Checkpoint for Monday 31 August 2020

5:07 PM.NZ businesses are being warned to batten down the hatches as cyber criminals expand their targets after taking down the stock exchange for the fifth consecutive trading day.

Two media outlets, RNZ… Read more Audio

5:16 PM.The Education Minister has issued a plea for all Auckland parents to send their children back to school, after thousands opted to stay away from classrooms today.

Around 250,000 children were… Read more Audio

5:25 PM.Firefighters are continuing to battle a large scrub fire in the South Island's Mackenzie District.

The fire is believed to have started around half past eleven yesterday morning near Lake Pukaki.

… Read more Video, Audio

5:29 PM.In Victoria the death toll has risen by 41 in the Australian state at the epicentre of the country's Covid-19 outbreak.

The number of daily infections has fallen to a near two-month low, with 73 new… Read more Video, Audio

5:38 PM.News from the business sector, including a market report. Video, Audio

5:43 PM.Some 10 years on from the devastating Canterbury quakes, the wait is still not over when it comes to law changes needed to improve the Earthquake Commission.

The government will not get it done until… Read more Video, Audio

5:54 PM.The government maintains it made the right call moving Auckland down an alert level, despite some of the country's top public health doctors worried it's too soon.

And the Health Minister say phone… Read more Audio

5:58 PM.In Tokoroa, Checkpoint reporter Nick Truebridge and cameraman Nick Monro spoke to locals about how Covid-19 is affecting their town. Read more Audio

6:07 PM.Masked-up Aucklanders cautiously made their way back to school and work today as the city returned to something resembling normal.

It was still quieter than before the latest level 3 lockdown… Read more Video, Audio

6:11 PM.The message to mask-up seems to have been well-received in Wellington today, with high compliance across all forms of public transport. RNZ reporter Eva Corlett took the bus to Wellington station to… Read more Audio

6:14 PM.The Ministry of Health has launched a review into a blunder which saw hundred of thousands of Aucklanders advised to get a Covid-19 test when they did not need to.

The Prime Minister said yesterday… Read more Video, Audio

6:17 PM.The government plans to introduce legislation to change the Earthquake Commission's operations, after a report found major failings.

It found EQC was woefully unprepared as it dealt with the… Read more Audio

6:21 PM.Greens co-leader James Shaw is scrambling to fix a storm of controversy over his decision to give millions of taxpayers' dollars to a private 'green' school.

Mr Shaw, who's also associate finance… Read more Audio

6:25 PM.Getting tested every four days is making the U.S Open experience a very different one for New Zealand tennis player, Michael Venus.

Several big names have opted out of the New York tournament, which… Read more Audio