Post-Cabinet Press Conference: Monday, 15 June 2020

Thank you, Prime Minister. Essentially, what we are putting in place today is a three-part fast-track process to speed up projects, to boost jobs and economic growth. As the Prime Minister has said, there are initially 11 named projects, some of which I’ll run through in a moment. They’ve been set out in the press release and they cover things like transport, housing, and water storage. We’re expecting the bill to have its first reading this week, followed by a short select committee process reporting back to the House, if the House agrees, by 29 June. Once the bill passes these listed projects, the firsttrack fast-track projects, if you like, will be referred directly to expert consenting panels, who are chaired by an Environment Court judge.

That panel will set appropriate conditions on the projects before they can proceed. There will be the opportunity for further projects beyond those named projects, and that’s from the second track, and that applies to applications that can be made by other public entities or private entities to use the fast-track process.

We’re looking forward to a number of projects coming forward from a range of people in organisations, including district and regional councils, iwi authorities, NGOs, and the private sector. Applicants will be required to provide information to me as Minister on how each project meets the criteria specified in the bill. Projects that are selected will then be passed to the panel for consideration, and that process is given effect to by Order in Council. And the third part of this process legislation is the ability for Waka Kotahi New Zealand Transport Agency and KiwiRail Holdings to undertake repair maintenance and minor upgrade works on their existing infrastructure in road and rail corridors as a permitted activity subject to certain performance criteria.

As the Prime Minister’s already said, notified applications for resource consents take around four to six months to process depending on the complexity and the level of contention involved. Appeals to the Environment Court after council hearings can take a year or more. In contrast, the new fast-track processes are likely to take 45 to 70 working days. Some transport projects as a consequence will be able to start for up to two years sooner under the fast-track measure on conditions set by the panel.

I would stress that while extraordinary times require extraordinary measures, positive environmental outcomes and Treaty relationships won’t be sacrificed at the expense of speed. While these projects are being advanced in time, environmental safeguards remain, including Part 2 of the RMA and things like matters of national importance. These will all continue to apply. Similarly, the principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi and Treaty settlement obligations will apply to all projects under the bill.

Lastly, I’d make the point that this is a short-term intervention. We are truncating rights of public participation and that shouldn’t last for ever. So the legislation will self-repeal in two years’ time. It’s not part of the wider review of the RMA. As you’ll be aware, we commenced a comprehensive review of the RMA, led by retired Court of Appeal Judge Randerson QC, which we’re expecting to release before the election.

The 11 projects range from the Kaikohe water storage project; some housing projects in Auckland and Queenstown, for example; papakāinga network developments; some rail projects, which I won’t list; and a couple of cycleways which are listed as well. Happy to answer questions.

Right. Happy to answer questions.

Prime Minister, is Ayesha Verrall your next health Minister?

Decisions around Cabinet are made should we be in the privileged position of forming Government again. What I, alongside the party, have been part of announcing today is simply what we hope will be our Labour team after the election.

Would you like Dr Verrall to—

Again, I’m making absolutely no comment on what the future Cabinet looks like.

Those are all decisions should we be re-elected, but what I’m very proud of is the huge talent that is coming through the Labour Party list, and I think that’s a vote of confidence in the role that we’ve been playing as Government and also demonstrates that as a party we’re in good heart.

Prime Minister, do you think Dr Ayesha Verrall would make a good health Minister?

Oh, again, I’m not going to get into any speculation on a future Cabinet. Needless to say, we have excellent talent in our existing Cabinet and excellent prospects for our future Cabinet.

Do you rate her, though?

Oh, she would not be so highly rated on a Labour Party list were it not obviously for the confidence that she’s built amongst a wide range of people who made the decision on the list. She is an extremely competent candidate, but so are a range of other candidates that join her on the list today.

[Inaudible] before the election?

Sorry—yes, absolutely.

In terms of the fast-track legislation, have you sought support from the other political parties, including National, for a fast track of the legislation through Parliament?

We haven’t discussed exact time frames with the National Party. I undertook to the National Party that we’ll share a copy of the bill as soon as it comes out of the printer, which we’re expecting to happen either tonight or tomorrow morning, and we’ll share that with them then.

In the past, the Government said that it is the Government of infrastructure and it’s got a lot of projects, and obviously you put infrastructure well on your agenda. You’ve laid out a process where we can have these projects. You said between 45 and 70 days.

Maybe it might be a bit of a technical answer, but why doesn’t this just happen with all infrastructure projects, given the fact that you’ve emphasised how important they are for your Government?

