AM Edition: Top 10 Politics Articles on LiveNews.co.nz for May 20, 2026 – Full Text

Source: Radio New Zealand

The government has announced plans to slash public service jobs by about 14 percent over the next three years in a shake-up it says will deliver $2.4 billion of savings.

The changes announced in a pre-Budget speech delivered by Finance Minister Nicola Willis on Tuesday would result in about 8700 job losses by mid-2029.

“Historically, core public service numbers have been equivalent to about 1 percent of the population. After a period of largesse under the last government it now hovers around 1.2 percent.

“We will be tracking progress towards a numerical target of no more than 55,000 full-time equivalent public service employees by July 2029. That’s 8700 fewer than were employed in December last year,” Willis said.

There are currently just over 63,000 full-time public servants, which is a slight decrease under this coalition government from the high of approximately 65,000 in the 2024/25 year.

Willis has outlined an overhaul of the public service designed to “reduce the number of government departments, increase the use of AI and other digital tools, and deliver significant savings”.

“Businesses and households are using AI every day and, while parts of the public sector have seized the opportunity to innovate, others are still locked into outdated ways of doing things that prioritise box-ticking over outcomes,” she told a Business North Harbour audience.

“Our government is as frustrated as you are by the fragmentation and silos, the complexity, the status-quo thinking and the dangerously slow take up of digital and AI technologies.

“In too many parts, the back-office of government still looks like an eighties relic, run on old-fashioned systems, with slow bureaucratic processes that are too often about box-ticking rather than improving outcomes,” Willis said.

The current public service operating model is reaching its limits, according to the finance minister, and “failing to meet the expectations Kiwis have in 2026, let alone what they’ll expect in 2036 and beyond”.

The government plans to put a “sinking lid on agencies’ operating budgets” over the next four years to drive progress in the three areas Willis has outlined as her priorities.

“Over the next four years these initiatives will deliver savings of $2.4b which will be re-deployed to deliver more health services, lift educational outcomes, build infrastructure and strengthen the defence force and police.

“New Zealanders expect public services that are responsive, effective and easy to use, but too often people and businesses are still navigating fragmented systems, duplication and outdated processes,” Willis said.

Public Service Minister Paul Goldsmith said the job cuts announced would be specific to core public services, and would not include teachers, doctors, nurses, other Health NZ staff, police, or defence personnel.

“Progress will be monitored regularly, with agencies expected to demonstrate improvements in productivity, delivery and value for money,” Goldsmith said.

Speaking to reporters at Parliament on Tuesday morning, Christopher Luxon said there was a “real opportunity to leverage technology” to be more efficient with taxpayer dollars.

Luxon said it would be case-by-case when it comes to what and how agencies could be amalgamated.

“There will be cases where it doesn’t make sense for it to come together, but there are also lots of cases where we have endlessly duplicated IT services, accounts payable services, lots of back office functions … and what I’ve observed coming from outside of politics is that you know the system has just been the system for 30 to 40 years, and no one ever asked the fundamental question of, right, well, why do we have 16 ministers interfacing with an organisation like MBIE.”

Having just recently visited Singapore, the prime minister said it was a good example of a country better applying AI and technology in the public service.

“Even look at the work that’s been happening in Malaysia and other parts of Southeast Asia as well.

“You’ve got people who need to purchase a house, they go around a very convoluted process, trying to prove their identity, trying to prove their income, that can be automated. You think about a Mum with an 11 and a nine-year-old, and one needs eye glasses, and she’s trying to work out her working for families tax credits. There’s a whole bunch of better ways in which we can deliver those results,” he said.

Infrastructure Minister and Hutt South MP Chris Bishop is overseeing the amalgamation of the ministries for the environment, housing and urban development, transport, and the local government functions of internal affairs.

The stand-up date for the new ministry – MCERT – is 1 July but Bishop says it will be years before the savings are seen.

“This is about setting the public service up for the future. It’s not about immediate savings in the next six months or even the next year, it’s about setting the public service up to be firstly a better partner for local government.

“One of the points I make to local government is that central government has been a useless partner with them in terms of grappling with the great challenges facing us, from housing through to climate adaptation, through to infrastructure funding and financing, we’ve been hopeless at it, and part of the reason we haven’t been very good at it is that we haven’t organised ourselves properly.

“So that is the big driver for the creation of MCERT,” he said on his way to caucus.

Bishop also pushed back on the idea that Wellington and the Hutt Valley are public service cities and would be deeply impacted by the proposed cuts.

“This idea that the Hutt Valley is just made up of public servants who get on the train in their walk shorts and go to Wellington every day for work is offensive and wrong about the Hutt Valley.

“It is an amazing place, in the same way that every suburb of Wellington is, with incredible businesses, and we’ve got to stop stereotyping Wellington as just this boring public service town. It is so much more than that, and we need to stop thinking about it like that,” Bishop said.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins said the changes on the table were “not good news for New Zealanders”.

Speaking ahead of his party’s caucus meeting on Tuesday, Hipkins said “more than half of the jobs in question are outside the Wellington region”.

“So, these are frontline people working all over the country, they’re social workers working with vulnerable kids and families, people working in our prisons, people working at our border, people working in the conservation estate, they are frontline jobs.”

Hipkins told Morning Report there were a lot of contradictions within the proposal so he wanted to see the details.

“Bigger isn’t always better, bigger government departments aren’t always more efficient than smaller departments. Some of the bigger agencies are the most bureaucratic, with the most double handling,” he said.

“So I don’t think bigger is always better.”

Hipkins isn’t against a more integrated and technology driven public service, but said there were limitations to that.

“All of those could potentially be good things, but setting arbitrary targets to potentially reduce the public service by 10,000 people. There is no way you could reduce that many people working for our public service without reducing frontline services.”

