Dear John,
In my first Bishop Bulletin of the year I reported 103 omicron cases that day. A couple of weeks ago when I wrote to you there were 2000. Yesterday it was over 23,000! It's incredible how fast it has spread - although we shouldn't be too surprised as what is happening in NZ has played out in almost every developed country in recent months. Remember - if you need support or help, please contact my office and we can assist.
The frustrating thing for me is how ill-prepared the government has been, particularly when it comes to testing. It was obvious to most people that our nasal PCR testing systems would be overwhelmed by Omicron, but the Ministry continued to insist as late as a couple of weeks ago that we could still do 58,000 tests per day. We've never hit anywhere near that number and people have waited up to a week for their results. Things got so bad that tests were sent to Queensland for processing! The government has neatly thrown Dr Bloomfield under the bus (he fronted a press conference without the PM or Chris Hipkins to issue an apology) but at the end of the day, Ministers are accountable, not unelected bureaucrats. Why haven't we been using saliva testing? Where did the wrong numbers come from? I asked for an urgent debate on this on Wednesday, but Trevor Mallard turned me down.
As I've been saying for months now, with Omicron rapid tests are critical, and we've been let down here too. I revealed last week that the government only ordered 13 million in November and December last year, didn't get onto it quickly this year, and now we clearly have a shortage. More are coming all the time, but it's still quite difficult to get one - unless you want to line up for a couple of hours. All of this was eminently foreseeable and we should have had ready access to rapid tests for months now. A rapid test (actually a LAMP) test has been awaiting approval for 18 months, even though its widely used overseas. We still haven't approved all of the rapid tests available in Australia, businesses are still struggling to access them, and the rules for critical workers continue to be overly bureaucratic and unclear. In short, it's a mess.
Protest at Parliament
The big news of course of the past couple of weeks has been the protest/occupation of Parliament, which basically ended on Wednesday after the Police moved in and cleared the site. The occupation ended in violence, with the protesters setting fire to tents, trees, grass, and even Trevor Mallard's extravagantly expensive slide. They even tried to light the Victoria University Old Government Buildings on fire. The New Zealand Police (and Fire and Emergency) did a great job. As I've been leaving the building each night I've been chatting to many of them (lots are from the Hutt) and their quiet fortitude has really impressed me. On Wednesday, 90 newly graduated cops were part of the action on their second day on the job. Quite an introduction to policing!
Mandates
Christopher Luxon gave an important speech last Monday about vaccine mandates and passes and the frustration that many in New Zealand are feeling right now. I've been struck by how many people don't support the protesters and condemn their behaviour - but also say that some of them have a point about the government's current response to COVID. The truth is that we do need a conversation about the issues of mandates, vaccine passes, and getting back to normality. As Christopher said, "Kiwis should be able to sympathise with some of the issues being raised by protesters on Parliament’s grounds without being framed as condoning illegal behaviour or siding with anti-science conspiracy theorists."
As I said in the House this week, with Delta it was very clear that vaccination made a big impact on transmission. Omicron has changed the game. It busts through vaccination and most people getting COVID at the moment are fully vaccinated. So that raises significant questions as to the utility and morality of mandates and passes. National's view is they should be phased out once we're past the peak of Omicron.(assuming no new variants). We are one of the most vaccinated places on the planet, but the mandates have caused real hardship and despair: kids denied entry to sports teams or public libraries; good men and women who have lost their jobs because they don’t want to be vaccinated.
MIQ
I've been pushing for changes at our border for a while now and so it was fantastic to see the PM stand up on Monday and announce not only the end of MIQ but the ending of self-isolation periods for people coming to New Zealand. The change for Kiwis from Australia has already taken effect and it applies from the rest of the world from 11.59pm tonight. We are finally starting to reconnect to the world and it's incredibly exciting. Now we need to move forward the timeline for tourists to come too, so we can kickstart a tourism recovery.
Russia
Finally, a quick comment on the appalling actions of Vladimir Putin and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.New Zealand has rightly condemned the invasion (Parliament unanimously passed a motion on Tuesday) but we are stymied by how much action we can actually take against Russia because we don't have the legal ability to sanction Russia without authorisation from the UN Security Council. Of course, Russia vetoes any of those resolutions so the net effect is that our foreign policy against Russia is decided by.... Russia. It's stupid, and Gerry Brownlee has a bill to implement an Autonomous Sanctions Act to allow us to take meaningful action. So far the government hasn't picked it up. I hope they do.
My thoughts are with the people of Ukraine right now as they face bombardment by the Russian forces.
Finally this week, I've published the results of the 3 Waters survey I did at the end of last year. Results below. Thanks for filling it out.
Have a great weekend.
Chris
P.S I'm holding a fundraising dinner with National Leader Christopher Luxon in a couple of weeks - tickets here or drop me an email if you're interested.
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Extraordinary scenes at Parliament.
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Back on the Jackson St Project last week - trying dinner at every cafe and restaurant from west to east  .
This was a first for us, starting dinner at one place and finishing at another! We started at one of our favourites, Chili N Spice, and enjoyed some delicious samosas and chicken tikka before they had an electricity outage and everyone had to leave! A real shame as the curry there is incredible. So we popped across the road for some Phở Bò from the appropriately named Vietnamese Restaurant and Cafe.
Phở is one of my favourite dishes. This was brilliant - very flavourful broth, plenty of greens to add and great chilli. Jenna enjoyed hers too.
Hospitality is doing it tough at the moment in the red setting, so please get out there and back our local eateries!
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Cobham Drive Crossing and Lights
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You’ll be pleased to learn that the first decision the absurdly named ‘Let’s Get Wellington Moving’ programme has made is to install a set of traffic lights on State Highway One. Yes, really. On Cobham Drive on the way to the airport. I kid you not. Oh, they've spent $250,000 talking about it too.
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In 2015 the previous National government introduced First Home Grants for first home buyers. Here is a graph showing the number of grants given to buyers in Lower Hutt. From a high of 585 in 2016/17, the number of grants fell to 193 in 2020/21.
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Last year I ran a survey of Hutt City residents asking for their opinions on 3 Waters Reform as proposed by the government. The survey was modelled on a near-identical engagement exercise done by the Upper Hutt City Council. There were 714 overall respondents.
Are you in favour of the Three Waters Reform?
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In the Hutt survey I asked people to say how concerned they were about a particular issue, ranging from "very" to "moderate" to "slightly" to "not concerned". Here is the graph showing the percentage of respondents who were "very" or "moderately" concerned about each issue.
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With my friend Sam Manzanza at the NZ-China Friendship Society (Wellington branch) Chinese New Year banquet last night. Happy year of the tiger!
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Wellington Children's Hospital Raffle
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Rotary in Wellington is furnishing two rooms in the new Wellington Children's Hospital and is running an awesome raffle to fundraise for it.
First prize a brand new Kia Picanto! Second prize worth $2000 - Wellington Gateway Package (two nights at a flash hotel, rental car, fuel, tickets to Weta Workshop, golf tickets). Third prize a deluxe grocery hamper from Hutt City New World worth $1000
Tickets available until 9 May and drawn a week later. $10 per ticket - tickets available from Gaylene Hughes.
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NZ reopens to the world... slowly
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Michael Wood and Poto Williams announcing the number of KiwiBuild homes built in the Hutt (300 promised at $300k each - yes really)
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