APNZ

John Key is lowering public expectations that the Government can deliver on its promise to have its books back in surplus by 2014-15.

A job surge associated with last year's Rugby World Cup may have proved a false hope for unemployed New Zealanders, as benefit numbers have crept up again this summer.

An American couple holidaying on the Coromandel Peninsula froze in their seats as a man smashed the windows of their van with a crowbar after an argument they had with him on a beach.

It had been nearly 22 months to the day since Ross Taylor last made a test century for New Zealand so the skipper was understandably happy to have broken his drought in Napier yesterday.

A man has been seriously injured after the car he was driving hit two parked cars and a light pole in Auckland overnight.

All Black Sonny Bill Williams has been linked to a new girl - the teenage daughter of former rugby and league international Matthew Ridge.

Snow fell near Dunedin and other parts of the South Island reached near freezing temperature last night as a midsummer cold snap makes its way up the country, the website WeatherWatch says.

You have just turned 24, won a Rugby World Cup, are young enough to play in a couple more, and cemented a place in New Zealand rugby history. How do you top that?

New Zealand has dropped out of the top 10 countries for media freedom after a year in which police searched newsrooms over the now-infamous "teapot tapes''.

A toddler who stowed away in a trailer went on an unexpected 20km ride down the winding Takaka Hill, to the shock of his oblivious grandfather.