Pasta News Network - New Zealand

David Anthony Ruck, who made headlines in 2013 when he started a Facebook page called the "Pākehā Party", was convicted by a jury in July of three charges of threatening to kill, court documents show.

The charges related to a May 2020 video posted to YouTube and two emails sent in October 2021.

In the video, he shared conspiracy theories about the New Zealand Government's relationship with the Trump administration, which Judge Paul Kellar said was his "right". The video crossed the line into criminal behaviour when "in reasonably emphatic terms, you make comments towards Jacinda Ardern, the New Zealand Prime Minister, stating that you have every right to walk up to Wellington and shoot her in the face".

Unhinged and not very nuanced, but the reality is that Jacinda has done more harm then good so such "strong" opinions were bound to happen.

Child vaccination rates in areas like south Auckland remain in a state of crisis as healthcare providers are stuck in a post-Covid-19 catch-up phase, according to an expert.

Figures from the Ministry of Health, covering the period between 1 July and 30 September last year, show just 65 percent of children in Counties Manukau were fully vaccinated at six months old.

Dr Nikki Turner is the medical director of the University of Auckland's Immunisation Advisory Centre. She said while vaccination numbers could often improve as providers "catch-up", the situation was dire.

Good luck with that, as the word "Vaccine" is now tainted due to how Covid was handled.

More than 200 police staff - from recruits right up to senior inspectors and top cops - have faced criminal charges in the last few years, including for drugs, fraud, serious physical and sexual assaults, kidnapping, family harm and driving offences.

From the start of 2015 to the end of October 2022 a total of 213 constabulary and non-sworn staff were charged with criminal offending.

Police provided the information on charges to the Herald under the Official Information Act.

The information stated that 213 staff faced 274 charges arising from 207 “incidents”.

In some cases, employees faced multiple charges.

Of the total charges 82 convictions were recorded, 157 were discharged, dismissed, withdrawn or acquitted after a trial before a jury or judge alone.

Not setting a very good example.

Wilson's analysis, which has not yet been published, covered internet sites known for extreme posts, including Gab, 4chan, some New Zealand channels of secure message service Telegram, Reddit and 8kun.

The issue needed more hard data, and more political attention, he said.

I certainly would like to know their methodology for analysis including the threads they have observed in the various places. Of course the biggest problem is equating that Twitter, Reddit or 4Chan represent the majority of society. They are all their own echo chambers at the end of the day, but some allow more creative thinking then others.

Stop and really think about this for a moment.

imagine a government whose instincts when faced with serious questions about its own process, credibility, veracity, and sagacity reaches as its first instinct not for “transparency, communication, and dialogue” but for “censorship, propaganda, and the literal use of weapons grade media and data manipulation upon its own people.”

can you seriously think of ANY characteristic more disqualifying for trust?

“if you question elections, you’re a domestic terror threat” is the line of despotism, not democracy.

A Bad Cat, on point. Mainstream media and government are on their last legs as far as trust goes.

A Wellington bar manager says he's been forced to stop serving tap beer after running out of it's last stock of carbon dioxide.

The country's last of two food grade CO2 plants, the Todd Energy Kāpuni plant, shut down a month ago amid safety issues, leaving the industry facing shortages and increasing importing costs.

Counter Culture Board Game Cafe and Bar manager Jack Tallott said they had stopped serving tap beer after using their last CO2 reserves last week.

This is fine.

Milk itself physically transformed du> ring the digestive process, forming a semi-solid structure.

Those changes had implications for how proteins and lipids - fatty components - were delivered to the small intestine and, ultimately, how the body sourced nutrition, she said.

The project would focus on infants, and how milk and milk products could provide them with nutrition.

This is where capitalism goes wrong. The focus should be on making women healthier so they have the capacity to produce nutrient rich milk themselves.

From 2020:

These arrangements have all the hallmarks of an autocratic technocracy. "Autocratic" because political power has been concentrated in the hands of a small group of people (in this case, the executive) absent the checks and balances that normally control the exercise of that power. The role of parliaments have been marginalised; inter- and intra-government review is abridged (if it exists at all); the oversight courts provide generally is not being accessed; and civil society and the media have largely been circumspect in their criticisms.

And "technocracy" because of the dominant role played by medical-scientific experts. Extensive legislative and executive decision-making authority has been delegated to these experts – directly in some jurisdictions, indirectly in others. Severe restrictions on an individual’s freedom of movement, association, and to earn a livelihood have been declared by them, or on their advice. How many times have we heard Prime Minister Scott Morrison, or a premier, say they have to follow the medical advice?

Nothing much has changed unfortunately. Experts have not updated their knowledge since 2020, nor have they abdicated their emergency powers completely.

Worth reading in full.

Earlier this month, former NY Fed repo guru Zoltan Pozsar wrote one of his most important reports of 2022, in which he described how Putin could unleash hell on the Western financial system by demanding that instead of dollars, Russian oil exporters are paid in gold, effectively pegging oil to gold and launching Petrogold.

Then, China's President Xi visit with Saudi and GCC leaders marked the birth of the petroyuan and a leap in China’s growing encumbrance of OPEC+’s oil and gas reserves: that's because with the China-GCC Summit, "China can now claim to have built a 'special relationship' not only with the '+' sign in OPEC+ (Russia), but with Iran and all of OPEC+."

"The dawn of the petroyuan."

The public realise there are many traditional sources of information about what products can be used safely.

If an individual suffers from a chronic or serious illness, or simply wants to maintain health, they need to retain their options to research and choose the most effective treatment for them.

The new bill will regulate all natural health products that claim to benefit health. This is an enabling bill. As a result, the government will appoint a regulator who will then decide for you what products can be sold and what health claims can be made.

They want to micro-manage your every bite, because they think they should.

I wrote and said publicly last year there was a non-negligible but real chance she would retire just before Christmas or early this year before the resumption of Parliament and in time for a new Labour leader to prepare for the election. I saw a retirement as possible, in part because of the intense pressures of the job over her five years in charge, and in part because Ardern has, bit by bit, ruled out many new policy areas for Labour.

She also knew she had become personally and viscerally unpopular with a section of the electorate, some of whom are swinging voters able to bring in a new Government. But it’s fair to say this is a surprise and a complete shock to most. It completely throws open the prospects for this year’s election, which is now set to be on October 14. I said it was possible, but never believed it was probable. It’s still a shock.

Short but honest, with a serve of nuance by Bernard Hickey.