Labour proposed its own cuts to the public service in late 2023, when in government, to the tune of 2 percent.

Asked about how many jobs would have been lost then, Hipkins said the advice he had was “there were a lot of vacancies that would be unfilled, and that they would just disestablish those jobs, so they wouldn’t have resulted in people losing their jobs”.

“There would have ultimately been a disestablishment of a number of jobs,” he said.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

America’s Cup winner and Olympic gold medallist Blair Tuke says the government should scrap its Fisheries legislation.

Tuke was speaking to the Primary Production select committee on behalf of the Live Ocean Foundation alongside ultramarathon swimmer Jono Ridler in response to the Fisheries Amendment Bill.

The bill makes changes to catch limits and the handling of on-boat monitoring footage with the aim of growing exports.

Several environmental groups have called for the bill to be stopped, while fishing companies say it helps modernise a system that has worked well for New Zealand for decades.

Tuke said New Zealand was responsible for the fourth-largest ocean space in the world, but the legislation would further entrench bottom trawling and fail to protect habitats – many of which could take centuries to recover.

“For a country surrounded by the moana, when it comes to ocean stewardship we are not leading – in fact, if it was sport, I would say we don’t even rank.”

Ridler said that while the bill did not specifically promote bottom trawling, the amendments “in aggregate prioritise short-term, bulk harvesting over broader ecosystem impacts”.

“It prioritises economic gain and bulk harvesting, including bottom trawling, while reducing safeguards to protect the environment. This increases the pressure on at-risk species and vulnerable habitats.”

He said their second concern was a weakening of environmental safeguards.

Fishing company opposes public access to boat footage

Moana New Zealand general manager Mark Ngata said New Zealand’s largest Māori-owned seafood company would be open to having an independent officer of Parliament review boat footage, but it should not be made public.

He said the company had begun using on-boat cameras eight years before it became mandatory, and having the ministry check footage was “more than sufficient”.

“We have always had the view of transparency, but also collecting information, otherwise you can’t make good decisions on what’s happening out there … it’s very important to maintain the privacy of our fishermen.

“We believe that having an organisation like the ministry out there that’s that watchdog, if you like, we think that’s more than sufficient.”

When questioned by New Zealand First’s Mark Patterson about whether an independent officer of Parliament could do that job instead, he said “trust comes from working together and solving problems … something like that could be considered”.

Overall, he said the bill was an important step for modernising fisheries management, improving responsiveness, efficiency, and certainty.

“We consider the bill to be a natural evolution of the quota management system reflecting advances in monitoring, reporting, and data availability.”

Canterbury council fears for biodiversity

Speaking for Canterbury Regional Council, councillor Genevieve Robinson said it had “serious concerns” that the proposed law risked undermining the council’s ability to meet its obligations to protect biodiversity and threatened species.

“Canterbury has the largest coastal marine area jurisdiction of any regional council in this country. More than 40 percent of our jurisdiction is coastal marine area, and that includes nationally significant ecosystems.”

“Several aspects of this bill move fisheries management away from ecosystem-based management. In particular, the council is concerned about the narrowing of the total allowable catch considerations, the reduced transparency around the onboard cameras, and the increased flexibility around annual catch entitlement carrying forward.”

She said catch limits should be set on an ecosystem-wide basis, and footage from fishing boats should be publicly accessible.

“This bill should not weaken its ecosystem safeguards, reduce transparency, or undermine our own regional councils’ ability to protect under the New Zealand coastal policy statement.”

A flotilla of crafts, from fishing boats and yachts to kayaks and stand up paddle boards, surrounding a floating ‘ban bottom trawling’ banner at Mission Bay in Auckland, New Zealand in a show of opposition to bottom trawling in the Hauraki Gulf marine park (file image).

Greenpeace

Speaking for Greenpeace, Ellie Hooper said the current balance of protection versus profit for New Zealand’s waters was “drastically off kilter” and extractive industry had been prioritised.

“It’s extremely clear that this bill, if it was passed, would take ocean policy in this country further in that wrong direction, prioritising extraction and removing the very few environmental checks and balances that exist in the Fisheries Act to stop further decline.”

She said the bill was “rotten and must be rejected in its entirety”.

“The idea that the minister would be able to disregard the environmental principles currently in the act as if fishing happens in a vacuum and doesn’t have an impact on other species or habitats is kind of non-sensical to us.”

She said they opposed the introduction of five-year catch limits, shortened judicial review timeframes, and exemptions for fishing camera footage from the Official Information Act.

“We note the issues with privacy from the industry, but there is surely a way that we can rectify this with blurring all the releases of segments of footage. This industry does have a large impact on the ocean environment, and locking up that footage from public view is not going to rebuild trust in the commercial sector’s activities.”

“Having a fine that could potentially be five times higher for somebody releasing evidence of environmental damage versus someone who actually did that damage in the first place, we think is pretty egregious.”

Young Ocean Explorers

Steve Hathaway from marine educational charity Young Ocean Explorers said the waters around New Zealand once had abundant crayfish, snapper and other stocks – but things have changed.

“Our goal is to ensure we have a thriving ocean for future generations, and we’re on the coalface with Kiwi kids. We’ve personally given presentations to over 150,000 kids around Aotearoa and we’re hearing regularly that this generation of kids are really concerned about the planet and the ocean they’re inheriting.

“Most of New Zealand is actually ocean, about 93 percent of it, and it’s thought over 80 percent of our natives live there … a very old friend of mine told me that he wouldn’t stop to have a fish at 90-Mile Beach until he saw the ocean was pink, where he knew there’s enough snapper that he would get a good feed. These days are long gone.

“I’ve seen crayfish and scallops in abundance, and something we thought would never run out. They should be our God-given right as Kiwis to harvest, but now our Northlands were not allowed to take either of them, as numbers are so diminished. How has it been so poorly managed that it’s got to this place?”

