NZ Engine

Source: Radio New Zealand

An Air New Zealand customer has been left upset after discovering at the last minute that a cabin crew strike had disrupted her travel plans.

“I have a flight tonight with Air NZ from Tonga,” the traveller who wanted to be identified only as Lia said. “I haven’t received any contact either via email or phone about my flight cancellation. I only found out about it when I went online to add a bag only to find out my flight date has been changed.

“I called customer service and they say email has gone out on Wednesday for a flight on Thursday, really? However, I didn’t receive any of that.

“There is a flight tomorrow. The customer rep said this morning there is one seat left but there is a possibility that it will be cancelled… If it will be cancelled the flight on Saturday is fully booked. I might lose my seat on the Saturday flight and the earliest I can go is Monday.”

Lia said it seemed to be very poor customer service and no compensation had been offered.

Flight attendants working on Air New Zealand’s Boeing 777 and 787 long range aircraft are striking on Thursday and Friday after failing to agree on pay and conditions.

Air New Zealand chief customer and digital officer Jeremy O’Brien told Morning Report it had proactively contacted all customers affected by the flight cancellations and offered alternative flights across its airline as well as its partner airlines.

The “vast majority” had been offered travel dates within a few days either side of the strike action.

Flights most affected were heading to North America and Asia, he said.

O’Brien said he appreciated that not all offered flights would suit every customer and a full credit or refund was available for those in that situation.

They could also claim “reasonable costs” involved with the disruption, like if accommodation was impacted by the changes.

A Consumer NZ spokesperson said in its view an international cabin crew strike was an event that within the airline’s control, and should be covered by the Montreal Convention.

“Under the Montreal Convention, if a flight is cancelled or delayed, impacted passengers can ask for a refund, or an alternative flight. They can also claim back any additional costs they incur as a result of the disruption – up to set limits. Passengers should retain receipts for any extra costs they incur to ensure they can get this back from the airline.”

Massey University marketing expert Bodo Lang said the strike could be an issue for Air New Zealand’s brand.

“On the one hand, passengers have been vocal about rising fares, with some complaints attracting headline coverage. On the other hand, staff are seeking improved conditions, including higher pay.

“For some consumers, this creates a perceived inconsistency: if ticket prices are increasing, why are staff arguing that pay and conditions need improvement? The inference some may draw is that Air New Zealand is generating excessive profits.

“However, the financial reality is more nuanced. Profit expectations for Air New Zealand have recently been revised downward, not upward. Explaining the intricacies of Air New Zealand’s financial statements to the public in an engaging manner is difficult. Some consumers may interpret the current strikes as profiteering, which could reduce the brand’s equity.”

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

A retired judge has been appointed to lead an external review into the events leading up to the deadly Mount Maunganui landslide.

The review, previously signalled by Tauranga City Council, is separate to a government inquiry that has also been confirmed on Thursday.

Six people were killed when part of the mountain fell and ploughed into a campground last month.

The council’s review will be helmed by Paul Davison, KC.

Mayor Mahé Drysdale said his reputation meant Davison could have the scope to examine every relevant matter.

This will include accessing independent experts.

The review is expected to be done by the middle of the year.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon will face questions following a visit to Space Operations New Zealand.

Luxon has been touring the facility in Southland with Environment Minister Penny Simmonds.

The stand-up is due to start around 2.45pm.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

Health New Zealand says two of its flagship hospital rebuilds are on track despite red alerts put on them months ago.

The red ratings on the Nelson and Dunedin projects were in the latest publicly available investment report from Treasury dated mid-2025.

Around that same time, the central health agency had rated itself badly with Treasury for how it managed its billions in assets, joined in the dog-house by Police and Defence on the latest measurement known as the Chief Executive Annual Attestations.

The Treasury investment report meanwhile showed the Dunedin outpatients building project under cost pressure, by a sum that was blanked out.

It also redflagged Nelson to ministers for not having its business case ready in time for Budget 2026 decisions.

Health NZ said on Wednesday that this related to Nelson’s future stages of work and there was no impact on construction timelines or the expected operation of new facilities.