He told Morning Report the first thing that went through his mind when he heard of Ardern's decision was respect for the job she had done.

However, her decision has not changed anything for ordinary New Zealanders. This week had seen a record low level in business confidence and a 32-year high in food prices.

"It's going to get worse, it's going to get more painful and they need a government that's going to get things done for them so they can get ahead," Luxon said.

Politically safe but very valid points are made by Luxon in this particular article.

Todd Energy says it has identified the root cause of safety problems which has shut its Kapuni gas plant for nearly a month.

Todd Energy said the problem had been identified as a safety valve releasing ammonia.

It expected liquid CO2 production to restart early next month.

Progress atleast.

Clark, who is in Switzerland at present, said she awoke to find she had received dozens of messages on her phone and was stunned, but, after a moment of reflection, not surprised by Ardern's decision.

"I've seen the public pressures of vitriol and mouthing against Jacinda in a very, very unfair way and at some point, as she said, you're human, at some point you don't have any gas left in the tank, and she's made the call that is absolutely right for her and her family."

Ardern achieved little of what she promised and leaves her role with a country that is doing worse after her leadership tenure. Her greatest achievement is putting Te Reo names on every department. And then fellow politicians are surprised that people may have strongly worded opinions ?

The new legislation—likely to pass since Republicans control both houses of the legislature—will permanently prohibit COVID vaccine passports, COVID vaccine and mask mandates in schools, masking requirements in businesses, and employers hiring or firing based on COVID vaccination status.

It will further protect doctors’ First Amendment rights so that they won’t lose their jobs if they dissent from medical orthodoxy, and defend medical professionals from discrimination based on their religious views.

.“When the world lost its mind, Florida was a refuge of sanity, serving strongly as freedom’s linchpin,” said DeSantis. “These measures will ensure Florida remains this way and will provide landmark protections for free speech for medical practitioners.”

DeSantis 2024

While it wasn't explicitly stated, it's hard to imagine the increasingly violent abuse directed at her was not part of the reason.

"It is no surprise to me at all … she could not, not be affected by this," says Disinformation Project director Kate Hannah.

"In the earlier parts of her first term we got sort of commentary about her looks and her lack of perceived experience. The fact that sort of she was, you know, well spoken, and really good at communicating complex issues was kind of a slur against her."

Guess who's come to dinner.

Per The BFD link of Today.

Census collectors visiting homes across New Zealand will be carrying panic alarms as a safety measure against a post-Covid rise in anti-government feeling.

The alarms can alert security teams should any of the more than 3000 census collectors, who are currently being hired to work the eight weeks from the end of January through to April, feel threatened while door knocking.

It’s understood the move is in response to a risk of doorstep antagonism. An applicant said recruitment agencies told them increased safety measures were “in anticipation of huge anti-government sentiment”.

Since there is a "Qanon / right-wing conspiracy extremist" hiding behind every door in New Zealand. Right?

Tax payer funds that could have been better spend.

Ardern’s deception on He Puapua will haunt her in 2023. Like Prince Harry, Ardern refuses to take responsibility for her actions.

Having gained office once through (Winston’s) selection, then through deception, Jacinda Ardern proceeded to put all her government’s blood sweat and tears (and our taxes) into an agenda no one knew about, but which Nanaia Mahuta’s tax-funded family were working on behind the scenes before the 2020 election.

Two years later, having divided the country with her unpopular race-based policies, she announces she won’t be campaigning on race. With no (promised) public consultation in 2022, and laws passed to legitimise them (Three Waters and the Health restructure), she is still in denial.

Hear, Hear!

If the Official Cash Rate was raised as high as 5.5 percent (from its current 4.25) it would be "a step too far", he said.

The impact of much higher interest rates was already flowing through to business costs.

"Inflation pressure is continuing to build and that again is playing on businesses but I do think the labour market will soften this year."

Businesses were already signalling they would hire fewer staff.

If there was a global recession, the country's economy would be in for a much harder landing, Kerr said.

Dear Mr. Kerr, maybe review those US graphs a little bit closer.

"There were other people in ICU, or waiting in the waiting room, that happened to be, not known to me at the time, Mongrel Mob, mostly women... Quite a few of them, no masks on," Thomas said.

"And then slowly after that, the next few days, it just got bigger and bigger, lots of Mongrel Mob there."

The problem was not the presence of the members, but their failure to wear masks, Thomas said.

Interesting priorities.

In a statement, Te Whatu Ora Waitaha said staff reminded visitors to wear a mask.

"Our security team are also available to assist if necessary and those refusing to wear a mask are asked to leave. Police may be asked to attend the hospital ... if required," it read.

Some security team you have there.

Here at The Reg FOSS desk, we've felt this was coming ever since we reported that Big Blue was launching new POWER servers which didn't support AIX – already nearly eight years ago. Even if it was visibly coming over the horizon, this is a significant event: AIX is the last proprietary Unix which was in active development, and constitutes four of the 10 entries in the official Open Group list.

Within Oracle, Solaris is in maintenance mode. Almost exactly six years ago, we reported that the next major release, Solaris 12, had disappeared from Oracle's roadmap. HPE's HP-UX is also in maintenance mode because there's no new hardware to run it on. Itanium really is dead now and at the end that's all HP-UX could run on. It's over a decade since we reported that HP investigated but canceled an effort to port it to x86-64.

“What is dead may never die.” - House Greyjoy

On May 4, 2021, he "lost his cool" after the repeated comings and goings of the small but powerful twin-engine Cessna outside a hangar at Nelson Airport where an engineering crew was working.

With its propellers spinning at full throttle, McCann jumped on the wing of the Cessna, pulled the pilot's hatch fully open, grabbed the pilot with both hands and pushed him across the cabin while swearing and yelling, "you f*g stupid moron, you fg c."

He then punched the pilot in the head several times, knocking off his audio headset and glasses, and leaving him with grazes to his face. He was also hit around the shoulder and chest.

Kinda based albeit inappropriate, completely understandable though.

Interesting how it was referred to an Iwi panel rather then regular 'ol white man's court. Even more curious is how there is no further mention if the Cessna pilot was reprimanded at all. I've played enough flight sim games to know you only throttle in full when you are on the take off strip, not next to the hangar.

One of the country's largest craft breweries has run out of carbon dioxide and has more than 60,000 litres of unfinished beer waiting for carbonation.

