Post-Cabinet Press Conference: Monday, 11 May 2026

Well, kia ora, good afternoon, everyone. Today I’m joined by Finance Minister Nicola Willis and also Associate Energy Minister Shane Jones to outline the details of changes to our fuel response plan following extensive consultation with business and industry. We’ve developed a clear plan that keeps our economy running and it ensures that everyone has access to fuel. We’re taking every possible step to make sure we have enough supply in New Zealand, minimising the impact on our businesses and the wider economy. If necessary, we are ready with a contingency plan to prioritise fuel as a very last resort.

While the disruption to the global fuel market is serious, I am pleased to report that it has not impacted New Zealand’s ability to secure sufficient fuel supply. As you will have seen from today’s fuel stocks update, New Zealand continues to have good levels of fuel in the country and on the way, with 51 days of petrol, 44 days of diesel, and 54 days of jet fuel. Fuel importers have now provided confidence of confirmed orders through July, with planned orders into August. The update shows that our fuel stocks remain within normal fluctuations, and well above the minimum stock holding obligations. This is a testament to the resilience of our supply chain and the proactive measures our Government has taken.

The biggest impact on New Zealand so far has been with regard to prices. New Zealanders are feeling that every time they fill up the car and that’s why we’re providing timely and targeted support, targeted to those who need it most, with an extra $50 per week for low and middle-income workers with kids and increases to mileage rates for community support workers, relief teachers and veterans needing to travel to medical appointments. While the higher fuel prices are putting pressure on households and businesses, it would be significantly worse if we had a supply problem. It has also been helpful to all Kiwis that diesel has come down 50 cents per litre and petrol 25 cents per litre since the highs of three to four weeks ago.

The importance of fuel to our economy and the risk that disruptions in supply can cause has required us to be proactive and decisive. That is why we established the Ministerial Oversight Group back in March, and this group has been very effective in providing a coordinated response to the global fuel crisis across Government and driving the proactive measures we’ve taken so far. Those measures of course include aligning our fuel specifications with Australia to maximise the availability of our fuel imports, investing $21.6 million to accelerate additional diesel storage capacity at Marsden Point and securing a deal with Z Energy to procure an additional 90 million litres of diesel, providing New Zealand with a strategic diesel reserve.

We’ve also deepened our understanding of future fuel supply into New Zealand. By working directly with the fuel companies and oil traders in Singapore, and visiting refineries in Singapore and also in South Korea, we’ve gained valuable insights into the upstream pipeline of crude oil. I am reassured by the continued operation of these refineries and their efforts to diversify crude oil sources. Last week, as you know, I formally signed an essential supplies agreement with Singapore’s Prime Minister Wong, further strengthening our supply chain and ensuring that fuel will continue to flow to New Zealand from Singapore. While the situation in the Middle East remains very uncertain, we are as confident as we can be that New Zealand will continue to see uninterrupted fuel supply in the months ahead.

That said, we’re not standing still. Our approach from the outset has been to stay ahead of the risk, and that will remain our approach for as long as the risk is there. As I mentioned earlier, we secured a deal with Z Energy to procure an additional 90 million litres of diesel. Today we can announce that that deal has been finalised, and we expect the diesel will be in the refurbished tanks at Marsden Point as early as the end of next month. This additional diesel supply will act as a strategic reserve for New Zealand and this reserve represents nine days worth of supply, approximately 40 percent of our current minimum stockholding obligations, and it will provide a critical buffer should we ever face any supply issues.

Today we’re also announcing the details of our revised fuel response plan, following extensive consultation with business and industry. This four-phase plan outlines the measures that would need to be taken to conserve fuel and to protect jobs, livelihoods and the economy in the unlikely event of a prolonged global fuel shortage. With the benefit of experience over the past two months and in consultation with major fuel users and fuel importing companies, we have refined a plan that places emphasis on maintaining supply through all four phases. The plan is designed to be flexible and adaptable, with pragmatic measures at each phase that are proportionate to the situation we encounter. We’ve sought to lay these measures out in a logical way, allowing people to make their own decisions about their fuel, while guiding them to do the right thing and guaranteeing supply to our critical services in the most extreme of circumstances.