No, that’s a good question, Jason. Go ahead.

Well, the long list of infrastructure projects is 1,800 long. Not all of them are funded, and they have to go through a prioritisation process for funding, but then they also have to have resource consent conditions attached to them. It would be too rough and ready for us just to give them an approval without conditions, and those conditions are set independently of Government in order to protect both environmental outcomes and Treaty interests. So those decisions have devolved. So we’re speeding up the process but we’re not taking away those safeguards.

Sorry, Jason, just to clarify, are you asking, as a general rule of thumb, why is not every project processed in that speed—is that your question?

Yeah, you laid out a way that—

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, I see, for the future?

Ah, well, most resource consents affect both public and private interests, and public and private people in New Zealand expect to be able to be involved in the process, including, generally, turning up to a hearing. What we’re doing here is requiring things to be dealt with on the papers, and we’re also taking away the rights of individuals to submit and leaving those submission rights on representative groups on their behalf. We wouldn’t want to do that for ever.

Doesn’t that risk making this a rough and ready process with these projects?

Well, we’re trusting in the expertise of the panel. The panel will include—well, it will be chaired by an Environment Court judge. It will include an iwi representative, a local authority representative, and the balance of the people will be picked for their expertise, so we think that’s protected.

How much of a role did the Infrastructure Commission play in the decisions around these 11 projects?

The projects were put forward by Government agencies rather than by the Infrastructure Commission.

But that was a whole commission set up for infrastructure, and Shane Jones said at the time it was a way to make things no so siloed. Why would you not use the advice of that commission, given the fact that it’s set up for that exact reason?

Well, we are in respect of the 1,800 projects, which are being filtered, but that task is not yet finished. It takes a while.

But these ones are a priority, and wouldn’t it make sense that you use the commission set up specifically for this for consultation on these projects?

Some of these will also, in order for them to be at the stage that they are, have been relatively far down the track, and also, in terms of scale, not all of them will necessarily be ones that are engaging in the amount of time and energy and effort that the Infrastructure Commission is putting in to determining pipelines going forward. So I think ultimately, the process has been to try and identify things that are ready to go.

The final point I would add to the Prime Minister there is, of course, the second track can be used for other projects that come through that pipeline.

These projects, did they come from the Mark Binns - chaired reference group?

Ah, well, they’ll probably all be listed in that, but, no, they came via the likes of NZTA or KiwiRail.

Yes, that, obviously—the Mark Binns work—the work of the Crown Infrastructure Partners—we are working through that long list now, which was received at the end of May, and it was a substantial list.

Compared to the NZ Upgrade package, you’ve got one road, two cycleways, and three rail projects in this package. Is that indicative of a rebalancing of the Government’s priorities away from grey infrastructure towards green infrastructure?

Ah, well, we wanted to make sure that the response to COVID doesn’t take the nation in the wrong direction. One of the concerns that was expressed when we announced this fast-track process is that we would be building, I don’t know, someone said coal-fired power stations and only roads. So we’ve been deliberate in our attempt to project some balance here so that we have a broad range of outcomes.

And also, as we’ve always said, you know, our COVID recovery is a chance for us to accelerate resolving issues that we’ve long had as a country—be it housing, be it efficient transport options—and so that’s what we’re looking to do, both in the infrastructure projects but also the acceleration of those projects.

Prime Minister, is it a conflict of interest that Dr Ayesha Verrall was speaking to media about the Government’s COVID-19 response contact tracing and entering level 2 after the nominations had already closed for the Labour Party?

I think you’ll find from all of the interviews that have been carried out and the questions raised, you’ll see that Dr Verrall has acted with the utmost integrity, being very quick to point out where there are areas we have needed to improve, and we’ve sought to act on that, so, no, I do not believe so. That was, of course, done from her perspective as a specialist in infectious diseases, and was utterly focused on that.

Should she not have declared that she was putting her hat in the ring for the Labour Party?

Oh, look, ultimately, has that changed the professional judgment and opinion that she has very publicly shared, which has been challenging to us to change and alter and ensure that we have the best contact tracing system we could—and so I think people would agree that she has been very quick to point out where we needed to change our approach and has been very, I think, objective in the work she’s done. Keeping in mind, of course, Dr Verrall has provided opinion as a professional, not as someone within the Government, and so she’s always had that outside perspective and has been providing us with advice.