The country's last of two food grade CO2 plants, the Todd Energy Kāpuni plant, shutdown three weeks ago amid safety problems, leaving the industry at a head with shortages and sky rocketing importing costs.

Wellington based Garage Project announced today its brewery had officially run out of CO2 at one of its sites.

Waiting for a boilerplate press release from the Beehive assuring as "This is fine." (Optionally blaming cost of living, Ukraine and Covid for lack of supply.)

It requires a considerable imaginative effort to understand the behaviour of the Christchurch Mongrel Mob. Commandeering Christchurch hospital carparks. (Having first “commandeered” a number of road cones.) Intimidating hospital staff and patients. Revving their guttural motorcycles at all hours of the day and night. Why would anybody do that?

Hospitals are generally considered to be places of refuge and sanctuary: institutions where all kinds of aggressive, anti-social behaviours likely to impede the treatment and recovery of patients is strictly forbidden. Even in the midst of a full-scale armed conflict like that currently devastating Ukraine, an attack on a hospital is treated as a particular heinous war crime. To interfere with the treatment of those suffering from injury or illness: acutely stressed and vulnerable human-beings; indicates a truly disturbing level of depravity. Who could do such a thing? More to the point, who could allow such a thing to be done?

The money shot:

All well and good, but the public expects – and has every right to expect – that clear breaches of the law, not to mention “the peace”, are confronted as and when they happen.

Great piece by Chris Trotter, stay for the comments.

A new lake formed by a landslide in the Waiorongomai Valley is being closely watched ahead of expected heavy rain, which is seeing Tairāwhiti's state of emergency extended.

The lake was created by a large landslide on privately-owned land, and is thought to be about 1km long in length.

Rain brought by cyclone Hale ravaged the region last week, causing floods, slips and power cuts. A state of emergency in Tairāwhiti was expected to be lifted at 10pm this evening, but will now remain in place.

Nature is as nature does.

But Kerr believed inflation was close to its peak, if it had not already peaked, and that the Reserve Bank would be cutting interest rates before the year was out.

About half of the inflation New Zealanders had experienced had come from overseas and he held out hope inflation could fall to 4% by the end of the year.

“I think that'll be the big story for the second half of this year; central bank's not only finishing hiking, but actually starting to provide some support.”

Not this year. Beehive spent too much money it does not have and America will (again) raise the debt ceiling and print more. Stagflation is around the corner.

A charity which claimed nearly $1 million in community grants to run a rarely-opened children’s library and wrongly claimed to be a registered childcare facility appears to have closed its doors permanently.

The Angel’s Children’s Education Foundation’s website has been offline since Stuff’s story about the charity was published last October, and sometime before mid-December, it had quit its Auckland headquarters, leaving behind empty bookshelves.

Its website is down, and its 0800 number has been disconnected.

Curious to know how much tax payer money ended up in here.

Actual journalism, from Stuff.

An economist doesn't think there will be any cost of living respite for New Zealanders this year.

A report from economic consultants Infometrics and Foodstuffs has found costs from suppliers to supermarkets rose by close to 11 percent in the year to December, and economists say multiple factors could result in more pain at the checkout.

Many residents RNZ spoke to in Christchurch on Sunday said they had felt the pinch over the summer period, particularly around the cost of produce.

Facts!

Saint Johns Butchery manager Dave Clark said the fruit and vegetable shop next door was ram-raided first.

"We had five teenagers involved, they have smashed a large glass panel to gain entry, which is a quarter of the size of the shop," Clark said.

"Three of them entered the shop looking for cash, one was holding a sizeable knife.

"The other offender took a heap of ice cream, that was the only thing stolen from the shop."

Plausible deniability when the ice-cream has been eaten, everything else though...

Meanwhile, they know they can get away with it. That is the only reason why these things happen while the Beehive remains soft on crime.

Opinion - A year ago I wrote about my sister's cancer. Given the brutal treatment regime she was undergoing had left her immunocompromised, I wanted to express my frustration that so many people were refusing to adopt Covid measures which would protect not only themselves, but others, like her.

I probably didn't do myself any favours by writing that during 2021 I had become misanthropic towards "anti-factsters"; that I felt contempt towards people who'd lost their sense of community and concern for others.

But I was not prepared for the resulting tidal wave that flooded my inbox - neither the volume, nor the venom.

Three key items:

• Journalists should not be telling people "how to think and what to do".
• Feelings should not trump facts and proper reporting.
• The response from the public is understandable albeit uncouth.

Trucking advocates are rejecting the government's claim that massive vehicles introduced onto New Zealand roads just over a decade ago are to partly to blame for the subsequent rise in reports of potholes.

In the first 10 months of 2022 there were 555 complaints of vehicle damage caused by potholes reported to Waka Kotahi, up from 421 in all of 2021 - a rise of about 58 percent.

In 2020, there were just 298 complaints.

I would vote to get replacement bitumen from Marsden Point.

The Special Ukraine Visa, which opened for applications in March, is granted only to direct family members (parents, grandparents, siblings and adult children) of Ukrainians in New Zealand, who have to undertake to support them financially.

Mahi For Ukraine and other humanitarian organisations are meeting with officials next week to discuss their request for the Government to look at amending some of the criteria around the Special Ukraine Visa.

They want Cabinet to widen eligibility, remove the financial burden from sponsors, extend the time-frame and offer a pathway to residency.

We have ordinary Kiwis, in emergency housing or unable to find an affordable home. We are a first world country with homelessness and high rates of poverty. Why does every priority change when Ukraine is the topic at hand.

Which is why the cost-of-living crisis is the #1 problem, according to the World Economic Forum's Global Risks Report - an annual poll of 1,200 government, business and civil society professionals.

According to the poll, there will be little respite from "energy inflation, food and security crises" in the coming years (or months?).

In the near term, nearly 70% of those polled say volatile economies and various 'shocks' are in the cards, while 20% or so of those polled say they fear "catastrophic outcomes" within the next 10 years, according to Bloomberg.

Zey vill fix this and you vill be happy.

A gas distributor has put some prices up by nearly 600 percent, because of the Kāpuni CO2 plant shutdown, according to a letter sent to customers.

Supply and Demand in action as expected.

"A lot of the breweries in New Zealand are small businesses, so to have a price increase of that much, potentially will cripple some of these businesses. They can't pass these costs on always," Kees said.

