Category: AM-NC

Source: Radio New Zealand

Health NZ says an initiative to give patients in the Greater Wellington region petrol vouchers to drive to Whanganui for an MRI scan is working to bring waiting lists down.

Hundreds of patients in the region had been offered $150 petrol payments to travel out of the district to get the diagnostic procedure faster.

There had been criticism of the scheme – with the senior doctors union claiming it offered people the chance to buy their way up the public wait lists for MRI scans.

But Health NZ Capital and Coast group director of operations Jamie Duncan told Checkpoint that was not the case.

“We’re providing support for people that have the ways and means to access the scans in Whanganui. I think the impact here is twofold. Clearly those people get access to a scan, but what it does do is it frees up capacity locally on our MRI scanners for those people who aren’t in a position to travel,” he said.

Duncan said 288 patients had taken the opportunity to travel to Whanganui with a petrol voucher.

“What that means locally is from September our waiting time for a scan was approximately six months in Wellington, now just over six months later the wait time is closer to three to four months,” he said.

“It’s having a significant impact in improving access locally.”

The target wait time was six weeks for an MRI scan.

“We still know we have a ways and means to go to hit that target but you can see on that trajectory we’re moving there quite quickly,” Duncan said.

Duncan said the scheme was about improving overall access to MRI scans.

“There are other things we’re doing locally to improve access, we’re outsourcing to private providers, we’re employing more radiology staff in the public system to increase access to public MRI, we’re working weekend shifts to improve access as well,” he said.

Duncan said there were seven public MRI machines in the central region, with Whanganui being one of those.

There were two in Wellington Hospital and one in Hutt Valley Hospital.

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

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/03/05/health-nz-says-petrol-vouchers-helping-lower-mri-waiting-list-in-greater-wellington/

Source: Radio New Zealand

A small fine meted out to an Otago fisher, who killed a Hector’s dolphin then lied to officials, underscores the failure to protect endangered species, a conservation group says.

Māui and Hector’s Dolphin Defenders uncovered the death of the dolphin – one of only about 40 left in the area – and fought through the courts to obtain the details.

Founder Christine Rose said the case laid bare a toothless system that failed to act as a deterrent to the fishing industry and also highlighted the vulnerability of relying on the industry to self-report bycatch.

The Moeraki fisher, who RNZ has chosen not to identify, was already before the court for illegal fishing when the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) discovered he had killed a Hector’s dolphin while set-netting off Otago’s coast in February last year.

The camera on-board FV Emma Jane recorded images of the net being cut and the dead dolphin sinking to the sea floor.

Neither MPI nor the Department of Conservation (DOC) brought charges over the death of the dolphin. However, MPI charged the man with failing to report the capture under the Fisheries Act.

While it is illegal to harm a protected species, commercial fishers are exempted for “accidental capture”, or bycatch.

The Ministry for Primary Industries said, although killing protected wildlife as bycatch was not an offence, it took the prosecution for failing to report the incident “due to the seriousness of the non-reporting”.

DOC said its only involvement in the case was to confirm the mammal in the camera footage was an endangered Hector’s dolphin.

Industry group Seafood New Zealand said fisheries were the most regulated and surveilled primary industry in the country and the case showed the rules were working.

Otago University emeritus professor Liz Slooten said the case proved dolphins killed by fishing gear were not always reported.

It comes as the government sought to roll back parts of the camera programme.

The current law – which had no penalty for fishing industry-related dolphin deaths – was not fit for purpose, Slooten said.

‘A dirty old shag’

After the dolphin’s death was discovered the skipper lied in his catch report, responding ‘no’ when asked if any protected species had been caught.

When fisheries officers asked about the catch he told them it was “just a dirty old shag or a seven-giller (shark)”, according to MPI’s summary of facts.

When formally interviewed he admitted to catching the dolphin claiming it was a “common dolphin”.

Another of the man’s ships, FV Triton, was caught trawling illegally days earlier near the mouth of the Ōrāri River in South Canterbury while skippered by another man.

A no trawl prohibition applied in the area from January to April to protect sea-run Chinook salmon, MPI described the fish as being at “crisis point”.

The ship’s owner said he was unaware of the no trawl areas.

He was charged with trawling inside a prohibited area.

‘Manifest injustice’

The fisher pleaded guilty to all charges last September and was fined $5000 for failing to report the dolphin’s capture, $10,000 for trawling in a prohibited area.

Both ships were automatically forfeited.

However, the man kept both ships in exchange for a fee of $14,460.

Rose said the man would be able to treat the fine and buy-back costs as the price of doing business.

“Hector’s dolphins are priceless but the court’s judgement makes dolphin lives look worthless,” she said.