Through consultation we heard that fuel prioritisation should be a last resort, and the priority bans outlined in the first iteration of the plan were too complex. Any implementation of priority user bands for fuel has been moved from phase 3 to phase 4. Phase 3 will instead focus more heavily on supply levers such as releasing our strategic diesel reserve, and demand reduction actions such as increasing public transport capacity and working with businesses on voluntary fuel reduction plans.

A move to phase 4 would occur only if there was ever a genuine likelihood of a severe and prolonged disruption, such as the loss of a large share of fuel supply for many months. While this remains highly unlikely, highly unlikely, the Government would set a fuel reduction target and apply a simplified framework of priority users to ensure that fuel goes to where it’s most needed. Modelled scenarios show that it’s highly unlikely we’d ever need to get to phase 3 or 4, but frankly it’s better to have a plan you don’t use than to need one and to be caught short. Soon I’ll pass to Nicola to talk you through more of the detail around that.

Our focus is on extending and shoring up supply, preparing measures to reduce demand if needed, and taking every step to avoid escalation. We’ve already done a lot to shore up supply in phase 1 and that has put us in a good position for the risk that the global situation worsens. The ultimate aim of course is to protect jobs and the wider economy by avoiding a move to phase 4, which we consider to be highly unlikely. I’ll now pass to Nicola and then on to Shane to provide a little bit more detail.

Thank you, Prime Minister, for that update. The first thing I want to emphasise again is that New Zealand remains well supplied with fuel and the risk of a major disruption to our fuel supply, gratefully, remains very low.

Recent engagements with refiners in Singapore and South Korea have provided reassurance on this score, with three key points coming through our market monitoring. First, refiners reported crude oil feedstock already being locked in through July and August. Second, refiners have diversified their markets for feedstocks from the Gulf and instead into the US, Mexico, Oman, and Latin America and Canada, and while overall production in these refiners has reduced, refiners are not envisaging further reductions in output. Third, suppliers have committed to proactively sharing information on any disruptions to future crude oil feedstock orders. This effectively provides New Zealand an early warning system, so we should know many weeks in advance of any increased likelihood of New Zealand-bound orders or shipments being disrupted.

Despite this, since entering phase 1 of the response plan in March, the Government has focused resolutely on improving supply and resilience. We’ve secured additional fuel reserves, developed a public services fuel plan for implementation should a move to phase 2 be needed, worked with industry to establish a jet fuel allocation plan, and honed the detail of future response phases, should they be needed. It is possible, I want to emphasise, that New Zealand will never need to move beyond phase 1 in this plan. Even so, the Government’s view is that even if disruption is unlikely, we should still be proactive and prepared, so there is a clear sequence of steps we can roll out in response to any disruption.

The updated fuel response plan we’ve shared with you today reflects deep consultation with business and industry, and community. Officials have engaged with fuel suppliers, major fuel users, iwi, Pacific partners, and agencies on the workability and practical implementation of the plan. More than 5,000 New Zealanders have attended webinars, more than 300 organisations have taken part in workshops, and more than 1,000 responses were provided online. The feedback was clear. Prioritisation or rationing should be a last resort. The system needs to be practical and flexible. Businesses and social organisations themselves are best placed to manage day-to-day operational decisions within clear, Government-set rules.

That feedback and those points has directly shaped the revised framework that Cabinet agreed today, with key changes including: first, simplification of the priority bands user framework, with prioritisation bands used in phase 4 only, not to be used in phase 3. Second, phase 3 will focus on supply levers, such as including releasing fuel reserves, including the additional reserve we have secured, regulatory relief options, and voluntary demand reduction measures with businesses.

Phase 4 will only be triggered in the event of a severe or prolonged disruption to New Zealand’s fuel supply, with a simplified, four-band priority user framework ensuring 100 percent fuel access for critical services, slightly reduced access for food and freight and further adjusted access for other organisations, and limits for general public use. Most importantly, this fuel prioritisation is now reserved, as I said, for phase 4 only, and I want to emphasise that phase 4 is an extreme scenario that remains highly unlikely to occur.