“The project continues to progress as planned,” said head of delivery of infrastructure, Simon Trotter.

The Nelson project was shrunk to under half its former budget and cut into phases by the present government.

In Dunedin’s new hospital build, the cost risks had since been managed and it was expected to open within budget on time later this year, Trotter said.

The wider programme that included the bigger inpatients build was also expected to be delivered within approved funding.

The total budget was set at $1.88 billion a year ago after the government rescoped it in the face of public protest, on the grounds sticking with the previous plan would blow it out to maybe $3b.

Trotter also commented that a red rating reflected an assessment against specific reporting measures at a point in time and “does not necessarily indicate a delay to delivery”.

However, Treasury’s description of a red rating was that: “Successful delivery appears to be unachievable. There are major issues which at this stage do not appear to be manageable or resolvable. The programme may need re-baselining and/or overall viability re-assessed.”

Falling short on keeping up

In the other Treasury pulse-taking reports to ministers – the attestations – Health, Defence and Police scored the worst for meeting higher standards for managing their billions of dollars of assets.

Infrastructure experts have castigated public agencies in general for not keeping across the state of their buildings or spending enough on maintenance – the country’s leaky courts have been an egregious example of lack of maintenance, which a series of expensive projects were now trying to sort out.

Since 2023, 62 agency chief executives have had to attest to Treasury annually on how they measure up in 25 areas such as taking care of really critical assets.

A minnow like Antarctica NZ that has been caught up in stop-start rebuilding was non-compliant in only one of the 25 (some measures did not apply) in the latest attestations done last July.

One or two non-compliances were common, such as at Internal Affairs, and perhaps surprisingly Justice, and Kainga Ora, which has massive assets. Education complied with all 25.

By contrast, Health NZ failed in more than half – for 13 out of 25 measures, including being too slow setting up investment assurance standards for its failure-prone digital services; and not properly keeping track of “the identity, condition, and risk exposure” of its service-critical assets.

This last was a black mark against the Defence Force, that missed on seven measures, even as it struggled with a $2-3b refurbishment of rundown housing and other facilities.

Police were non-compliant with the watchdog’s demands on eight fronts, telling Treasury they were five-10 years away with some, such as getting all their asset management plans done or having an IT set-up that could keep track.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

A High Court Judge has won the right to have a dispute over a family bach heard in private, rather than open court.

In 2022, Justice Anne Hinton sold her share of the bach to two of her four sisters – but her other sister, Gillian Gatfield and niece, Emma Pearson (who inherited her mother’s share) argued Hinton had, years earlier, promised to transfer her share to them.

They took their case to the High Court, but Hinton successfully applied to have it referred to independent arbitration.

The plaintiffs appealed the arbitration referral in November – but the Court of Appeal dismissed that on Thursday.

Hinton wanted arbitration because it was faster and cheaper than going through the courts – and private.

Her lawyers argued any judge hearing Hinton’s case in court would be put in a difficult position: either risking the perception of favouring a colleague, or ruling against her which would effectively question her credibility.

But Gatfield and Pearson disagreed.

Lawyer Matanuku Mahuika said “significant weight” was placed on Hinton’s role as a judge in her request for arbitration, which was “not appropriate”.

He urged the judges to be mindful of open justice and warned them against being seen to give preference to a fellow judge.

Mahuika also pointed out arbitration had never been ordered – as opposed to agreed to – in a trust dispute.

But in Thursday’s decision, the judges said the Associate Judge who ordered the arbitration was following the correct procedure.

“We consider that the court has power to order that an arbitration take place and to appoint an arbitrator, even when there is no agreement to arbitrate.

“We also consider there is nothing inherently inappropriate in doing so.”

The Judges said it was “unnecessary” to explicitly address all the matters Gatfield and Pearson’s lawyers raised as reasons against private arbitration.

“We agree with the decision made by the High Court,” their judgement said.

Mediation and arbitration were appropriate options in a case involving “strongly felt personal allegations”, it said.

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

Lawyers acting for the terrorist who massacred 51 worshippers at two Christchurch mosques say their client suffered a “complete destruction of his identity” because of his prison conditions, leading to an irrational decision to plead guilty.