He said New Zealand needed an ambitious goal for the future of its oceans.

‘Minor updates and modernisations’ – Fishing company

Fishing company Solander Group’s managing director Paul Hufflett said many of the other submitters were making “a lot of noise” and talking “off subject”.

“What we’re dealing with is effectively an update to a piece of legislation that has served New Zealand incredibly well for the better part of 30 years,” he said.

“Really we’re just talking about some relatively minor updates and modernisations of a robust piece of legislation that’s put New Zealand in an excellent position to go forward for another 30 years.”

He said they supported the minister having the power to make five-year Total Allowable Catch decisions, supported excluding boat footage from the OIA, opposed the 20-day time limit on judicial review, opposed the introduction of alternative deem values for inshore and deep water bycatch, and strongly supported allowing fish to be returned to sea.

Ngāti Porou settlement body was not consulted

Whangaokena ki Onepoto Takutai Kaitiaki Trust spokesperson Keryn Goldsmith said the trust was not consulted over the bill.

She said the Crown was obliged to engage with them on any Fisheries legislation that affects regulations in the area under their settlement.

“We’re not opposed to the fisheries reform, rather our submission supports improvements to the fisheries system, provided those changes operate consistently with the statutory and deed-based recognition arrangements already provided and agreed between Ngāti Porou and the Crown.”

She said the Ngā Rohe Moana o Ngā Hapū o Ngāti Porou Act and the deed to amend the deed of agreement 2017 were binding on the Crown.

“They establish a bespoke framework that must be taken into account whenever fisheries decisions or decision making affects our Rohe Moana. Those obligations apply throughout the legislative development, not just at implementation, and they are not displaced by generic public consultation processes.

“As drafted, the bill would reduce scrutiny. It would compress participation time frames, concentrates discretion with decision makers, and limits accountability. Considered together, these changes risk narrowing the practical space in which hapū are able to exercise their authority and responsibilities that parliament has already recognised from a kaitiaki perspective.”

She said the Crown’s obligation was to engage with Ngāti Porou hapū on any amendment to fisheries legislation that affected the recognition and fisheries mechanisms.

“That consultation did not occur prior to the introduction of this bill. This is not merely a procedural irregularity, it is a breach of statutory and deed-based obligations owed to Ngāti Porou hapū. The Crown cannot meet those obligations by treating Hapu as one voice among many in a generic public submission process.”

Goldsmith said they did not oppose the reforms, but they must proceed in a way that honours existing commitments.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

The Prime Minister says the public service isn’t a “make-work” scheme as he signals there will be job losses as a result of proposed government changes.

Finance Minister Nicola Willis will set out three proposals in her Auckland pre-Budget speech on Tuesday afternoon in an effort to create efficiencies in the public service.

These are centred on cutting and amalgamating government agencies, more work on digitisation and using AI, and setting a target to reduce the public service head-count to 1 percent of the total population by 2029.

Speaking to reporters at Parliament on Tuesday morning, Christopher Luxon, said there was a “real opportunity to leverage technology” to be more efficient with taxpayer dollars.

Luxon said it would be case-by-case when it comes to what and how agencies could be amalgamated.

“There will be cases where it doesn’t make sense for it to come together, but there are also lots of cases where we have endlessly duplicated IT services, accounts payable services, lots of back office functions … and what I’ve observed coming from outside of politics is that you know the system has just been the system for 30 to 40 years, and no one ever asked the fundamental question of, right, well, why do we have 16 ministers interfacing with an organisation like MBIE.”

There will be job cuts, but Luxon wouldn’t put a number on how many.

“There will be job losses over time. Some of that will happen through attrition, some of that will happen over a period of time.

“Public service is not a make-work function. It’s not here just to maintain jobs and maintain a position of how it was always run since 1995 in the same way. We have to constantly evolve the public service to make sure it’s on point and it’s delivering for New Zealanders. It’s pretty exciting, sort of proposition,” he said.

Having just recently visited Singapore, the prime minister said it was a good example of a country better applying AI and technology in the public service.

“Even look at the work that’s been happening in Malaysia and other parts of Southeast Asia as well.

“You’ve got people who need to purchase a house, they go around a very convoluted process, trying to prove their identity, trying to prove their income, that can be automated. You think about a Mum with an 11 and a nine-year-old, and one needs eye glasses, and she’s trying to work out her working for families tax credits. There’s a whole bunch of better ways in which we can deliver those results,” he said.

Infrastructure Minister and Hutt South MP Chris Bishop is overseeing the amalgamation of the ministries for the environment, housing and urban development, transport, and the local government functions of internal affairs.

The stand-up date for the new ministry – MCERT – is 1 July but Bishop says it will be years before the savings are seen.

“This is about setting the public service up for the future. It’s not about immediate savings in the next six months or even the next year, it’s about setting the public service up to be firstly a better partner for local government.

“One of the points I make to local government is that central government has been a useless partner with them in terms of grappling with the great challenges facing us, from housing through to climate adaptation, through to infrastructure funding and financing, we’ve been hopeless at it, and part of the reason we haven’t been very good at it is that we haven’t organised ourselves properly.

“So that is the big driver for the creation of MCERT,” he said on his way to caucus.

Bishop also pushed back on the idea that Wellington and the Hutt Valley are public service cities and would be deeply impacted by the proposed cuts.

“This idea that the Hutt Valley is just made up of public servants who get on the train in their walk shorts and go to Wellington every day for work is offensive and wrong about the Hutt Valley.

“It is an amazing place, in the same way that every suburb of Wellington is, with incredible businesses, and we’ve got to stop stereotyping Wellington as just this boring public service town. It is so much more than that, and we need to stop thinking about it like that,” Bishop said.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins said the changes on the table were “not good news for New Zealanders”.