The Ministry for Business commissioned export fuel consultancy Envisory to model disruption scenarios, albeit it is highly uncertain whether disruptions will in fact occur. That scenario testing suggested that the most plausible disruptions are instead more likely to be smaller, temporary supply shocks that can largely be managed through supply-side measures and voluntary fuel savings. That is to say, most disruptions we can envisage could be managed without having to move into a phase 4 plan.

The scenarios that we have worked through indicate that a large-scale, ongoing diesel or petrol supply disruption is extremely unlikely. The advice we have received is that the risk of an extraordinary event in which fuel importers run short on cargoes is unlikely to happen for a long period of time. Experts agree that if that low-probability event were to occur, New Zealand would be most likely to see any lost cargoes or lost shipments being replaced via the market, meaning fuel importers would be able to replace that fuel elsewhere, potentially at a higher price, but to replace it nonetheless. All of this together is why it’s highly unlikely a move to phase 4 would be needed. Before getting to phase 4 we would deploy additional levers, such as using our strategic reserve of diesel, dipping into fuel companies’ minimum stockholding obligations, with any exemptions to these being—including replenishment plans and time frames.

So just to run you through the updated framework, today we’re in phase 1.

In phase 2, that would apply to a short-term disruption to fuel supply, for example where shipments are delayed for multiple weeks but replacement supply is expected to be secured and to arrive quickly. That is a cancelled shipment but fuel importers are able to find more fuel elsewhere. The focus in a phase 2 would be on securing supply, removing barriers and encouraging sensible fuel conservation.

Phase 3. That would apply in the event of a more prolonged disruption, potentially one or two months, where additional coordination and voluntary fuel-saving measures would be needed to stretch supply while replacement fuel was being secured. Fuel prioritisation would not occur at this stage, although the Government would encourage and support a range of fuel use reduction efforts.

Phase 4 would apply only in the highly unlikely event of a severe ongoing disruption where supply could not be secured with confidence and critical services could not be protected through market responses alone. In that scenario, fuel users would be grouped into four categories, a simplification of what we presented to you several weeks ago.

Category 1: critical services. This includes emergency services, health, lifeline utilities, schools, and core state functions, and they would receive priority and uncapped fuel access. The list of critical services was developed based on the definitions of critical organisations from the Civil Defence Emergency Management Act, with health and welfare services that are not directly covered in that Act added in.

Category 2: food and freight users. They would continue to access fuel through normal commercial channels, including truck stops and bulk delivery, but they would need to meet fuel-saving targets set by the Government. A fuel card system would allow approved users to purchase fuel beyond normal retail transaction limits when needed. These users would be expected to have fuel reduction plans in place.

The third category would be other commercial and community users of fuel, such as manufacturing, construction, trades and tourism operators. They would operate under the same system as the category 2 users, but with stricter fuel saving requirements and tighter allowances.

Category 4, the final category, would be the general public filling up at the normal retail store. They would continue to access fuel in the normal way through retail service stations, but they would be subject to transaction limits. These would be designed to reduce overall demand and would be set according to targets of how long we were trying to stretch the fuel. However, they would still allow practical flexibility for people in genuinely exceptional circumstances, including, for example, rural communities and workers who are required to travel long distances.

Importantly, this categorisation, and the whole of the phase 4 response, would be self-managed, not the State allocating all the fuel. It would be self-managed but compulsory. Government would set the fuel reduction targets and the operating rules, but businesses and fuel suppliers would manage how they meet those requirements, and they would be required to set out those plans in mandatory fuel reduction plans. The overwhelming feedback from New Zealanders we spoke to was that this self-managed approach would be far more workable and practical than a centralised allocation model, which would be filled with difficulty. Compliance and enforcement arrangements, including targeted verification, spot checks of fuel plans and penalties for non-compliance, will be subject to further policy and legal design.

