New Zealand’s Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) has congratulated the Nelson City Council on its vote today to boycott companies which trade with illegal Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories.

The city council (pop. 58,000) — New Zealand’s 15th-largest city — became the latest local body to change its procurement policy to exclude companies identified by the UN Human Rights Council as being complicit in the building and maintenance of illegal Israeli settlements on Palestinian land.

“Nelson City Council is taking action while our national government is looking the other way”, PSNA chair John Minto said in a statement.

• READ MORE: This year, Arab-American political power came to the fore over Gaza
• Other BDS movement reports

“It is [Prime Minister] Christopher Luxon who should be ending all New Zealand dealings with companies involved in the illegal Israeli settlements.

“Instead, our government is cowardly complicit with Israeli war crimes.”

It is a war crime to move citizens onto land illegally occupied as Israel is doing.

Nelson City Council joins Environment Canterbury and the Christchurch City Council — New Zealand’s second largest city — which both adopted this policy earlier this year.  Other local bodies are believed to be following.

“We also congratulate local Palestine solidarity activists in Nelson who have organised and battled so well for this historic win today. They are the heroes behind this decision,”minto said.

Minto said following the move by Nelson city representatives, “we are renewing our call for the government to act”.

He again called for the government to:

• Ban all imports from the illegal Israeli settlements;
• Direct the Superfund, Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) and Kiwisaver providers to end their investments in all Israeli companies and other companies supporting the illegal Israeli settlements; and
• Direct New Zealand government agencies to end procurement of goods or services from all Israeli companies and other companies supporting the illegal Israeli settlements.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Minister of Finance Grant Robertson used today’s post-cabinet briefing to discuss the shifting ownership of the national Kiwibank and flooding in the South Island districts of Nelson and Marlborough.

But they also faced questions over rogue Labour MP Dr Gaurav Sharma and planned protests tomorrow at Parliament.

Cabinet this week was expected to consider further support for flood-affected communities, including in Nelson and Marlborough after Ardern and Emergency Management Minister Kieran McAnulty examined the damage today.

• READ MORE: Parliament protest: Barricades erected, public urged to plan ahead

Ardern said she was always mindful that visits to significant weather events — like those in Nelson — and natural disasters only gave a snapshot, often several days into the response and after some of the clean-up had begun.

“With all of that in mind there is no question that the rain in the region has been devastating. Homes have either become uninhabitable or they have large slips sitting precariously behind them,” she said.

The recovery would take some time, but she saw a very tight-knit community working hard to help out one another.

“Scones being brought to workers, the woman who delivered chocolates to the digger operators. I asked one woman if her home was okay. ‘Yeah, we’re absolutely fine,’ she said, ‘except for the car hanging above it.’

“It transpired that she couldn’t return home, but she seemed much more worried about everyone else, much more so than herself.”

Ardern said one of the biggest concerns in the Marlborough region at the moment was reconnecting those who had been cut off from the usual transport routes.

Watch the media conference

After discussion with McAnulty, the government will be kicking an initial $100,000 into the Marlborough relief fund, which was expected to be further extended.

The Nelson mayor had also requested a further $100,000, which took the Nelson fund to $300,000.

These funds were for immediate response, and were highly discretionary on the part of the mayors.

Ardern highlighted that they did not amount to the full recovery cost, and came separately to things like the funding for repairing roading, or support from the Ministry of Social Development.

Government taking control of Kiwibank
Ardern said it was both exciting and reassuring that the government had secured Kiwibank’s long-term future in New Zealand ownership, with the crown taking over from crown-owned NZ Post, Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) and the NZ Superannuation Fund.

“Not only will this safeguard all future profits to stay in the country — unlike the Australian-owned banks — it will also continue to enhance competition in the banking sector,” she said.

“The government is fully committed to ensuring Kiwibank is supported to meet its full potential and that includes ensuring access to capital, so the bank can be a genuine and credible competitor … which operates independently of the government but that is able to compete on a level playing field with the big Aussie operators.”

Robertson said the move honoured the purpose and intent of Kiwibank when it was set up in 2002.

“This transaction has come about as the circumstances for the shareholders since 2016 — New Zealand Post, ACC and the New Zealand Super Fund, all crown-owned — their interests in Kiwibank have diverged … since this time.”