There was an interview done at least a week after she had formally nominated for Labour, and it was very positive about contact tracing and about where the Government had got to. Shouldn’t that be a declarable situation?

And following a very critical report that was produced by Dr Verrall. Ultimately, you’re asking me whether or not I believe she’s acted with integrity. In my view, she has. She’s acted as a professional with specialist knowledge of infectious diseases. It would be a shame if we can’t both utilise her professional opinion in our COVID response and her professional expertise in our Parliament.

Prime Minister, would David Clark be a health Minister in any future Government that you lead?

I’m going to preface my answer by saying first that we have just come through a one-in-100-year global pandemic in which the Minister of Health has been part of the leadership team making decisions that have led thus far to New Zealand being in an incredible position. And I do credit him with the role he has played in that. And so the question you’re asking me is whether or nor his entire career should be determined by one mistake during that period as opposed to the many, many significant decisions he made on behalf of New Zealand. My view is a little more emphasis on the outcome that we have now experienced would be in order.

That’s totally fair, Prime Minister, but you also said that you would’ve sacked him if you could’ve at the time. So will he be a health Minister in any future Government you lead?

Oh no, and, look, I’m happy to clarify this point. There seems to be some view that somehow once I make a decision I revise it. I do not. I made the decision at the time. The decision still stands.

Prime Minister, how can you talk about gender equity and equality when you just have six women in your top 20?

Yes, so, look, in terms of context, I have not changed in this list our current Cabinet rankings, so with the exception of placing the Speaker, because he, of course, needs to be included in our list, our Cabinet rankings just mirror what we have today. And that is simply because Cabinet is something that I determine when we do Cabinet reshuffles, not through a list process. And so what we’ve generated here with the Labour Party is the look of our entire caucus, and I’m very proud of the fact that based on the best estimates we can make, we will now have a caucus made up of 50 percent women, and extraordinary talent amongst it.

And just four Māori in your top 20; it’s one, maybe two, max, more than National.

Again, what we’ve got here is simply the same Cabinet that I had yesterday reflected today, in this list. But in our wider caucus we have the most representation from Māori that we have had as a Labour Party and now we’re looking to add to that the talent of, I hope, Arena Williams and also Shanan Halbert in Northcote. I’m very proud of the diversity in our team, and, again, going into the future, increasing the pool of that diversity means that we should see that reflected in the top table as well.

In terms of infrastructure, could you please give us a sense of the extent to which this law will be used? You’ve got 11 projects announced now. How many more do you expect to go through that second pathway?

The Order in Council process?

Yeah.

A substantial number. We can’t put a figure on it, but we’ll have a better idea once the funding decisions are made through the sorting of the projects that have come through from the infrastructure group. So I’m expecting over the next two years a significant number to go through this panel, but it relies upon people coming to us showing that they’re job-rich, that they’re ready to go, that they’ve got the funding, and that going through this short-track process will actually get people employed, because the purpose of this is employment. So if they haven’t got the funding or it’s not going to be any faster than it would be through an RMA process, we wouldn’t put it through this process.

Roughly how many projects are you looking at to cut down to from—to get that original 11, how many were you looking at?

I don’t have a number for that. That’s a Budget-related decision rather than an RMA decision.

Prime Minister, the Police Association chief, Chris Cahill, has called the passage of the Arms Legislation Bill a life or death matter. So where is it and when will it return to the floor of the Parliament?

Oh, look, I’d need to check in with the Minister on the introduction, but I consider it to be on track in terms of the next stage of the bill.

Can you guarantee that your second tranche of gun law reforms will become law in this Parliament?

Oh, that’s certainly our ambition, to progress it as far as we can in the time we have left. What I would say is that there’s—obviously, every bill that’s before the House has been impacted by the fact that Parliament hasn’t had the same amount of sitting days that we otherwise might have. So that has potentially delayed the progress of some legislation, but we are looking to do what we can to make sure that that legislation we wanted to see through before the end of Parliament—that we do what we can to progress it.

Yesterday—

Yes, sorry?

Some Māori media—The Hui, Marae, Te Karere—are worried about their future off the back of the Māori media proposals. Does it provide for a plurality of voices—

Yes, it does.

—as we have with mainstream media?

Yeah, unfortunately, I think probably what’s been proposed here has, unfortunately, been misinterpreted. Certainly, it’s not our intention to lose those range of voices when it comes to current affairs and news within Māori media. What we’re simply consulting on is this notion of having a bit of a clearing house but not a reduction in programming. As I say, though, it’s a consultation and so the whole point now is to go out, see what the views are of the sector, and to work from there.