Brewers Guild executive director Melanie Kees.Brewers Guild executive director Melanie Kees. Photo: Supplied "It may mean, both with the shortage and the price increase, that they either pause production of beer, simply because they cannot access the CO2 that they need, or, in some cases, they may actually shut up shop.

A pub with no beer is one thing, a country without beer should make politicians very nervous.

You don't "just" make changes in a complex system.

National Party energy and resources spokesperson Stuart Smith told Morning Report government inaction has been a major cause of the problem.

"[Finance Minister] Grant Robertson was warned that if ACC was forced to sell their 10 percent shareholding in the refinery it would likely close and he just virtually laughed it off."

CO2 shortages were a consequence of this, Smith said.

"We have always suffered from the tyranny of distance and we're also quite a small market so when there's global shortages of things such as CO2, as there is at the moment, we have an issue with a plant not being able to produce it now."

Words are easy, then again National thinks you can just turn a refinery on and off.

A gas pipeline connecting Lithuania and Latvia was hit by an explosion in northern Lithuania with no immediate evidence of an attack.

A raging fire was later put out at the blast site in the Panevezys county on Friday, Lithuanian gas transmission operator Amber Grid said.

“According to the initial assessment, we do not see any malign cause but the investigation will cover all possible options,” Amber Grid chief executive Nemunas Biknius told a news conference.

Whoops.

From 2021:

Right from its first issue in 1823, the Lancet was more than just an ordinary medical journal. Its founding editor, the dyspeptic surgeon and coroner Thomas Wakley, purposefully gave the journal the name of a sharp scalpel that could cut away useless, diseased tissue: he used it as a campaigning organ, to push back against injustice, bad ideas and bad practice.

What bothered Wakley most was the establishment. Not only did the Royal College of Surgeons care little about quacks and snake-oil salesmen, but its members were also engaged in corruption and nepotism, ensuring that their cronies got the best positions and filling their pockets with lecture fees. Wakley wrote in 1838 of the ‘mercenary, goose-brained monopolists and charlatans’ who won privileges that should have been due to merit. This system was ‘the canker-worm which eats into the heart of the medical body’.

"The bill comes due." - Baron Mordo

After an extraordinary four years as director general of health, Dr Ashley Bloomfield has been made a knight for services to public health.

Sir Ashley was pushed into the limelight heading up the country's response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

He became a familiar face, as he fronted up day after day behind one of the podiums in the Beehive theatrette.

Respect, for being a figure of calm and admiration for a populace confused and sitting in fear during a time of crisis.

Disappointing, how like many other health officials, he publicly chose "The Science" over science. Time will tell us the implications of this.

Ultimately,

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it." - Upton Sinclair

New Zealand supply chains are expected to be less disrupted but far more expensive next year, an expert says.

The industry has been hit by numerous disruptions over the past two years due to the pandemic, now the problem has shifted to an inventory crisis.

Experts and industry professionals warn that while disruptions may be declining, 2023 will see significant price escalations.

Such is shipping and a looming energy crisis.

The ministry does not keep records of how many hens have been transitioned out of battery cages into colony cages, but the federation’s executive director, Michael Brooks, says as of December 2022, 10% were in conventional cages (and would be gone by 1 January), 33% in colonies, 29% in barns and 34% free range. In December 2012, 86% were in battery cages.

The ministry worked with industry to ensure compliance with the incoming ban, said Gray Harrison, the ministry’s animal welfare manager. “As part of that our animal welfare inspectors inspected 26 chicken farms over the past 12 months to ensure they would meet the 1 January 2023 transition deadline,” he said.

A whole ~2 farms inspected per month.

There were thousands of stories published by RNZ in 2022. You may have missed some of the most significant.

Here are some of our picks from the In Depth team in 2022.

A balanced list overall. Hancock's Air quality discussion would be my pick from the list. Shame we did not hear more about implementing engineering controls to improve matters vs continuing the spiel that masks make a difference.

Meanwhile, the "mandate protest" that "shocked a nation" is completely absent from a list of "significant" stories.

By the same point in 2021, the vacancy rate was at 7%, with 508.74 unfilled full time equivalent positions.

This was despite the budget for 7262.48 roles in that 2021/2022 financial year.

Professor Robin Gauld, the director of the University of Otago's Centre for Health Systems, said the significant vacancy rates were worrying.

Drop the mandates, follow actual science and bring back resilient staff to help bring the work load down. Simple as.

Local dairy representatives say the SmokeFree 2025 Bill could wipe out the industry following an already challenging year.

The bill, introduced in June this year, has passed into law (Royal Assent on 16 December), and will restrict the number of tobacco retailers.

The government wants a smoke-free generation, and aims to prevent young people born on or after 1 January 2009 from ever taking up smoking.

Small businesses and dairies are now wanting to fight the bill.

Where there is demand, there will be supply. That is how any economy, legal or illegal, works.

Previously:

A organisation which provides health education to young people says some rangatahi who vape are consuming as much nicotine as someone smoking a pack-and-a-half-a-day of cigarettes a day.

The Life Education Trust says schools are crying out for help because they are dealing with young people with full-on dependancy issues.

Life Education Trust chief executive John O'Connell said vaping had become an epidemic and the amount of nicotine being consumed was horrendous.

"Smoke-free" Generation.

Two 22-year-old industrial design students making a low-carbon fibreglass alternative out of harakeke are raising $2m to start taking their product global

Harakeke is also a seemingly miracle material. Māori used parts of the plant for rafts, sweeteners, poultices and medicine, and harakeke fibre made fishing lines, nets and rope.

Harakeke rope was so strong, in fact, early Australian traders wanted it - and as much as Māori could make. They bartered harakeke for muskets, in the process turning tribal conflict into full-scale war.

Russia has banned oil sales to countries and companies that comply with a price cap agreed by Western nations earlier this month.

The price cap - which was agreed by the G7 group of nations, Australia and the EU - came into force on 5 December.

The cap prohibits countries from paying more than US$60 (NZ$95) per barrel of Russian oil.

Russia has now said its oil and oil products will not be sold to anyone imposing the price cap.

Russia will simply continue to sell to China and India, or use them as intermediaries. Trying to force a price on something you do not even own, let alone at a price well below market rate, is quite the sight to be hold.

A Wellington medical company is researching a combined flu and Covid-19 vaccine.

P3 Research is looking for people aged between 50 and 80 years old to take part in the clinical trial, which is investigating whether a single vaccine can effectively prevent both illnesses.

There are (already) potential complications from having both a Covid vaccine and Flu vaccine in each arm at the same time.

