New Zealand Herald

New Zealand Herald

Bleddy Ref - Goldie Returned - Rapist Dead - Moore & Samuels - Manning On Roll - Forestry Relaxation - Woman Charged - Maori Students - Cervical Inquiry Golden Handshake - Nz Judge

BLEDDY REF: The South African referee whose long second half cost New Zealand the Bledisloe Cup says the All Blacks wasted six minutes mucking about with their lineouts. A Herald stopwatch analysis shows 7m 35s were added to normal time at the end of the second half.

- GOLDIE RETURNED: The identity of an anonymous art benefactor who returned a stolen Charles Goldie painting remained a mystery last night as the net tightened on those responsible for wrenching it from the wall of the Auckland Museum. Auckland police were stunned when the businessman - who wants to remain anonymous - walked into the central police station late on Saturday night with the painting - worth up to $65,000 - wrapped in newspaper.

- RAPIST DEAD: A man accused of sex crimes, including the vicious Mother's Day rape of a South Auckland woman, has been found dead in Mt Eden Prison. Alfred Taituma, aged 44, was found in his remand-section cell about 11 am on Saturday.

- MOORE & SAMUELS: : Mike Moore, on leave from his job as Director-General of the World Trade Organisation, is staying in the Far North with sacked Maori Affairs Minister Dover Samuels, an old friend. The former Labour Prime Minister said it was inappropriate for him to comment on Mr Samuels' situation but he was willing to talk about his first year in the WTO and the protests he had encountered in most countries.

- MANNING ON ROLL: When Te Kauwhata RSA president Rohan Wahrlich first met Private Leonard Manning as a young boy fascinated with the Army, he never thought he would be adding his name to the Roll of Honour. When Private Manning's name is written in gold next month it will be the first to join the Waikato township's roll since the Second World War.

- FORESTRY RELAXATION: By noon each day, thousands of New Zealand forestry workers have each scaled more than 50 pine trees and dragged ladders, harnesses and metre-long pruning shears through dense gorse and blackberry bush. But instead of putting their feet up and taking it easy, many eat on the run while they go in search of a different kind of relaxation.

- WOMAN CHARGED: A 28-year-old Carterton woman was charged yesterday with assaulting a Wairarapa toddler who died last month. Hinewaoriki Karaitiana-Matiaha was already dead when she was taken to Masterton Hospital by two aunts on Sunday, July 23.

- MAORI STUDENTS: The number of Maori schoolchildren will equal Pakeha by 2050, an Education Review Office report into multicultural schools predicts. Ministry of Education statistics show that in July last year the student population comprised 65 per cent Pakeha and just under 20 per cent Maori.

- CERVICAL INQUIRY: Five weeks of evidence and cross-examination ended at the Gisborne cervical screening inquiry yesterday with two former national coordinators responding to criticism of the national cervical screening programme. Susan Dahl, national coordinator from January 1993 to September 1994, said comments that there had been little evaluation or monitoring of the programme were "very harsh."

- GOLDEN HANDSHAKE: A top local government official has been forced out of her job, with ratepayers left to pick up the tab for any golden handshake, National claims. National's Murray McCully said yesterday that Carol Stigley, chief executive of Local Government New Zealand, was the victim of a breakdown in the Coalition's much-vaunted "partnership" with local bodies.

- NZ JUDGE: A former New Zealand Appeal Court judge has pulled out of the British inquiry into the Bloody Sunday killings, pushing it further behind schedule. Sir Edward Somers, aged 72 of Christchurch, left the three-man tribunal saying that "personal reasons" were behind his resignation.

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