He said the acquisition would not change the overall value of the crown’s balance sheet, but owning shares in Kiwibank did not fit with NZ Post and ACC’s long-term plans, including NZ Post’s goal of growing its core delivery business, and ACC’s long-term investment strategy has evolved beyond owning shares in a bank.

NZ Super Fund was interested in a majority holding, but withdrew its interest as it did not align with the government’s ownership objectives.

New Zealand public ownership of the bank was a bottom line for the government, Robertson said, as it was for the previous National-led government.

“Kiwibank will continue to operate independently and at arm’s length from the government with the crown’s ownership of Kiwi Group Holdings through a newly incorporated schedule for a company, Kiwi Group Capital.”

Robertson said Kiwi Group Capital would be governed by a board of directors and the shares would be held by shareholding ministers as usual.

“At one level the acquisition is a straightforward transfer of assets … the government does have to fund this transaction and this will be through the government’s multi-year capital allowance.

“This means that the cost to purchase is already reflected in the borrowing programme we announced at Budget 2022 and has no impact on the crown’s overall debt forecasts.”

He said part of the transaction would include a special dividend payment to the crown, which was yet to be determined by the board.

Robertson rejected the suggestion the Kiwibank ownership model was changing because New Zealand Post was struggling with its business model.

“What this is, is making sure that a banking institution, that we think’s got a really important role in New Zealand, stays Kiwi-owned, and when the five-year exit limit came off last year we began discussions.”

The Super Fund had wanted a level of flexibility which would have allowed foreign ownership or final sale to foreign entities, “which we simply couldn’t do because our bottom line was to stay Kiwi-owned”.

He believed the bank remained an important part of New Zealand’s banking landscape.

Ardern said after 20 years of operation for Kiwibank, it was an exciting milestone.

Labour backbench MP Gaurav Sharma
Labour’s caucus will tomorrow consider expelling Hamilton West MP Dr Gaurav Sharma.

Ardern said there had been no basis to a lot of the claims that had been made by Dr Sharma, “and I think we do need to have thresholds before we launch into things like inquiries that of course come at considerable expense and of course stress and anxiety to the staff that have been drawn in”.

Dr Sharma provided a recording of someone he said was a senior MP in the caucus to Newshub, who called him after a meeting he was not invited to.

Ardern said she did not think the fact it was secretly recorded was appropriate and she did not intend to chase down details of who it was.

She said it was her personal belief the person who contacted Sharma was trying to help the situation.

A message from minister Kiri Allan, shared to the caucus, which Dr Sharma shared with media in a screenshot he claimed showed backbench MPs were being advised on how to avoid the Official Information Act, had been taken out of context, Ardern said.

“What you can see there is a minister who is concerned — as a decision-making minister, Minister of Conservation, remember … she needs to ensure that no one seeks to compromise that decision-making. It’s only appropriate to remind MPs that it wouldn’t be appropriate to lobby a decision-making minister.”

Ministers worked hard to ensure, where they did have decision-making powers, they treated those decisions very seriously, she said.

“We often can be judicially reviewed on the basis on which we make decisions, we do need to make sure that we undertake those decisions with due caution and it’s important to make sure colleagues know how seriously we take that as well.”

Responding to further questions about Sharma’s claim that MPs were being taught to avoid the OIA, Ardern said it was important that MPs had knowledge about how to handle information.

“A question was asked where an MP raised a situation where a constituent’s information was released in an OIA and was concerned about that … we find ourselves in a conversation where we’ve got a complete misrepresentation of the situation.”

She said whether or not Dr Sharma was expelled would be decided by caucus tomorrow.

The rules dictate that a member facing expulsion must be granted the right to attend and speak, “and of course we follow our rules closely”.

She said Sharma had, to date, not chosen to offer a defence to the caucus, nor had he taken up the offer of mediation.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Hundreds of people in Nelson in Aotearoa New Zealand’s South Island spent the night out of their homes and a state of emergency was declared after the Maitai River burst its banks.

Occupants of 233 homes near the Maitai River were evacuated and cordons put in place at Tasman and Nile Streets.

Soldiers have been patrolling the streets to keep an eye on evacuated properties and all residents are being asked to stay home if possible.

