A new disease, Mycoplasma Bovis, was found in July in a South Canterbury farm. Since then, 7 farms now have infected cows. All the farms are connected to the original one in some way. Farmers often move animals to another farm which has better grass and this disease spreads through contact between cows. Equipment, like milking machines, can als ...…

First, listen to October 10th A commemorative service was held in Belgium this morning to remember the soldiers who died at Passchendaele. A Maori waka together with a Belgian rowing boat arrived together at the beginning. Some of those Maori paddling the waka were relatives of soldiers who had died at Passchendaele. The Maori then performed a ...…

On October 12th 1917, 842 New Zealand soldiers were killed at Passchendaele, Belgium, and others died in the following days. October 12th 1917 is known as New Zealand’s darkest day; more New Zealanders died that day than on any other day before or since. This was during the First World War in Europe. The soldiers were killed by German machine g ...…

First listen to Election results. Special votes were announced yesterday and there are some changes to the preliminary results from election day. The National Party has lost two MPs and both Labour and the Greens have gained one MP. National now has 56 MPs, Labour has 46, and the Greens have 8. Labour and the Greens had planned to form a coalit ...…

From the end of this year, Countdown supermarkets will no longer have single-use plastic bags available for your groceries. Countdown is owned the Australian company Progressive Enterprises which also owns Supervalue and Fresh Choice. All three supermarket chains will not have these bags available for customers who instead will need to bring th ...…

Although our national election was a week ago, we are still waiting for a final result. We should have this result in another week, by October 7th. Special votes have yet been counted. These are votes from people who could not vote in their home electorate or who enrolled late. There is a large number of these votes and they could make a differ ...…

Auckland airport gets its fuel from a pipeline. This 168km pipeline sends aviation fuel from the refinery in Northland to Auckland airport but a break in the pipeline has stopped the flow of oil. It is not clear what caused the break. Possibly it was a digger on a farm a few months ago. However, the break is in a very acidic swampy area which m ...…

Christchurch cathedral before the earthquake On Saturday, the Canterbury Anglicans voted to restore the broken cathedral. The cathedral was badly damaged in the earthquakes nearly 7 years ago. Since then it has been gradually deteriorating while arguments have gone back and forward about what to do with it. The cathedral belongs to the Anglican ...…

Today the Christchurch City Council announced a car-sharing plan, using electric vehicles. Starting in November, there will be 70 electric cars for use by the Council, Environment Canterbury, the District Health Board, and several businesses. At first, the cars will be located in parking buildings at the airport, and near the City Council. By M ...…

Tonight, TV3 hosted a debate between the two main party leaders, Bill English the PM and also leader of the National Party on the one hand and Jacinda Ardern the leader of the Labour Party. This was a much more fiery debate than the previous one. Jacinda especially became quite heated when arguing about matters which she felt strongly about. Th ...…

Spring comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. This is an old saying about the Spring in Britain and it certainly applies to New Zealand also. The lion is known for being a fierce animal while the lamb is a gentle animal. They are symbols for the kind of weather we can have at the beginning and end of Spring. September is the first month ...…

Did you watch the leaders’ debate tonight on TV1 between the Prime Minister Bill English and the new leader of the Labour Party, Jacinda Ardern? Tonight’s debate focussed especially on housing, tax, immigration, education and selling water. They both spoke very well about their policies. With the election just 3 weeks away, Labour and National ...…

The value of wine exports is now about the same as our kiwifruit exports. The latest report from the New Zealand winegrowers shows that the value of our exports in wine has increased 6% since last year to $1.66bn. The main reason for the growth is the increase in exports to the US. New Zealand wines are the third most popular in the US after Fr ...…

Today, August 25th, is daffodil day. Perhaps you saw people wearing a daffodil on their jacket. The daffodil was in return for a donation. This donation is used by the Cancer Society which is a charity to help people who have cancer. The charity also supports scientific research into trying to find a cure for some kinds of cancer. Another impor ...…

Are you eligible to vote in the general election on September 23rd? You must be 18 or older, be a New Zealand citizen or permanent resident and have lived in New Zealand for at least one year continuously. Many people feel unsure of who to vote for. The general election website has some information which might help. There are two useful website ...…

This week, the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Julie Bishop, appeared to be very angry with the New Zealand Labour Party. Ms Bishop said that if the Labour Party won the election and became the government, it would be very difficult for Australia to work with this government. The reason for her anger was that a New Zealand Labour MP (M ...…

I was surprised to hear on the radio recently that some public libraries in England have closed. Public libraries are very important for a community and it’s hard to believe that councils would close them. In New Zealand, we have many public libraries. Auckland, our biggest city, has 55 public libraries spread throughout the city. Auckland is a ...…

The National Party announced that one third of government-owned cars will be electric by 2021. The government owns about 15,000 cars so that means 5,000 will be electric. Right now, there are nearly 4,000 electric cars registered in New Zealand but the government is aiming for 64,000 by 2021. New Zealand is lucky enough to have 80% of our elect ...…

Watch this video to see the damage to the railway line near Kaikoura. After the 7.8 November earthquake in Kaikoura, the road and rail were very badly damaged. Railway lines were twisted, some (lines) were pushed into the sea, cliffs fell on top of lines, bridges and tunnels were destroyed. With both road and rail closed, access was difficult f ...…

Statistics NZ released their employment figures for the June 2017 quarter (i.e. for 3 months). Salaries and wages increased by 1.7%. The minimum hourly wage increased by 50c to $15.75. However, for those people working full time, the average paid per hour was $38.70. This includes people on a salary who probably earn much more than those on a w ...…

The Book Council survey of over 2000 adults found that 88% of those people had read a book in the past year. The average number of books read was 22.6 books in a year. 52% said they had read at least one book written by a New Zealander. Slightly more women than men had read a book in the past year (91% of women, 84% of men). Fiction was a littl ...…

She is the new leader of the Labour Party and hopes that she will be the new Prime Minister after the election. She is an Auckland MP, representing the Mt Albert electorate. She is spokesperson for Security and Intelligence; Arts, Culture and Heritage; and Children. She has been interested in politics since she was a teenager. She joined the La ...…

In a shock announcement this morning, Andrew Little said he had resigned as Leader of the Opposition. In his place, the Labour Party caucus had voted Jacinda Ardern as the new leader. She had been Deputy Leader. The new Deputy is Kelvin Davis from Northland. This was very surprising news as the general election is only 8 weeks away. The reason ...…

First listen to yesterday’s post The previous post focused on stepping stones to reach Paris target of reducing our greenhouse gas emissions. Our target is to reduce these emissions to 50% below the 1990 levels. Dr Jan Wright is the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment and this is her last report before she retires. She has been in th ...…

Last week, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Jan Wright, released a report called Stepping stones to Paris and beyond. Paris here means the Paris Climate Change agreement. Stepping stones are steps or plans to reach our target. New Zealand has set a target to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 but we do not have stepp ...…

Boris Johnson is the British Foreign Secretary. He visited New Zealand for two days and has now left for Sydney. While he was here, he unveiled the UK War Memorial in Wellington’s Pukeahu National War Memorial Park. It is a very large structure which is part a New Zealand Pohutukawa tree and part an English oak tree. It was designed and made by ...…

The rain storm which caused flooding in many places on Friday and Saturday, affected only the east coast of the South Island. Farmers had to deal with flooded paddocks. They had to move animals to higher parts of their farms if that was possible. Some animals drowned. Rivers broke their banks in Timaru and Oamaru. Some houses were flooded and p ...…