Wednesday's papers: lower blood alcohol limit for driving to be considered by the Government; permits urged for all boaties on the Kawerau River; patients fail to arrive for thousands of operations.
The New Zealand Herald
The Government says it will consider lowering the blood alcohol limit for driving. Police want New Zealand's limit of 0.8 grams of alcohol per litre of blood lowered to 0.5 grams - the same as Australia's.
The front page looks a bit like a poster for the movie Jaws: it has a frontal view of a shark emerging from the water to devour the bait bag from a fisherman's line north of Auckland. One fisherman had his feet in the water just moments before.
The Dominion
Drivers are getting their gas guzzlers out of the garage again because of falling fuel prices
The paper also says thousands of slots for operations and specialist appointments are going to waste because patients fail to turn up. It says district hospital boards are trying to come up with a better system of reminding patients.
The Press
Two of the girls who died in a house fire in Mangere were from Christchurch. They were in Auckland to visit their father.
Surfers and swimmers are getting in each other's way at Taylors Mistake. A woman required hospital treatment after she was hit in the head by a surfboard last week.
The Otago Daily Times
It appears a jet ski and jetboat in a fatal collision on Monday evening on the Kawarau River in Queenstown collided head on.
The paper says search operations in the South Island cost nearly $400,000 last year. There were 180 search operations involving the police.
The Southland Times
The paper says the Queenstown Lakes District Council had previously been warned that it needed to tighten the rules for boating on the Kawarau River. One major commercial operator on the river wants anyone using it to be required to get a permit.
Concerns are held for a Cromwell woman, Jessica Roberts, 28, who left a family gathering on Saturday and has not been seen since.
