COMMENT: Sometimes, a really effective policy simply doesn't get the appreciation it deserves.

The Prime Minister is unmoved by a poll for the Drug Foundation showing most New Zealanders now support legalising, or at least decriminalising, cannabis.

How could a thousand people fall ill anywhere in New Zealand from drinking tap water?

After the disappointment of the All Black Sevens at the Olympics this week, some rugby fans were suggesting they should lose that title.

Despite everything, the Olympic Games are working their magic.

The report of the Independent Hearings Panel on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan injected a good dose of realism into the plan.

EDITORIAL: This country has no need to lower its interest rates.

The response of police to reports of people running up big bills in restaurants and then disappearing raises concerns not only for the restaurant owners.

As the curtain rises on the 31st Olympics, the prospects for a memorable games in Rio de Janiero are uncertain.

The debate over the Bain murders looks destined never to be resolved in the public mind.

Regulation is hard to get right. The political climate tends to swing from excessive freedom to excessive restriction or vice versa.

It is a tough task for teenagers to make sound decisions about their career path.

After winning the Rugby World Cup last year, All Black coach Steve Hansen could probably name the tenure of his next contract.

For the past two weeks, reporter David Fisher and photographer Mark Mitchell have taken us on a journey through New Zealand as it is today.

New Zealand's prison muster is closing in on 10,000 inmates, about the population of Greymouth.

Predators have a price tag. According to a University of Auckland study, the cost of ridding New Zealand of pests over 50 years is about $9 billion.

We are going to see Russians winning medals and an Olympic movement in disgrace.

The Republican Party in the United States conferred its nomination for President on a man of doubtful political pedigree and unpredictable intentions.

Having once been too reliant on one export market, NZ does not want to be in that position again, whether the market is post-Brexit Britain or China.

Russia and her allies have started a fightback to stay in the Rio Olympics after the sensational disclosures about a state-directed doping programme.

The Vice-President should enjoy his 24 hours here. His personality and his politics are closer to a Kiwi style than most American officials we greet.

Having summoned democracy to his side, the Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdogan may need to be more willing to honour it.

Two pathfinding odysseys are circling the globe in unconventional carriers.

China refused to participate in the Sea Law case and does not recognise it as a legitimate exercise under international law.

It is hard to escape the sense that Hekia Parata should have gone further when announcing a limited inclusion of digital technology in school curriculum.

State housing and building programmes are just the political branding of a package that contains more potent taxation inside.

If the gun lobby in the US has been impervious to the carnage caused by lax gun laws, it surely cannot continue to ignore the power of phone cameras.

The Ministry of Health refuses to fund a simple sleeping pod for babies so they might more safely sleep alongside their mothers.

Way out in space, so far that it takes a message nearly an hour to reach earth, the Nasa craft Juno is doing what the classical mythologists anticipated.

John Chilcot produced his verdict on the Blair Government's decision to join the US' invasion of Iraq. None of its findings are a surprise.