Can you give a commitment that we won’t lose those Māori media services like The Hui?

Yeah, and so that’s actually one of the examples I’d give. The intention isn’t to reduce the access to funding sources for those multiple programming options. And so that’s where I think, unfortunately, that’s been misinterpreted. That’s not our intention to lose that range of voice and programming options, but to create a clearing house for some of these different operations.

Minister Parker, just on the fast-tracking stuff, given one of the big criticisms around the PGF is often the number of jobs that it says it’s going to generate and then how many actually come to fruition, with these projects is there particular job numbers that are set and sort of accountability measures around making sure they actually do come to fruition?

One thing before I hand to Minister Parker on that, keeping in mind, of course, these are projects that are often brought to us by entities like, for instance, local councils, and they are often the ones that are undertaking some of the analysis and providing estimates of job creation, and so that’s often what we’ll be basing that on. Ultimately, of course, there’s only so much responsibility we can take for whether or not some of the work that’s done by those local councils is—

So if they overestimate, then the Government is not accountable?

Oh well, again, ultimately, if the idea is and the whole objective is job creation, then we both share that goal, but there will be some circumstances where they may have not had an entirely accurate count on FTE for a project. The goal is, though, job creation.

Well, to give a specific example, the first on the list here is the Kaikohe water storage facility which is a project of the Northland council. It has been funded in part by the Provincial Growth Fund. The job estimate there is 70 jobs. Those jobs will be brought forward faster because of this legislation than they would have otherwise occurred, but I presume the number’s about the same.

So is there specific expectations, though, on projects—is there set numbers, FTEs, that you’re actually allocating in order to give it a tick?

They’re based on individual project estimates, rather than just saying as a result of the RMA fast tracking we would like to achieve x amount of job creation.

So some could be 10, some could be 200?

I doubt if a 10-project would justify this process. You know, you’ll see that the lowest number on this, I think, is actually—

It’s 30 to 40 for one of the cycleways.

hundreds.

Yeah, 30, but most of them are sort of towards a hundred or many

On Māori media, do you think it sends the right message to Māori that American film projects like Avatar get the same amount of money from the Government than all of Māori media combined?

If you’re asking about the rebate, I don’t think that that’s—it’s not fair, I think, to compare what is a rebate based on money spent and then revenue gained by the Government in New Zealand to grant funding for broadcasting—first point.

Second point: there’s a more generous rebate regime for New Zealand domestic screen production for the very point that we actually do take a different view when it comes to content that tells our story.

know—

Māori media spend money in New Zealand on cameras and staff and coffee, you

Yes, and when it comes to—and we, essentially, fund Māori media. What you’re asking, though, is about the incentives regime, which is a different project again, and when it comes to domestic film production—including, for instance, say, Māori film—they have a more generous incentive regime than we do for international productions.

If someone tests positive for COVID-19 and it turns out in their infectious period they visited a café or a shop that didn’t have a Government QR code, the Ministry of Health has said, essentially, the only thing they’d be able to do in that scenario is do a public appeal through the media to try and [Inaudible] people who might have been exposed to the virus. Is that good enough, and should the Government have not lifted that requirement for contact tracing?

So the first thing to keep in mind, of course, is that not everyone carries a device that will enable them to use the COVID Tracer app, and so it’s not a foolproof option to make sure that everyone is keeping track, digitally or otherwise, of where they have been, which is why we make the general appeal to New Zealanders: please record where you are going, because if we do have that scenario, we do want to know where you’ve been so we can help other New Zealanders look after themselves.

On the COVID Tracer app, we have asked that businesses do display the QR code so that people who have the app can use it. We are seeing an ongoing increase in the number of posters that have been distributed and displayed, and the number of people downloading the app continues to increase. You’re asking, though, should we make it compulsory. That would require businesses to enforce people to either scan or record. That, of course, comes with a range of flow-on effects, by requiring businesses to be the enforcer. What we are doing is keeping open the option that if we believe it’s necessary, we have that option. In the meantime, we’re working with business to try and encourage the display of the QR codes.

We had that requirement under level 2, though, at least for pen and paper, if not the Government app. Why not maintain the pen and paper one?

Simply—at the pen and paper, of course, some people did refuse. It is a public display of people’s information, so not an ideal option. What is better, of course, is if people do have the app. For those who don’t have it, we ask them to try and keep their own record. Nothing is foolproof. That is why contact tracers on the ground, as the WHO advises, is still the best thing that any country can do, rather than just relying on technology.

