Author: MIL-OSI Publisher

Source: Radio New Zealand

Residents of an affluent east Auckland suburb fear their quiet lifestyle could be shattered by a three-storey development in the middle of their neighbourhood.

With dozens of buildings looming high above her garden, Farm Cove resident Anne Moore said there was nowhere to hide.

“My sister’s room is curtains drawn because there are people building on the building site, and there’s no privacy,” she said.

Moore was leading the charge urging council to take action over the partly-completed construction.

With the support of her neighbours, she had sought legal advice, maintaining the development should no longer be allowed under Auckland’s recently changed planning rules.

The hammers and grinders echoing through her home office were hard at work on a pair of three-storey residential units, and they were right next door.

Moore worried the lack of privacy could be permanent once her new neighbours moved in.

“I think the fact that it looks right into our home and right into our property. We’ve got a spa pool, there’s two or three swimming pools in the surrounding area that they now look down on all of us,” she said.

Another neighbour, Lisa Anne Roy, said the new building towered over her property and blocked the sun.

“The impact’s been absolutely huge,” Roy said.

“We have an immune-compromised child, and taking all the sunlight away from the bedroom side of the house, I mean going up 11 metres, it’s just horrific.”

Roy only heard about the development through word of mouth after construction had already started.

“I have three dogs. To have that third dog on my property, I had to get every single neighbour to sign before council would let me have three dogs on my property,” she recalled.

“They didn’t have to get any signatures to totally change the landscape.”

The development in Farm Cove was allowed by the central government’s Medium Density Residential Standards (MDRS), introduced in 2022 and permitting three-storey buildings on most city properties.

Contractors at the site on Bramley Drive had just broken ground in October last year when Auckland Council pulled out of those standards, the result of an agreement with the government following the 2023 floods.

That change limited new builds in Farm Cove to two floors, but the development had already been consented for three.

Anne Moore said construction should stop, and was campaigning for the council to step in.

“I keep getting emails saying that, you know, he had a building consent, he got it under the MDRS, and so they’re not going to enforce it because he was given that at the time. Well, that’s all very well, but those rules don’t apply anymore.”

Auckland Council’s head of resource consents, James Hassall, said the development could go ahead despite the recent changes.

“The government is investigating changes to help remedy the situation. This has allowed Auckland Council to issue formal notices to affected consent holders confirming they can rely on their existing consents and continue with their developments while a permanent fix is investigated,” he said in a written statement.

The developers declined RNZ’s interview request, but reiterated that the council had given them permission to continue.

And continue it had. Within a few months, contractors had already erected the frame of the third floor, and the shape of the building was coming into view.

Moore said the noise was driving her crazy, work often dragging into the evenings and weekends.

“They are allowed to work until six in a residential area, but they often keep going and we all have to yell out, hey, time to go, because by then we’ve had enough. So we really want our privacy back for what little time we have it,” she said.

“They’re here Monday to Saturday, and then last Sunday some showed up to work last Sunday, which they’re not allowed to do.”

In an election year, she said National risked losing its previously loyal support in east Auckland.

“I think it’s going to make a difference at the polls this year, to be honest,” she said.

“And this area is a big stronghold for a certain party, and so people are outraged.”

Anne Moore said her community felt burned, and feared others may be put in a similar position.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

Former students of St George’s Preparatory School in Whanganui have been stepping back in time on tours of the almost century-old campus ahead of its demolition.

The district council-owned site is being deconstructed – piece-by-piece – ahead of being repurposed for iwi health organisation Te Oranganui.

Built in the neo-Georgian style in 1927, St George’s was originally a boarding school for boys destined for nearby Whanganui Collegiate. In 1980, faced with declining rolls, it went co-ed before eventually relocating entirely to the Collegiate campus in 2017.

Former student Richard Austin’s father, Geoff, was headmaster from 1957 to 1977. He found the tour an emotional experience.