• READ MORE: Building in flood-prone locations needs to stop, insurer IAG says
• Follow RNZ’s state of emergency live blog

The country’s largest insurer, AIG, said building in flood-prone areas had to stop.

IAG has released a three-part plan to try speed up efforts to reduce flood risk from rivers.

It said climate change was having an enormous impact on the insurance sector, and there needed to be simple, practical, concrete actions quickly.

IAG has released a three-part plan to try speed up efforts to reduce flood risk from rivers.

There have been 10 major floods in the past two years with total insured losses of about $400 million, while the wider economic and social costs extend into the billions.

People in 160 homes in low-lying parts of Westport were been asked to leave so they would not have to be rescued if their homes were flooded.

On the West Coast, the Buller River levels are dropping but civil defence remains on alert with more rain forecast.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Evacuated Nelson residents wait to discover extent of flood damage https://t.co/wTXwBuWJor

— RNZ News (@rnz_news) August 17, 2022

Explosive new data shows the sea level is rising twice as fast as previously thought in some parts of Aotearoa, massively reducing the amount of time authorities have to respond.

The major new projections show infrastructure and homes in Auckland and Wellington — as well as many other places — risk inundation decades earlier than expected.

For example, in just 18 years parts of the capital will see 30cm of sea level rise, causing once-in-a-century flood damage every year.

• READ MORE: Other climate change reports
• NZ SeaRise’s online tool — available here from 5am, today May 2.

Previously, councils and other authorities had not expected to reach this threshold until 2060 — halving the time to plan for mitigation or retreat.

The new information comes from a programme comprising dozens of local and international scientists called NZ SeaRise, which also includes GNS Science and Niwa.

It combines data about where land is sinking with the latest international sea-level rise projections.

The new information is a game changer, and will likely have serious consequences for climate adaptation planning, and could impact property prices.

Globally the sea level is expected to rise about half a metre by 2100 — but for large parts of New Zealand it could more than double that because of land subsidence.

Victoria University of Wellington professor and SeaRise programme co-leader Dr Tim Naish said: “We have less time to act than we thought.”

Wellington: Just 18 years or less before serious effects
Dr Naish said he was surprised how soon impacts would be felt in parts of Auckland and Wellington.

Some areas are sinking 3mm or 4mm a year — about the annual rate at which the sea is rising.

“[This] doubles the amount of sea level rise and it halves the time … you thought you had to deal with the sea-level rise that was in the original guidance documents that councils were using.”

Dr Naish described a case study of the road connecting Petone and Eastbourne in Lower Hutt, which would see 30cm of sea level rise by 2040.

This threshold is important because at that level a one-in-100 year storm which closes the roads and damages infrastructure could happen every year.

He said local and regional councils have been making plans for this threshold to be reached in 2060, giving 20 fewer years to plan and adapt accordingly.

Other places on Wellington’s south coast such as Ōwhiro Bay, Lyall Bay, Seatoun among others are also subsiding.

“You are going to see the impacts of quite damaging sea level rise much sooner than we thought …. roads and properties inundated.”

He said road and rail infrastructure on State Highway 2 at the Korokoro interchange in Petone is another highly vulnerable area.

The largest overall increases in the whole country are on the southeast North Island along the Wairarapa Coast.

Here, the sea level could be be up well over one and a half metres by 2100.

About 30cm of sea level rise is unavoidable because of the amount of climate gases already in the atmosphere.

Homes and crucial infrastructure in Auckland in the firing line
Dr Naish said vulnerable places in Auckland included the waterfront around the bays, Tamaki Drive, the Viaduct, areas around the Northwestern Motorway at Point Chevalier, St Heliers and Mission Bay.

He said many of these places already have issues during king tides, are close to sea level, and are sinking.

At the Viaduct the land is sinking about about 2.5mm a year.

“That almost doubles the rate of expected sea-level rise and halves the time you have.

“The city council, [and] the port authority are all going to have to start looking closely in terms of their future activities at this new information.”

He said in many parts of Auckland the sea-level would rise 30 to 50 percent faster than what was previously thought.

Meanwhile, he said parts of Thames township is also very vulnerable, and the sinking happening in the Hauraki plains means the stopbanks there have a shorter lifespan than previously thought.

