Aaron Gilmore has no future with the National Party. The only question is when the end will come - now or at next year's list selection process, says Audrey Young.

A Christchurch couple's romantic dinner was ruined by National MP Aaron Gilmore's "unpleasant" behaviour at the table next to them.

The number of ex-diplomats in Parliament will swell to seven when new National MP Paul Foster-Bell joins the Government next month.

Keep Our Assets protesters at the National Party's Mainland Region conference say their mock toll booth was so well-received it may be used again.

Former National MP Paul Quinn has ruled out a return to Parliament to replace Jackie Blue.

History will regard the Key Government as having been responsible for a further and possibly decisive relapse in a long-term economic decline, writes Bryan Gould.

Labour and the unions have cried foul over the appointment of MP Jackie Blue as the new Equal Employment Opportunities Commissioner.

A private investigator has been cleared of alleged misconduct for secretly filming National Party president Peter Goodfellow and his estranged wife Libby Black in their former matrimonial home.

Prime Minister John Key was pushing his childhood friend Ian Fletcher as a good candidate for a top-level government job as early as 2009, says Ian Rennie.

Claire Trevett says when it comes to delivering bad news about the fauna and flora of NZ, the same advice applies as to tramping near fairy tern nesting sites: tread with meticulous care.

Someone should tell David Shearer that getting all indignant about someone else's blunder was not the best of tactics to employ in Parliament, writes John Armstrong.

Were senior Cabinet ministers asleep at the wheel? Did they fail to step in soon enough when problems at Solid Energy were apparent? John Armstrong investigates.

Why has National remained so incredibly popular for so long despite suffering continuing calamities, embarrassments and unwanted distractions, asks John Armstrong.

John Key was touted as a dinner companion in a lucky dip contest fronted by a National Party minister - but never knew he was the prize used to lure entrants.

Since the 1980s, too, successive Governments have become increasingly high-handed, and ideologically driven, writes Anne Salmond.

Nine months in the political wilderness awaiting Lyn Provost's painstaking report may well have done the trick, writes John Armstrong.

Dame Sian Elias and fellow judges of the Supreme Court made a remarkable declaration of confidence in you and me and our adherence to a constitution this week.

A Parliamentary committee has recommended a starting wage for youth be passed into law.

National has risen above 50 per cent again in the latest 3 News political poll, while Labour and the Greens polled 43 per cent between them - well short of a majority.

Hekia Parata or no Hekia Parata in the job, Cabinet ministers had few illusions from the start.

The Herald met Nikki Kaye in 2013, she was a fresh-faced Cabinet Minister.

Longstanding National MP and former Speaker Lockwood Smith has used his final speech in Parliament to tell of his regret at voting against homosexual law reform.

As you'll know by breathless media reports, the old battle-axe Titewhai Harawira took the country to the brink of disaster just as the Prime Minister and other dignitaries were about to arrive at the lower Waitangi marae.

The lawyer hand-picked by Minister of Justice Judith Collins for a top state service job is an old friend of her husband, says a private investigator who used to work for both men.

So coos the sugar-encrusted, but hollow-sounding real estate-speak intent on seducing would-be home buyers and hard-headed investors into succumbing to the charms of life at Hobsonville Pt.

In between overseas trips, Murray McCully talks to political editor Audrey Young about his hectic year ahead.

Carter takes over as Speaker of the House despite Labour move to install Mallard