“I was thinking of those moments during my time there. Where I was sitting when I was told about the untimely death of my grandfather. I could just picture where I was sitting and where Dad told me.

“To walk onto the headmaster’s steps into his study. There were red steps where you were about to be caned. I could almost picture my dad’s binoculars hanging over the balcony balustrade.”

He reckoned his dad pumped up his role somewhat.

“He was more like a housemaster for 80 boarders all aged under the age of 12 or 13, and maybe 40 day boys. So, it was a boarding house, which I lived in, and the headmaster’s residence that was entirely discrete, but it didn’t stop me slipping through and helping myself to home food as well as school food.”

Austin – who had no qualms about the buildings coming down – looked back at his time at St George’s fondly.

“Our life there was a microcosm, we just lived a completely organised, regimented and caring life.

“School holidays were great. I had all these swimming pools I could use, all these tennis courts I could use or cricket fields I could play on. It was a wonderful time.”

Whanganui Heritage Trust co-chairperson Mary-Ann Ewing petitioned to save the school but had long accepted that was not possible.

“Our focus turned to salvage looking at the materials, the heritage materials, and we’ve been promoting to the council access for the public to walk through so that past students, teachers and grandparents can effectively say goodbye to it.”

The visit also moved her.

“It was quite emotional walking through. It’s such a beautiful building and we feel we’ve done the right thing arranging these days of walk-throughs, so people can see how much there is to salvage. The beautiful wood.

“And we were very impressed with ARC. They are passionate about salvaging as much as possible.”

ARC Asbestos Removal and Demolition chief executive Thomas Bishop was hoping to salvage up to 95 percent of the building materials.

“Your rimu, your matai, your totara, this material needs to be between 600 and 800 years old to mill. This building’s been up 100 years, so if it’s 600 to 800 years old before it’s even been installed in this building. We’re potentially talking about timber that is over 1000 years old which is pretty special. And it hasn’t seen moisture or the light of day in a hundred years.”

It wasn’t a responsibility Bishop took lightly.

“There is a lot of history here and we have a lot of focus on is being kaitiaki for this product, this native material. We want to see this last forever, so for us to make sure it gets a new lease of life or installed in something else is hypercritical.”

The brickwork was also a focus.

“So, these bricks were actually clayed and fired here in Whanganui. There’s over 500,000 of them at this stage. It was actually full height double-bricked so there was potential for a million bricks here at one stage, but we’ve got 500,000 potentially left on site which are going to be cleaned up and repurposed.

“We’re still doing a bit more of a deep dive into the roofing tiles to figure out what’s going on with them. I know they were used as ship’s ballast to travel to and from Aotearoa New Zealand back in the day.”

Heritage management consultancy, Geometria, was also going through the buildings with a fine-tooth comb recording every aspect of the school so that it could create a digital record of it – including a three-dimensional representation of it.

Whanganui District Council bought St George’s from the YMCA in 2019.

It has signed a 21-year lease with Te Oranganui which planned to use the site as a community-focused health and wellbeing campus.

Te Oranganui Mātaiwhetū chief executive Whetūrangi Walsh-Tapiata said the trust had been able to tour the buildings before the extent of its asbestos issues was known.

“So, we have known about the beauty of the materials, in particular the wood, and as we progressed towards a lease arrangement with the Whanganui District Council and in our conversations with the Whanganui Heritage Trust, we always anticipated that we would like to consider using some of those products as a part of our new development.”

Walsh-Tapiata said the trust wanted the new build, planned for the school’s cricket ground, to honour pre-colonial and more recent history.

“So we are very excited about the possibility of ongoing conversations with the Whanganui District Council to consider how we might be able to use some of those materials.

“We’ve also created an artist group and they’re part of the group that walked through the property earlier this month with a view of seeing how we might be able to utilise some of these products or some of these resources, some of these materials.”

Walsh-Tapiata said as news of the deconstruction of St George’s spread, she expected requests to come in from marae and hapū iwi.

