An unnamed Swedish institution has been cleared to buy eight Waikato dairy farms from local billionaire Graeme Hart’s Carter Holt Harvey by the Overseas Investment Office. Southern Pastures Limited Partnership was given a green light to buy 3,205 hectares of land in December for an undisclosed sum, according to a decision summary published today. The farms have been for sale …

Chief Justice Sian Elias has floated the prospect of the Supreme Court restraining the government to selling no more than 25 percent of state-owned power companies while it sorts out a long term solution to Maori claims to freshwater rights under the Treaty of Waitangi. Her comments came at the end of the first morning of two days’ scheduled hearings …

The government is reactivating its relationship with Datacom, the New Zealand firm that managed teacher payrolls before they were switched to the glitch-plagued Novopay system last year. The senior Minister made responsible for handling the Novopay debacle, Steven Joyce, announced a series of steps today, including “investigating a revised contingency plan led by the acting Secretary of Education, who has …