Checkpoint for Thursday 5 December 2019

6:23 PM.The Pike River recovery team expects to break the main seal and push further into the mine by Christmas if all goes according to plan.

WorkSafe has signed off on an exemption that will allow the next… Read more Video, Audio

6:20 PM.The Chief Censor is concerned about the rise in popularity of simulated incest porn online and videos with non-consensual behaviour.

The Office of Film and Literature Classification has released a… Read more Audio

6:15 PM.The Commerce Commission has confirmed what many drivers already suspected: they're probably paying too much at the petrol pump.

The competition watchdog says the big fuel companies' stranglehold over… Read more Video, Audio

6:08 PM.Returning to Samoa now where just 5,000 people were vaccinated today as the medical teams raced against time to vaccinate the country's population against measles.

People were told to stay at home on… Read more Video, Audio

5:55 PM.An experienced hiker who was swept almost to his death in a Tasman river, says it's the closest call he's ever had in the outdoors.

Chris Muse, an outdoor guide in Alaska, was walking the South… Read more Video, Audio

5:50 PM.Many Ngāpuhi leaders are doubtful the Crown's renewed effort to get its Treaty settlement back on track will work, and are furious they've been given just days notice before an open hui about a way… Read more Video, Audio

5:40 PM.The woman known as the "Black Widow" has won the right to have body samples of her dead husband released so they can be re-tested.

Helen Milner was jailed for life in 2014 and ordered to spend at… Read more Audio

5:36 PM.News from the business sector, including a market report. Audio

5:33 PM.The Reserve Bank is going ahead with a plan to make banks hold significantly more capital to back their loans.

The decision is estimated to cost the banks $20 billion and is expected to increase… Read more Audio

5:28 PM.Pharmac-funded research into whether people with epilepsy were imagining side effects from a medicine brand change has been suspended after four deaths were linked to the switch.

The research… Read more Video, Audio

5:18 PM.The government is promising to push through new laws to help force down the price of petrol by mid next year.

A final report by the Commerce Commission into the retail fuel market has found industry… Read more Video, Audio

5:10 PM.Samoa went into shutdown today as the death toll from the measles epidemic climbed to 62 and a two-day door to door vaccination campaign got underway.

People were told to stay at home today between… Read more Video, Audio