After west Aucklanders suffered 3 years of aerial spraying of Foray 48B for the Painted Apple Moth, another round of aerial spraying is set to begin this week, this time of a herbicide to eradicate Crack Willow in Auckland's largest wetland area.

The Department of Conservation announced yesterday that it would take no further action over an incident in which it was alleged a woman smacked Moko with an oar or paddle when he was playing in Omaio bay two weeks ago.

Christchurch, Dec 3 NZPA - Police allege a man did $400,000 in damage with ram raids on Christchurch parking meters that got him $20,000 cash.

Christchurch, Nov 17 NZPA - David Jerrold Theobald will have to pay for less than a third of the $41,500 damage he caused in his ram-raid protest at the Christchurch offices of the Inland Revenue Department.

This week in 1989 was one of the most historic in recent times. In Berlin, a city divided after the Allied victory over Nazi Germany in 1945, the wall came tumbling down. And that made it both a good and a bad time to be a socialist.

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In the last two days Auckland City Mayor John Banks has been forced to back down on two major issues - parking charges and the Queens wharf - casting doubt on his leadership ability.

Several youths are contemplating breakfast in custody this morning following the recovery of three stolen cars in Hamilton early this morning.

Sergeant Charles Burgess of the Hamilton Police said the first car was recovered about 2.30am.

Keeping your Windows PC secure from viruses and spyware can be both difficult and expensive and some of the popular security software slows down computers.  Microsoft Security Essentials is a new free and effective anti-virus and anti-malware program.

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The so-called wins made by the Maori Party over the ETS deal appear to be disintegrating by the day and highlight how shambolic the negotiations must have been, Labour's Associate Energy spokesperson Chris Hipkins says.

The Government's embarrassing dithering over Auckland boundaries has resulted in an appropriate 11th hour u-turn on Rodney, but the decision to stick with its proposed southern boundary makes no sense at all, says Labour's Auckland Issues spokesperson Phil Twyford.