National

New Zealand's iconic Christmas Tree, the pohutukawa, may have originated from Australia, a new study says.

Police have released the name of a teenager who died in a workplace accident at a Hamilton warehouse earlier this week.

An Air Force Orion sent to search for four New Zealanders on a yacht off Fiji has now rendezvoused with the crew.

Prime Minister Bill English has indicated Todd Barclay did not know his recording of a staff member's conversations could be illegal until a police investigation was launched.

The woman at the centre of a secret tape scandal which has cost Southland MP Todd Barclay his Parliamentary seat says the rookie politician should have resigned immediately.

Repeated cuts in the cost of fuel in recent weeks - to the lowest levels since September last year - has the AA perplexed.

There are fresh calls for all police officers to be armed as New Zealand faces a "second wave" of drug and organised crime with significant international ties, a new report claims.

"Urgent action'' needs to be taken over the side-effects of the anti-psychotic drug clozapine, a new study says.

Canterbury schools were fed "inaccurate and insufficient information'' about closures and mergers after the 2011 earthquake, the Chief Ombudsman has found.

With National MP Todd Barclay out the way, Opposition parties have turned their attention to Prime Minister Bill English and the police role in a secret recording scandal.

A new selection process will begin ''very shortly'' in the Clutha-Southland electorate after MP Todd Barclay's announcement yesterday he is quitting Parliament, the National Party says.