Widower's emotional plea for thieves to return tablet with photos of his wife.

The 2016 Hyde St party was low-key affair marked less by its saturation of scandal and more by its population of "good people and good times", as reveller James Gibson puts it.

Volunteers have started the massive task of cleaning up Dunedin's Hyde Street after the annual student party, held yesterday.

Two people are in a serious condition after a major crash near Mosgiel.

Balconies at nine student apartments have been closed amid safety fears after an accident that injured 18 people in Dunedin.

One man is in hospital with a serious head injury after the car he was driving rolled on a South Island road early this morning.

Dunedin residents are being told to remove couches from their porches ahead of the annual Hyde St Party today.

Police in Christchurch have found no evidence of an attempted abduction of two schoolboys in Christchurch on Wednesday.

In Southland they take pride in their past, and rich veins of history can still be found throughout the region.

Dunedin club says course is threatened by marauding dogs and warns it's only a matter of time before someone is seriously injured by a golf ball.

While climbing in Mt Cook National Park Danlio Hegg found an old log book containing some of the most famous names in NZ mountaineering.

Man who threw liquid at the Earthquake Recovery Minister had been convicted of child porn offences in 2013.

A family has been left shaken by a road rage incident at the weekend in which a man allegedly forced their vehicle off the road several times, police say.

A French au pair who was deported and held in a cell overnight has told how she was given a dirty blanket, no pillow and just one slice of bread and an apple.

Dunedin family furious police have not laid charges after they woke in the night to find a stranger standing in their bedroom doorway.

Immigration New Zealand has apologised to the French au pair put in a Queenstown police cell for the night and then deported.

COMMENT: New Zealand, drop your plans to book that trip to the Gold Coast. Visit Caroline Bay instead. Never heard of it? Let me tell you.

The man with whom she shared a volatile relationship was found with serious gunshot wounds and a firearm close by.

A police officer escaped injury after his car was rammed by a vehicle involved in a police pursuit through Christchurch early today.

Road blocks have been put in place and homes are being evacuated after a burn-off in Canterbury went out of control in high winds.

Sale and purchase agreement for the Abel Tasman beach that was bought for the public through a crowd-funding scheme has been finalised.

Reducing the use of a controversial pesticide in Christchurch could cost ratepayers nearly $90 million between now and 2025.

Police have found a firearm following the incident in Dunedin.

John Key says the treatment of a French au pair jailed overnight and deported after travelling to Queenstown with an Australian family on holiday was 'heavy-handed'.

Some areas in the South Island are going to be hit with sweltering temperatures later this week.

Party-goers blocked police from entering some flats to get people off balconies and roofs ahead of a balcony collapse that injured 18 people in Dunedin.

Police have named the 3-year-old boy who died when a log fell on him at his father's workplace in Timaru.

Rescuers say a 40-year-old man who was found clinging to the upturned hull of his dinghy off the Hokitika River mouth just after nightfall yesterday was totally unprepared.