journalist – a multiple award-winner for documenting life in Australia’s offshore detention system – has left Papua New Guinea
•The story behind Behrouz Boochani’s flight to freedom
Behrouz Boochani, the Kurdish Iranian refugee and journalist who became the voice of those incarcerated on Manus Island, has landed in New Zealand and says he will never return to Papua New Guinea or Australia’s immigration regime.
“I will never go back to that place,” he told the Guardian, shortly after leaving PNG. “I just want to be free of the system, of the process. I just want to be somewhere where I am a person, not just a number, not just a label ‘refugee’.”
Continue reading...The mosque attacks rocked New Zealand but good deeds and generosity will help keep us together
The day of 15 March 2019 will stay with me forever. I was working in my bedroom, listening to radio and drawing. The on-air chat and music was interrupted as news of a shooting at a mosque in Christchurch began to filter through. How could this possibly be happening in our quiet little island tucked away at the bottom of the world?
I brushed it off as some sort of mistake, until news of a shooting at a second mosque emerged minutes later. While witnesses and locals reported the horror that had just unfolded, I scrolled online looking for some sort of explanation, a way to make sense of it – and found everyone was lost for words as I was.
Continue reading...A New Zealand jury has been shown CCTV of the man accused of murdering Grace Millane wheeling out a luggage trolley bearing two suitcases – one containing the 21-year-old’s body – into a hotel lift and loading them into a hire car. The man – whose identity has been suppressed by the court – is accused of strangling her in his apartment. He has pleaded not guilty to murder. Millane's body was found crammed inside a suitcase buried in scrubland outside the city
Continue reading...UK backpacker died from pressure to neck as police interview reveals suspect initially claimed he said goodbye to her in Auckland city centre
Grace Millane died from prolonged pressure to the neck, which took place during sex, a forensic pathologist has told a jury in Auckland, as it emerged the suspect initially lied to police about the last time he saw the British backpacker.
Dr Simon Stables told the high court injuries like Millane’s were extremely uncommon worldwide. “From my point of view it is incredibly rare, I have never heard of another case … in New Zealand.”
Continue reading...Interviewed about her plans for retirement, the former Aotearoa New Zealand prime minister says the word is not in her vocabulary
Helen Clark, 69, is the second woman to hold the post of prime minister of Aotearoa New Zealand and fifth-longest serving prime minister. She was also the first female head of the United Nations Development Program.
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Continue reading...For a very long time, our politics has been run by older dudes in suits – but for democracy to work it must look like all of us
Good comedy is supposed to prompt reflection on privilege and power structures, bringing to light the unsaid. It’s supposed to serve as a fuse-breaker for conversation about things we take for granted, things that we don’t question about the culture and society we’re deeply imbedded in.
Baby boomers had stand-up. Gen X got the Netflix specials. Millennials made memes, and the Zoomers are reinventing humour altogether with the likes of TikTok.
Continue reading...Forensic evidence shows ‘extremely strong scientific support’ that blood in CityLife hotel room was Millane’s
Forensic scientists have given evidence at the murder trial of Grace Millane in Auckland’s high court, and said the blood found in the accused’s hotel room most likely came from the British backpacker.
Millane, 21, was on a round-the-world trip when she disappeared on 2 December in New Zealand’s largest city during a date.
Continue reading...The New Zealand prime minister's zero-carbon bill has passed in parliament with historic cross-party support. It commits the country to new climate change laws and to reduce its carbon emissions to zero by 2050 in line with the Paris climate agreement. The bill passed by 119 votes to one with the centre-right opposition National party's support, despite none of its proposed amendments being accepted
Continue reading...Centre-right opposition National party throws support behind the legislation that has been applauded around the globe
Jacinda Ardern’s landmark climate legislation has passed in New Zealand parliament, with historic cross-party support, committing the nation to reduce its carbon emissions to zero by 2050 and meet its commitments under the Paris climate accords.
The climate change response (zero carbon) amendment bill passed on Thursday afternoon with the centre-right opposition National party throwing their support behind it late in the day, despite none of their proposed amendments being accepted. The bill passed 119 votes to one.
Continue reading...UK backpacker’s friend says ‘something seemed out of place’ during online chat as jury watches video of Millane visiting bars with Tinder date
The parents of Grace Millane have watched CCTV footage of the last hours of their daughter’s life as an Auckland court heard how a friend of the British backpacker feared for Millane on the Tinder date during which she died.
The CCTV footage, played to the court on Thursday, showed Millane, in a black dress and white sneakers, greeting the man now accused of her murder with a hug and a brief kiss on the cheek before the pair visited bars around the city together and then went to his hotel.
Continue reading...A New Zealand jury has been shown CCTV of British backpacker Grace Millane’s movements on the night she died while on a Tinder date with a 27-year-old man. The footage shows the pair visiting numerous bars across Auckland. The man – whose identity has been suppressed by the court – is accused of strangling her in his apartment later that night. He has pleaded not guilty to murder. Millane's body was found crammed inside a suitcase buried in scrubland outside the city.
Continue reading...With micro-parties poised to steal votes from the PM’s coalition partners, it could sink them all in 2020 election
With a year until the next election, Jacinda Ardern may be extraordinarily personally popular, and Labour polling well, but neither fact will determine her fate.
In the end, all eyes will be on a handful of low-polling minor parties that could wield influence well beyond their size and ultimately determine the outcome.
Continue reading...The South Island’s beautiful and desolate west coast region suffers from a severe lack of jobs and people
Driving up the west coast of the South Island, it’s possible to have the road to yourself; kilometre after kilometre of black-sand beaches, snow-covered southern Alps and towns that have barely changed since the gold rush.
The quiet, traditional lifestyle of the coast is prized by residents, many of whom say they are unfazed by decades of stagnant or declining growth – in fact, they prefer it that way.
Continue reading...Green MP Chlöe Swarbrick drops a casual 'OK boomer' in response to being heckled during her speech in a sitting of the New Zealand parliament. The captions department of NZParliament TV struggled with the millennial slang, quoting her as saying 'OK Berma'.
Continue reading...As 5 million approaches, it’s thanks to the Treaty of Waitangi, that multiculturalism will succeed
We are expanding our coverage of New Zealand. Please help us by supporting our independent journalism
In April 2003, the year New Zealand’s population hit 4 million, statisticians were predicting the country would hit at 4.8 million people in 2046. As in Europe and North America the country’s birth rate was falling, and no one quite knew whether mass immigration would – or even could – continue at pace. Instead, the pressing concern at the time was how to reverse the brain drain.
In the mid-2000s almost 40,000 New Zealanders were upping sticks each year. Miners and truck drivers were packing their bags for Queensland’s mining boom. Bankers and lawyers were taking up plum jobs in London. Teachers, nurses, and other public servants were comparing what they made in Wellington with what they might make in Washington or Ottawa.
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