Speaking ahead of his party’s caucus meeting on Tuesday, Hipkins said “more than half of the jobs in question are outside the Wellington region”.

“So, these are frontline people working all over the country, they’re social workers working with vulnerable kids and families, people working in our prisons, people working at our border, people working in the conservation estate, they are frontline jobs.”

Hipkins isn’t against a more integrated and technology driven public service, but said there were limitations to that.

“All of those could potentially be good things, but setting arbitrary targets to potentially reduce the public service by 10,000 people. There is no way you could reduce that many people working for our public service without reducing frontline services.”

Labour proposed its own cuts to the public service in late 2023, when in government, to the tune of 2 percent.

Asked about how many jobs would have been lost then, Hipkins said the advice he had was “there were a lot of vacancies that would be unfilled, and that they would just disestablish those jobs, so they wouldn’t have resulted in people losing their jobs”.

“There would have ultimately been a disestablishment of a number of jobs,” he said.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

MIL OSI

Source: New Zealand Government

Youth Minister James Meager has confirmed at least 300 at-risk young Kiwis will be supported to re-engage in education or transition into the workforce, through new joint Government and community funding initiatives.

It follows Mr Meager’s launch of Youth Week 2026 at Parliament this evening, marking the start of a nationwide celebration of young people and the vital contribution they make to communities across New Zealand.

South Auckland-based Mana Inc has received $1m in equal co-funding from the Government and Aotearoa Lifecourse Fund to deliver a ten-week, early intervention support service to more than 150 young people aged 12 to 24 years, over one year. 

Action Ed has also received $200,000 in equal co-funding from the Government and Foundation North to deliver leadership development and employment-readiness programmes to more than 150 Auckland young people aged 13 to 24 years, over one year. 

“By co-funding alongside other organisations, we are doubling the amount of financial support being brought into the youth sector. This provides twice the opportunity for young people to benefit from these initiatives at no additional taxpayer cost,” Mr Meager says.

“We know community support is essential to achieving long-term positive outcomes for young people, and when local organisations work alongside government, we can back proven ideas, further our reach, and ensure help is tailored to those in need.”

The Government has also provided youth development peak body, Ara Taiohi, with $85,000 in grant funding for youth-led/focused events and internships throughout Youth Week 2026. 

“These events will be built around this year’s theme of ‘Our voices matter, We deserve to be heard’ and will create more spaces where young people’s ideas, perspectives, and ambitions are heard. This will be through practical initiatives, like careers expos and mental health webinars, to set the next generation up for success,” Mr Meager says.

Source: Radio New Zealand

A disability advocate says a bill to clarify the purpose of Disability Support Services is the worst piece of legislation she’s ever seen.

The government introduced the Disability Support Services Bill on Monday, aimed at “providing clarity and stability” to the system supporting disabled New Zealanders.

The bill includes details clarifying the Crown is not the employer of family carers.

It comes after the Supreme court ruled last year that two parents who care full-time for their disabled children should be considered government employees.

The legislation would reduce the Crown’s exposure to fiscal and litigation risks, following that ruling.

Advocate Jane Carrigan said family carers should clearly be considered employees, they were doing what was recognised as the government’s responsibility.

“They’re providing disability support services. The government’s responsible, notwithstanding it bending over backwards in this legislation to suggest they aren’t, for providing disability support services.”

There were “40-odd” people with family care-related cases filed with the Employment Relations Authority, who should be allowed to have them heard, she said.

This bill would pull the rug on their only chance at legal remedy, she said.

“All this, this piece of legislation is doing is limiting remedies for those people with the highest needs.”

She likened the bill’s proposed changes to “Part 4A” – a law that was in place from 2013 to 2020 which allowed some people to be paid for caring for their disabled family members, while inhibiting others.

Part 4A also prevented disabled people and their families from taking their complaints to the Human Rights Commission, or taking any legal proceedings on the basis of discrimination to their human rights.

“It’s cruel and perverse … It has to be the worst piece of legislation I’ve ever seen.”

Carrigan said she was glad the bill had not been entered under urgency, as she would be fighting it throughout the select committee process.

“I’ll be making the most of the fact that it’s going through a standard committee, and I can tell you there will be a lot more like me.”

Family carers had been failed by the system, Carrigan said.

“Family carers are completely isolated. This is not a system that cares about them. This is a system that suddenly worry it might have to pay for the disability support services they’re providing.”

‘Never the intention’

Disability issues minister Louise Upston told RNZ there had “never been an expectation” that MSD would employ family member support workers.

The bill would not affect the two already successful claims, but there were better ways to support family carers, she said.

“I have commissioned further work in this space and will be consulting on a package for carers”

She said that work was “clearly overdue”, and she would like to have that package by the end of the year.

“We do need to make sure that it’s fair, transparent, and sustainable,” she said.

At the moment, the disabled person themselves could be considered to be employing their family member as a support worker, Upston said.

“When somebody doesn’t have the means to be able to do that as a disabled person, we need to look at how do we better legally protect them.”

In some cases, a third party called an “agent” was considered to be the employer.

The bill clarified that DSS funding was a “contribution” toward disabled people being able to live an everyday life, Upston said.

“It makes clear that families and whānau have responsibility for the wellbeing of their members in the first instance and where appropriate.”

This did not mean DSS would not help where disabled people’s families were supporting them, she added.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: New Zealand Government

Good afternoon everyone. It’s my pleasure to join Business North Harbour once again and to speak with you about this year’s Government Budget.

Let me acknowledge my colleague, Paul Goldsmith, the Minister for the Public Service and Digitising Government.

Most importantly, let me acknowledge the business leaders, employers, entrepreneurs and Kiwi battlers represented in this room today. I know you work hard for a living, that you take seriously the people who depend on you for their jobs, and that many of you have been through a hard slog these past few years.

