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15 Aug 2026

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Neighbour heard loud 'boom', explosions as fire gutted Island Bay home
"Vicious" flames spread quickly in strong winds across two properties.

Westpac CEO explains commission cut decision
Westpac chief executive Catherine McGrath explains why the bank is ending trail commissions on home loans and says the move isn't impacting applications.

Still a ‘really difficult’ time to be a retailer as two Stirling Sports stores go under
The Christchurch stores went into liquidation citing weak sales, and rising operational costs as factors.

Mushroom murderer Erin Patterson files appeal against conviction
Convicted mushroom killer Erin Patterson’s bid to appeal her guilty verdicts has been lodged and accepted by the Court of Appeal.

‘No-one is going to hear you’ - guilty plea over rape of student
A man who has admitted raping a student, ordered her to wash her hands as he later removed her sheets.

ACC cuts Water Safety NZ funding, saying drowning injury claims not reducing
ACC says it hasn’t seen a measurable reduction in the $3 million a year it pays out in drowning injury claims; Water Safety NZ says the decision will “make a hard job a whole lot harder”.

Fourth hornet queen found in Auckland
It brings the total number of hornets found to six.

Police across NZ involved in falsifying alcohol breath tests
About 120 staff are under investigation after 30,000 tests were "falsely or erroneously recorded".

Cloud startup Lambda unveils multi-billion-dollar deal with Microsoft

OpenAI debated merging with one of its biggest rivals after firing Sam Altman, court docs reveal

Bitcoin Miners IREN, Cipher Rise After Multi-Billion-Dollar Microsoft, Amazon Deals

David Seymour admits 'a lot of upgrades' needed for country's fire trucks
It comes after a former All Black-turned-firefighter's claims of at least one truck breaking down every day.

Battlefield 6’s new ‘dad mode’ replaces trash-talkers with bot armies
If the pace of a first-person shooter is too much for your tired reflexes, take heart: Electronic Arts’ Battlefield 6 has added “Casual Breakthrough,” a mode where most human players are replaced with bots but experience gain isn’t really affected. The new addition to the frenetic shooter sim was announced over...

A new waste mountain?
Every minute of every hour of every day huge numbers of lithium-ion cells roll off production lines around the world. They go into EVs, portable devices, vacuum cleaners and almost every thing else you can think of. What happens when they eventually fail? What do we do with this mountain...

NZTA to spend another $32 million fixing Wellington's Transmission Gully
NZTA's Mark Owen told Morning Report the builder never applied the final chip seal layer so it was not as waterproof as it should be.

Black Caps opener ruled out of T20I series against West Indies
Tim Seifert was hit hard on the glove while batting for Northern Districts in the Ford Trophy on Monday.

One of the cheapest ways to jet across the Tasman: Qantas competes with Air NZ on new route
The Australian carrier has begun flights between Auckland and Adelaide.

Photos reveal extent significant fire damage to Auckland track
Fairy Falls Track, which reopened last summer after a $1.6 million renewal, is closed again after a fire broke out on Sunday.

How would a move to criminalise pornographic deepfakes in New Zealand work?
Explainer - They have been described as a sadistic and degrading weapon - yet in New Zealand, nude deepfakes are not explicitly a crime.

Palantir Q3 earnings set to test AI defense tech stock's rally as investors eye government shutdown impact

The Steam Deck pushes Linux past a new milestone: 3% of Steam gamers
It’s finally happening! The year of the Linux… PC gaming handheld device. (Okay, that doesn’t quite roll off the tongue.) According to the latest Steam hardware survey, Linux has just over 3 percent of the market share of users who have Steam installed. It has almost certainly benefited from Valve’s...