NZ Engine

Source: Radio New Zealand

Police and the University of Otago will be monitoring student behaviour, with concerns about another year of out-of-control and dangerous behaviour during Orientation Week (O-Week).

It has prompted the university to start meeting with some of the larger, named flats to discuss expectations for the year and how to party safely.

By Sunday afternoon, Castle Street was quiet, but the signs of Saturday’s pre-O-Week ‘Flo-Week’ blow-out remained with shattered glass, bottles, boxes and rubbish lining the road.

Second year students Charlie, Hunter and Hugo hosted Saturday night’s Castle Street bash, saying hundreds of people attended.

Hunter said there was a bit of pressure to host, so the six flatmates pooled their money and paid a company for the gear and set up.

Charlie said they also had security and wristbands to control who could go inside.

Hugo said out-of-towners could be okay, but not when they got too rowdy.

Someone had smashed a bottle into a window because they thought they could, he said.

Hunter said people did not seem to understand that people lived in these flats.

They acknowledged the street was in a sad state, with Charlie saying the red rubbish bin was full in a day between the six flatmates and the glass bin might only last 30 minutes on a night out.

Charlie said the flat had met with university staff as part of the new initiative.

“It was actually real good, and they kind of just were like ‘we know what you’re here to do’. They’ve got it run pretty well.

“They know it’s not the tidiest place to live. No one’s living in the best conditions but we’re all choosing to be here and they told us they can give us more rubbish bins, talked about obviously getting on roofs with what happened last year, and couch fires and stuff.”

Second years Kyra and Pippi were excited for O-Week.

Police have called some of the behaviour “feral”, which Pippi reckoned was fair.

“I think it’s definitely feral. But I think that’s just how everyone wants it to be. People know that Flo-Week you kind of just like go all out for a couple of weeks. But then tame it out throughout the rest of the year,” Pippi said.

Since September, two young men have been critically injured from falls – including from the roof of a Castle Street flat.

Pippi said people liked the thrill of climbing on roofs.

“It definitely is dangerous and bad… but it is very common. You just see people on roofs at almost every house but I think people get a bit of a shock once they hear the bad stories about it. Like, we heard a pretty tragic story and so it’s honestly scared us all.”

Kyra was glad the university shared information about staying safe.

“It’s also really good that there’s like police around, controlling everyone… when it gets really rowdy and stuff, so it like makes people feel more safe.”

They both had friends down for Flo-Week, and said it was good to have visitors and others to meet as long as they did not trash the flats.

First years Amy and Ruby just moved into a uni hall, saying there has already been meetings about safety.

Amy was glad the university was proactive about it, saying it meant they felt more comfortable asking for help.

“I think it’s real cos they know exactly what we’re doing and I mean they help us do it safely rather than turn their heads the other way and pretend it’s not happening,”

Ruby was not surprised about the state of Castle Street, describing it as disgusting and filthy.

“I guess that’s just what Castle Street’s all about.”

University vice-chancellor Grant Robertson said they proactively told students about safe partying and how they were expected to behave. That included staying off roofs.

“We’re really clear that students need to stay off roofs. The tragic consequences of that are clear for everybody. We make that clear in all of our communications with students.”

He was pleased that flatmates from about 40 of the larger, named flats had met with the proctor as part of the new initiative, which he said made sure they were all on the same page.

The university did not support out-of-towners joining the frivolities as they could be difficult to manage, Robertson said.

“Many times they behave quite differently than students who know that Dunedin is their home.”

Flats were made aware this could be an issue and there was support for them if there were any issues, he said.

“Police have obviously got a role to play there because ultimately what is facilitated and allowed comes down to what the police are prepared to put up with given that these are private residences where these parties are being held.”

A major step forward would be to take out the glass, and the university had submitted to the local Alcohol Plan for that to happen, he said.

More than 4000 first-year students were welcomed over the weekend.

The Otago University Students’ Association is hosting a range of events for O-Week, which kicked off on Monday. Association president Daniel Leamy said they would be safe, inclusive environments for all students.

“Student Support is also always open to assist students as needed, and will have the Are You OK teams on the ground at events,” he said.

“We must also be cognisant of a select few creating a bigger story for the masses. Most students have a great week.”