Richmond in Nelson a hotspot
A major worry is the suburb of Richmond and nearby parts in the Nelson area which is subsiding at about 5mm a year.

“That whole area there has been a lot of development, new subdivisions, housing … the airport is very exposed, and that road around [the coast to Richmond] is vulnerable,” Naish said.

He said local and regional councils in the region have known for a long time there could be issues there with sea-level rise.

“There is going to be some really big challenges for that region.”

Online tool lets residents, authorities check
New Zealanders will soon be able to see for the first time how much and how fast sea-level will rise along their own stretch of coast.

The entire coastline has been mapped down to a 2km spacing.

The new advice combines data about where land is sinking with the latest international sea-level rise projections.

It will be an major new tool for councils, businesses and homeowners to assess risk from erosion and floods.

New data shows that sea levels are rising twice as fast as expected in New Zealand https://t.co/TUj5Vdr4nk

— RNZ News (@rnz_news) May 1, 2022

‘Information is power’
Dr Naish said the new data was important information and people should try not to be too overwhelmed.

“Information is power, so don’t be afraid of it.

“We still have time … but we don’t have time to sit on our hands anymore.

“If you’re a [council representative] or you’re a developer, or you’re a decisions maker in the coastal areas of New Zealand you need to start thinking right now what the plan is for adapting to that sea-level rise.

“Yes, it is a bit terrifying but there is still time and I think that is the way to look at it.”

The information is timely, coming hot on the heels of the climate change draft adaptation plan released last week.

It asks for public input on the plans, and on so-called ”managed retreat'” – abandoning areas where it is not possible or financially viable to live any longer.

Uncertainty about predictions laid out in tool
Dr Naish said uncertainty about the predictions were clearly laid out in the tool — but he said there was no question that there would be a response from property owners, the insurance and banking sectors to the new information.

GNS Science Environment and Climate Theme Leader Dr Richard Levy said until now, the risk from sea-level rise has been quite poorly defined for New Zealand.

“Current sea-level projections in the Ministry for the Environment coastal hazards guidance do not take into account local vertical land movements.”

Most of the information about sea-level rise was more or less extrapolated out from the global average.

NZ SeaRise is a five-year research programme comprising local and international experts from Te Herenga Waka-Victoria University of Wellington, GNS Science, NIWA, University of Otago and the Antarctic Science Platform.

It is funded by the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment.

Climate change and warming temperatures are causing sea levels to rise, on average, by 3.5 mm per year.

This sea level rise is caused by thermal expansion of the ocean, by melting land based glaciers, and by melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has confirmed that the whole of New Zealand will move into the red light covid-19 setting at midnight tonight in response to the covid-19 pandemic.

Nine covid-19 cases in Nelson yesterday have been confirmed as the omicron variant, Ardern said.

Another household member has since tested positive.

• READ MORE: Samoa announces covid lockdown from 6pm last night until 6pm on Monday
• Health workers prepare to support Omicron cases remotely
• Auckland City Mission Omicron plans in place

They are one family and recently attended a wedding and other events in Auckland and there is no clear link to the border.

Ardern said there were well over 100 people at these events.

The family was on the same flight as an Air New Zealand flight attendant who tested positive. All members of the family who were eligible have been double vaccinated, Ardern said.

“That means omicron is now circulating in Auckland and possibly the Nelson-Marlborough region, if not elsewhere,” Ardern said.

Focus on slowing the spread
Ardern said the focus is on slowing the spread of the omicron variant and the strategy includes rapid tests, contact tracing and isolating cases and contacts.

New Zealand’s system has “significant capacity” to work on stamping out outbreaks due to low case numbers, she said.

Watch the NZ government media briefing today. Video: RNZ News

“We know we will see far more cases than we have in the two years to date, but the difference to previous outbreaks is we are vaccinated and we are better prepared.”

Ardern encouraged New Zealanders to get their boosters saying it will help limit the spread and limit the likelihood of someone getting sick or needing to go to hospital.

She also encouraged parents and caregivers to seek out information about vaccines for their children.

Already, 20 percent of children aged 5-11 have been vaccinated or are booked to receive their vaccination.

Red light setting
Ardern reminded people the red light settings was not a lockdown.

She said it had restrictions, but business was still open, gathering numbers were reduced and differed depending on whether people were vaccinated or not.