Meanwhile, Moderna already has a pipeline for this, and they still haven't produced a functional product.

Some ideas, are genuinely very bad ideas. This is one of them.

Supermarket shelves are bare of eggs while others are limiting the number of cartons customers can buy during a drop in supply.

At a Pak'NSave in Christchurch, customers were only allowed two cartons each, while shelves were empty at both New World and Countdown in Levin.

A ban on battery caged hens, announced back in 2012, comes into effect on Saturday and over the past few years the deadline has caused turmoil in the industry.

Egg Producers Federation executive director Michael Brooks said more than 75 percent of chicken farmers have had to change their farming methods or their career because of the ban.

the bird of gains

The Government has hired about 200 different consulting firms to work on its Auckland Light Rail project in the five years since 2017, costing over $50 million.

National’s transport spokesman Simeon Brown described the spend as a “gravy train”, noting that despite the volume of firms clipping the ticket, Aucklanders are a long way from having their hypothetical light rail tickets clipped themselves. Not an inch of the line has been built, despite an election promise from Labour leader Jacinda Ardern to have the first stage from Britomart to Mt Roskill built by now.

The spend, revealed in answers to written Parliamentary questions from Brown, included multiple consulting firms, law firms, and transport specialists. The Government even engaged market researcher Colmar Brunton.

Nope.

Boxing Day spending is up from last year, but experts say another shopping event could be the new black.

New data from payment network company Worldline showed New Zealanders' Boxing Day spending reached record heights this year, with consumers spending $100.5 million at core retail merchants, up 2.6 percent on last year.

The company's chief sales officer, Bruce Proffit, said that money was mostly spent on presents and food.

However, he said the sum was only about half of what was spent on Christmas Eve, and also did not reach Black Friday spend levels.

New Zealand is known as paradise for tourists to visit.

From our stunning beaches to thrill-seeking adventure centres and our glistening snow-covered mountains, Aotearoa is always high on the list for holidaymakers.

We often hear that Kiwis are some of the most laid-back people in the world and will go above and beyond to make tourists' and foreigners' time here in our land that much better.

But there are a number of things tourists are baffled by when they come to New Zealand, and Kiwis sometimes aren't aware of it.

Imagine paying for the news, when what you get is a recycled Reddit thread for content. They did attribute though.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) asked Jacinda Ardern to appoint an "empowered" minister or senior officials to collaborate on getting an Overseas Investment Office consent without delays and to discuss bringing in skilled IT workers from abroad, among other things, an Official Information Act (OIA) response shows.

AWS also said: "We would very much like to discuss opportunities we see for fine-tuning New Zealand's policy settings that can support public sector cloud technology enablement", including how Amazon could meet the requirements to host highly classified data.

She could have just been upfront about it when initially asked, rather then not commenting "for confidential and commercial reasons". In the end it was visas and sponsorship like most international entities would ask for.

Auckland's Long Bay Regional Park has reached capacity today after thousands of beach-goers fill the area.

"People are being turned away, so save yourself the journey and enjoy your afternoon elsewhere," police said in a statement.

The popular north Auckland beach is a mainstay of holiday visitors.

Rural Queenstown residents are concerned about the effect of a massive private New Year's fireworks display on their animals.

Neighbour John Quinn said more than 50 locals are up in arms, and nearly 400 people have signed an online petition against the 14-minute commercial-grade display, planned by the owners of a property on Littles Road in Dalefield.

The first neighbours knew of the display was a public notice in a local newspaper.

The millionaire planning the large display on New Year's Eve said he will consider financially assisting his Queenstown neighbours to move their livestock.

Locals are concerned the show will cause their horses to panic and injure themselves, or the public.

"No fun allowed, ever. Because it affects me."

There were nearly 300 water engineer positions advertised on recruitment website Seek last month. The high demand for these specialist engineers bodes ill for the government's Three Waters reform, which will rely heavily on experts the country currently doesn't have in the required numbers.

Not a bad thing.

Water engineers specialise in the design, construction and management of wastewater, drinkable water and stormwater systems. They will have typically completed a four year engineering degree, usually civil or environmental engineering, before specialising. Competency can take an extra five years.

Currently, these specialists are in very high demand internationally. Companies regularly compete to employ engineers with five or more years' experience, offering excellent wages and conditions. There is simply not a large enough pool of water engineers in New Zealand, and the situation is set to get worse.

If only the government would spend as much time fixing the education system as they worry about the treaty.

The Government has slammed the election-year brakes on New Zealand’s plan for upholding the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

The Cabinet agreed on Monday that ministers wouldn’t receive any further reports on developing a draft plan in response to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples until 2024, Newsroom can reveal.

It comes just before the summer break, at which point all ministers are expected to go away and look at work programmes and reforms in their portfolio areas to see what could be cut at the start of next year.

The Prime Minister is clearing the decks in January and wants the Government focus to be on those reforms that are needed, and don’t cause unnecessary distractions.

One way to avoid awkward questions in an election year.

The government is refusing to say whether police are using an Israeli-American private surveillance firm to scan people's use of social media.

RNZ previously revealed immigration authorities had hired the controversial firm Cobwebs Technologies.

Documents suggest another unidentified agency began using Cobwebs in October 2019.

The police have previously confirmed they began using a new Internet search tool in November 2019 after the mosque attacks, but would not name it.

This article was removed / censored by RNZ itself and replaced with another article. See Archive link.

After a huge outcry from farmers the government has made some changes to its proposal to price agricultural carbon emissions.

It has released its response to the more than 23,000 submissions to its plan, though final decisions will not be made until next year.

"After listening to farmers and growers through our recent consultation, and engaging over recent months with industry leaders, today we have taken the next steps in establishing a proposed farm-level emissions reduction system as an alternative to the ETS backstop," Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said.

Going green "uber alles", but we will concede as we do not want the peasants to revolt immediately due to lack of food.

A 97-year-old woman who worked as a Nazi concentration camp secretary has been convicted for her role in the murder of thousands of people, in what could be one of the country's last trials for World War II crimes.

The district court in the northern town of Itzehoe handed Irmgard Furchner a two-year suspended sentence for aiding and abetting the murder of 10,505 people and the attempted murder of five people, a court spokesperson said.

A statement from the court said the prisoners were "cruelly killed by gassings, by hostile conditions in the camp, by transports to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp and by being sent on so-called death marches".

