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Elderly patients at Auckland’s Waitākere Hospital have described losing their beds to free up space for new admissions.
The family of one 83-year-old says patients in the emergency ward were woken up by staff at six in the morning two Saturdays ago.
The woman’s son says patients were put in chairs in the same room - including one person attached to medical equipment.
Te Whatu Ora says emergency departments and acute diagnostic units are both very busy, as expected at this time of year.
The agency says patients are not allocated a bed for the duration of their stay - as they would be on other inpatient hospital wards.
Families are waiting longer for answers at coronial inquests, and criminal cases are taking longer to be resolved, as court system backlogs continue.
In May, there were 234 families waiting five or more years for answers in the Coronial courts - six years ago it was 15.
The average number of days to resolve criminal cases in the District Court is 176 days - a jump of 62 days from five years ago.
The Government says work is under way to clear the backlog.
The Reserve Bank will reveal its latest Official Cash Rate decision this afternoon.
It’s widely tipped to remain unchanged at 5.5 per cent.
Ahead of the decision, BNZ, ASB, Kiwibank, ANZ and Westpac have raised home loan rates.
Raw footage of the Whakaari/White Island eruption has been played in court.
It comes as damning claims against Whakaari/White Island’s owners are made - as their health and safety obligations are put under a spotlight.
WorkSafe is accusing six parties of failures ahead of the 2019 eruption - which killed 22 people and injured 25 others.
Yesterday, prosecutor Kristy McDonald KC outlined its case against Whakaari Management Ltd and its three directors, as well as Tauranga Tourism and ID Tours - which marketed to cruise ship passengers.
She claims the owners had not done enough to limit or understand the risks of sending people to an active volcano crater.
Evidence from those on Whakaari/White Island when it erupted, will be heard today.
South Africa’s largest city has been blanketed in white after a rare snowfall.
Johannesburg hasn’t seen snow in over a decade, leaving residents stunned.
No major disruptions have been caused by the snowfall at this stage but cold weather conditions were expected to continue through the week.
The new free open-air saltwater pool is already proving popular.