Will 2018 compensate for the 23 years of long winter? Hell yes, it already has.

Journalist Edward Rooney found booking an airbag replacement surprising effortless.

COMMENT: Vague is in vogue as the heat goes to our heads. Here are the reasons why.

Struggling Northland marae could be fixed up by bailed offenders, advocacy group says.

Inmates at eight prisons are at last getting their share of current affairs.

Disappointing start to the traditional summer riding season for motorcyclists.

The depth of Shane Jones' pockets will be tested by NZ's needy regions

Daily newspapers being delivered to more prisons to

Remembering the man who lived the ups and downs on the dirty sidewalks of Broadway.

In Australia, Kiwis are second class citizens. Here, we give our mates from Aus flowers.

Firefighters around the country are preparing for the worst as the Big Dry sets in.

Watch NZ Herald Focus: My wife was three days overdue with the latest addition to the family when I was told my blood donor status had changed.

A prison reform group, formerly headed by the late Sir Peter Williams, QC, has been renamed in his honour.

28 hours later the protest at Kaitaia Airport by Ngati Kahu ends in a blaze of tyres and five arrests.

Children will miss out on clinics after protesters occupying Kaitaia Airport have forced a flight carrying five specialist doctors to be cancelled this morning.

Prime Minister John Key says Solid Energy "did everything they possibly could" to recover the bodies of 29 miners at Pike River.

A ground-breaking development by a Kiwi is expected to reduce death and injury from dangerous button batteries worldwide.

Residents in a quiet, family neighbourhood were left shocked and fearful after tragedy struck in their midst last weekend.

Laila Harre's appointment was one of the worst-organised interviews we've attended, writes Edward Rooney.

The Greens have released the final roster of list candidates for this year's election - and there's one notable omission.

The population of a small Central Otago town will shrink when the school choir jets off to Melbourne for a festival this year.

It was a handful of glass marbles that drew the attention of the most famous woman in the world to a star-struck Auckland boy.

The family of an Auckland man killed as he intervened in an attack five years ago have called on Kiwis to live up to his legacy.

Shark fin remains on the dinner menu at Auckland's SkyCity casino, at $70 for a small serving, despite assurances to the contrary.

Holiday-makers returning to the big smoke are leaving a trail of fumes north of Auckland in traffic delays of up to three hours.

One person is dead and another critically injured after a high speed crash on a river in the Hawkes Bay.

Members of the Northern Action Group reckon they would do better out of the SuperCity.

The Government postponed an announcement this week on the sale of shares in Meridian Energy, sparking doubts about whether the sell-off will go ahead on schedule in November.

A slice of gay New Zealand history goes up for auction this morning.

A controversial children's novel is being reviewed by the Office of Film and Literature Classification.

World media remain on alert for the birth of the royal baby this weekend.

New landlord Vicky Crawford has been inadvertently passing on the full Watercare Services bill to her tenants - unaware a portion of it was hers to pay.

Len Brown launches his re-election campaign today, and pledges to tackle social problems such as corner bottle stores and pokie parlours.

The Government might have better spent it's $9.5million school breakfast money on walking school buses, findings from a Danish study into children and exercise suggest.

Broadcaster John Tamihere raced to a fatal car crash in central Auckland yesterday after hearing his wife's son was hurt.

On this day 60 years ago, a strapping mountaineer from Auckland wrote in his diary: "George, Greg, Tenzing and I plus eight Sherpas (five to South Col and three Ridge men - Ang Nima, Pemba and Ang Pemba) set off for South Col."

Star rugby league winger Manu Vatuvei knows as much as any New Zealand sportsman how crowds can dish up the abuse.

Harry "Middy" Middleton spoke very few words about the Great War.

A fee for tapping into the waterworks in parts of Auckland has gone up by 900 per cent in the past two years - from less than $850 to almost $8000.

It's the bane of sports fans everywhere - their favourite club changing kit yearly, forcing them to spend big dollars to look up-to-date.

When the Govt announced a Budget was being unveiled on August 12, 1982, good, keen Kiwi blokes knew what to do.

Census officials are calling on New Zealanders to participate in the national survey next Tuesday as it will bring about sweeping changes to our lives.

In the midst of turmoil over Maori land in 1987, it was still possible to enjoy an idyllic childhood as a tomboy, beachcombing the shorelines of Omarere Beach and Kai Iwi lakes.

Hopes for an annual international air show have crash-landed with financial failure after this year's inaugural event.

Helen Clark intervened to get a quickie knighthood for ailing broadcaster Paul Holmes, after discovering how seriously ill he was.

A rigging supervisor who narrowly escaped death in a helicopter crash is fighting to overturn official findings that hold him partly responsible.

In 2004, John Mercer was at Cheltenham Beach, flicking his 4-year-old girl high into the summer afternoon air time and again. Photographer Amos Chapple happened upon the scene and caught the action as it happened.

Two bikers were killed on a toy run for charity when about half a dozen riders were hit head-on by a van yesterday.

A man cleared of offensive behaviour after being seen jogging in the nude celebrated yesterday by going boogie boarding - naked. "It's just another day at the office," he beamed.

The lawyer for a man cleared of charges for jogging in the nude says the case is proof of New Zealand's growing tolerance.

An elite school plans to send Year 13 students away to camp next year - for the entire year.