Will we be holding Health officials to the same judiciary standard, given the willful ignorance of the available academic data concerning covid and the vaccines?

Former NPDC chief executive Craig Stevenson had a remuneration package of $406,490 for the 2021/2022 financial year, while New Plymouth mayor Neil Holdom was on $147,413.

In comparison, the chief executive of the Christchurch City Council earned more than $500,000 and the boss of the Auckland City Council had a remuneration package in excess of $600,000.

Via RNZ on 2022/12/18:

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is paid $471,049 a year and the deputy prime minister gets $334,734, while the leader of the opposition is on $296,007.

Awkward.

Respected Māori cultural adviser and community advocate Rangi McLean - who last year had his own issues with a German artist who used his image without permission - said it was a big positive for Aotearoa for Bezos to take a Māori name for his boat.

“I believe Bezos has taken on our way of life and is taking on board all those aspects. From what I have read, he understands what the koru means and stands for.”

Two Things:

• Did anyone ask Bezos if this is fact?
• Did it cost him anything? Since all the usual gatekeepers are awfully enthousiastic.

Christchurch will celebrate the 30th anniversary of its World Buskers Festival from today, with international buskers returning for the first time in three years.

Over 100,000 people are expected to turn up to the festival, which will run from 13 to 29 January.

Bread & Circus World Buskers Festival director Scott Maidment said he expected about 20 percent of that number to be people who had travelled nationally and internationally.

Good times ahead in ChCh.

A 90-year-old man was left bleeding from his head on the bathroom floor for over two hours this week, despite paying for a St John ambulance emergency alarm.

St John has defended its response time, saying it must prioritise the most life-threatening calls and balance this with available resources and patient demand.

Meanwhile:

National's health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti said he'd heard other examples in recent weeks of patients waiting longer for ambulances.

Reti said it was a consequence of a health system that he believed was "very clearly in a crisis".

I would replace "in a crisis" with "Munted".

Dawson said dry ice, which is the solid form of carbon dioxide, was essential for the transportation of perishable products, including fruit, fish, meat and medical supplies that needed to be chilled.

Concerns over the availability of carbon dioxide had been bubbling away following the decision to close the Marsden Point oil refinery, which had been the country’s biggest supplier until it was decommissioned in March.

Little late now.

The Government has been approached for comment.

Of course.

There is no longer any doubt about the challenge that China, Russia, and other authoritarian regimes pose to international rule of law, respect for sovereignty, democratic principles, and free people. These threats have grown as China and Russia have harnessed new technologies to surveil populations, manipulate information, and control data flows. They are setting an example for how authoritarians can further clamp down on freedom of thought, expression, and association. China’s draconian zero-COVID measures may yet test that control, but its use of technologies like drones to monitor quarantine adherence represent a new era of digital repression.

Rising geopolitical tensions have coincided with growing encroachments by disruptive technologies into all aspects of public and private life. The implications for 2023 and beyond are clear: the technology platforms of the future are the new terrain of strategic competition. The United States therefore has a core interest in making sure that these technologies are designed, built, fielded, and governed by democracies.

Mentioning "United States" and "Democracy" in the same paragraph is becoming the oxymoron of our time.

"Accuse your enemy of what you are doing, as you are doing it to create confusion." - Karl Marx

In 1984, 61 percent of the population were living in 86 locally declared nuclear-weapons-free zones. Academic activists came together to form Scientists Against Nuclear Arms (SANA) and Engineers for Social Responsibility (ESR - this group now focuses on the climate disruption). The medical fraternity formed a local branch of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW).

Much of the information which fuelled the work of all these groups was brought to light by the extraordinary sleuthing talent of one man. Owen Wilkes is described as “….the intellect behind New Zealand’s anti-nuclear stance” in a recent book, Peacemonger: Owen Wilkes international peace researcher, published by Raekaihau Press in association with Steele Roberts Aotearoa.

Opening is too long but has some interesting tidbits, apart from that an interesting piece on Kiwi history.

Some people catch fish. Others like Tim Riley catch cell phones, rusty nails, 100 year old drill bits, coins and whatever else is metal and lurking on the bottom of the river.

Christchurch based Riley and his young sons are magnet fishermen, and they love going out in the evenings after work and school to see what they can pull up from the murky depths of the Avon and Heathcote Rivers.

It was so much fun and so interesting, Riley said he had ordered a magnet 14 times more powerful than the one he was using now to hunt deeper in the silty depths.

Good family fun.

The man who attempted to bring down New Zealand's national grid says he's "having a great time in prison" and is a "Corrections success story".

Taupō man Graham Philip, 62, was sentenced on seven unprecedented charges of sabotage two months ago after attacking Transpower infrastructure in November 2021 to draw attention to his anti-vaccination views.

The attack sparked a fire and resulted in $1.25 million in damage. All further details, including precisely what he attacked, are permanently suppressed. He was the first New Zealander to ever face a sabotage charge since the law was introduced shortly after World War II.

One way to make a statement I suppose.

A golf coach who was “humiliated” after being dismissed for not getting the Covid vaccine will receive more than $15,000 from his former employer after successfully arguing his dismissal was unjustified.

Benjamin Harwood had worked for Whangamatā Golf Club Incorporated for a little over a year when he was dismissed in December 2021 following the club’s “no jab, no play” policy.

Harwood took the club to the Employment Relations Authority (ERA), arguing that the policy was “unreasonable and unfair” and failed to fairly consider alternatives to dismissal.

Marking an employee, who is primarily outdoors, as a high risk vector for Covid spread is not an isolated case sadly. Also shows people had and continue to have little understanding of how pathogens work.

Regardless, a small win for democracy and principles.

"This is a reverse Robin Hood scheme. It's taking from people who don't have a choice about what kind of vehicles they drive like farmers and tradies and it's giving it to people who can afford to buy the expensive luxury vehicles like a Tesla," National's transport spokesperson Simeon Brown said.

But while it's supposed to be revenue-neutral, since April when the tax part of the scheme began only $62.8 million has been collected from the heavy emitters tax - while just over $95 million has been paid out in subsidies.

Good Job.

It has been nearly 10 months since the first arrests were made outside Parliament during a protest that held the Capital, and the country, on tenterhooks. One woman who was arrested but has since had her charge dropped speaks out about her experience.

When Susan Denham stood in court after being arrested during the Parliament protests, she told the judge she was just a regular person.

"I'm not a criminal, I'm a regular person who just wants peace and normality."