This self-managed approach reflects the feedback we received from industry about what would actually work in practice if New Zealand ever faced a severe disruption. In their feedback, I want to say, submitters pointed out that in any scenario where global supply was disrupted enough to leave New Zealand short, then that would imply that global prices for fuel would be very, very high, and this in itself would drive significant reductions in fuel use. Again, I want to stress that we don’t expect New Zealand to move into these later phases, but we agree that having a credible, practical and flexible plan in place is an important part of protecting New Zealand’s resilience and economic security in an uncertain world. Over to you, Shane.

Yeah. Thank you, Prime Minister, Minister Nicola. Just to put things in context, 20 million barrels a day has been compromised with the closure of the Strait. Fifty percent of that flow has found another way of entering the market. Historically, 80 percent of that flow went to South-east Asia. We are advised that the refineries up there are seeking feedstock from other sources. They have changed the processes of manufacturing and converting the feedstock into refined fuel. We are also advised that they are dealing with up to a 10 percent reduction in output during this period of uncertainty.

But I want to remind everyone that every year when we spend our $9 billion importing fuel to New Zealand, we consume 58 million barrels. That is about 10 to 12 days of production at the refineries that we rely upon in Malaysia, in Singapore, and in South Korea. That’s before we go and engage with other sources of supply. I raise that to ensure that people realise that in terms of New Zealand’s consumption, as expensive as it might be for our economy, we are a very small percentage of the output in the capacity of that part of the world to create refined fuel.

Secondly, of the fuel that we do bring into New Zealand, obviously our focus to date has been on supply. My focus has been working with my ministerial colleagues, in particular Minister Nicola, and looking at other options to build a buffer. We have made our decision in terms of diesel. We are taking advice if at all we need to do anything on aviation fuel. We realise that there is additional storage capacity in New Zealand. We have about a billion litres’ worth of storage capacity and about a quarter of that is unused. That however will not come online in the short term in the event we choose not to boost the buffer, but it’s certainly something going forward after this quagmire, that a future Government is going to have to address to boost our resilience. Thank you very much.

Well said. OK, I think the point Shane’s making in the last point there is really important. Just, in your heads, $106 million—106 million barrels a day produced with global oil production. New Zealand’s annual consumption: 58 million. And as Shane quite rightly identified, 75 percent of the production out of the Middle East has essentially found either an alternative route out of there, or alternatively has been substituted with stocks from elsewhere in the world, and that’s why we keep saying it’s a highly unlikely we actually end up getting to phase 4 because there will be a supply of crude oil always available, ultimately, to our refineries.

OK, Jo Moir.

Nicola, can I just ask for you just to explain with the categories? Because this all works perfectly if, when it comes to trucking, each individual truck is only dealing in something that fits very specifically into each category, right, because they’re all having to make fuel reductions and there’s different fuel reductions depending on which category you fit into. Take Mainfreight as an example. If they’ve got a truck and they’ve got grocery goods, which sit in one category, but also on that same truck they have goods that relate to—I don’t know—a toy shop or whatever, a garden shop, how do the fuel reductions work for those companies when they’re split across various categories?

The point you’re making is exactly the point that industry made to us, which is in the original design of the multiple categories of prioritisation, you would have had freight awkwardly sitting between categories. That’s why in this revised plan, freight, logistics and distribution of all sorts are contained in that second ‘food and freight’ category. All freight sits in that category and doesn’t sit between categories because we acknowledge the practical reality of freight is often the food is on the same truck as the medicine, as the other essential supply, and in fact, in a situation where fuel’s really short, you might be likely to see more mixed goods being put in trucks because they would be wanting to maximise the space in those trucks. So all freight is covered in category 2.

What was the response from grocery about not being in with critical, because obviously they were calling for that, right?

Not an issue. They understand that freight’s all one big category. You need both, and that’s part of what the insight has been, to keep it really simple. I mean, the key question here, team, is we’re not interested in doing COVID 2.0, where there was, you know, absolutely crazy machinations of a butcher outside of a supermarket as a no-go, but a butcher inside a supermarket is. That’s not where we’re going. We’re going to very simplified categories. We’re going to have very, you know, escalating series of fuel reductions that we expect to have in each of those four buckets, but we’re going to make sure that we work with industry and actually work our way through that in a very pragmatic sort of way.

