Calls for the dumping of the government’s disastrous new and proposed laws was a repeated focus of discussion at ECO’s AGM, held online on 23 August. The multitude of laws were described as eco-toxic by members at the meeting. Member groups were unanimous that at least five laws or draft...
Our winter lecture this year was held on the afternoon of 23 August at Kāhui St David’s, 70 Khyber Pass Road, Grafton, a Category A historic heritage place. About 60 people attended, enjoying the playing by Aleksy Kowalski of the 1905 Croft organ as they entered the Great Hall, then...
New Zealand’s largest environment NGOs – Forest and Bird, the Environmental Defence Society and Greenpeace Aotearoa – want to see the Natural Environment Bill and the Planning Bill thrown out. They say the bills are designed to undermine environmental protection in our country and would cause deep and lasting damage to...
New Zealand’s environmental reporting system should not simply document environmental decline, it should require the government to say what it will do about it, says the Environmental Defence Society. EDS has lodged its submission on the Environmental Reporting Amendment Bill. “The Bill contains some genuinely useful improvements, but there are...
A coalition of Aotearoa New Zealand’s environmental and climate organisations has delivered a joint open letter to all Members of Parliament, calling on them to back legislation that would permanently prohibit commercial mining across all public conservation land and waters. Civic Trust Auckland is one of those groups. The groups urge...
Mt Albert electorate MP Helen White has met with MCERT officials to share her concerns about the state of Building One. She is considering drafting a members’ bill to make it an obligation for owners or managers of heritage buildings to protect them from neglect. “What is not acceptable is...
The Tree Council is calling on the public to contact their local MP and ask them to vote against the Planning Bill and Natural Environment Bill when it goes for its third reading in a couple of weeks’ time. The protection of urban trees, other than notable trees with historic...
Throughout the year, Auckland Council and its community partners plant hundreds of thousands of native plants to protect and restore our waterways. A new trial on the North Shore in Wairau Valley is testing a Swiss-engineered technology to reduce sediment from stormwater ponds. It aims to lower carbon emissions and has the...
Remuera Library was built in 1926, in the Neo-Georgian Classical style of architecture, and opened to the public on the 31 July that year. The photo was taken a few years after it was opened. The library’s 100th birthday was celebrated on 25 July with speeches, cake, balloons, live music,...
The 2026 Tāmaki Makaurau Zero Waste Awards, held on 6 August, recognised Aucklanders doing the practical, everyday work of zero waste: rescuing materials, restoring taonga, and finding new uses for what would otherwise go to landfill. The awards honoured outstanding contributions to zero waste initiatives from people right across Auckland....