The association actively encouraged students to choose cans over glass and recycle responsibly, promoted registering parties in advance in partnership with Good One and actively participated in clean-up days as a signatory to the Sophia Charter, he 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

From ants inside clothing packages from Australia to potentially deadly European hornets, Auckland has recently become a hotspot for unwanted insects from overseas.

Aucklander Jayd Graham, 21, was disgusted to find ants inside the sealed packaging of one of two dresses she ordered from Australia.

“I opened the package in my room. The first dress was completely fine. But then I opened the second dress and started seeing ants all over my bed. In the package with the second dress, there were eggs and ants crawling everywhere. I literally ran outside and chucked it on the ground.

“I was like, that’s disgusting, and my mates said I should make a video on TikTok.”

Biosecurity officers confirmed the ants were an Australian species already present in New Zealand.

In response to RNZ’s questions about whether the package had ants in it upon arriving in New Zealand, Biosecurity acknowledged that some unwanted pests can slip through the border security system.

Graham said the clothing brand she ordered from, which did not respond to RNZ’s request for comment, ultimately replaced her order and gave her a voucher.

Meanwhile, also in Auckland, Biosecurity staff are searching for yellow-legged hornets and their nests after the invasive pest, which wreaks havoc on overseas agriculture, was spotted in the country for the first time in 2025.

To date, 51 queen yellow-legged hornets and 61 nests have been found on Auckland’s North Shore.

A retired Hawke’s Bay beekeeper, Peter Berry, who worked in the industry for about 50 years, said the possibility of a wider outbreak was still worrying.

“If these things get away, the problem will be huge. And it won’t just be for the environment or for beekeepers, because they make life really unpleasant for anybody who bumps into them. People will die, and people will be severely injured by these things, and certainly lots and lots of people will be terrified.

“We really need to keep an eye out throughout the whole country because they are so easily spread.

“As I understand it, they’re fairly like the wasps we’re used to seeing that hibernate in lumps of firewood over the winter. If a queen wasp has got into one of those lumps of firewood, in the bumper of somebody’s car, or under a tarpaulin somewhere, then it could be anywhere in the country.”

He said the economic cost of a nationwide outbreak would be worse than anything he dealt with during his career.

“For the whole country, you’re probably talking billions of dollars lost.

“Wasps are bad enough. The German and the common wasp used to cost us when we were a business something like $100,000 a year.

“And when the number of those gets up in a rural environment, they just eat everything. And there’s nothing left for the birds to eat. So something a lot worse than them, that would be an absolute bloody disaster.”

He said harmful species entering the country was not ideal, but almost inevitable.

“We have gaps in our biosecurity the size of containers. A queen yellow-legged hornet is half the size of your little finger. And it’s very, very difficult to find something like that. Obviously better and cheaper to stop them in the first place, but without curtailing trade, it’s virtually impossible.”

“I’d love to have better biosecurity, but the main thing is if it gets here, that they do something about it.”

The government had committed $12m to cover the cost of the hornet response until the end of June 2026.

Berry said that the investment was absolutely worth it.

“If you can catch it when it’s small and jump on it and spend millions of dollars to kill it while you’ve only got a couple of hundred of them, it’s an awful lot cheaper than ever trying to wipe out tens of thousands.

“I think they could possibly spend some more time trying to just check around over the whole of the country to make sure that there isn’t something popping up. But I think you’ll find that pretty well every beekeeper in the country will be looking.”

Fruit fly battle ongoing

In the central Auckland suburb of Mount Roskill, biosecurity staff were also trying to eradicate an obnoxious fruit fly from Australia.

Restrictions on the movement of fruit and vegetables are in place in the area after a single male Queensland fruit fly was found in a surveillance trap in January.

Kris Robb, the manager at Clyde Orchards, was hopeful that the fruit fly would not get to them in the South Island.

“It’s obviously concerning to the industry, but personally, I think we’ve got full faith in the processes in place to be able to contain it.

Our biosecurity measures are as strong as any country in the world. They do the best job they can to stop these incursions. It’s just unfortunate that the odd bug gets through. That’s a risk of a global economy.”

There have been 15 previous incursions of different fruit fly species in Auckland and Northland since 1996, and all have been successfully eradicated.

In a statement to RNZ, Biosecurity said only a small number of pests made it through the border, and that this was the first time the yellow-legged hornet had been detected here.

“It is impossible to eliminate the risk of live organisms getting past the border without stopping all trade and travel – something that would be unacceptable to most New Zealanders.

