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  • Kiwis fork out over $200k for Virgin space flights

    Branson confident of year-end space target Kiwi travellers are snapping up the chance to experience a trip of a lifetime. Eight New Zealanders have forked out more than $200,000 each to book a place on the world's first commercial space flights. Tickets are being sold through House of Travel at a cost of $224,000. In an advertisement for the flights Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson said: ...

  • Super-city plans nudged by rival merger idea

    Source: Photos.com The countdown to a Wellington super-city is about to begin. What has been a slow, lumbering journey towards local government amalgamation in the region got a jolt yesterday when the Masterton, Carterton and South Wairarapa district councils asked the Local Government Commission to merge them into a single entity. In doing so, they started a process that is likely to see the ...

  • Surge in fake notes worries shopkeepers

    Photo / NZPA Fake $100 notes are circulating in Auckland, with one group of businesses being targeted repeatedly. Several Otara businesses have received the counterfeit notes with one man recognised by several retailers as someone using the fake money. Bhajnam Kaur, 31, received one at her Chapel Downs dairy on Tuesday. It wasn't the first time and when she spoke to ...

  • KiwiRail eyeing asset cash

    Labour transport spokesman Ian Lees-Galloway said he was not surprised the Government was tipping more cash into KiwiRail. Photo / Natalie Slade Struggling KiwiRail may soak up almost $600 million - or a tenth of the cash raised from partially privatising state-owned power companies, Budget documents reveal. In last week's Budget, Transport Minister Gerry Brownlee announced ...

  • Familys home raid heartbreak

    Candy Atkinson says she's horrified such young children could think of destroying her family's home as they have. Photo / Christine Cornege Candy Atkinson and her three children huddle together in a friend's bedroom at night and struggle to sleep a week after a group of kids burgled and trashed their home. Four children, aged just 12 and 13, have been referred to Youth ...

Movie Review

The Replacements

It is clear that screenwriter Vince McKewin ("Fly Away Home") has been watching his sports movies. His script for "The Replacements" is a combination of every cinematic sports cliché, from genre classic like "Knute Rockne, All American" (1940), to later comedies like "Major League" (1988) and "Necessary Roughness" (1990). There isn't a single bone of originality in its entire 110-minute run ... ...

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  • NZ still the kid in intelligence family

    Chief of Defence Force Lieutenant General Rhys Jones. Photo / Greg Bowker When it comes to the Five Eyes intelligence sharing grouping, it's like a family with the United States and Britain as parents, and New Zealand being the 5-year old that others were made to play with. That's how Chief of Defence Force Lieutenant General Rhys Jones described the grouping yesterday, while trying ...

  • Rent aid for new tenants only

    Minister Nick Smith. Photo / Mark Mitchell Housing Minister Nick Smith has finally cleared up a mystery from last week's Budget - disclosing that only new tenants moving into community housing, and not existing tenants, will get state-subsidised rents. That explains how he was able to extend income-related rental subsidies to community housing tenants for an average of only $35 a week per ...

  • Residents inwardly bitter over officers actions

    Tame Iti says he holds former Prime Minister Helen Clark responsible for the impact the Urewera raids have had on Tuhoe. Photo / Alan Gibson Residents of the eastern Bay of Plenty say there is still an "inner bitterness" towards police after the way they were treated during the Urewera raids. Jack Purewa, brother of activist Tame Iti, remembers being made to kneel for hours with no ...

  • New mum unaware of pregnancy

    Erica Gunther and Thomas Jones, who says he was told by doctors he would be a father 10 minutes before Laurelin was delivered. Photo / Otago Daily Times Thomas Jones and Erica Gunther have the ultimate souvenir of their New Zealand holiday. Mr Jones, 23, from England, and his United States-born partner Ms Gunther, 22, had been in New Zealand for a few weeks when they had the biggest, and best, ...

  • Heating homes properly out of reach for many - survey

    Photo / Thinkstock One in three New Zealanders can't afford to heat their homes properly in winter, an especially acute issue for younger people, a survey shows. A University of Otago public health professor said the findings were concerning because living in a cold house can have serious heath implications. A nationwide Canstar Blue survey of 2060 people found 74 per cent have changed ...

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