How the Beehive handled the protests was atrocious and a mockery of democracy.

Dropping the charges is a step forward, but many steps remain to be made.

The Todd Energy site in Taranaki has been New Zealand's only domestic producer of food-grade CO2 since the Marsden Point refinery was decommissioned last year.

Beverage Council spokeswoman Belinda Milnes told RNZ: "Since the closure of Marsden Point, that reduced the supply domestically in New Zealand quite a bit."

I suppose not having a supply would be a "reduced" supply.

National's energy spokesman Stuart Smith believed when the Northland refinery was decommissioned, leaving a sole domestic liquid CO2 supplier at Kapuni, government ministers overestimated Aotearoa's energy resilience.

A rare admission of failure.

Professor Baker said despite the ominous name, it was important to remember it was just another variant of Omicron although it had "some novel features which are of concern".

It is based on a recombinant virus but it has added in a new genetic mutation which meant it could more easily escape people's existing immunity and also had a better ability to bind with the ace receptors in the body which made it more infectious.

A typical person who has been vaccinated and received a booster shot would have the best chance of fighting off infection, Professor Baker said.

"Vehicle expert advises that using diesel fuel in cars that operate on unleaded, have the best possible chance of achieving velocity."

"Good ventilation" makes for the only two sensible words in the article since engineering controls actually work.

The cost of CO2 has tripled in the past six months, with breweries big and small struggling through ongoing shortages.

"This is our peak time of the year. It's summer, it's beer-drinking weather and we can't package beer. It's a disaster," Ruffell said.

Since the Marsden Point refinery was decommissioned last year, the only domestic production of food-grade CO2 is at the Kapuni liquid carbon dioxide plant in Taranaki, owned by Todd Energy.

The cost of eco-facism caused by progressives.

A queue of eager punters snaked out the door at one of Canterbury's most popular pie purveyors on Friday, waiting patiently to snap up one of the 6000 pastry parcels produced each week by a husband and wife duo and their team.

About an hour from Christchurch, well-placed for day trippers, skiers, tourists and tradies alike, the Sheffield Pie Shop and its sister store and bakery in Oxford are on the market.

Owners Loretta and Shane Paterson​ say it's time to move on.

"We feel like we've done what we set out to do."

Hard work and dedication. Feel good read for the day.

The pandemic saw the rise of misinformation, corroding trust in evidence, research and democratic institutions. The issue requires a global and coordinated response, writes Gilbert Wong

The Covid pandemic has brought personal tragedy on a global scale with more than 6.5 million deaths, along with deep damage to economies. A third and less obvious threat is the rise of misinformation.

Vice-Chancellor Professor Dawn Freshwater of Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland, says, “We’re dealing with another ‘virus’ that we need to ‘vaccinate’ ourselves against.”

Three Things:

• There is a-lot of academic circle jerk going on here.
• "evidence-based" gets mentioned twice which is laughable in light of academia still recommending masks and vaccines in 2023.
• The problem is easy to fix, make sure the principles of transparency and accountability are properly upheld.

A Todd Energy gas plant has been temporarily shut down over safety concerns.

The Kapuni liquid carbon dioxide plant in Taranaki has been New Zealand's only domestic producer of food-grade CO2 since the Marsden Point refinery was decommissioned last year.

Todd Energy has confirmed to RNZ the closure started more than two weeks ago, just before Christmas.

There is no reopening date yet.

The equitable results of Eco-Facism hard at work. We will all pay more for our food and drinks.

The Coromandel Peninsula is bracing for Cyclone Hale, with officials warning that road slips, fallen trees and power cuts are possible as the storm barrels towards the North Island.

Waka Kotahi NZTA said New Zealanders in parts of the country forecast to feel the brunt of the weather should "avoid unnecessary travel", while one council said people should move to somewhere safe by Monday night.

"Cyclone Hale is expected to impact on the Coromandel late this afternoon and early evening bringing heavy levels of rain and high winds," the Thames-Coromandel District Council said on Monday afternoon.

Welp.

Donations to charities are being hit by the rising cost of living, KidsCan says, and it is worried its ability to help children will be affected.

In 2022 the Aotearoa charity fed 49,000 children a day and had an increase of 10,000 more tamariki that received assistance, as well as recording its biggest drop in donors in the past 17 years.

KidsCan founder Julie Chapman said the charity was struggling to fill the gap and there had been less new donors signing up.

Inflation was also affecting the organisation's ability to provide help.

Your tax dollars hard at work: We cannot feed our own kids, but we can prioritise sending millions to Ukraine

Tourism New Zealand is shifting its sights to the long-term recovery of international tourism here, after a focus on domestic marketing due to disruption from the pandemic.

The organisation branched into domestic marketing in 2020 when international tourists were cut off. And while its staff expected to continue to market domestically, they would widen their scope this year.

Tourism NZ chief executive René de Monchy said international tourism was bouncing back quicker than expected.

Optimistic news atleast. Still no one discussing what New Zealand would do without ongoing tourism. If things keep up, it is not going to be cheap to fly to Middle-earth in the near future.

Ram-raids, stabbings, and shootings - barely a day goes by when we don't hear about them. And it's a big driver of an increase in prisoner numbers.

"Yes we have seen it come up since June," said Corrections national commissioner Leigh Marsh.

New figures from Corrections show the number of inmates increased from 7728 in June to 8308 as of Friday. That's an extra 580 people in prison. But Corrections said it's coping with the influx.

If we had better leadership, in turn creating a better society, people wouldn't have to turn to crime and drugs.

The Blue Baths heralded a new era - men and women bathing together. This picture told the world New Zealand was progressive, modern, and open for business.

The photo now hangs in a darkened and empty room in the Blue Baths. Around it the building gathers mould, mildew and corrodes from sulphur gases rising from the ground below.

Former Blue Baths leaseholder Jo Romanes said the picture was used as an official publicity image, likely for the Tourism Department, the first of its kind in the world.

"It was quite glamorous and sophisticated."

Could be amazing with a fresh coat of paint, but making sure it will not come apart in the next earthquake is a very costly affair.

Bill Burr still wakes at 1.45am every day - the time two teens broke into his home and bashed him multiple times over the head in a bid to steal his car. But he has no regrets about how that day played out, despite ending up in court after one teen’s fingertip was cut off during the home invasion. Six months on, Burr tells Open Justice while he is unrepentant about what happened, the subsequent months haven’t been easy.