How do you justify telling the general public that they could face restrictions at the pump but like a cafe, if they show to you that they’ve got a fuel reduction plan, can have unlimited supply of gas?

We recognise that no one wants to get to a phase 4. In phase 4, everyday New Zealanders would still be able to buy fuel at the pump, they just wouldn’t be able to buy as much at once as they used to. But that, we think, allows for people to show restraint and be practical, which is to say that if they need to fill up several times a week, they can, but there’s just a purchase limit when they go to make that fill-up. It’s to encourage the kind of reduced use that you’d be likely to see when prices were very high anyway. I expect also that cafes would be voluntarily reducing their use of fuel because of course that would be a significant cost to their business, and we would require them to present to us a plan of how they were going to reduce that use.

So what’s to stop anyone with a company car going down and saying, “Well, this is my company car,” and just using it for personal use?

Well, look, that’s exactly why we want this to be a self-managed plan, because we want companies to ensure that they are monitoring their staff. It’s not practical for the New Zealand Government to have a fleet of police out there policing every fuel transaction at the pump. That’s just not achievable or plausible, so instead what we will ask businesses to do is to lead good management. And they can monitor that, Jenna. They have fuel cards that are used by the company. If they were to see an employee suddenly racking up more than they should be, that would be obvious to the business, and you’d expect them to have a quiet word.

I guess more my point is: why distinguish between community and commercial users, as opposed to personal users? Why are you putting business in front of personal use?

Well, we’re not doing that. What we’re saying is that we expect commercial users to have specific fuel reduction plans in place that they will be responsible for enforcing and delivering on. To make things simple for the New Zealand public, we’re not going to ask every Kiwi to submit a fuel reduction plan. Instead we’re just going to say, look, we’ll have a limit on how much you can buy at the pump.

Where would you set that purchase limit at, do you think, for members of the public?

That will very much depend on what our targeted fuel use reduction is. So let’s say there’s a scenario in which we know that we’ve had—I don’t know, two tankers haven’t arrived and there’s been some challenge replacing those tankers’ worth of fuel. Then we might say, “Look, we’re trying to eke out our reserves for another couple of weeks. In order to have full confidence that we can do that, we’re wanting to target this level of fuel use reduction, which means this level of limit at the pump makes sense.”

Is this going to get messy? Because you said before, “Hey, people in rural communities who maybe have to drive further than people in urban areas, they might get a bit more than people in the cities.” Is this going to be hard to manage?

We’re going to have to be pragmatic. And actually, if we’re in phase 4 and the whole world has had a massive disruption in the availability of fuel, we would be asking New Zealanders to apply common sense and to do well by their fellow New Zealanders, by which I mean, if you can reduce how much fuel you’re using, please do, otherwise the country might run out of fuel, and here’s a practical way of achieving that. And actually, our country has shown that most people, when given the chance to do the right thing, do the right thing.

And so, yes, there would be exceptions so that if there was someone who was running around, I don’t know, being a boy racer, racing up and down the country using excess fuel, and that became obvious to the community, you’d be able to clock their fuel use with their fuel card. But equally, if someone said, “Oh, I’ve noticed that person’s filling up a lot,” and it actually became clear that was because they were a nurse having to travel long distances, then we wouldn’t be cracking down on that. We need to be commonsense. We need to be practical. This is not about having a police officer on every corner.

And, Benedict, the kind of scenario—just so we’re clear, the kind of scenario you’re looking at when you get to phase 4 is, you know, you can imagine a scenario where you’ve lost 30 percent of your diesel import for the month, for a given month, and actually there’s a disrupted supply for six months. You know, that’s the kind of situation that we’d be in. The world would be experiencing that challenge as well, and obviously you’ve got extremely high fuel prices at that point in time as well.

So, look, we’re just trying to be very, very pragmatic about actually how we work our way through it we’re going to appeal and make it a high-trust regime. Obviously there’s ways in which we can, you know, check that and put some enforcement in place but we’re going to trust Kiwis to do the right thing. Thomas?

