The opposition doubts the public will be ready for an election in September; and the National Party insists Covid-19 contact tracing is failing to find too many people or is too slow.
1.Police and military guards could be used to monitor people returning from overseas under new rules to be announced today. The Government is to announce the compulsory supervised quarantine of all people entering the country.
2.The National Party insists Covid-19 contact tracing is failing to find too many people or is too slow. As the Government seeks reliable data to help it make a decision on whether to lift the lockdown.
3.The opposition doubts the public will be ready for an election in September. Parts of the country are increasingly looking likely to be living under varying kinds of lockdown when the general election rolls around on 19 September.
4.A hundred thousand face masks owned by two District Health Board’s in the Wellington region are in need of repair after parishing in storage. The elastic on 90,000 masks held by the Capital and Coast and 10,000 by the Hutt Valley District Health Board has deteriorated and needs replacing.
5.The Government’s employment watchdog is warning businesses failing to pass on the wage subsidy that they could be committing fraud. 290 complaints have been made to the labour inspectorate during the lockdown which include many about employers forcing their staff to take leave.
6.Severe Tropical Cyclone Harold strengthened to a category 5 cyclone overnight as it moved away from Fiji and headed to the Tonga group with wind gusts of 285km/h. Reports from Tonga’s capital, Nuku’alofa say strong winds were being felt there and there were power outages in some areas.
7.Thousands of people have reported feeling a shallow 4.3 quake that struck near Christchurch. It was centred 10 km south-west of Christchurch and was at a depth of 5km. There have been no reports of damage from the quake which hit at 7.49am.
8.Paywave limits will increase to $200 to reduce physical contact with PIN pads during the Covid-19 pandemic. Previously only transactions of $80 or less were able to be completed without a PIN using a contactless card.
9.A lorry driver from Northern Ireland has pleaded guilty to the manslaughter of 39 Vietnamese migrants who were found dead in a refrigerated trailer last year. Maurice Robinson, 25, was arrested shortly after the bodies of eight females and 31 males were found in a trailer attached to his Scania cab in an industrial park in Grays, Essex, on 23 October.
ENDS
