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Today I am setting out our plan in the event we have a new case of community transmission of COVID-19 in New Zealand. Since we moved to level one, we have continued work to ensure we have an ongoing level of preparedness for resurgence in New Zealand
The facilities were an unprecedented response to an unprecedented threat: coronavirus. The need for large-scale accommodation quickly became apparent in late March 2020 when the border was closed and Kiwis flooded home. "Fifteen hotels were quickly contracted in Auckland," says Megan Main, one of the joint heads of MIQ, reflecting on the past year's COVID-19 response. "By April 9, when the Prime Minister announced managed isolation was compulsory, we had 18 hotels to house returning Kiwis. We now have 32 facilities, across five regions, with an operational capacity of 4500 rooms, supporti...
Thanks to those concerning occurrences at the Pullman – along with other more recent circumstances – our news for the next few weeks is likely to be once again dominated by the term “Border Failure”. That is understandable – the recent circumstances via which first the South African strain and then the UK variant made their way out of containment deserve serious scrutiny. However, there’s another dimension to failures in our border policy. One which also mandates public attention and concern. Not least because that which underlies the latter also may very likely be actively contri...