“And I hope they do, because when I look at particularly the wood. I think, wow, what did our land look like 100 or 200 years ago?

“You’ve got to remember that a lot of our forests 200 years ago were shipped to, for example, Wellington, and were part of building our Parliament buildings. So, you know, that is the nature of the beauty of the materials that came out of this region.”

Walsh-Tapiata said Te Oranganui had operated in the region for more than 30 years and its more than 200 staff were often spread around multiple locations.

“One of our goals was to build a fit for purpose facility where we would all be together and that would reflect our values and the way in which we have a wellbeing approach to the services that we offer.”

Walsh-Tapiata said stage one and stage two of the development would be to locate a headquarters for Te Oranganui on the St George’s existing cricket field, while stage three would be to invite partners onto the site of the existing school to create a genuine wellness hub.

It was envisaged more than 100 Te Oranganui staff would be based there.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

The southbound lane on the Remutaka Hill Summit is blocked due to a two-vehicle crash.

The crash on State Highway 2 between Wellington and the Wairarapa was reported to emergency services about 7am.

Motorists were asked to delay travel as emergency services worked at the scene.

Police said the lane may be blocked for some time.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

Workers, wine, and building new alliances – what New Zealand and India get from our free trade deal

It’s the free trade deal that was expected to take years more of relationship-building, but sprinted over the finish line.

Yet to be ratified by both parliaments, New Zealand’s agreement with India could be said to be very one-sided in our favour – access to 1.4 billion consumers with tariffs cut dramatically. India gets improved access for workers and students, in numbers that would seem like a drop in the bucket to such a populous country.

Yet it’s that aspect that has Kiwi politicians up in arms. Today on The Detail we look at a deal that the government has done a great job of nailing, but a poor job of explaining.

That lack of communication is especially puzzling when you consider that in order to enact ‘favoured nation’ status, we urgently need to get the ink dry on it. If the EU passes its free trade agreement with India first, any future drop in their tariffs won’t have to be matched in our deal.

Beyond trade, there’s also another aspect of the motivation behind the signing, and that’s the world’s changing geo-political scene, where countries are looking for fresh friends and alliances. New Zealand is the third Five Eyes nation to do a trade deal with India, and agreements with Canada and the US are in train.

Gaurav Sharma, a senior journalist with the RNZ Asia team, says when it comes to this deal, you can talk about immigrant visas and opportunities for students, but it’s mainly about geo-politics.

“Suddenly because of the rise of China, people have started looking at India differently,” he says.

That includes a new willingness to sit down at the table to discuss market access, but also talk about military alliances in the Indo-Pacific.

“In the last couple of years or so India has started looking at defence ties with New Zealand,” he says.

This includes visits from Indian military ships, and a visit by Prime Minister Christopher Luxon to a military base in Mumbai. He gave a speech during that visit on international security. The motive is the increasing presence of China in the Indo-Pacific region.

Sharma says there is significance in the appointment of the new Indian High Commissioner to New Zealand, Muanpuii Saiawi, who was formerly responsible for international security in Delhi. “It’s an important marker.”

He says the Indian diaspora here is over the moon with the deal – “it’s a stamp that India and New Zealand relations are moving to the next level.”

But he says there’s no hope that at some stage the agreement will make room for our dairy products, a notable omission from the deal.

“You have to realise that earlier this year India did a deal with the European Union and the US – two of the biggest marketing blocs and powerful economies in the world – they also didn’t get dairy.

“For New Zealand to think that in the next hundred years that India will open the market for dairy for New Zealand exporters, it’s not going to happen.”

New Zealand has insisted on having a clause in the agreement that if other countries at some stage get a look in, we will too. But India’s trade minister has categorically ruled out ever giving dairy concessions to any country.

Newsroom’s national affairs editor Sam Sachdeva was one of the sceptics who doubted the National government would get a deal over the line in its first term.

