Well-connected lobbyists Saunders Unsworth worked with Solid Energy, Treasury and Cabinet Ministers to thwart questions about the company's problems.

Shares in New Zealand and Australia's largest gold producers have bombed in recent weeks, with Australian giant Newcrest Mining shedding A$9 billion ($10.72 billion) in share value.

Far North Mayor Wayne Brown's prospecting company is one of three that has won gold and silver exploration permits worth up to $13 million to Northland even if they don't result in mining.

Three companies, including one partly owned by Far North Mayor Wayne Brown, have been awarded permits to explore for minerals at five Northland locations

An independent review of events leading to Solid Energy's near collapse has raised questions.

Solid Energy withheld financial information from Treasury when challenged on its business plans in what an independent report says was a pattern of disrespect.

The Environment Court will reconvene tomorrow ahead of its final deliberations on whether to allow an open-cast mine to go ahead on the West Coast's Denniston Plateau.

An independent review of events leading to Solid Energy's near-collapse has raised questions over Treasury's response to early warning signs of trouble.

The Denniston Plateau deal shows that National and the mining industry have learned their lesson from their last attempt to mine on conservation land.

Mining on conservation land, deep-sea oil drilling, subdivisions on unspoilt coastline, cranes in suburbia - they bring protests on the streets and rouse neighbours from their burrows.

The priorities are clearly badly wrong, writes Bryan Walker. NZ needs to turn its back on a prosperity resulting in severe threats to the human future and build an economy which flourishes on green energy sources.

Waihi residents' groups fighting a company's plans to mine beneath their homes are taking their battle to the Environment Court.

The company behind a proposed underground gold mine beneath homes in Waihi will appeal against parts of the resource consent.

A High Court hearing gets underway in Christchurch this morning as environmental groups try more ways to stall mining on the Denniston Plateau.

Newmont Waihi Gold hopes to start work on its controversial $1 billion Correnso underground mine around the middle of next year.

Bathurst Resources has cleared another hurdle in its struggle to start coal mining on the Denniston Plateau near Westport but still needs the blessing of courts and faces tough market conditions.

Australian mining company Bathurst Resources has passed a crucial hurdle to establishing an open cast coal mine on the West Coast's Denniston Plateau.

Solid Energy ex-chairman John Palmer opposed Treasury's wish to appoint an independent advisor to the company's board last year.

Writing in the journal Nature Geoscience, the scientists, backed by the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, said rare earth minerals had been found in mud on the ocean floor.

A decision granting a company permission to mine beneath the eastern part of Waihi has left those on the other side of town worried they could be next, a residents group says.

Consent has been granted for an underground gold mine under a residential part of Waihi, with a Green MP saying those affected will be devastated by the decision.