Mothers with young babies and sick and disabled people on benefits would be forced to look for work under a proposed overhaul of NZ's welfare system, which would see all benefits replaced by a 'jobseeker payment'.

Prime Minister John Key says he is open to work-testing beneficiaries when their youngest child turns three.

The Government won't consider reductions to main benefit levels including the sickness, invalid's, unemployment and domestic purposes benefits as part of any welfare overhaul recommended by the Welfare Working Group tomorrow.

A consortium of North Shore doctors has a radical proposal to use health professionals to help sickness and invalid beneficiaries back to work.

John Key has been accused of being disconnected after saying that beneficiaries who resort to food banks do so out of their own "poor choices".

John Key says beneficiaries who resort to food banks do so out of their own "poor choices" rather than because they cannot afford food.

Labour is promising to extend paid parental leave and make Working for Families more generous for parents of under-2s.

The Chief Human Rights Commissioner is 'deeply disappointed' the Crown is to appeal a High Court ruling on caregivers' rights.

The Ministry of Health is to appeal a court ruling that parents caring for disabled adult children are eligible for financial support.

A nine-year-old with horrific injuries never wants to see her parents again, a court has heard.

A couple accused of torturing their nine-year-old daughter appeared briefly in court this morning.

The mother of a girl, 5, found dead in her bed after an alleged assault was trying to escape violence in her life.

New claims emerged last night that the nine-year-old girl allegedly tortured by her parents was also sexually abused while in Child Youth and Family care.