In terms of the high trust model, what’s to stop me from filling up at one—reaching my purchase limit at one gas station and then driving to a nearby gas station and then purchasing my limit again?

Thomas, you strike me as a high-integrity individual. That doesn’t sound like something you would do.

If I was going to try it, what—

The rule would be that you shouldn’t do that, and we would have the option to do spot checks, auditing and compliance if need be. But the starting position would be, “Kiwis, we’re trying to stretch out the fuel reserve. We’re in trouble here. Do your bit.”

Hang on, guys, can we go to Thomas? Sorry, can we let Thomas have his follow-up?

How would you audit that? Would that be using cards or something?

Oh, look, there are a range of options, but we’d work with the fuel companies in the first instance.

Sorry, I’ll go to Henry and then—

Minister, have you commissioned or seen any modelling on how likely it is that we actually get to something like level 4? You’ve seen several times that it’s quite likely we wouldn’t.

Yes.

Do you have anything like a number on that?

Yes, we have commissioned extensive modelling by an outfit called Envisory, and then our officials have looked at those scenarios themselves and then built out from there. And essentially what that modelling says to us is the kind of thing that is within the reasonable zone of plausibility is a scenario in which a tanker or two tankers of fuel is cancelled at short notice, although I want to say that doesn’t seem likely to us, based on the fact that the fuel refineries have told us they’d let us know well in advance if they were down on crude oil stock. But let’s say two shipments were stopped at short notice and they were big tankers of fuel, and then the fuel importing company was looking to source fuel from elsewhere but it was coming from further away in the world and that created a delay of several days. If that scenario went on for some time, then you first might eke into your reserves.

So, yes, we have had modelling and scenarios, which is what gives me the confidence to say in just about all of the scenarios that they mapped out, they said, “Actually, with your additional reserve and your minimum stockholding obligation and a bit of fuel restraint, you should be covered.” It’s very hard to imagine a scenario in which phase 4 is needed.

We’re looking at single-digit probability kind of thing?

Yes.

And Prime Minister, sorry, have you sought any advice on whether David Seymour’s comments on The Platform concerning RNZ and TVNZ, and its management and appointment of hosts, breached the Cabinet Manual?

Guys, why don’t we actually—yeah, can we just close out the fuel questions first, and then we can come on to general issues and ask that question again. Can we go to Sean?

Associated with the fuel, have we had an official request from the Americans to take part in any action to keep the Strait of Hormuz open? Have you had any advice on what—if that was required and we decided to do it—what we could provide? Where’s that at?

Yeah, look, there’s two proposals that are being worked up. One is obviously a UK/French-led proposal with 51 countries that have been associated with that—I’ve been part of those conversations and joined those conference calls and Zoom meetings—and then likewise, as you know, about a week or so ago, we received a proposal from the Americans. In both cases we want to find out more information. But obviously it’s predicated, before we would get any involvement, on making sure that there is a long-lasting peace and ceasefire in that region, and then obviously as to what our involvement could or would be it’s something we need to discuss at Cabinet. So at this point—

Are you getting advice from Defence and Defence chiefs about what we could provide?

Yeah, at this time it’s really actually asking more questions back in to both the leadership groups of the US and obviously the UK and France, as to actually us seeking more information from them as to what’s involved and how they see it all working out. There’s a lot of detail that you need to understand before we could work out how we contribute.

OK, Tom.

Prime Minister, just on a different topic, regarding the—

Sorry, have we finished with the fuel topics? Because I’ll do those first before we move on to general topics.

Just on jet fuel, do you know when the similar sort of plan for aviation fuel will be and what that might kind of look like?

Yeah, look, on aviation fuel, the reality is the airlines and the airports have had actually a lot of good experience, a) through COVID, b) through the pipeline being dug up a few years ago, and actually, you know, they actually self-manage and allocate incredibly well. So again, in this case it would be exactly the same logic of us—we’d need to generate, “Hey, listen, we need to make a 15 percent saving because we haven’t got, you know, aviation gas in the country”, and as a result we’d let them work through how they do that allocation between airlines and airports. That works very well. They’re very mature in the way they do that.