We’ve had 24 days of no COVID-19 cases. When will we be able to definitively say New Zealand has eliminated COVID-19?

Well, the one disclaimer we have to give is that, actually, this is going to be an ongoing campaign. New Zealand will have cases again in the future. Of course, our hope and expectation is that that should be at the border if it’s anywhere, because that’s where we still have New Zealanders coming in from around the world, where there continues to be COVID cases at a rapid and alarming rate. But if they’ve quarantined, of course, that’s a very different story than in the community. So it is an ongoing campaign. Of course, some specialists will tell you that once you’re 28 days clear, then you can define yourself in that way, but I don’t want New Zealanders to believe that the battle is over when it is not.

What the Minister for Māori Development was proposing is a single Māori news service to be located within the Māori Television service. So you’re saying that’s a clearing house, but some would say that sounds like a—

And again I’m pointing out that that doesn’t preclude other programming continuing to access other funding sources, which is where they currently, many, are funded through. So that’s where I’m saying that we do not wish to see a diminishing of our Māori news and current affairs services.

On infrastructure, when will Ministers come back with the decision on the infrastructure industry reference group recommendations, and just as a second to that, of those that are decided, what proportion do you expect might be streamlined under this—

I’ll answer the first part, and perhaps the second for Minister Parker. We received a longlist at the end of May. There are hundreds of projects within it, so we’re working our way through, so I wouldn’t mind just giving the ability for us to do that as rapidly as we can, but we haven’t put a date yet on when we’re likely to have finalised those decisions.

I would think a significant proportion of them will seek to use the track-two fast-track process.

What colour goes on top of the tino rangatiratanga flag?

What, sorry?

What colour goes on top of the flag?

Black.

Just to clarify, will programmes like The Hui still be able to access funding from Te Māngai Pāho under the centralised model?

Yes, yes, that is my understanding, yes.

You don’t expect that they will lose out on any funding?

Oh, well, again, I’m not going to pre-empt funding decisions, but what I’ve said, as I’ve said, it is our expectation that they will be able to still access that funding. But, again, this is a consultation process. I really do encourage you to ask Minister Mahuta around some of the work she’s doing in this space and some of the feedback she’s hearing.

Jason, I’ll take the last couple, just as a warning for people.

Yesterday at the Black Lives Matter march that ended at Parliament, justice Minister, Andrew Little, admitted that there was something wrong with the New Zealand justice system and something has to change. Do you agree with him, and what needs to change?

Yes, I do, because our statistics speak for themselves. We do have overrepresentation of Māori in our justice system, and so long as that exists, there is something that needs to change, and he was right to say it.

So what needs to change and what’s the Government going to do?

Well, first of all, actually making sure that we have broad representation in our system; also, looking at the system itself. You know, we have seen, through things like our Rangatahi Courts, through our iwi panels, a change in the way that our justice system is fundamentally operating. And, ultimately, all of it is to make sure that we ultimately see fewer victims of crime. We do have over-victimisation of our lower socioeconomic communities as well, and so there’s a double track here to make sure that we’re looking after those communities too.

Prime Minister, on the list, you essentially inherited the list you ran with in the 2017 election—

Sorry, what was that?

You essentially inherited that list—you weren’t leader when it was designed. This list is one which you have had some influence on—I know you’ll say it’s the wider party. What did you seek to do with that influence?

Make sure that Parliament, through the Labour Party, reflects New Zealand.

That’s our job. The New Zealand Parliament is here to represent the people of New Zealand, so it needs to look and feel like the people of New Zealand. I’m proud, for instance, that, yes, we’re looking to have 50 percent women in our caucus, but also, in someone like Ibrahim Omer, who is a refugee, who started his life in New Zealand as a cleaner, worked his way through that job to put himself through university—he’s an exceptional person, and is telling the story of a number of other new New Zealanders. So I’m very proud of our list. OK—last one?

Sorry, just another question on infrastructure. You know, clearly, these panels will have a lot of work to do assessing all these applications—how many panels do you expect to set up and how many people will be involved with the panels?

It’ll depend on the need. That’ll be left to the Environment Court judge, who will be in charge of formulating those panels. But we will give them the resources that they need to do the task.

What’s your expectation, though?

I would think there will probably be a number of panels—I wouldn’t like to put an exact number; it won’t be 10 panels, but it’ll be more than one.

Yeah; OK, thank you, everyone.