Hector’s dolphins are only found in New Zealand waters and are estimated to number about 15,000, a stark decline from the 50,000 estimated in 1975.

The case showed the organisations charged with protecting threatened marine mammals were failing, Rose said.

“If this was a kiwi or a kākāpō people would be rightly outraged. But, because it’s a dolphin, we only know about it because of the persistence of groups like ours.”

Rose learned of the death after spotting a reference to unreported bycatch in a presentation from MPI.

The dolphin’s death was not initially reported on DOC’s database, though it had since been added with a note that “due to an ongoing compliance investigation, this incident was not reported publicly until January 2026”.

The court did not impose any suppression orders and ordered the release of the information to Māui and Hector’s Dolphin Defenders last month.

“When he was finally prosecuted, as we find out from the district court records, it turns out he’s got a history of breaking the law and despite the fact he’s been fishing for 40 years he pretends to not know what the rules are,” Rose said.

“The fine he gets for all of this is only $5000 and forfeiture of his boat but in the meantime he’s able to buy that boat back and can be right back out there fishing.”

MPI’s 2023-24 South Island Hector’s bycatch reduction plan annual report noted that on at least four occasions the same fishing boats killed more than one Hector’s dolphin in a 12 month period.

MPI director of science and information Simon Lawrence said when Fisheries New Zealand finds evidence of breaches of fisheries rules it took a range of actions from education to prosecution.

Prosecution decisions were made based on Crown Law guidance, he said.

DOC biodiversity system and aquatic director Kirstie Knowles said DOC became aware of the dolphin’s death in April when Fisheries New Zealand asked for confirmation the footage showed a Hector’s dolphin.

As a Fisheries investigation was already underway, DOC did not open a separate investigation under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, Knowles said.

The High Court found in 2024 DOC’s approach to prosecution and investigation were unlawful and lacking.

Rose claimed DOC and MPI were failing in their duties.

“MPI are protecting the fishing industry, they’re not upholding the rules. DOC are nowhere to be seen. They should have been prosecuting this under the Marine Mammal Protection Act,” she said.

“Both these agencies that are supposed to be upholding the law and the flourishing and preservation of the marine environment and these protected species are missing in action.”

Less than a fifth of on-board footage monitored in last quarter

Before the introduction of on-board cameras, the industry reported one or zero Hector’s dolphins deaths in nets or trawls between 2014 and 2022.

But 15 deaths were reported or observed in the first year on-board cameras were rolled out.

A 2025 MPI report said about 30 percent of footage had been reviewed since 2023.

Figures for the quarter to September 2025 showed only 18 percent of footage was reviewed.

Seafood NZ chief executive Lisa Futschek said the Otago case showed the system was working.

There were clear rules on reporting, she said.

“We have a robust system. We need to work within it, and we do, and for those who don’t there are clear consequences which is what happened in this case,” Futschek said.

There were limits on the number of dolphins the fishing industry could kill in certain areas.

Those limits protected endangered species, Futschek said.

In the South Island the limit was 47.5 dolphins per year, but last year only seven were killed by the industry, Futschek said.

“So whilst even one capture is too many, we are still doing really well when it comes to making sure that particular species continues to thrive,” she said.

However, in the East Otago region the limit is two deaths per year.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

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

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/03/05/fine-for-unreported-hectors-dolphin-death-reveals-toothless-system-conservation-group-says/

Source: Radio New Zealand

More than 3000 New Zealanders are in the Middle East as the Iran war continues.

The US and Israel have been bombing Iran for almost one week, with Iran launching retaliatory strikes on US and Israeli bases across the Middle East.

Travel warnings are in place, and most flights in and out of the region are not operating.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said 3171 New Zealanders were registered with its service SafeTravel in the region.

That included 1,893 in the UAE, 411 in Qatar, 401 in Saudi Arabia, 120 in Egypt, 42 in Jordan, 72 in Kuwait, 55 in Bahrain, 30 in Iran, 12 in Iraq, and 83 in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory, 38 in Oman, and 14 in Lebanon.

However, it expected the actual number of New Zealanders in each country to be higher.

Defence Minister Judith Collins previously told Midday Report on Thursday, two NZDF planes would be leaving New Zealand in the coming days.

“We’re not saying exactly where they’re going to be, for obvious security reasons, but we will be saying to people, if you want to leave, we’ll get you out of the region into a safer region…. but we won’t be bringing back the thousands of New Zealanders who we know are in the region all the way back to New Zealand.

“We’ll get you to a place where you can be safe and you can get commercial flights.”