First there was Covid, then there was out-of-control inflation and spiralling interest rates, then there was the inevitable economic downturn and the massive efforts you’ve taken to leave it behind. That’s before we mention the actions of the current occupant of the White House or the fuel crisis the world is now facing.

Doing what we can to make economic conditions easier for you is front and centre for me every time I put together a Budget. When you do well, New Zealand does well. Jobs are created, pay rises can be paid and life can be more affordable for every Kiwi. Thank you for what you do.

As the Prime Minister highlighted last week, this year’s Budget takes place in challenging times. The world is more volatile than ever and things we once took for granted – like secure fuel supply or a rules-based trading system – are no longer a given. Across the globe, countries are struggling to deliver the improving living standards and basic affordability citizens rightly expect.

As a small, trading nation, already carrying high levels of debt, New Zealand is heavily exposed to these global trends. We’re still carrying a deficit from the Covid spend-up and international credit rating agencies are watching us closely. The interest bill on our debt has soared to about $9 billion a year, unemployment has only just started falling, and Kiwis are, fairly, focussed on what it will take to make life more affordable in this country.

I have to say, with an election around the corner, it’s tempting to proffer another spending band-aid in response. To suggest a superficial solution that sounds good today, even if it doesn’t deliver tomorrow. You know the genre – the kind of announcement that comes with a catchy slogan, typically about something “free”, or promising a cash hand-out we can’t really afford. Well, we’ve seen that movie before, and we didn’t like the ending.

Consider the last government’s cost-of-living payment, a $350 band aid that ended-up being paid out to French backpackers and dead people and only added more fuel to the underlying inflation fire. It was a band-aid on a bullet wound. The wound was still in need of treatment long after the band-aid had worn off.

Tempting as it is, our Government is not going to repeat those mistakes.

Instead, we’re doing the substantive reform work to address the underlying drivers of today’s affordability challenges, so that New Zealand can be a more affordable place now and in the years ahead.

Making consumer prices more affordable by keeping underlying inflation in check, with clear accountabilities for the Reserve Bank supported by a sensible spending approach by Government.
Making the business of government more affordable by driving value-for-money in all we do – from service delivery through to infrastructure planning.
Making housing more affordable – to rent and to buy – by fast-tracking new housing developments, planning reform, ending the war on landlords and with interest rates having tracked lower on our watch.
Making household rates more affordable by legislating for rates caps, supported by work to simplify and re-focus local government.
Making electricity more affordable by consenting and incentivising the generation investments needed to ensure abundant, affordable and resilient energy supply.
Making childcare more affordable by providing the FamilyBoost tax rebate to families who are working hard for their kids.
Making insurance more affordable by pausing hikes in the Natural Hazard Levy while we get to the bottom of what’s really driving insurance costs.
Making groceries more affordable by carefully doing the overdue and complex work needed to enhance competition between supermarkets.
Making work, investment and savings affordable, by stopping Labour’s constant march towards more taxes and instead reducing them where we can.
Making hard work and entrepreneurialism affordable by continuing the growth reforms needed to make this a better place to establish and grow a business, whether that’s by signing new free trade agreements, lifting education standards, or delivering growth-enhancing public infrastructure.
A larger envelope of capital spending, to support the building of major new job-rich public infrastructure projects that support economic growth and resilience.
A major lift in funding for our health system to support better primary healthcare, along with specialist, elective and emergency services.
Targeted investments in frontline services including those delivered by our schools, police and corrections services.
A continued enhancement of the capability of the New Zealand Defence Force so it can properly contribute to the defence relationships on which our national security depends.
More progress towards our goals of balanced books and lower debt.

Let’s be clear, none of this work delivers overnight and I’m with every Kiwi who wants it done as fast as possible. But I believe our government’s approach – of addressing our country’s underlying challenges with durable reform – is the only honest and responsible response to today’s affordability concerns.

Put simply, in an uncertain and fast-changing world, New Zealand simply can’t afford another failed spend-up.

Now, more than ever, you need your government to hold a steady hand on the tiller, ensuring the country’s finances are in fit condition to withstand whatever comes our way. That the public services you depend on are delivered well and can be sustained. That we are putting in place the building blocks for a more affordable tomorrow.

That’s why this year’s Budget will continue our ongoing work to get the books back in balance and the debt curve bending down. With a global fuel crisis underway, some would have us put those plans on hold, we say no, those goals are more important now than ever before.

In this year’s Budget, we’ve reduced the amount of new money we’re giving ourselves for day-to-day spending and we’ve carefully prioritised your precious taxpayer dollars towards the things that really matter.

With careful budgeting and ongoing reprioritisation we have been able to achieve a lot. On Budget day we will announce a series of investments needed to make this a stronger, more resilient, and more affordable country now and in the years ahead.

Let me pick out some highlights of what Budget 2026 delivers.

You’ll hear more from me on all of these fronts just under two weeks from now.

For today, I want to share with you the details of one important initiative in this year’s Budget: the next phase in our plans to transform the public service.

Phase Two of Public Sector Reform

A driving goal for our Government is to deliver better public services for New Zealanders, not by just blithely spending more, but by driving better results from the spending we already do.

Our perspective is simple: a Government’s compassion shouldn’t be judged by the size of the cheques it writes on your behalf, but rather it should be judged for the results it gets for that spending.

Ensuring value for taxpayer money shouldn’t be a radical position, but the need to re-state it is evidenced by recent history.

Cast your mind back to 2023: Labour tripled government debt in dollar terms, lifted spending by 73 per cent, and left behind a structural deficit.

