This is not a Government that often springs surprises, for which we should be grateful most of the time.

A party of off-road driving enthusiasts set out in 13 vehicles on Sunday to tackle a notorious high-country dirt track before it was closed for the winter.

The Labour Party surprised many people last week by advocating the complete abolition of boundaries on urban expansion.

Parker has New Zealand and Samoa behind him tonight as he bids for a chance to go for the summit. Here's to him.

These days Auckland is more like a graveyard for potential All Blacks. They seem to do better in any other franchise.

A survey of 1777 secondary school teachers has found nearly half believe the national assessment system, NCEA, is adversely affecting their teaching.

It is often said in favour of prisoner rehabilitation programmes that every offender has to be released eventually. That's not quite true.

We should be reducing debt faster while the good times last, not talking about tax cuts.

The theory of tradeable quotas always sounded too good to be true.

The Government should tilt the market in favour of those still waiting for the Kiwi dream.

A man drives into a bridge and a city grinds to a halt. Such is the impact of a crash on Auckland's vulnerable motorway system.

The election of a candidate of Islamic Pakistani extraction as mayor of London is a proud moment for Britain and inclusion of minorities in its politics.

It is not often that international solutions work so well but when it happens, it deserves a tentative cheer.

The Auckland RSA deservedly took a barrage of criticism for its failure to include wheelchair-bound veterans in its dawn parade to the Auckland cenotaph.

Let us not soften the language we use about a man who hits a woman. It has been called domestic violence or partner violence.

The primary school system is in trouble. It is failing some of the young pupils who can least afford to be left behind.

The requirement for all rental properties to be insulated by mid-2019 was just a step in the right direction.

The fear is MediaWorks is losing too much talent. It needs to show it is still a serious competitor for visual news and current affairs.

Lizzie Marvelly has today written bravely about harassment she has endured at the hands of men in the music industry.

The bank and the Government need new solutions to the economic damage being done by this raging house market.

The Prime Minister's talk of a new tax on land is a sign that he is worried by the resurgence in house prices, as he should be.

People should be able to come home at the end of their working day. In New Zealand, that is less sure than in Australia or the United Kingdom.

Exactly a century ago, when New Zealanders marked the first anniversary of the Gallipoli landings, they would have been heartily sick of war.

The latest honour bestowed on the Rugby World Cup-winning All Blacks is the tribute which best illustrates their extraordinary consistency.

Our forebears came to NZ to escape perpetual tenancy and have property of their own. That has been the Kiwi dream and there is no reason to give it up now.

Ratepayers in Hawkes Bay have every reason to expect accountability and transparency from a big irrigation project in the region.

Australia's politics continue to be as turbulent as New Zealand's are calm.

It may be a reflection of an unusually long and warm summer, now past, that the numbers of homeless on Auckland's streets appears to have increased lately.

An international conference at the United Nations headquarters this week is expected to agree that the UN's "war on drugs" is over, and it has failed.

Rugby is an industry in which New Zealand dominates the world, and the remuneration of its international players reflects its success.