The government is urging New Zealanders in the Middle East to register on SafeTravel in preparation for evacuation.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

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

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/03/05/over-3000-new-zealanders-in-the-middle-east-amidst-conflict/

Source: Radio New Zealand

A small fine meted out to an Otago fisher, who killed a Hector’s dolphin then lied to officials, underscores the failure to protect endangered species, a conservation group says.

Māui and Hector’s Dolphin Defenders uncovered the death of the dolphin – one of only about 40 left in the area – and fought through the courts to obtain the details.

Founder Christine Rose said the case laid bare a toothless system that failed to act as a deterrent to the fishing industry and also highlighted the vulnerability of relying on the industry to self-report bycatch.

The Moeraki fisher, who RNZ has chosen not to identify, was already before the court for illegal fishing when the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) discovered he had killed a Hector’s dolphin while set-netting off Otago’s coast in February last year.

The camera on-board FV Emma Jane recorded images of the net being cut and the dead dolphin sinking to the sea floor.

Neither MPI nor the Department of Conservation (DOC) brought charges over the death of the dolphin. However, MPI charged the man with failing to report the capture under the Fisheries Act.

While it is illegal to harm a protected species, commercial fishers are exempted for “accidental capture”, or bycatch.

The Ministry for Primary Industries said, although killing protected wildlife as bycatch was not an offence, it took the prosecution for failing to report the incident “due to the seriousness of the non-reporting”.

DOC said its only involvement in the case was to confirm the mammal in the camera footage was an endangered Hector’s dolphin.

Industry group Seafood New Zealand said fisheries were the most regulated and surveilled primary industry in the country and the case showed the rules were working.

Otago University emeritus professor Liz Slooten said the case proved dolphins killed by fishing gear were not always reported.

It comes as the government sought to roll back parts of the camera programme.

The current law – which had no penalty for fishing industry-related dolphin deaths – was not fit for purpose, Slooten said.

‘A dirty old shag’

After the dolphin’s death was discovered the skipper lied in his catch report, responding ‘no’ when asked if any protected species had been caught.

When fisheries officers asked about the catch he told them it was “just a dirty old shag or a seven-giller (shark)”, according to MPI’s summary of facts.

When formally interviewed he admitted to catching the dolphin claiming it was a “common dolphin”.

Another of the man’s ships, FV Triton, was caught trawling illegally days earlier near the mouth of the Ōrāri River in South Canterbury while skippered by another man.

A no trawl prohibition applied in the area from January to April to protect sea-run Chinook salmon, MPI described the fish as being at “crisis point”.

The ship’s owner said he was unaware of the no trawl areas.

He was charged with trawling inside a prohibited area.

‘Manifest injustice’

The fisher pleaded guilty to all charges last September and was fined $5000 for failing to report the dolphin’s capture, $10,000 for trawling in a prohibited area.

Both ships were automatically forfeited.

However, the man kept both ships in exchange for a fee of $14,460.

Rose said the man would be able to treat the fine and buy-back costs as the price of doing business.

“Hector’s dolphins are priceless but the court’s judgement makes dolphin lives look worthless,” she said.

Hector’s dolphins are only found in New Zealand waters and are estimated to number about 15,000, a stark decline from the 50,000 estimated in 1975.

The case showed the organisations charged with protecting threatened marine mammals were failing, Rose said.

“If this was a kiwi or a kākāpō people would be rightly outraged. But, because it’s a dolphin, we only know about it because of the persistence of groups like ours.”

Rose learned of the death after spotting a reference to unreported bycatch in a presentation from MPI.

The dolphin’s death was not initially reported on DOC’s database, though it had since been added with a note that “due to an ongoing compliance investigation, this incident was not reported publicly until January 2026”.

The court did not impose any suppression orders and ordered the release of the information to Māui and Hector’s Dolphin Defenders last month.

“When he was finally prosecuted, as we find out from the district court records, it turns out he’s got a history of breaking the law and despite the fact he’s been fishing for 40 years he pretends to not know what the rules are,” Rose said.

“The fine he gets for all of this is only $5000 and forfeiture of his boat but in the meantime he’s able to buy that boat back and can be right back out there fishing.”

MPI’s 2023-24 South Island Hector’s bycatch reduction plan annual report noted that on at least four occasions the same fishing boats killed more than one Hector’s dolphin in a 12 month period.

MPI director of science and information Simon Lawrence said when Fisheries New Zealand finds evidence of breaches of fisheries rules it took a range of actions from education to prosecution.

Prosecution decisions were made based on Crown Law guidance, he said.

DOC biodiversity system and aquatic director Kirstie Knowles said DOC became aware of the dolphin’s death in April when Fisheries New Zealand asked for confirmation the footage showed a Hector’s dolphin.