What’s worse, there was almost nothing to show for this historic spend-up. Educational achievement went backwards, health waiting lists grew, immunisation rates fell, violent crime increased and social housing waiting lists ballooned. Grand visions for light rail across Auckland resulted in little but a canned cycle-bridge and a massive consultancy bill.

So what did New Zealand have to show for the structural deficit bequeathed to us? In part we had the wage bill of a truly historic hiring spree, with the number of public servants having exploded from 47,250 to 65,700.

To put that into context, that growth in public sector roles outpaced job creation in the private sector at a ratio of almost three to one. Worse, most of the growth occurred in the back-office, with ballooning costs for policy analysts and consultancy invoices, rather than for frontline positions.

The country was on a completely unsustainable course, with the books in tatters and public services in decline.

Since being elected, this Government has been on a mission to reverse those trends. Our belief is that you don’t need to break the bank to get better results.

That belief may be poo-poohed by my Opposition colleagues but I know the people in this room get it.

Your mission for increased productivity isn’t a debating point, it’s essential for staying in business.

You think carefully about every extra dollar you spend and seek to constantly squeeze more bang out of every buck.

You relish the opportunity to use new technologies and tools, to deliver better for your customers and to get greater returns for the work you put in.

You should expect the same focus from your Government. After all, it’s your money we’re spending.

The good news is we’ve already made significant progress.

When we came to office the Prime Minister set clear targets for the outcomes we want to achieve from the public service. We are rigorous in measuring our progress against them, and in prioritising our resources to achieve them.

We’ve had an ongoing focus on stopping poorly targeted spending and have put every new idea to the affordability test.

A tougher stance on law and order, accompanied by more visible policing, has driven a considerable decline in violent crime. Our targets have been met well ahead of schedule with 49,000 fewer victims of violent crime since we were elected, and a 25 per cent reduction in the number of children and young people with serious and persistent violent behaviour.

Hospital wait times have stabilised and are now improving. People are waiting for less time in the emergency department and for elective surgery. Last year our “Elective Boost” policy saw us partner with the private sector to deliver an additional 16,000 life-changing medical procedures.

In education, we’re driving reforms to bring back a structured approach to teaching reading, writing and maths. The early results are exciting. Attendance levels are up, maths students are making faster progress and new entrants are reaching literacy benchmarks in far greater numbers. Through modern delivery we’ve significantly reduced the cost of building new classrooms.

Another example is housing. The last Government left us with a heavily indebted state housing agency Kainga Ora, record waiting lists for social housing, soaring rents in the private sector and thousands of children living in emergency motel rooms. We’ve turned that around: Kainga Ora’s debt is down $9.5 billion even while the number of social houses has increased by more than 7000, waiting lists have reduced by more than 5000 people, rents have stabilised and 2000 children have been moved out of motels.

All of these performance improvements have come alongside a period of cost restraint and fiscal consolidation, as we chart a path back to balanced books and debt reduction.

Our first two Budgets included $44 billion of redirected spending. We’ve driven hard to reduce back-office costs: spending on consultants is down $915 million, clerical and administrative positions are down 15 per cent, managers are down 6 per cent and policy analysts are down 10 per cent.

What this shows you is that, even with more limited resources, our public service can achieve a lot. I can tell you honestly that some of New Zealand’s best, brightest and most publicly-spirited individuals are employed in our government agencies. With good leadership at the top, they are capable of extraordinary things.

But, if you’re listening to this record of progress and quietly thinking – there’s still so much to do – then let me say, we agree.

Yes, progress to date has been promising, we’ve fixed up the basics, but so much more is needed to achieve the modern, efficient and productive public services Kiwis expect.

Our Government is as frustrated as you are by the fragmentation and silos, the complexity, the status-quo thinking and the dangerously slow take up of digital and AI technologies.

In too many parts, the back-office of Government still looks like an eighties relic, run on old-fashioned systems, with slow bureaucratic processes that are too often about box-ticking rather than improving outcomes.

In truth, we are reaching the limits of the current public service operating model.

The current system is failing to meet the expectations Kiwis have in 2026, let alone what they‘ll expect in 2036 and beyond.

So today I’m announcing that as part of this year’s Budget our government is embarking on a fundamental overhaul of the public service, to drive better services, more productivity, and better value for taxpayer resources.

We’ve set three key goals and set a sinking lid on agencies’ operating budgets in order to guarantee progress.

Goal Number one. We are going to streamline the number of government agencies and entities.

Comparisons are not exact, but New Zealand has, by latest count, 39 departments and ministries administering Budget lines. That compares with 16 in Australia, 24 in the UK and around 12 in Finland.

More departments equal more managers, more HR departments, more comms teams and more administrators. More departments also equals more statutory compliance requirements, more silos, more inter-departmental consultation and more costs for the citizens and businesses forced to multiply their interactions with government.

So, over the next three to five years, we are going to significantly reduce the number of public service agencies.

Following today’s announcement, public service agencies will be asked to come up with proposals to logically merge their existing activities around citizen-facing functions, using common technology platforms. We expect to announce more detail in the coming months.

The creation of the new Ministry of Cities, Environment, Regions Transport is an example of what is possible.

Merging the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, the Ministry of Transport and the Ministry for the Environment will reduce duplication and ensure a faster, more integrated approach to issues like housing affordability and climate adaptation. It will also create significant savings along the way.

Goal number two. We’re going to ensure government is fully on board the digitisation and AI revolutions sweeping the world.

While New Zealanders are increasingly conducting more of their business digitally, the public sector hasn’t been keeping pace. For too long, the public service has been scared of AI, slow to move to the cloud, and has procured a complex and fragmented set of overlapping IT solutions.

We need to digitise both customer-facing services and back-office systems to make it easier and more affordable for people to interact with government agencies.

We have a Government Chief Digital Officer with responsibility for overseeing digital investments. His mission: to improve services and drive down cost.