“Even with fully closed borders, some pests and diseases would still reach New Zealand through natural means such as wind, ocean currents or migratory species. Because some risk will always exist, Biosecurity New Zealand’s approach is to reduce this to an acceptable level.”

It said there were multiple safeguards in place to stop harmful pests from getting into the country.

“Biosecurity New Zealand operates a multilayered defence system that works offshore, at the border, and within New Zealand to stop harmful pests from entering the country. The system includes strict import rules for potential risk goods (eg. produce), screening of cargo, passengers, mail and vessels, detector dog teams, and surveillance programmes, including more than 36,400 insect traps nationwide.

“High-risk sites such as ports and approved facilities that receive international cargo are routinely inspected. Any insects detected that could pose a biosecurity risk are tested and dealt with immediately.”

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

Source: Radio New Zealand

Hamilton residents are facing a shake-up in how they pay for water.

National water reforms meant the city had to move away from the way residents had always paid for water – through their rates based on capital value – to either a set charge or a user pays model.

The new local water authority, Iawai, hoped a water meter trial, due to start in part of the city, would help find a way forward.

Carla Johnstone’s busy Hamilton household tried to think about their water use.

“I grew up really trying to conserve water in Australia,” she said.

They took simple steps such as turning the tap off when brushing their teeth, while balancing it with enjoying life.

“It’s quite nice to have come here and not have had to worry about it so much, and having two young children who like to play outside with the hose, it’s nice to not have to be so conscious of it,” she said.

As the city did not have water metering, she really didn’t know what her household used – but she soon would.

Her family was one of hundreds taking part in a water metering trial in Hamilton East.

Johnstone was generally supportive of the idea that the city might introduce metering.

“It could be beneficial to people and the city,” she said, citing the role metering played in helping identify leaking pipes.

Andrew Parsons from Iawai, the new water authority set up by Hamilton City and Waikato District, said metering water in the area of Hamilton where the Johnstones lived would come with many challenges – which wasn’t a bad thing.

“The good part for me about Hamilton East is that it’s an older area, there’s established trees in the berm, there’s a mix of pipes under the ground,” he said.

That more challenging infrastructure environment would hopefully mean the trial collected lots of helpful data.

Parsons said doing a trial did not mean a decision to move to water metering had been made.

“This is not a decision to roll out meters across the whole city, it is more an information gathering phase so we can understand the costs, what works from a customer perspective and what might work from a business perspective.”

The alternative to user paid water metering, however, was a fixed price model, which Parsons said could come with some poor financial consequences.

Under that model every household would pay the same amount for water, whether they were a single person in an apartment or a family of six with a pool and spa.

Wintec principal civil engineering academic staff member (water) Maryam Moridnejad said metering was fairer than both the current way of paying and a set price.

“You’re paying for water anyway at the moment, you are paying through your property rate. If the meters go ahead you are going to pay based on your actual usage,” she said.

It would also be expected to lead to water conservation – making the water Hamilton had go further.

“People will be surprised with how much water they use per person,” she said.

Moridnejad said data showed people in Hamilton used 1.5 times more water per person than residents of Tauranga – where water had been metered for several decades.

She said the country needed to face up to its water challenges and treat water as a precious resource.

“In New Zealand we are going towards water scarcity in future; we have been ignoring our water resources and the infrastructure of water for so long and they are now at a very critical point.”

Andrew Parsons from Iawai said they were looking forward to the results of the water meter trial and would soon consult with the public on a 10-year water services strategy.

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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 shotgun has been seized during a search of a Māngere property, as part of the ongoing investigation into a shooting in Onehunga last month.

Police were called to a house on Arthur Street on 16 January following reports several people had arrived at a house and fired shots toward the front of the home.

A man inside the home was shot and critically injured.

Police are yet to confirm whether they believed the gun, found during the search of a Māngere property on Friday, was used in the shooting.

Detective Senior Sergeant Matt Bunce said they recovered a shotgun and ammunition.

“The public will appreciate we can’t share the details of the work ongoing, however we have a dedicated investigative team that is working to hold those involved to account for what happened that day.”

A 43-year-old man appeared in Auckland District Court at the weekend, charged with unlawful possession of a firearm as well as unlawful possession of ammunition.

Bunce called for any information that could help the ongoing investigation.

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