As a Fisheries investigation was already underway, DOC did not open a separate investigation under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, Knowles said.

The High Court found in 2024 DOC’s approach to prosecution and investigation were unlawful and lacking.

Rose claimed DOC and MPI were failing in their duties.

“MPI are protecting the fishing industry, they’re not upholding the rules. DOC are nowhere to be seen. They should have been prosecuting this under the Marine Mammal Protection Act,” she said.

“Both these agencies that are supposed to be upholding the law and the flourishing and preservation of the marine environment and these protected species are missing in action.”

Less than a fifth of on-board footage monitored in last quarter

Before the introduction of on-board cameras, the industry reported one or zero Hector’s dolphins deaths in nets or trawls between 2014 and 2022.

But 15 deaths were reported or observed in the first year on-board cameras were rolled out.

A 2025 MPI report said about 30 percent of footage had been reviewed since 2023.

Figures for the quarter to September 2025 showed only 18 percent of footage was reviewed.

Seafood NZ chief executive Lisa Futschek said the Otago case showed the system was working.

There were clear rules on reporting, she said.

“We have a robust system. We need to work within it, and we do, and for those who don’t there are clear consequences which is what happened in this case,” Futschek said.

There were limits on the number of dolphins the fishing industry could kill in certain areas.

Those limits protected endangered species, Futschek said.

In the South Island the limit was 47.5 dolphins per year, but last year only seven were killed by the industry, Futschek said.

“So whilst even one capture is too many, we are still doing really well when it comes to making sure that particular species continues to thrive,” she said.

However, in the East Otago region the limit is two deaths per year.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

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

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/03/05/fine-for-unreported-hectors-dolphin-death-reveals-toothless-system-coservation-group-says/

Source: Radio New Zealand

Experts say a series of tremors around Kerikeri this week are a reminder that nowhere in New Zealand – even the country’s most seismically stable region – is immune from earthquakes.

Five quakes were recorded between 1 and 4 March, all centred below Kerikeri Inlet at a depth of about 5km.

The biggest, with a magnitude of 2.1, struck at 5.05pm on Tuesday.

Residents at Opito Bay, on the northern side of Kerikeri Inlet, described their homes shaking, hearing a “loud thud” or a booming sound like thunder, and their dogs “going crazy”.

Another said it felt like a car had crashed into the side of the house.

The quakes were also felt at Rangitane and Doves Bay, and at Wharau Bay on the opposite side of the inlet.

While small by New Zealand standards, any quakes in Northland get attention due to their rarity.

Seismic duty officer Sam Taylor-Offord said 10 earthquakes, including this week’s Kerikeri cluster, had been recorded in Northland since Earth Sciences New Zealand (formerly GNS Science) expanded its monitoring network in 2022.

He said the Kerikeri quakes were not recorded automatically by GeoNet, the country’s geological hazard monitoring system, and so did not show up immediately online.

That was because the earthquakes were small and occurred at the margins of the monitoring network, which was tailored to large quakes in seismically active areas, such as around the volcanoes of the central North Island.

The shakes were, however, recorded by Northland’s local seismometer network.

Using that data, staff at the 24/7 National Geohazard Monitoring Centre were able to pinpoint the locations and manually add the five Kerikeri earthquakes to the record.

“These events correspond to reported times of shaking around Opito Bay and Doves Bay over the last couple of days. We’re now looking to see if there are more earthquakes in the sequence,” he said.

There was no known fault under Kerikeri Inlet so the cause could be best understood as the Earth’s crust breaking under accumulated stress.

Taylor-Offord said he was grateful to Northlanders who had reported the quakes at www.geonet.org.nz.

Such feedback helped Earth Sciences NZ update its records more accurately, especially around the margins of its monitoring network.

Taylor-Offord said earthquakes were rare in Northland because the region was far from the active plate boundary, where the Pacific plate was being forced under the Australian plate.

At its closest point to Northland, the boundary, known as the Hikurangi Subduction Zone, ran parallel to the east coast off Hawke’s Bay and Te Tai Rāwhiti, before continuing northeast along the Kermadec Trench.

That distance meant there was relatively little stress in the Earth’s crust under Northland.

The last big earthquake in Northland, in December 1963, was a magnitude 4.8 shake east of Kaitāia.

Northland’s average of about three earthquakes a year compared to thousands recorded every year along the East Coast (Hikurangi Subduction Zone) and Southern Alps (Alpine Fault) plate boundary regions.

Taylor-Offord said the Kerikeri Inlet shakes were a good reminder to expect earthquakes anywhere in New Zealand.

