Shawn McAvinue

A "bedraggled'' aviary at Otago SPCA in Dunedin will be replaced with a new purpose-built facility after a $5000 donation from Delta yesterday.

Friendly fire was exchanged in Dunedin last night at the Hiroshima Day debate, which discussed whether New Zealand was safer being nuclear-free and out of the Anzus Treaty.

A stolen laptop and backup computer hard-drive belonging to a Dunedin writer has been recovered and two ''scumbags'' charged but the life story of the Dunedin woman with a degenerative disease was deleted - but could still be recovered.

Theologian Sir Lloyd Geering found his five years at Otago Boys' High School a ''grind'' but it taught him ''how to play the game''.

A Kavanagh College rugby player is in an induced coma in Dunedin Hospital after suffering a head injury on Saturday.

Female University of Otago academics told on Thursday of unwanted sexual advances by colleagues, lack of permanent positions and unread academic work, revealing gender inequalities.

Mosgiel pensioner Eleanor Moore's mobility scooter explosion could have been avoided by following some precautionary charging measures but one makes her feel unsafe and she hopes Housing NZ will provide greater protection.

The millions of taxpayers' dollars that fund the ''What's My Number'' campaign is money well spent because it keeps power companies price-competitive, Electricity Authority chief executive Carl Hansen says.

Contractors say they will shelve work on installing a 2degrees cellphone tower in Brighton until given further instructions by the telecommunications company.

Two Australian brothers snowboarding in Queenstown were rescued from a gully near the Remarkables skifield late last night.

A Dunedin couple are offering a $1000 reward for the ''irreplaceable'' items stolen from their Northeast Valley villa.

A wheelie-bin arsonist left mounds of melted plastic and a Dunedin suburb ''saturated'' with police patrols yesterday morning.

More babies were taken from mothers and put in Government care in the South Island last year despite a North Island area having bigger population.

The eviction date given to Dunedin pensioner Robyn Swale for feeding ducks outside her Dunedin City Council flat lapsed yesterday, but she is yet to receive official word about what will happen.

Synthetic cannabis addicts should smoke cannabis as it is the ''lesser of two evils'', says Dunedin Community Alcohol and Drug Services clinician Mark Greco.

A door-to-door truck shop is targeting Dunedin beneficiaries to spend their weekly food money to service debt, Dunedin Budget Advisory Services adviser Charlotte Wallace says.

About 60 ''flat cats'' came a step closer to domestic bliss at a clinic in Dunedin yesterday for the cats of tertiary students.