“I think the government, to its credit, did walk the talk. You saw multiple visits by [Trade Minister] Todd McClay, I think he said he’s been there eight, nine, 10 times … Christopher Luxon went, that was the first visit by a New Zealand Prime Minister in, it must have been close to a decade I think. Winston Peters himself went a few times. So you’ve had those political-level visits but I think there’s been other business delegations that have gone over there. That has helped kind of smooth the path.”

Many of the details of the agreement are still a mystery – until recently, even to the Labour Party which has been asked to help it pass.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins wrote to the Prime Minister this weekend expressing concern that it still hasn’t received a formal request to support it, and was only provided with a complete text of the agreement more than a month after negotiations were concluded.

“Your decision not to involve Labour at any point in the negotiation process – without consultation, despite your public assurances to the contrary – and the expectation that Labour would unconditionally support the agreement once presented with it as a fait accompli, falls short of best practice and is not in the spirit of bipartisanship,” the letter reads.

It says Labour will support it on the provision that concerns over migrant worker protections and international students are addressed, and it wants assurances over the expectations that the private sector will invest $33 billion into India over the next 15 years.

If the government’s promotion of this aim falls short, India has the right to revoke market access for the apple, honey and kiwifruit sectors.

But Sachdeva says that clause is not a hard fail line, and he doubts it will be enacted if the amount falls a bit short.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

“Human-machine teams” using leading-edge technology to defeat the enemy are part of the NZ Defence Force’s vision for the future.

The defence force’s new briefing to Parliament on the future of fighting technology contains visions of a digital twin for each soldier, laser weapons and drones using satellites to engage with targets before a human pulls the trigger

But it also includes warnings about the costs and ethical difficulties.

“Machines will increasingly operate systems, processes and capabilities independently of humans,” said the 66-page long-term insights briefing, which imagines a world after 2035.

“Machines will play an increasing role in targeting processes.”

The briefing said it was only talking about influences on military capabilities, and was not a shopping list, but some things were inevitable.

This included laser-fast targeting which integrated with other militaries’ systems and “will be a non-negotiable for defence forces to remain combat-capable and inter-operable with partners”.

The rise of machines looms larger than in previous briefings.

“It is not expected that autonomous systems will herald a wholesale replacement of human presence on the front-line,” but it added the more fluid and dangerous a situation was, the more machines would be a factor.

The future briefings are released every three years.

Three years ago, the defence ministry’s $12 billion Defence Capability Plan (DCP) was a long way off and the government was just beginning to ramp up its warnings about the state of world geopolitics.

Aukus was already well established, but while New Zealand has not joined up to it in the past three years, the country has made various arrangements and experiments with Five Eyes partners to develop emerging military technology – which is what Aukus Pillar Two was all about.

Public inclusion

The new briefing said one background shift would be from public engagement to public inclusion.

“Ensuring Defence maintains public trust will remain essential, and possibly more challenging.”

The defence ministry declined a request to be interviewed.

“The briefing itself provides a detailed overview of how technology innovations could influence New Zealand’s defence capabilities beyond 2035. We have nothing further to add at this time,” it said.

‘Who is going to build all of this?’

Defence analyst and former lieutenant colonel Josh Wineera said his main question was: “Who is going to build all of this?”

“Is the government thinking about declaring what are sovereign capabilities and therefore become priority investment areas for firms to be supported or even funded?” he asked.

That would help skirt global supply chain strictures, which Australia was doing. “Will the LTIB then see a similar investment?”

Wineera was speaking from Europe, where the Munich Security Conference is being held.

The US has struck a more conciliatory position towards Europe than at last year’s divisive conference.

But US Secretary of State Marco Rubio also stressed in his speech how immigration was a problem and how the US and Europe shared the “deepest bonds that nations could share, forged by centuries of shared history, Christian faith, culture, heritage, language, ancestry, and the sacrifices our forefathers made together for the common civilization to which we have fallen heir”.