Anyone who experienced a large earthquake should remember the advice to “drop, cover and hold”.

Anyone who lived near the coast, as was the case for many Northlanders, should also be alert to the possibility of tsunamis.

“If the shaking is long or strong, get gone,” he said.

Northland’s monitoring network had 12 seismometers, with equipment at Whangaruru, Kawakawa and Omahuta closest to the Kerikeri earthquakes.

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

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/03/05/nowhere-immune-from-earthquakes-not-even-northland/

Source: Radio New Zealand

Alcohol Healthwatch’s Executive Director has said he was “horrified” after thousands of Steinlager beer bottles were mislabelled as alcohol free.

Andrew Galloway said he would like to see a strong regulatory response after the incident.

Food Safety New Zealand Deputy Director General Vincent Arbuckle told Checkpoint the implications are serious.

“[Lion are] very acutely aware of the fact that people choose for very real reasons to not drink and this is a very serious mistake.

More than 2500 boxes of 24 beers, more than 60,000 individual beers in total, are now being urgently recalled by Lion NZ after they were wrongly labelled alcohol free when they are not.

The Steinlager Ultra Low Carb Beer is actually 4.2 percent alcohol, but has been mislabelled.

Some of those boxes have gone to hospitality venues and will have been broken up.

Food Safety New Zealand said it is potentially very serious, with many consumers choosing to avoid alcohol for religious, cultural and medical reasons.

Arbuckle said there will be a thorough investigation, but the priority is the getting the beer back.

“They (Lion) know that and they have apologised publicly and we’ll be working with them to make sure we understand why this has happened and to be sure that it never happens again”

Lion said it was made aware of the mistake after a customer complained.

The company then found out there was an error in its production run, meaning beer containing 4.2 percent of alcohol was incorrectly labelled.

Arbuckle said they were now working to spread the message as far as possible.

“They’re working with all the retailers that the product’s been sold through. It’s also gone to hospitality, so they’ll be working with hospitality outlets where the product may have gone.”

“[Lion] released a public release yesterday, as did we, and they’re doing their level best to get the message out.”

With some of the beer sold to hospitality outlets, Arbuckle said there is a strong possibility of it being hard to identify.

“You would see a row in a chiller, that’s the non-alcoholic and here’s the alcoholic beers. And it’d be very difficult to sort that out. So outlets will need to be very cautious about trying to make sure they isolate.”

“They’ll have records of when they received a product and they’ll have some records of the batch they received. There’ll be ways in which they can check this out, but it is serious.”

Alcohol Healthwatch Executive Director Andrew Galloway told Checkpoint the organisation had a number of concerns, with medical being the most stark.

“People who are pregnant might be choosing to drink zero percent products and the risk of drinking while pregnant is the potential of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, a lifelong disability.”

“There might be previously heavy drinkers or dependent drinkers. And buying this product that says it’s zero, that isn’t, could be a trigger into a relapse, which could ultimately cost lives.”

“I think there is responsibility, shared responsibility, one from the producer and manufacturer, but also the regulatory regime in which this is allowed to happen.”

“I don’t think there is any checks and balances on the products that are out there for sale… I think monitoring would be good to see… some more tools when something like this happens that you can follow up with a regulatory response and perhaps send a very strong message out there to other manufacturers that this will not be tolerated.”

He said it was important that the recall response was swift and far-reaching to avoid further harm.

“We are talking about New Zealand’s most harmful drug… in the situation we are at at the moment there’s over 2500 cases out there.”

Galloway said the development of zero alcohol options meant it was often hard for the consumer to tell the difference in taste and appearance.

He said it was likely someone drinking the alcoholic version with a non-alcoholic label would not be able to tell the difference and end up in a dangerous situation like drink driving.

“These products do mimic the parent brand… so someone could quite easily in good faith be thinking they’re doing the right thing and land themselves in trouble.”

Vincent Arbuckle said anyone who thought they might have the incorrectly labelled product should return it.

“Check the best before date. If you’ve got any doubt at all, return that product from where you purchased it from. Advice is to be very cautious with those with that product, if there’s any doubt at all, don’t drink it, return it to your retailer.”

The recall is for Steinlager Ultra Low Carb beer 24 pack of 330ml bottles.

On the outer carton the best before date is 21/10/26, the best before is the same on the bottle.

Steinlager Alcohol Free is only sold in green bottles, not clear bottles, so if a beer in a clear bottle is labelled alcohol free it is incorrectly labelled.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

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

LiveNews: https://nz.mil-osi.com/2026/03/05/alcohol-healthwatch-horrified-after-steinlager-beer-mislabelled/