新西兰英语 314 MP Chris Carter

The Labour MP Chris Carter is in trouble today. He wrote a letter which he handed to some reporters. The letter said that he believed Phil Goff, who is the Leader of the Opposition, does not have a chance to win the next election. He believed that an

新西兰英语 203 Boy Racers

Listen also to May 26th 2009 The law to crush boy racers cars passed in Parliament today. The government hopes that boy racers will be so frightened of having their cars crushed that they will drive sensibly. The Minister of Police, Judith Collins, s

新西兰英语 282 Violence in Thailand

Since March there has been conflict in the streets of Bangkok between the Red Shirt protestors, who support the last Prime Minister, and the Thai army. However in the last fortnight the violence has increased, with over 60 people dead and more than 1

新西兰英语 88 Problems in Fiji

Relations between Fiji and New Zealand are very tense at the moment. Two years ago, Commodore Bainimarama got rid of the Prime Minister and took over the government of Fiji himself in a coup. He established martial law, which is rule by the army. New

新西兰英语 423 Schools share sites in Christchurch

Thirty-four schools in Christchurch have a red sticker which means the school is badly damaged and not safe. Nearly all schools are now open but for most of those 34, it means sharing with another school one in the morning and one in the afternoon. T

新西兰英语 109 Scholarship Results

On Wednesday, high school students who sat scholarship exams at the end of last year, found their results on the NZQA website. By now, all students will have their results by mail too. Scholarship exams are for the top students in schools. They are e

新西兰英语 115 Workers lose their jobs

Each week now we hear of more workers who are losing their jobs. This week, Sealord will lay off 180 workers from their Nelson fish processing factory but they will employ another 50 on the fishing boats. These days it is cheaper to process fish on t

新西兰英语 238 Mike Moore US Ambassador

The government announced our new ambassador to the United States will be Mike Moore. This is an interesting choice as Mike Moore was a Labour Party MP and also, very briefly, the Prime Minister in 1990. The present government is a National government

新西兰英语 117 ACC in financial trouble

The Head of the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) was fired from his job on Monday because the ACC was in debt. The costs are more than the income. Our ACC means that we cannot sue anyone who causes an accident. This is different from countries

新西兰英语 130 Michael Cullen to resign

Michael Cullen was Deputy Prime Minister for nine years under the Labour government led by Helen Clark. He has announced that he will leave Parliament at the end of April. Like Helen Clark, he has been an MP since 1981. He was Finance Minister during

新西兰英语 131 John Key in Thailand

The Prime Minister, John Key, is on his way to Thailand for the Asean conference which will be held this weekend in Pattaya, 100km south of Bangkok. Ten Asian countries including Japan, South Korea, India, Australia and China, will be represented at

新西兰英语 156 David Bain Not Guilty

Over the past three months, TV news has shown the David Bain re-trial. This is his second trial. David has spent 13 years in prison for murdering five members of his family, his mother, father, two sisters and his brother in 1994. David Bain said tha

新西兰英语 276 John Key in Afghanistan

Prime Minister, John Key, has just ended a 3-day visit to Afghanistan. Helen Clark also visited Afghanistan when she was Prime Minister. We have 70 members of the SAS (Special Air Services) fighting in Kabul and 140 soldiers working in Bamiyan provin

新西兰英语 324 More babies born

Statistics New Zealand released figures of births for the year ending June 2010. The figures show that births are up by 2%. Most of that increase is in Auckland. In 1961, women had an average of 4.3 children but today women have an average of 2.2 chi

新西兰英语 413 Official Cash Rate

The governor of the Reserve Bank, Dr Bollard, reduced the official cash rate (OCR) by half a percent from 3% to 2.5% today. For background to the OCR, listen to June 10th 2010 and follow the links. Most banks immediately dropped the floating mortgage

新西兰英语 287 Dairy Farmers feel hopeful

Fonterra said today that the 11,000 dairy farmers in their co-operative will receive an opening price of $6.60 a kg of milk solids for the 2010 / 2011 year. They will also get 30c to 50c for each share they have in the company. In fact, the price cou

新西兰英语 290 A new New Zealand bank

Three finance companies are planning to merge to become a bank. At the moment, there is no name for this bank. The three finance companies are the Canterbury Building Society, Southern Cross Building Society and Marac finance which is owned by Pyne G

新西兰英语 169 John Key’s visit to the Pacific

Last week, John Key visited four Pacific Island countries: Tonga, Samoa, Niue and the Cook Islands. He spent one day in each country. New Zealand gives financial aid to each of these countries and one reason for the visit was to find out what each co

新西兰英语 218 30 years since Erebus crash

To remember the Erebus crash 30 years ago, Air NZ is paying for six people to fly to Antarctica and visit Mt Erebus. The people chosen are family members of someone who was killed in that plane crash. These six people were chosen by ballot. To find o

新西兰英语 320 Military funeral

The funeral for Lieutenant Tim ODonnell was held today at Linton Military Camp. Linton is the nearest military camp to Tims hometown, Feilding. Tim was killed a week ago in Afghanistan. Listen to August 4th 2010 for more about what happened. He is th