‘Profound’ effect

The new future briefing said the new tech’s effect on New Zealand’s strategic context was “profound”, because distance was no longer any protection.

The new technology was opening up more types of fighting aside from actual open warfare, such as cyber attacks.

One issue would be the costs – not just to the country’s pocket but potentially to its values – with questions over how the technical and warfighting benefits weighed against sovereignty, legality and public licence.

“For many defence forces, these trade-offs could be challenging to manage, particularly if partner positions begin to deviate from international norms, or where the cost of capabilities enabled by advanced technology becomes prohibitive.”

Machine speed, precision and autonomy – including “self-mending” drones – were key themes in the briefing.

“The precision, range, and lethality of strike weapons is increasing.

“These advances will also lead to decisions increasingly being made independent of human analysis and inference, where it is lawful, and ethically and operationally sensible to do so.”

Weapons of the future

The briefing’s focus was on four areas – as well as human-machine teams, there was discussion of seamless command-and-control for target weapons shared in a network across partners.

It covered likely weapons of the future as well as some which exist today: “Breakthroughs in biotechnology are gradually delivering brain-machine interfaces that detect brain activity to direct machines with thoughts,” it said.

The NZDF has set out to acquire some of these. The DCP envisaged spending hundreds of millions of dollars on things such as drones and space surveillance over the next four years.

Beyond that, technology advancements could include a large drone that could last ages at sea and launch masses of smaller drones to surveil and deter an adversary; a minituarised sensor/micro-drone so advanced it could track individual soldiers, or be used in search and rescue; a special forces soldier with night vision contact lenses and adaptive camouflage; and an ‘avatar’ that updated in real-time when the person was injured and could measure blood loss and stress – then recommend a treatment.

“Bio- technologies are set to enhance defence force personnel in entirely new ways, while simultaneously introducing novel risks from pathogens and other weapons,” the briefing said ominously.

Human-machine teams

Human-machine teaming (HMT) was the most “uncertain, encompassing, and ethically challenging technology” in the briefing.

“Algorithms detecting, classifying, and prioritising targets, shifting the human role to verification and authorisation” was one of six types of HMT mentioned in the briefing.

The NZDF has already engaged in exercises with the US over what the Pentagon called “human-machine integration”.

Seamless command-and-control, which the briefing said was non-negotiable, has also featured in exercises and experiments between the Five Eyes militaries, in particular since about 2020.

‘C5ISRT’ meant “increasingly, algorithms will detect, classify, and prioritise targets at machine speeds, shifting the human role to verification and authorisation”.

Drones and satellites would feed the system data about “the environment and battlespace”.

“This will be possible without human intervention and with the ability to occur at machine speeds.”

The briefing noted an example of C5ISRT – America’s Project Maven. The system was already several times faster at targeting than human analysts, and the US was now expanding Maven.

“C5ISRT technology innovations will continue to open new opportunities to integrate defence systems with international partners,” said the future-look briefing.

“For New Zealand, this may include new policy infrastructure such as data-sharing arrangements that are consistent with domestic policy and law.”

More autonomy was also in the future.

“Robotic Autonomous Systems (RAS) will share data quickly and securely between themselves and crewed systems.”

Organic networks that self-heal and can build ad hoc networks will also support ‘technical autonomy’ – so a damaged subsea drone could repair itself.

The briefing did not look at future defence doctrine or geostrategic considerations.

It mentioned warfighting and war just a few times.

Its main real-world reference point was Ukraine versus Russia, citing how acoustic sensors have boosted missile spotting.

However, it also said the Pacific stand-off between US and China was key.

“Of particular concern is the rapid and non-transparent growth of China’s military capability.”

‘Stretch future budgets’

None of this would come cheap.

“Growing costs, especially from investing in advanced software and hardware, along with rising military inflation (… significantly higher than regular inflation) will stretch future budgets,” said the briefing.