He and his son Shaun faced a daunting trial defending multiple charges, including wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and maiming, after chopping off the tip of a teenager’s little finger after a home invasion in October 2020.

After an eight-day trial, a jury acquitted the pair of all charges.

Do not mess with Farmer Bill.

Good article, but framing his political views about Trump at the very end feels like it was only done to paint him as a "right wing boomer". It is of no particular value to the subject at hand.

An international study suggests New Zealand is underestimating the damage caused by volcanos.

The study, from Geophysical Research Letters, analysed ash deposits at the Ubehebe crater in California, United States.

One of the study's authors, University of Otago volcanology professor James White, said the Ubehebe crater was familiar.

Officials underestimate many things.

Trade Me search data might have cracked the question of what comes first - the chicken or the egg? Turns out, it's the chicken.

Interest in online auctions for chickens has more than doubled amid a nationwide egg shortage.

Trade Me spokesperson Ruby Topzand said searches for chickens, coops and feed had risen to more than 21,400 in the past week - up from 9300, a 129 percent increase.

Supply and Demand hard at work.

Commercial bakers are feeling the heat as a nationwide egg shortage drives up wholesale prices for the key ingredient.

A ban on battery caged hens has left some supermarket shelves empty and prompted cartons to be rationed. The Egg Producers Federation has said more than 75 percent of chicken farmers have had to change their farming methods or their career because of the ban.

Wellington-based Nada Bakery manager Michael Gray said eggs were a commodity product and the shortage had exacerbated already high prices.

When "positive" changes positively cost people more.

Tiny house advocates say legislation, lending and land are prohibiting people from buying tiny homes.

Tiny House Hub founder Sharla May said there was "huge demand" for tiny homes, but that complications appeared when people tried to make their dream a reality.

Tiny houses are not a bad idea, but the more tiny houses you have within one area, the more resources you will need. There's also the differences in rates between a normal and a tiny house and councils do love to collect their rates.

A New Zealand company that makes fence posts out of soft plastic will soon be manufacturing its products in the South Island.

That means collection points for the Soft Plastics Recycling Scheme are expected to be re-established across Nelson and Marlborough.

Future Post managing director Jerome Wenzlick said the company started making fence posts nearly five years ago in Auckland, using soft plastic waste.

I like the concept and the engineering, my only concern is with the longevity of plastic. Will it leach into the soil and will particulate shaven off by the wind / debris / etc. cause more micro plastics to be airborne.

The northern part of New Zealand has been shaken by a strong earthquake this morning.

The 5.1 magnitude quake hit at a depth of 7km about 5km south of Te Aroha in the Waikato region at 5.39am.

More than 20,000 people reported feeling a shake in the areas nearby, including Hamilton, Tauranga, Auckland, and Rotorua.

It was followed by two 2.7 magnitude earthquakes in the same spot at 5.47am and 5.51am.

"We are working as hard as we possibly can to fill the gaps, even though there are some areas - Queenstown comes to mind - where the labour shortage is reasonably acute," he said.

"If it takes people five or 10 minutes longer to get a coffee, or 15 minutes longer to get a meal, then so be it. I still think the level of service received will still be done with a smile and people will still have the experience they've come over here for.

That is not exactly going to help New Zealand's current reputation, but hey more tax dollars.

Nationwide bookstore Whitcoulls is selling a magazine peddling a number of anti-vax conspiracies and insinuating the Christchurch mosque terror attack was a “false flag” operation.

Kate Hannah, director of The Disinformation Project, a research group monitoring Covid-19 disinformation, said some of the commentary in New Dawn was borderline in legality.

Stuff Limited:

• Does not understand the Streisand Effect.
• Proves that a retailer has more appreciation for "freedom of speech" then a news outlet does.
• Are happy to generate negative sentiment, on a widely read public platform, towards a legitimate business that does not control the content of the product they sell.

They published this article, for what is a bi-monthly magazine with "unique" appeal.

“People who see and/or consume such content must understand that there are larger and more dark agendas present, particularly the Russian connections, which aim to destabilise liberal democracy,” she said.

Dark agenda's indeed. But, it is not "muh Russians", it is the progressives that are forcing their own "muh feelings" reality matrix upon everyone that is destabilising society.

Coalition for Books chairperson Melanie Laville-Moore said the organisation began in 2019 after there was recognition that books needed to be more visible.

"Whether it be through reviews, shelf space, or whatever, it was time to collaborate and pool resources. The discussion now is, how do we go about having an organisation that is well-funded and well-researched to speak on behalf of the whole," Laville-Moore said.

Raise funding via the industry that wants this, not via my tax dollars.

Travellers from China will likely face new requirements to enter New Zealand, as Covid-19 numbers surge there, epidemiologist Michael Baker says.

China's switch last month from the "zero-Covid" policy that it had maintained for nearly three years led to infections sweeping across the country unchecked, with experts suggesting there was inconsistency between case and death numbers officially reported and what was happening on the ground.

Perpetually nervous man is nervous about nervous people from a particularly nervous country, harbouring pathogen that keeps perpetually nervous man nervous.

Despite every other country harbouring the same pathogen within its populace and borders.

Fire and Emergency received more than 40 calls on New Year's Eve, an increase on previous years.

Spokesperson Adrian Nacey said the main issue was fireworks causing vegetation to catch fire.

"So this has been a particularly busy night for us which is really disappointing - all of these fires are completely avoidable and it's just too hot, it's too dry and it's too windy for people to be setting off fireworks at this time of year.

"I think people perhaps don't understand the danger that these fireworks create and how difficult these fires can be to bring under control once they're started."

Smokey Bear says: "Only you can prevent forest fires."

The article is more or less as expected, covid-zero is not working and hospitals are overwhelmed.

But this particular paragraphs stands out:

The disappearance of the videos and hashtags, seen by many as an act of censorship, suggests the Chinese government still sees the narrative surrounding its handling of the disease as a politically sensitive issue.

Western governments would never censor of course.

At 71, Kiwi athlete Sharon Prutton has been crowned world champion for a 13th time – in her fourth different sporting event. Coached by her son, she tells Suzanne McFadden she has even more sports challenges on her horizon.

Sharon Prutton lives by a motto coined by a friend: ‘Keep the old woman out’.

“I mix with like-minded people, and we all try to keep the old women out,” says Prutton, who takes an almost daily dip at dawn in the nippy waters around Christchurch. “I need to keep moving, keep doing things.”

Bless.