The Chief Digital Officer will oversee investment in digital systems to move human resources, payroll, case management and other systems to the cloud and to embed AI deployment as a basic expectation for all public entities.

An example of what is possible is the recent trial of an AI scribe tool in hospital emergency rooms which has reduced the amount of time clinicians have to spend on file notes and increased the time they spend with patients. Feedback from doctors and nurses has been overwhelmingly positive.

Goal number three. We’re going to get public servant numbers back in step with historic norms with a focus on hiring and retaining talent.

Every business leader here today knows it’s not how many people you employ, it’s the talents of those people that counts.

We are going to going to bring renewed focus to the essential task of attracting, retaining and developing public service talent.

The Public Service Commission is already working to identify and develop future public service leaders, is actively tracking our 100 highest potential leaders, and will soon launch a public service academy to professionalise its talent-development efforts.

At the same time, we’re going to pull the brakes on the increase in overall public servant numbers.

Historically, New Zealand’s core public service has equated to about 1 per cent of the population. After a period of largesse under the last Government it now hovers around 1.2%.

One of Labour’s first moves was to remove the cap National had previously put on the number of people employed in government administration. Unsurprisingly, that spurred a huge hiring spree, with the number of workers in service support roles rocketing up by 46 per cent.

That’s unsustainable, it’s unaffordable and it’s out of step with international trends.

In Canada, Mark Carney’s government is reducing the size of the federal public service workforce by 10 per cent over the next few years. In Singapore, growth in the public service is pegged to not exceed overall growth in the labour force. The UK is systematically shrinking administrative budgets.

Our Government has therefore set a goal to get our core public servant numbers back to the historic norm at 1 per cent of the population, roughly equivalent to what it was before Labour took office.

We will be tracking progress towards a numerical target of no more than 55,000 full time equivalent public service employees by July 2029. That’s 8700 fewer than were employed in December last year.

Let me stress that these targets apply to the core public service and do not include teachers, nurses, doctors, police or people employed by Crown entities. We fully expect that with good budgeting we will be hiring more nurses, police officers and others in critical frontline roles.

How will we achieve this reduction in numbers? By doing the things your business considers routine: allowing for natural attrition, stopping duplication, streamlining back-office functions, accelerating uptake of digital tech and requiring government agencies to report every quarter on their progress towards the targets.

The result?

A modern, high-performing public service that is more connected, productive and efficient, and that ensures more resources are directed toward better outcomes for New Zealanders.

We’ll also deliver some big savings. To reflect and drive the efficiencies expected from these reforms, this year’s Budget reduces most agencies’ operating budgets by 2 per cent in the coming year, followed by a further 5 per cent in each of the following two years.

Those savings add up, and have created significant headroom for higher-priority investments, a total of $2.4 billion over the forecast period, averaging $597 million a year. These savings will now be deployed to better purposes – to delivering more services in our health system, to increasing educational resources for our schools, to building infrastructure and strengthening our defence force and police.

I look forward to detailing these investments on Budget day.

Some like to pretend we can have all that investment without saving a dollar elsewhere. They’re wrong. Their promises don’t add up, and the future they invite is bleak: a future of increasing taxes, heavier borrowing, shaky finances and unaffordable debt.

Sensible political leaders owe it to Kiwis to face seriously into the increasing volatility of a changing world. We simply must ensure our own house is in order and that our government books are under control. We must do the work now to ensure we can face the future with confidence.

In closing, let me say once again, thank you for listening and for your continued work to realise the great potential of this country.

Despite our many challenges, there’s no place I’d rather help lead than New Zealand: a country free from armed conflict with undisputed borders and access to abundant natural resources, a history of tenacity and innovation, strong community spirit, smart people, savvy business leaders and – may the voters agree in November – a country that had the wisdom to elect a government with the drive and common sense to secure a better and more affordable future for us all.

Budget 2026 will help secure New Zealand’s future, your future and your children’s future. Thank you.

Source: Radio New Zealand

A primary teachers union says a last-minute amendment from Education Minister places the Teaching Council under total ministerial control.

The Green Party says it bad lawmaking and an ideologically driven undermining of the Council’s independence.

Erica Stanford unveiled the changes to the Education and Training (System Reform) Amendment Bill, which was set for a Tuesday Committee of the Whole House debate in Parliament.

Stanford said the changes were aimed at improving the “effectiveness, accountability and public confidence in the Teaching Council”.

They included:

• Adding child safety to the Council’s statutory purpose
• Changes to reporting and monitoring arrangements
• Requiring the Council to “give effect to government policy decisions while preserving its independence in individual decisions”
• Updating council membership to between seven and nine members, all appointed by the minister
• Enabling the minister to remove members
• Introducing term limits for the chief executive

She said the changes followed a review by lawyer Debbie Francis, who Stanford appointed to the Teaching Council board in February, as well as a Public Service Commission inquiry into conflicts of interest and procurement processes.

“I am deeply concerned by the Francis Review finding that child safety is not clearly centred as the Council’s purpose, and that the Council lacks clarity in its role and does not appear to see itself as a system regulator,” Stanford said.

“The Public Service Commission inquiry found that the Council had significant flaws in governance and internal oversight, which led to serious shortcomings in the Council’s processes. These findings indicate the need for serious structural reform to build the Council’s capacity and make sure it is focused on its core business: protecting child safety and assuring quality teaching.”

In a statement, the primary teachers union NZEI Te Riu Roa said the moves marked a significant departure that would strip the council of its independence and place it under “total ministerial control”.

The changes also contradicted the advice from the Education Ministry, president Ripeka Lessels said.

“These changes dismantle the independence of the teaching profession’s regulatory body and were introduced with no prior consultation with the education sector,” Lessels said.

