COMMENT: Let's stop cycle of whanau leaving us when so young.

COMMENT: It's not easy to read Winston Peters, says Alan Duff.

COMMENT: This weekend the world will feel ended for some and gloriously begun for others.

COMMENT: Rugby reflects the mateship Kiwis hold dear at the heart of their culture.

COMMENT: When a politician says he represents the poor, he is not telling the truth.

COMMENT: Colin Meads was a great New Zealander, says Alan Duff.

COMMENT: We're desperate for more tradesmen, not boys whipped into shape.

COMMENT: Julian Savea - the Bus - will be back. Those writing him off maybe not.

Why Alan Duff is thinking about changing who he votes for.

COMMENT: NZ needs a Guggenheim Museum like the one here in Bilbao, Spain.

COMMENT: Jones has air of over-confident club player convinced he should have been an AB.

COMMENT: Time to hand out tough sentences to welfare-bludger criminals.

COMMENT: Explorers teach us fundamental truths.

COMMENT: Some passengers' habits can turn already tiring long-haul travel into an ordeal.

COMMENT: Excessive displays of mirth and ego betray Kiwi values.

COMMENT: Everyone's an expert until events intervene, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: The Swiss show how business might take a far more active part in society.

Comment: We're less racially divided than a tiny minority would have us, says Alan Duff.

COMMENT: Too little commitment by leaders and lack of family support are barriers to kids.

COMMENT: Sometimes we find it hard to understand China but we need to try, says Alan Duff.

COMMENT: New leader has defied critics but path ahead is tough, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: Some offenders are trying to reclaim what was never given to them in first place

COMMENT: Macron is about to dance with France's first lady, Paris, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: No culture is friendlier - except when at the wheel, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: What is happening in Syria all depends on where you source your news from.

COMMENT: Alan Duff wants to see New Zealand try out more cultural festivals.

COMMENT: Welfare, drugs and booze are issues for many Maori, argues Alan Duff.

COMMENT: Achievement an inspiration that shatters generational mindset, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: My father opened our minds to notions, concepts bigger than our mere selves and gifted us with the rules of grammar.

COMMENT: As the world's least corrupt country, we are lucky that the brazilian outlook hasn't taken hold here. But it could if we're not vigilant.

A break-down in the countryside was a reminder of classic rural integrity and why our day-to-day problems fail to matter, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: Looking in our backyard at the familiar and the challenging, everything is so New Zealand, eh? Yeah-nah.

COMMENT: Uproar engulfing presidential hopeful is the sound of bubble bursting for political elite, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: Past atrocities can be found in the history of every culture and do not excuse wrong-doing in the present.

COMMENT: Gareth Morgan plays with a straight bat, but he needs to adjust his aim, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: Your columnist has a soft spot for those born into less blessed homes and difficult circumstances. But not for gang members.

COMMENT: Wherever you look in NZ our approach seems to shout 'who needs architecture?'

COMMENT: Keep making the resolution, and keep at it every day.

COMMENT: If the Kardashians are more famous than scientists saving millions of lives with their research, then we're all culturally less for it.

COMMENT: I reckon a little less spent on self, and more on others is the better Christmas spirit. Maybe that's a New Year resolution.

COMMENT: The situation is complex even for the people who live there, let alone us trying to understand it. None of our business.

COMMENT: Sugar is sprinkled over sugar over calorie-laden stodge. It's the culture, dude.

COMMENT: You want uplifting, pure unadulterated joy and access to your inner mind? Listen to Chopin.

COMMENT: The more science advances, the more inclined is the human race to cling to nonsense.

COMMENT: Blaming quakes on sexual behaviour is a disgraceful insult as our hearts go out to shaken communities.

COMMENT: Every reader and viewer saw headlines like 'mathematical impossibility' that Trump could win enough electoral votes.

COMMENT: I can never quite adjust my mind to accepting that a person in his or her mid-20s should resign to a life of living for alcohol.

COMMENT: Step out of the shot and let it be about someone else for a while - it's not always about you.

COMMENT: Riding buses reminds your columnist of what he might have become had not a bit of genetic blessing come along and saved him.

COMMENT: Can vigilantism be condoned in the fight against scourge of meth?

COMMENT: Kiwis, don't come and eat in France or Spain with that tuck-in mentality to a good feed. They just don't get it in these parts, says Alan Duff.

COMMENT: We have no right to look back and judge past eras by our standards.

COMMENT: My father's animal drawings are finally framed and up on our walls, 24 years after his death in 1992.

COMMENT: Burkinis be damned is the one-sided debate raging here in France. Comeback king Nicolas Sarkozy has promised voters he'll ban the burkini.

COMMENT: Why is the US election down to being between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton? Alan Duff reckons it's because the US is weird and contradictory.

COMMENT: There can't be many New Zealanders who don't love the All Blacks. The All Blacks are kind of our religion.

COMMENT: Cigarette companies are proof that, if you get an early start, you join the ranks of the respectable. Safe for lifetime after lifetime.

COMMENT: From public spat with this writer to UN delusion, there's no end to hubris.

COMMENT: Many cultures across the world have suffered horrible cruelties but haven't all become killers and thieves.

COMMENT: Drink in each lucky moment, folks. Stop sweating the small things or getting vexed over piffling matters. You don't know how lucky you are.

COMMENT: Tribal authorities have an important role to play in lifting the lives and aspirations of their people.

India's Gujarati people took an incredible attitude of enterprise around the world and are the better for it.

"Basque songs unique, emotional and better than Maori"

COMMENT: We've just passed a milestone with 12 million books given out on our Books in Homes literacy programme.

COMMENT: This columnist usually stays away from politicians. But then Hone announced a comeback.

COMMENT: We live only 30 minutes drive from Spain and haven't been there near enough.

COMMENT: Cultural outlook is the hardest nut to crack. Not even centuries of ever-growing modernity has broken the witch doctor/healer mentality.

Millions of words have already been written and spoken on Muhammad Ali, and virtually nothing new can be said of a legend.

COMMENT: I'm going to selectively quote from a Pablo Neruda poem titled To Wash a Child.

COMMENT: We can't let Moko Rangitoheriri's death be forgotten - or be a vengeful mob storming the Taupo police cells to lynch Moko's evil killers.

COMMENT: Maoris are more in need of learning parenting skills than are non-Maoris and that applies to a lot of Pacific Island parents too.

COMMENT: I do think we Kiwis need a really good national anthem. Like Kapa O Pango did to the All Blacks' haka. A big, beautiful anthem like the Welsh, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: You know life can change for a few people to something unrecognisable. But I don't think the basics change, at least with most, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: I have a pathological reaction to bullies like Wiremu Perry. You have to stand up to all thugs or they'll run right over you.

COMMENT: No other indigenous people has the same lucky historic, geographic and genetic circumstances as we do. We have to be grateful, writes Alan Duff.

COMMENT: Money and hope fuel TV conference in France where a writer's dreams can come true, or be dashed.

COMMENT: Hungarians have kept their unique language and culture alive through years of oppression, then a revolution.

COMMENT: Till the day comes that banks and supermarkets accept emotions as payment, they must always come second to objectivity.