Hospitality was seated and required a single server.

She said schools remained open, with mask wearing for everyone from year 4 upwards.

Ardern said school ventilation systems would be assessed.

Ardern encouraged households to have a “buddy” to help with food, for example, if someone in a household was unwell from covid-19.

The government had been preparing for three stages in its response to omicron, Ardern said.

Phase one includes the period up to 1000 cases a day or less. This is expected to take up to 14 days to arrive, and involves a “stamping-out approach”, she said. That includes contact tracing, isolation and testing anyone with symptoms at a community testing station or primary health provider. PCR tests will be used, but rapid antigen tests will also be rolled out to these providers.

In stage one people will need to isolate for 14 days if they are a case or a contact.

Stage two is a transition stage where the system is adjusted to identifying those at greater risk of omicron and where there is the greatest risk of severe illness from omicron.

When asked, Ardern said her wedding would not be going ahead under the red setting.

Ardern said New Zealand was not likely to enter stage three for a few weeks.

Stage three will involve changes to contact tracing. It will include the definition of contacts and isolation requirements and more details will be provided on Wednesday.

“It’s important to remember covid is a different foe to what it was at the beginning,” Ardern said.

Because of vaccinations, it would be a mild to moderate illness which could be managed at home, she said.

But she said the “team” still needed to do what it could to slow it down, as some people are immuno-compromised and more vulnerable to the virus.

When asked if cabinet had considered funding N95 masks, Ardern said there would be an assessment on mask advice to consider if there needed to be an update.

Risk of undetected omicron transmission ‘high’ – Bloomfield
Director-General of Health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said anyone with symptoms should get tested for Covid-19.

He said the risk of undetected transmission of the omicron variant in Auckland was considered high, because the Nelson family that had tested positive spent time at a wedding there.

New locations of interest will be listed on the Ministry of Health’s website.

There are five Air New Zealand flights that are locations of interest, which include the flights the infected family took, and the flights the flight attendant worked on.

• Flight NZ5083 from Auckland to Nelson at 5.20pm on 16 January
• NZ5080 Nelson to Auckland at 4pm on 19 January
• NZ5077 Auckland to Nelson at 2pm on 19 January
• NZ5049 Auckland to New Plymouth at 7.50pm on 19 January
• NZ5042 New Plymouth to Auckland at 1.50pm on 20 January

Contacts who have been at a location of interest were legally required to isolate and get tested as per Section 70, Dr Bloomfield said.

The risk of undetected transmission was judged as being high, as it was unclear how they became infected and they attended a wedding, he said.

As of 11pm last night, 150 of 192 people on the Air New Zealand flights had been contacted by health officials.

Attendees at the wedding have attended other venues with high numbers of people, including a funeral, an amusement park, the Sky Tower and domestic airports.

It is expected the number of cases and contacts will grow, Dr Bloomfield said.

Dr Bloomfield said people who needed medical care could receive it, and urged them to not put it off. Hospitals are at 84 percent occupancy, which was typical at this time of year, and ICU occupancy was under 70 percent.

Wage subsidy scheme for sick/isolating workers – Robertson
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Grant Robertson said the economic disruption from the omicron variant was expected to be more on the supply side of things — as seen overseas.

He said the initial focus was on those unable to be at work because they were infected or were a close contact isolating.

Support for these people included the Covid-19 Leave Support Scheme, which was paid at the same rate as the Wage Subsidy Scheme.

There would also be a scheme in place for people unable to work from home when waiting on covid-19 test results.

Robertson said New Zealand could afford the financial support the government was providing — and if anything, cannot afford to not provide it.

He said the country’s debt is lower than expected in part because of the wider covid-19 action taken in New Zealand.

Robertson said the scenario planning shows there could be 350,00 people self-isolating at once at the mid-point scenario planning, which would be with 25,000 cases.

Samoa announces 48-hour lockdown
In Samoa, RNZ Pacific reports that Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata’afa had announced the country would be going into lockdown from last night at 6pm until 6pm on Monday evening.

Only essential services would be allowed but all offices and shops, including all public transport, would be closed. Churches were also closed.

“No vehicles will be allowed on the roads during his time and police will be monitoring,” she said.

The prime minister said the decision was to ensure proper measures were in place to avert community transmission.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.