But again, there is not a shortage of aviation fuel. At the moment airlines all around the world, when you look at what you’re reading in Europe, you know, they’re going into peak summer seasonality, they’re dealing with high prices—it’s up to 40 percent of their cost base—and obviously they’re doing, you know, some rationalisation of flights and schedules because of that. OK.

On the modelling, will you release that publicly? Secondly, in terms of if we do get to phase 4, in that unlikely scenario, would there be some kind of penalty regime in place in case people do breach it? What kind of penalties would those be?

Look, in terms of the modelling, I just want to indicate that we’re trying to model for a world which is very unknowable. So, yes, I’m happy to release that in due course, but I want to caveat it with saying anything could happen and that is the basis on which we have prepared these plans, to be ready for anything, even as low-probability as it may be.

On your second question, that was around—

Penalties.

Penalties. Yeah, look, the Petroleum Restraint Act allows for penalties to occur, should there be significant breaches of the expectations under a phase 4. We’re taking a careful look at that because, in the first instance, we wouldn’t want that to be a rigorous court process. We’d be more likely to want it to just be spot fines, simply administered, so we’re looking at what may be required in a regulatory sense for that. As I say, we are a long way away from phase 4 right now.

Nicola, you said that you reached out to Pacific and Māori partners. What was the feedback received from the two groups and why was that interaction important when developing the plan?

Look, one of the first things was, as a critical user, having marae in that group, given their incredibly important role in responding to civil emergencies, as we’ve seen with recent flood and cyclone and weather events. A second point there was around ensuring that social service providers are able to have clarity about whether they would be able to access the fuel to deliver social services at different phases in the plan, which we’ve been able to affirm with this refined version we’ve put out today.

In terms of Pacific partners in particular, the Prime Minister and the Minister for Foreign Affairs have engaged with their counterparts in the Pacific, particularly as it relates to the Realm countries, who would be affected by any elevation in the fuel phases. Of critical concern to them has been ensuring that they have the funds needed to pay for fuel should it spike significantly in cost, and our Ministry of Foreign Affairs is already working alongside Australia and other international partners to ensure that we do have a joined-up response there.

OK, guys, are there any more fuel questions? Otherwise we’ll move to general questions of the day. We’ll take a few before we need to break.

Prime Minister, have you sought any advice or received any advice about whether David Seymour’s comments breached the Cabinet Manual, and have you talked to him about those comments? These are the comments about TVNZ and RNZ and its presenters.

Yeah, look, I had a chat with him this morning about it. But, look, as I’ve said, politicians criticising media and vice versa has been going on for hundreds of years.

[Inaudible] Seymour this morning?

Well, no, I talked to him this morning as we have Cabinet meeting on a number of different topics. But what I’d just say to you is he’s explained his comments well. There’s no indication he’s directed TVNZ or RNZ. I’m super comfortable with it.

You aren’t aware that it breached the Cabinet Manual at all?

Yeah, absolutely [Inaudible]. I’ve got no indication he’s directed RNZ or TVNZ at all.

Prime Minister, are you comfortable with one of your Ministers releasing details of what’s in the Budget in a radio interview before the Budget’s announced?

Well, with respect to?

[Inaudible] fees-free.

Fees-free. Look, I mean, we were always gonna do a pre-Budget announcement around that. You know, as you know, it’s a failed policy, it’s a huge waste of taxpayers’ money, hasn’t delivered at all and it can be better deployed doing other things like trades training, as we’ve talked about. But, look, you know, the bigger issue for me was that, you know, that was a really important topic—you know, fees-free was a big New Zealand First, you know, commitment and actually, you know, I give them real credit because they actually have seen, you know, it’s a policy that’s not working. So, you know, I’m really relaxed about it.

Sorry, he literally said, “I’ll give you a Budget leak,” and you’re not going to—

He got Heathered. I think he got Heathered, Jenna. I think that’s what happened.

You’re not going to castigate a Minister for leaking a part of the Budget? What—

Well, I’m very relaxed. We were going to do a pre-Budget announcement, he got Heathered on the radio, and that’s all good.

