The stories that shaped our year
Top journalists from RNZ, TVNZ, Newshub and Stuff nominate their top stories of the year.
Every year is a big year for news, but the past 12 months have seemed particularly impactful as we have come to grips with the consequences of climate change and violence against women.
And who could ignore the ongoing shenanigans of President Donald Trump?
We asked some of our most prominent journalists to share the stories that affected them most in 2018 (and will stick with them for years to come) and they also nominated the death of Jamal Khashoggi and the rescue of the boys trapped in a Thai cave.
But the most-mentioned news story was the birth of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s daughter Neve, not only because it was internationally significant, but for what it told working mothers: you can do it.
Hilary Barry, Seven Sharp TVNZ
Boys trapped in Thai cave
No other story this year captured the hearts of people around the world like the boys trapped in a flooded Thai cave.
We watched in collective anguish hoping they and their coach would get out of that flooded cave system alive.
As each day passed it seemed more and more unlikely they would survive. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who cheered and wiped away a tear when the last of the boys made it out safely.
Our PM had a baby
Having a baby isn’t particularly newsworthy, except when you’re running a country. Jacinda Ardern made history as just the second woman in the world to give birth while in office.
The message to young women all over the world was an important one; you don’t have to choose between motherhood and career.
Royal wedding, royal baby, royal baby to be, royal tour
It was a big year for the royal family and for anyone who’s vaguely interested in them. Prince Harry got married, his brother and sister-in-law William and Kate added to their brood and then while touring the Pacific, Harry and Meghan announced they were having a baby. Whew!
Paula Penfold, Stuff Circuit
Climate change
I mean, obviously, it’s not a new story, nor is it contained to 2018. But this year the story of climate change is, finally, resonating in ways I don’t think it has before.
Yes, we knew previously that the sea was rising, ice sheets were melting, species were becoming extinct.
We’d seen in the news with terrifying regularity the reporting of weather events and disasters of the scale that not so long ago would’ve been described as one-in-100 year events.
We knew all this yet somehow it didn’t sink in, at least not how it needed to.
But something’s changed in the collective consciousness. There’s been some lightbulb moment.
You can see it in the small changes we’re making; ditching plastic bags, taking the bus, buying local. We know these things aren’t enough, but want to do something. It’s there in the recognition that this isn’t some distant future apocalypse, that the effects are already upon us – in our towns, on our beachfronts.
It’s apparent in the unselfconscious renouncing by journalists of the principle of balance in reporting on this issue: why would we continue to give a platform to climate change deniers when they’re provably and dangerously wrong?
There’s a palpable sense of urgency now, a realisation that we’ve been asleep at the wheel and if we don’t wake up, the petrol-laden tanker we’re driving will crash in a giant ball of fire.
It’s a news story for the ages, not just the year.
Susie Ferguson, Morning Report RNZ
Khashoggi killing
There were a couple of international stories that really stood out. The killing of Jamal Khashoggi was astonishingly audacious and the details, dripfed by the Turkish authorities, brutal and shocking. It laid bare an uncompromising regime in
Saudi Arabia which many governments turn a blind eye to and that many people have little knowledge of.
Another story that gripped me was the rescue of the boys from the
Thai cave – it had me on the edge of my seat. The worst was feared when that was first reported but a complex and truly heroic effort saw them freed safely, as the world held its breath.
Both these international stories have the element that you couldn’t make them up, interesting in a time where the term fake news gets a lot of airtime. Political waves
Back home, the PM had a baby and that’s hardly a regular occurrence as Jacinda Ardern is only the second world leader in recent history to have given birth while in power.
The photo of her pregnant and wearing the korowai with her partner Clarke Gayford in the heart of British royal society was, dare I say it, iconic.
However the Jami Lee Ross scandal was compelling and eclipsed many other political stories of the year, rocking National.
MeToo
A couple of other standout stories for me was how the #metoo wave hit the legal profession and Russell McVeagh especially.
A review and now overhaul of culture in the law firms could change how women are seen and stop them being treated as second class.
And also a shout out to Rose Matafeo, winning the top comedy award at the Edinburgh Festival – what a star!
Jack Tame, TVNZ Breakfast
Mine’s a bit of an odd one perhaps, but I think the biggest story of the year is Facebook. Most of us are still grappling with the enormity of its influence, and many us don’t care, but various events in 2018 only reinforced Facebook’s power.
Think about all of the political shifts we’ve seen in the last couple of years and how many can in some way be attributed to Facebook’s information loops.
The Cambridge Analytica revelations this year were extraordinary, but hardly surprising.
What’s even crazier is that
Facebook doesn’t seem to understand its own problems. It still hasn’t properly developed ways to block foreign interference in election campaigns, and I found it stunning to hear Mark Zuckerberg testifying before the US Congress, not appearing to personally comprehend the power of his own baby. Facebook has changed the world.
Mike McRoberts, Newshub Live at 6 Mr Trump
One word ‘‘Trump’’. His presidency continues to the be the gift that just keeps giving for the world’s media, ours included. The bluff, the bluster, the contradictions and defiance – it’s drama on a daily basis.
It’s amazing to think he started the year tweeting that his nuclear button was bigger than
North Korean leader Kim
Jong-Un’s, and yet months later we had the extraordinary sight of the two embracing in a summit in Singapore.
I was fortunate enough to be in
New York reporting on the mid-term elections for Newshub and one headline in particular stuck with me – ‘‘Trump – making America vote again’’ and it was true.
Love him or hate him, Trump has well and truly activated the political consciousness of Americans and the world. It’s going to be one hell of a ride to the presidential elections in 2020.
Samantha Hayes, Newshub Live at 6 Neve Te Aroha
Undeniably one of the biggest stories this year has been New Zealand’s pregnant prime minister. Both here and around the world there was a fascination with Jacinda
Ardern and Clarke Gayford’s baby, not just because Ardern was only the second female world leader to give birth in recent history but because
Ardern and Gayford are unmarried and he would be a stay-athome dad while she ran the country.
Neve Te Aroha’s birth made international headlines and her famous appearance on the floor of the United Nations general assembly in New York was heralded as a historic moment, reminding world leaders what they were all meeting to decide, the future for all children.