A promising young rugby player with a "glittering career" ahead of him has been given a discharge without conviction after admitting an assault on a man who was at a bar with his ex-girlfriend.

The business year starts gradually and, usually, nervously. This year is no exception.

When the Christmas-New Year period ended for accident statistics on Tuesday morning, 12 more people had died on the roads.

President Barack Obama's tearful intervention this week in America's gun control debate had an immediate impact.

With two months until we vote on national symbol, it is important to view proposed new design in action.

Like most long-established Australian retailers in this country, Dick Smith felt like one of ours. How could it have failed?

The modern pre-Christmas frenzy is closely followed by sales where consumers rush to buy more stuff to clutter their lives.

A new year, 2016. Suddenly we are into the second half of the second decade of the 21st century.

The law is clear. When it comes to search warrants, there is a line which protects all in society, and in some cases particularly the press.

Eventual ruling could have far-reaching implications for law governing use of the internet, from YouTube to Facebook.

It is time to recognise our common humanity, appreciate each other, and let us wish you, good readers, a happy Christmas.

Some believe the charge being set on the copper network was being artificially inflated, however there are a number of issues we need to reconsider.

The raising of interest rates by the United States Federal Reserve late last week is the best news in seven years for the world's economy.

Ko's year special by any measure and sign of what's to come but rugby heroes claim standout moment.

Search for New Zealander of Year recalls ethical dilemma of terminally-ill lawyer's legal battle for right to end her own life.

Strange and costly things can happen to an economy when a government decides its wisdom is better than the signals of a market.

Getting so many nations, including "developing" nations such as China, to sign on to emissions reductions certainly makes the agreement historic.

Climate change may still seem a distant threat, but a "Super El Nino" summer is already evident.

Two petitions are circulating for the funding of the new immunotherapy drug against melanoma, Keytruda.

The new heavyweight boxing champion of the wwooorld is going to get very boring very quickly.

What more could a national holiday do except reopen old wounds and invite continued debate? We have enough of that around Waitangi Day.

For the past year, the Office of the Ombudsman has been reviewing the Official Information Act.

Judith Collins' return to John Key's Cabinet is a credit to her. It would have been easy for someone of her temperament to have reacted differently to her dismissal.

Gun sales in the US have increased. Requests for access to courses at shooting ranges are up.

Rob Campbell, once one of the sharpest young minds in the trade union movement, has kept a lower profile since his thinking changed radically in the 1980s.

Pharmac is possibly the most publicly respected body in this country.

Four years have passed, another Rugby World Cup has been won, and still the "people's wharf", "party central" of 2011, languishes largely forgotten.

As the Prime Minister said, "It makes no sense to be calling for emissions restrictions on one hand while subsidising emissions on the other."