“Making investment choices that balance the investments needed for future technology while also managing short-term capability gaps will be increasingly difficult.”

One answer to escalating costs was 3D printing drones close by a battlefield.

But partnering would be the big enabler.

“The growing pace and scale of defence innovation will mean that maintaining technological interoperability will become increasingly expected by allies, partners, other government agencies, and industry.

“The increasingly integrated nature of future defence technologies meant the research needed to focus on connectivity and understand the macro-trends that transcend capability sets.”

The other big barrier was ethics – how to deliver an “innovative combat-capable force, with strong adherence to domestic and international law.”

The briefing meets reality most closely in the NZDF’s Surveillance (Air) Project funded in the last Budget.

Defence is looking for drones that can hover for ages over the ocean for maritime spotting.

Last month it invited local and foreign business and researchers to workshops to “increase the overall understanding of platform supply, technology applications, training” among other things.

Because the workshops made no decisions and did not cost much, the MOD refused to identify who attended them, in its OIA response.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

Residents in Banks Peninsula are waking after heavy rain overnight, with up to 100 millimetres predicted to fall between Monday evening and Tuesday mid-morning, and flooding expected in some areas.

Christchurch mayor Phil Mauger warned people not to travel unless they had to.

“It might be a lot of rain, but it’s not for a long time, so we’re keeping an eye on it and hoping for the best.

“Keep an eye out for slips and water running off hills where it doesn’t normally run off a hill and report it, because that’s where slips and dropouts will start to occur.”

He said council staff had spent Monday checking sumps, stormwater outfalls and clearing culverts.

“I don’t mind if a road floods for a very short time, but I don’t want water into people’s houses, that’s not a good look.”

He said Civil Defence teams were ready to mobilise “at the drop of a hat” if needed.

Last May, Little River, about 30 kilometres south of Christchurch, was cut off after State Highway 75 through the town was inundated by half a metre of water.

Residents of the Banks Peninsula town were angry and frustrated and said opening the nearby Lake Forsyth to the ocean would have mitigated flooding in the area.

Mauger said Lake Forsyth / Te Roto o Wairewa had been closely monitored over recent days as water levels had risen and concerns but the weather conditions were too rough for it to be opened to the sea successfully.

Consent conditions determined when the lake could be opened. It had to reach a minimum level of 2.3 metres in summer, and could only be opened early if forecasts show it may rise above 2.7m.

Previous forecasts did not show the lake reaching that threshold, so it could not be opened and sea conditions in recent days had made an opening impossible.

“I think the council’s done all it can do at the moment, it’s cleared as many drains as it can and the culverts under the road, especially by Little River, to get the water into Lake Forsyth.”

Council staff were watching the conditions closely and expected to open the lake later this week, potentially on Wednesday, once conditions allowed.

Given the amount of rain forecast, Little River residents were warned to prepare for possible flooding, and other parts of Banks Peninsula to be aware of the potential for slips and road disruptions.

Mauger said the council had been working on a longer term solution to address flooding at Lake Forsyth and Birdlings Flat, with large pipes currently installed that could be mechanically opened to drain water to the sea when needed.

Christchurch City Council general manager of city infrastructure Brent Smith said teams had done preparation work in the areas expected to feel the greatest impact.

“We’re taking our usual precautions by ensuring beach outfalls and wet weather grilles are clear. Pumps and personnel are on standby for the Flockton area and the most critical location in Southshore. The upper Heathcote flood storage basins will be functioning as they should during this event, so people may notice fluctuating water levels in the river,” Smith said.

“Take care and drive to the conditions, do not drive in any floodwaters. If you do need to travel through pooled water, please drive slowly and carefully, and treat all floodwater as contaminated.”

Staff were also monitoring sensors in place on Lighthouse Road and the surrounding area for any land movement, with several homes in the area evacuated during heavy rain last May.

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