Pressure is mounting on State Services Commissioner Iain Rennie after it emerged he ignored advice to exclude Cera boss Roger Sutton from a press conference.

Roger Sutton attracted a large amount of public sympathy when he resigned this week.

A large earthquake has struck off the coast of the North Island this morning, leading some buildings in Rotorua to be evacuated.

A team of scientists drilling deep into the South Island's high-risk Alpine Fault have been intrigued to encounter unusually high temperatures just several hundred metres below ground.

Builders accidentally sealed a Christchurch cat into a wall of a house for two days, before sealing her again into a neighbouring house's ceiling for a week.

The East Coast was rattled by a magnitude 5.3 earthquake this morning.

Nottinghamshire in England was hit by an earthquake, experts have confirmed, as social media sites were flooded with reports of a tremor.

Two earthquakes have shaken western Southland tonight, including a magnitude 6.2 quake of “severe” intensity.

A strong quake has shaken the lower east coast of the North Island this morning.

A team of 100 scientists and engineers has begun drilling a 1.3km-deep borehole into the Alpine Fault to gather information about the inner workings of the fault line.

A magnitude 5.5 earthquake struck the lower North Island around 2.30am this morning.

A moderate earthquake rattled the Wanganui region today. The 3.9 magnitude tremor hit at 7.28am, GNS Science said.

A register of Dunedin's earthquake-prone buildings has been made public for the first time, but it is likely to represent only the tip of the iceberg, the Dunedin City Council says.

Politics playing a big part in questions raised by council offer.

A moderate earthquake rattled the Tararua District today.

A spate of small earthquakes around White Island today is not unusual and is nothing to worry about, seismologist John Ristau says.

"Whatever we pointed out - he said, 'no that's historical." A Christchurch couple say an EQC engineer who assessed their house falsely told them it was safe.

The most powerful earthquake to strike California for 25 years has heightened fears that the state may soon face a "mega-quake" with a strength exceeding 7.5.

New Zealand's biggest general insurer has paid out more than $3.3 billion for Canterbury earthquakes damage and settled 58 per cent of claims.

The New York Times has named Christchurch as the second of 52 places in the world to visit this year.

A tropical storm was moving out into the Sea of Japan last night after lashing the country with rain and winds, leaving one person dead and more than 50 injured.

Lindsay Jones has no desire to knock down his 129-year-old church at the top of Queen St. But as things stand, the senior pastor and his congregation can't afford to keep it open either.

Only 10 years ago members of the congregation at St Benedict's Catholic church in inner-city Auckland raised about $2 million to lovingly restore their Victorian red brick church.