Australian Brenton Tarrant wants the Court of Appeal to overturn his convictions and sentence for the March 2019 shootings at Al Noor Mosque and Linwood Islamic Centre.

After initially pleading not guilty in June 2019 to 51 counts of murder, 40 of attempted murder and one of committing terrorism, he changed his pleas in March 2020.

The terrorist was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole in August 2020.

The 35-year-old now claims he pleaded guilty only because he was irrational as a result of the solitary nature of his prison conditions, which were torturous and inhumane.

One of the terrorist’s lawyers, who can only be identified as counsel A, quoted Nelson Mandela in laying out their argument to Justices Christine French, Susan Thomas and David Collins.

“No one truly knows a nation until he’s been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged on how it treats its highest citizens but how it treats its lowest ones,” the lawyer said.

The lawyer argued there were minimum conditions that all prisoners were entitled to, regardless of the crime they were accused of, and the terrorist’s rights had been breached.

“Those conditions apply to everyone. They apply to everyone, even Mr Tarrant, who has been described as the most reviled person in New Zealand. He is entitled to the rule of law and to be treated in accordance with the same standards that attach to all prisoners in New Zealand,” the lawyer said.

“Even in this most terrible of cases there are minimum expectations – minimum – which we say were ignored in this unprecedented case. These principles and standards include the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, as well as international agreements as to how prisoners are to be held and treated.

“It is submitted that we must hold fast to those ideals that form this nation and not be pulled away by the undoubtedly strong and no doubt justified emotions that attach in this particular case. We must hold fast, especially in the most difficult of cases and circumstances which this case undoubtedly is. It is these most difficult of cases which test and strain at the rule of law the most.”

Counsel A claimed that the terrorist had lost all ability to defend himself in court as a result of his prison conditions, including total isolation aside from transactional contact with corrections staff, constant surveillance and limited activity.

“His guilty pleas were not entered voluntarily. They were entered as a direct result of the oppressive conditions in which he was held,” the lawyer said.

“It is said that these oppressive conditions impacted upon his mental health to such a severe extent that it prevented him from being able to participate in court process properly.

“It is Mr Tarrant’s evidence that due to his isolation and the associated conditions, he suffered a complete destruction of his identity. He describes this as nervous exhaustion or a nervous breakdown.”

The court has heard the terrorist initially raised the possibility of pleading guilty on 31 July 2019 – which came as a surprise to one of his then-lawyers – but four days’ later he again changed his mind and maintained his not guilty stance.

On Tuesday his former lawyers Shane Tait and Jonathan Hudson told the court from that point they were clear the terrorist always intended to plead guilty but he wanted to control the timing of his plea.

The terrorist claimed his mental state had declined to such an extent he felt forced into pleading guilty and he feared embarrassing himself at trial.

“It is his evidence that he had lost his sense of who he was and the capacity, the resilience if you like, to be able to run an effective defence by himself,” counsel A told the court on Thursday morning.

“There was also the point made that he believed if he did plead guilty that he might be able to ameliorate or improve those prison conditions under which he was being held.”

On Wednesday the court heard from other lawyers who had previously acted for the terrorist and described his conditions as unsatisfactory.

A psychologist said the terrorist’s prison conditions were not positive but were not as harsh as some prisons globally and did not amount to torture.

The terrorist was housed in the prisoners of extreme risk unit (PERU) at Auckland Prison.

He was cut off from meaningful interaction with other people, including fellow prisoners.

Another lawyer acting for the terrorist, who can only be identified as counsel B, said the conditions her client was held under before pleading guilty were unprecedented in modern New Zealand history.

“Make no mistake, Mr Tarrant’s circumstances are like no other. They are far more extreme, in our submission, than any other prisoner in the PERU or any other prisoner in New Zealand history,” counsel B told the court.

The terrorist, in his own subjective assessment, was not acting rationally at the time of pleading guilty but had only become aware of that with the benefit of hindsight, counsel B said.

The terrorist’s lawyers will continue their submissions on Thursday afternoon.

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