Prison officers have agreed to halt their industrial action and return to work. Earlier this week, the nearly two thousand officers were suspended for continuing their low level industrial action in support of their pay claims. The government ordered in defence personnel to help run the country's 17 jails. The prison officers' union, the Corrections Association or CANZ, says its members have agreed to return to work from tomorrow night. We're joined now by the national organiser of CANZ, Brian Davis. Now we're joined by the general manager of public prisons, Phil McCarthy. LIVE
To Fiji now - and the elections there are going down to the wire. The Fiji Unity [illegible] of the country's caretaker Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase, is now neck and neck with the deposed Prime Minister, Mahendra Chaudhry's Labour Party, as the counting for the remaining seven seats continues. Our reporter Barbara Dreaver is there and has just finished talking to both leaders - she joins me now. LIVE
We're joined now by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Phil Goff. LIVE
The results of East Timor's elections have just been announced - Fretilin has won decisively, although the party failed to get the two thirds majority it wanted. Our reporter Eric Frykberg has just returned from covering the elections - he is in our studio now. LIVE
BUSINESS NEWS WITH JOHN DRAPER
A group representing this country's most senior police officers fronted up to Parliamentary Select Committee this afternoon, warning that proposed law changes risk turning the police force into the Government's private army. The Committee is hearing submissions on amendments to the Police Act - changes the government says are designed to strengthen police accountability and clarify the relationship between the Police Minister and the Police Commissioner. But the Police Managers Guild is utterly opposed to the moves saying they [illegible] the independence of the Commissioner and open the police up to political interference. The President of the Guild John Reilly joins us now. LIVE
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The New Zealand Government is poised to put taxpayers' money into a rescue package for Air New Zealand. But there are also suggestions that Australia should be helping out financially, because Air New Zealand's problems relate to its Australian wing, Ansett. Ansett is reportedly losing a million dollars a day and needs a cash injection of up to a billion dollars to keep flying. The Air New Zealand board is meeting again late today to try to put together a rescue package to go before the government. Our economics correspondent Brent Edwards joins me now. LIVE
A West Coast coal company wants an exemption to existing transport laws so it can move millions of tonnes of coal in super-trucks three times the maximum size allowed now. The Pike River Coal Company wants to use 110 tonne-trucks, instead of the usual 44 tonne vehicles, to move the coal 40 kilometres from a proposed mine in the Grey Valley to Greymouth's wharf.
Tarek Bazley has been looking at the proposal. PKGE
The government has released a plan for preventing family violence in the wake of police figures showing a sharp rise in violent crime. A 1994 study estimates that one-in-seven families are affected by violence and that has an economic cost of at least one point two billion dollars a year. Our social issues correspondent Shona Geary reports that raising public awareness is one of five key areas highlighted in the plan. PKGE
The Nursing Council is hoping a joint agreement between New Zealand and Australia will help ease this country's chronic nursing shortage.
New Zealand is short of about two thousand nurses but the Nursing Council says a Memorandum of Co-operation it's to sign with its Australian counterpart will make it much easier to recruit nurses from across the Tasman. The Council's Chairperson Judy Kilpatrick says while both countries already recognise each other's nursing qualifications, the latest agreement effectively creates a [illegible] Australasian nursing pool. She says at the moment, Australian-registered nurses find it can take weeks or even months to get approval to work here. PREREC
To Queenstown now - and a former world hang gliding champion remains in hospital with spinal injuries after the latest in a spate of adventure tourism accidents. While the tourist town is known as the country's adventure capital, Maureen Lloyd reports that it's been making headlines for all the wrong reasons. PKGE
High profile prison escapee Kevin Polwart has had a further six years and nine months added to his original ten year sentence by the High Court in Wellington The additional time was imposed for escaping from custody, committing an armed robbery while on the run, and possession of three firearms - all of which Polwart admitted. Our Court Reporter Merle Nowland was at the sentencing and joins me now. LIVE
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