Are you able to respond to that, please, because it is your Budget, so how did you feel when you were approached or heard that Winston Peters had, quote, “done a Budget leak” and released it?

The Prime Minister has already expressed [Inaudible].

Minister, just on the cruise ship, what measures is New Zealand taking to safely repatriate the one New Zealander who’s flying back to Perth?

Yeah, look, we are in constant contact with the individual. I’m not going to go into the details of what we’re doing for privacy reasons, but you should know that we’ve, you know, been in regular contact and we’ve got consular support in place there.

Is there any plan to quarantine them when they come back to New Zealand?

Again, I just won’t go into that for privacy reasons right now. But, you know, rest assured, we’re over it and we are engaging with the individual as well.

On NZTA Alliance—

NZ what?

NZTA Alliance contracts, you know, this alliance that builds Auckland roads or manages Auckland roads. There’s a bunch of investigations—

AT, Auckland Transport, you’re talking about, or NZTA?

[Inaudible].

OK.

Are you aware that there’s six investigations into the NZTA Alliance contracts, and is that a concern to you? One of them is the SFO.

Again, I’m not aware of the specifics of it. I’d ask you to direct your question to Chris Bishop in particular, as the Minister. But, you know, we’ve got—we’ve got a lot of infrastructure to build. We’re using the alliance model in many cases on major roads across the country. But we obviously want to make sure there’s financial probity in place and it’s good management. So I’d just talk to Chris on that.

Chris Bishop wasn’t actually aware that the investigations were in place until after The Post made inquiries. Is that good enough? There’s six investigations, one by the SFO, and the Minister responsible isn’t aware of them.

Well, look, he’s aware of it now and I’m sure he’s all over it, so he’ll come back to you with an answer.

Prime Minister, a question for you but also Minister Jones, being from Northland, just your response generally to Mariameno starting her own party today.

Look, it’s a total mess on that side of politics, frankly, so it’s irrelevant to us. We were very clear at the beginning of the year who we would and wouldn’t work with, and we’re very focused on a fuel crisis. That’s much more important stuff.

Prime Minister, given that it’s been disestablished, should the BSA continue investigating complaints currently before it?

Look, I mean, that’s the question for Minister Goldsmith. As you know, we’ve decided it doesn’t make a lot of sense.

Hard to get hold of him, actually.

I don’t know why he wouldn’t want to talk to you.

Minister Jones, your thoughts on Mariameno starting her own party?

Shane, do you have anything you want to say to that? It sounds like we’re—

I’d advise her to consult Hone Harawira. He tried the same stunt as well.

Can I ask on hantavirus, please, have you got any information about the New Zealander who was tied up on the cruise ship? It sounds as if they’re possibly going to Australia. Do you know anything about the quarantine requirements?

Yes, we do. That’s what I was alluding to earlier. We’re in contact with that individual. We’ve got consular services in contact with them, a high level of contact. I’m not going to go into the details for their privacy reasons.

Adam, last question.

Just further to Julia’s question, in an interview Mariameno Kapa-Kingi said that she would be open to starting a discussion with you after the election if circumstances, you know, dictated that conversation. Would you be open to having it?

Well, again, I’d just say to you we haven’t seen what this party is actually about and what its policies are. That’s always the first thing. So good luck to her and let’s see what happens. But I mean, from my point of view, as I’ve said, if you want a real safe government, it’s in the National Party leader’s capacity, two ticks blue. And frankly, if we need to work with New Zealand First and Act, we’re very comfortable doing so. We’ve proven we can work very well together over the last couple of years.

A grand coalition with Labour, can you rule that out today?

Oh, hell yeah. Yeah, yeah. That would be [Inaudible]. I mean, I am cleaning up the ungodly mess that Labour left this country. You know, they want to borrow more, tax more, spend more, they don’t deliver anything and they’ve got no ideas. So basically, you know, I know that’s a lot of curiosity for the Beltway but that ain’t happening.

Would you like one of these t-shirts?

No thanks, mate.