“This mirrors the same undemocratic process used by the Minister to remove Te Tiriti o Waitangi obligations from school boards under section 127 through a last-minute Amendment Paper.

“Losing guaranteed representation for early childhood education, primary, and secondary sectors is a massive step backward. Rushing these major changes through without asking teachers for feedback shows a complete lack of respect for our profession.”

However, Green Party Education spokesperson Lawrence Xu-nan said the moves undermined the Council’s independence and the profession as a whole.

“We’ve seen the minister over the past few legislations whittle down the power of the Teaching Council, which is an independent body that is supposed to be in charge of anything from initial teacher education courses … teacher registration, also disciplinary actions, etcetera.

“The minister has moved a lot of some of the functions under the secretary under the ministry, and now we’ve seen that she has just completely ripped away any remaining ounce of independence and voice from the sector from this particular body.”

He said before the coalition came to power, the Council had 13 members, seven of whom were elected by the sector.

“The Teaching Council – like the Nurses Council, like any other professional body and professional council – must remain independent and must not be politicised by any government. That’s how we can have a long and enduring public service system.

“Rather than teachers and the teaching council and initial teacher education using best evidence and best practice when it comes to the teaching profession based on international evidence, etc. They are now going to be all subsumed under this narrow scope of what any minister would consider to be best practice and evidence.”

He said having the amendment paper dropped the night before the Committee of the Whole stage removed any chance for consultation .

“It is fast and loose lawmaking, it is bad lawmaking, it is undemocratic,” he said.

“The last time this happened was the removal of the Te Tiriti or Waitangi treaty clauses in section 127 of the education and training amendment bill, and that has had obviously a long impact. Most recently, now we’ve just seen … the Waitangi Tribunal has severely criticised the Crown for the way they went about the process of removing that particular section.”

“This is terrible law making. It just shows that the government and the minister is taking just a one-sided approach and completely undermining the democratic process of Aotearoa New Zealand, at the same time undermining the independence of the teaching council, as well as the sanctity and professionalism of the teaching profession.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: New Zealand Government

The Government is extending the timeframe for Southland farmers to submit freshwater farm plans to ensure they can benefit from the updated national system to be adopted later this year, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay, Environment Minister Nicola Grigg, and Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard say.

The regulation currently requires farmers to prepare and submit a farm plan by 27 May 2026, before improvements to the national freshwater farm plan system are finalised.

“This is now impractical and so we are pushing the date out to give farmers certainty,” Mr McClay says.

“Cabinet has agreed Southland farmers and growers will now have until the end of November 2027 to submit their farm plan and benefit from the updated system,” Mr McClay says.

The extension makes sure approximately 2,500 Southland farmers remain compliant with the regulations.

“This sensible decision will ensure what Southlanders need to do is aligned with the requirements for farmers in other regions as the new system comes into effect – giving them confidence to continue to produce high-quality food and fibre.”

Environment Minister Nicola Grigg says extending the timeline for Southland farm plans will remove unnecessary pressure on local farmers and will help ensure a smooth transition to the improved system.

“This is a common-sense solution that aligns with our approach to streamline or remove many of the burdensome regulations that are holding back our farmers and growers.” 

Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard says the Government is maintaining momentum on improving farm plan regulations.

“This change announced today applies only in Southland. The extra time will mean that national and regional farm planning systems are well aligned to avoid duplication and unnecessary cost for farmers,” Mr Hoggard says.

“The improvements to the system, while supporting effective freshwater management will clarify what farming activities will need a certified farm plan along with simplifying parts of the farm plan such as land blocking and mapping.”

“We are currently testing improvements to the freshwater farm plan system with the rural community.”
 

Source: Radio New Zealand

Labour leader Chris Hipkins says public servant caps can be “arbitrary” and bigger government departments aren’t always better at doing the job, as the finance minister looks to downsize the public service.

Nicola Willis will reveal on Tuesday afternoon proposals to reduce the number of government agencies, by telling ministries and departments to come up with plans for amalgamation.

RNZ understands Willis will set out three proposals in her Auckland pre-Budget speech to create efficiencies in the public service, including amalgamating government agencies, more work on digitisation and using AI, and setting a target to reduce the public service headcount to 1 percent of the total population by 2029.

Hipkins told Morning Report there were a lot of contradictions within the proposal so he wanted to see the details.

“Bigger isn’t always better, bigger government departments aren’t always more efficient than smaller departments. Some of the bigger agencies are the most bureaucratic, with the most double handling…

“So I don’t think bigger is always better.”

Hipkins said Aotearoa needed to have a public service that was the right size for the job.

“Rather than setting an arbitrary cap we need to ask what is it we want the public servants to do.”

Public service agencies were easy to pick on, Hipkins said, and many were working on preparing for things people might not understand why it was needed – things like earthquakes and pandemics.

That “just in case” work was really important, he said.

Another idea many people had was that people working in public service were all sitting behind a desk in Wellington.

“This just isn’t true,” Hipkins said.

Hipkins did agree new technological tools, including AI, could be used to increase efficiency in the public service.

There are 42 ministries and agencies currently in the public sector and just over 63,000 full-time workers.

Willis says the headcount blew out by far too much under the previous Labour governments – it was 48,000 in 2017 and had increased to 57,000 by 2020.

Getting the number of public servants back to 1 percent of the total population by 2029 would require a cut of potentially 8000 jobs, with the government believing AI and greater digitisation like what is used in the private sector could pick up the workload of public servants currently in the system.

While 43 percent of the public sector workforce lives and works in Wellington the other 57 percent is based all over the rest of the country.

About 21 percent of the workforce is in Auckland.

Last year, the Public Service Commissioner Sir Brian Roche told Mata he was looking at a shakeup of agencies.

At the time, he said all options were on the table, but indicated ministries’ functions and branding would remain.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand