Thousands of people turned up for climate strikes across Aotearoa New Zealand today — and briefly staged a sit-in at Christchurch City Council.

School students and others around the country protested for climate change action from the government.

School Strike 4 Climate Christchurch spokesperson Aurora Garner-Randolph, 17, said she expected between 15,000 to 20,000 people to participate.

• READ MORE: Other climate protests reports

After the fallout from the Auckland floods and the devastating effects of Cyclone Gabrielle across the North Island, the organisers of the protest have five demands, including no new fossil fuel mining or exploration and a rebate for e-bikes.

Other demands include greater marine protection, funding a transition to regenerative farming and lowering the voting age to 16.

Earlier this evening in Christchurch, young climate activists breached the doors of the city council offices and staged a sit-in.

One of the organisers for School Strike for Climate Ōtautahi, Aurora Garmer-Ramdolph, said the group had been planning to protest at the council’s office for a while.

‘Strike protests a long time’
“We feel that we’ve been having these strike protests for a long time now.

“Young people, people of all generations have been showing up in the streets to protest for climate action and we’re not seeing the change that we need, so we’ve decided to step it up this time. We decided to come directly into the Christchurch City Council.”

Garmer-Ramdolph said the group’s key demand is that the council retracts its support for the proposed new international airport at Tarras in Central Otago.

More than 1000 people of all ages joined the Wellington march, which arrived at Parliament in the afternoon.

Speaking after the march to Parliament, Te Umanako Waa said the horrific weather events of the last few weeks should be a wake-up call for those in authority.

“I feel like the facts are in their face. The students, the people, everyone is telling them what needs to be done.

“If the response for covid can happen this quick surely the response for a worldwide disaster, a natural breakdown, can happen too.

“It’s really important that we hold our leaders to account.”

Time for politicians to take notice
Waa said it was time for politicians to take notice of what their citizens were telling them.

The crowd of protesters, who were mainly young people, stretched half the length of Lambton Quay, with shoppers stopping in doorways to watch them pass, some breaking into spontaneous applause.

In Auckland, the march began at Britomart Station and went to Victoria Park, where a concert continued until 7pm.

Addressing the crowd at the Auckland march, the co-president of Unite Union Xavier Walsh said the government had failed to deliver the radical change needed to tackle the climate crisis.

“Plans by the opposition, such as to reopen deep sea oil drilling, would make the situation even worse — and that is a shame.

“So I say to the Labour and National parties, I can smell the fossil fuels on your breath!”

Walsh said real change will only come from ordinary people standing together and refusing to accept injustice.

Auckland Transport warned of delays
Auckland Transport said more than 1000 people were expected to march in the city. Public transport users could also expect detours, cancellations and delays.

In Wellington, the protesters marched down Lambton Quay before gathering at Parliament.

Student Breeana was among them.

She told RNZ it was important to protest for a better future.

“Most people in the older generation assume we do it … well, I’ve had a lot of people say you’re just doing this to get out of going to classes.

“We have to grow up with this. This is our future that we’re trying to prepare for and our planet. We don’t have another option.”

Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau was also among them.

She used the opportunity to tell the crowd in order to get climate justice, the right politicians needed to be voted into central government.

“Now I know that your Minister for Climate Change is listening. I know he backs the kaupapa. So my message to you, this year, it is election year.

‘Vote for environment parties’
“So if you can vote, make sure you vote for the parties that put the environment at the top of their priorities.”

Students also gathered near Nelson’s church steps as part of the global climate strike calling for change.

Garin College student Nate Wilbourne said they were demanding transparent and meaningful climate action from decision-makers.

He said the evidence of climate change was clear.

Nate Wilbourne said teenagers had many concerns about the environment.

Climate strikers wanted to see real commitment to achieve climate goals from policy and decision makers, Wilbourne said.

They marched to the Nelson City Council buildings this afternoon to present a letter to Mayor Nick Smith calling for free public transport, he said.

‘This is going to be a climate election’ – Greens co-leader
Labour will have to commit to stronger climate change policy if it wants the Green Party’s support come election 2023, Greens co-leader James Shaw said.

Shaw made the comments to reporters on Parliament’s forecourt after speaking to climate inaction protesters.

“Frankly, this election is going to be a climate change election and it is clear from the experience that we’ve had over the course of the last month that we’re now living in an age of consequences,” he said.

“I think if any political party wants the Greens’ support they’re going to have to come to the table.”

Shaw said he could not imagine a scenario where he would choose to work with the National Party over Labour.

“If you look at National’s track record in the last 20 years on climate change it’s frankly appalling and while they say that they’re committed to the targets we’ve committed to, they’ve actually voted against every single policy we’ve put in place to meet those targets without proposing alternatives.”

Shaw said he hoped everyone, including politicians from all parties, would support stronger climate policy in the wake of terrible weather events.

Cyclone ‘wake up’ call for politicians
“I really hope that if anything, the experience that people have had of the cyclone and the floods in such close proximity will cause politicians to wake up and start to take it seriously and treat it at the level of emergency that it actually is.”

Speaking from Christchurch on Friday, Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said the government was making a lot of progress on many of the topics students were striking about.

“Climate change has been at the forefront of the government’s agenda for the past five years and it will continue to be so,” Hipkins told reporters.

“If you look at the emissions reduction plans that we’ve already set out, you can see that we’re making significant progress — of course we’ve still got some heavy lifting to do though, there’s no question about that and the government’s absolutely committed to doing it.”

There was no question we were seeing the effects of climate change here and now, Hipkins said.

“What’s happened with our flooding, with the cyclone, we’re going to see more of these sorts of events, and that just I think underscores to New Zealand how important it is that we do two things: one is that we do everything we can to reduce climate change, the human-induced effects on the climate,” he said.

“The second is that we also look at how we can be more resilient and how we can make sure that we’re adapting to accept that actually there are going to be more of these sorts of events in the future.

‘It doesn’t happen overnight’
“Many of the things that are going to make the biggest difference to our emissions are going to take some time, so when we think about transitioning to more renewable energy use … that doesn’t happen overnight, it requires some hard work and some ongoing work to make that happen.”

On the voting age, he said people should expect to hear something further on the government’s intentions on that soon.

“The courts made a ruling, Parliament now has to consider that, that’s been referred to a select committee for consideration. How the government ultimately responds to that process is something that we will turn our minds to in due course.”

In November last year, the Supreme Court declared the voting age of 18 inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act. Any change would require the backing of three quarters of MPs, or a majority vote in a referendum.

New Zealanders on average in 2021 produced 6.59 tonnes of carbon dioxide each — about 40 percent above the world average, according to the Our World In Data Global Carbon Project.

Climate Action Tracker, an international project which rates countries’ efforts towards meeting their climate obligations, ranks New Zealand’s efforts overall as “highly insufficient”.

New Zealand’s farming industry also produces a lot of methane, which though it does not remain in the atmosphere as long as CO2, traps a lot more heat.

‘No time for finger-pointing’
But the country’s small population meant it contributed only about 0.09 percent of the world’s total C02 emissions.

Garner-Randolph said it did not matter that Aotearoa only accounted for a tiny fraction of the world’s emissions.

“Now isn’t the time for finger-pointing and saying, ‘Oh other countries are producing far more emissions.’ It’s our responsibility as global citizens, as players on the global stage, to step up and do our part, no matter how big or small it is.

“And we have incredibly high per capita emissions here in Aotearoa, so although we may be small, we are high individual emitters and that needs to change.”

The last school climate strikes took place in September.

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

Long-time residents in a street in Māngere, Auckland, say they never imagined that one day they would have to row their way out of their street to safety.

One resident, Mesalina, said they were left in the dark when the power failed and the situation hit home when she saw her neighbour sailing past on a boat.

“The lights went off around ten o’clock night time,” she said.

• LISTEN TO RNZ PACIFIC WAVES: Following the Auckland anniversary floods
• Other Auckland floods reports

“I opened the window and said, ‘can you help?’ — I didn’t believe that the water had come inside.”

A month on since the Auckland anniversary weekend floods, Mesalina and her daughter Nancy are now staying at a motel, but Nancy said there is “no place like home”.

“She’s just really bugging me about really wanting to go back home,” Mesalina said.

“She’s kind of homesick; we just don’t like the motel because it’s something new.”

Te Ararata Creek overflowed
On that Friday night, the heavy rainfall caused Te Ararata Creek to overflow, seeping into the surrounding homes around Bede Place and submerging vehicles that lined the street.

Samoan community leader Paul Mark lives next door, but his house has been yellow stickered and flood-damaged items are strewn around the property.

Mark is staying with his sister in the nearby suburb of Manurewa but said the floods had uprooted his life.

“We’re trying to keep busy, like going back to work but we’ve got nowhere to go for home,” he said.

“We’re all scattered around, my parents are at a motel room and the kids have had to change schools.”

He said securing a new home was challenging as he had his parents’ needs to consider.

“We’re trying to find a place that’s accessible, that has a ramp and a walk-in shower for my mum who is a wheelchair user.”

House now a shell
Just minutes away is Caravelle Close, where Louisa Opetaia lived, but she said her house had become a shell.

Salvageable belongings are piled in the middle of each room but the bottom half of the walls have been taken out and the home is uninhabitable.

Louisa is staying at emergency accommodation in the city but said with meals not included, it’s becoming stressful.

“I don’t want to appear ungrateful but it’s just hard and there are families living in this hotel with us who have kids. They’re stuck in the city where there aren’t many places to eat except for fast food outlets and they can’t cook for their kids.”

While much of the country’s attention has turned to cyclone recovery efforts, the affected residents of Māngere say they’re still suffering.

“So there’s all these other kinds of struggles you know that are still continuing, even though it’s a month later — I mean the ground has dried up but the struggles that we’re going through still continue,” Louisa said.

Four weeks on from the flash flood that tore through their streets and turned their lives upside down, the residents of Bede Place and Caravelle Close are left wondering what the future holds for them.

Despite staying in warm and safe places for the time being, they know it’s not a long-term solution and that it won’t be a quick or easy mission rebuilding their lives.

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

Aotearoa New Zealand’s largest insurer says 20,000 homes across the country are at severe risk of flooding and it is in talks with government about where flood-damaged houses should be written off for good.

IAG is part of an advisory panel that is helping the government with managed retreat legislation.

Those in regions hard hit by Cyclone Gabrielle, who want to walk away from their flood-damaged homes, need answers, among them Peter Johnstone.

• READ MORE: Other Cyclone Gabrielle reports

He stood on the roof of his house the night Pakowhai flooded, and felt creaking and groaning and feared the roof would collapse. Two weeks on, he was shocked to learn the insurer planned to fix his home.

“The people that are there to assess are sort of saying, ‘Oh no, this is rebuild, this is a refix’, refix is the word they’re using,” he said.

“I said, ‘You be kidding me, the whole bloody lot could be condemned, Pakowhai should be condemned’. Every house in Pakowhai is munted.”

He is 75 and together with his wife has lived on the four hectares for three decades.

‘Daunting for me’
“It’s just daunting for me — I’m not scared of hard work but it’s daunting for me. How on earth will I get that place back up?”

They want out and have commissioned an independent engineer to determine if the yellow-stickered home is, in fact, a write-off.

Also in Pakowhai, Keith Gore and his wife live between the two rivers and also want out. An assessor visited this week.

“The assessor is out of Christchurch and he’s been in the game for 43 years,” Gore said.

“He did the Christchurch earthquake, floods at Taeri, floods at Greymouth and one other, and when he walked in our house he said: ‘This is the worst I’ve ever seen’.”

He was not impressed that the insurer wanted to scope costs to rebuild the silt-ridden house.

RNZ talked to three different councils in the East Coast — none would say which areas should be vacated for good.

Quick decisions needed
Minister of Finance Grant Robertson said on Sunday decisions need to be made quickly on whether some places should be rebuilt the way they were — before money and resources were wasted in areas that would need to be abandoned.

IAG chief executive Amanda Whiting said the insurer had maps of areas at high risk of flooding, and was sharing these with officials.

“They vary and we’ve got to do a bit more mapping yet because we’ll have to agree on the parameters that deem those high flood risk zones. But we do have a lot of that mapping available and we’ll share that with government and other stakeholders,” she said.

IAG’s modelling shows 1 percent of homes — around 20,000 around the country — are at risk of severe flooding.

Until there was certainty over areas for managed retreat, Whiting said homeowners caught in limbo should let their insurer know if they want to relocate.

“Talk to us. As we start to get a bit of a sense of those people who are wanting to retreat that will help us with the government on a plan.”

In central Hawke’s Bay, around 200 homes flooded in Waipawa on the night of the cyclone.

Bryce Fergusson was among locals who ran to safety when the river’s stopbank overflowed. Even so, he wanted to rebuild.

“I’m pretty sure it’ll be in hot demand living up on the hill now but we love our land. We’re really hoping this is a once in a lifetime experience.”

Central Hawke’s Bay mayor Alex Walker said there was no urgency to relocate entire communities in Waipawa.

“There’s not a clear locality within central Hawke’s Bay district where we would be talking about urgent withdrawal of property but there might be some isolated pockets of one or two properties where there is a requirement for that conversation about where and how people may rebuild.”

Hastings mayor Sandra Hazlehurst said residents were already making decisions about whether to stay or go, and needed certainty — especially those in 680 yellow-stickered homes.

“We pretty quickly need to sit down with our affected communities, government, insurance council and banks and work out what this process will look like to give them some certainty about next steps and a timeframe.”

Up the coast, Gisborne District Council chief executive Nedine Thatcher Swann said it would likely to take time, and Māori landowners needed to be consulted.

“We’re talking about people who are deeply ingrained, who have whakapapa here.

“So it’s not a matter of simply, you know, redesigning and rebuilding and relocating. It’s a long journey that we need to work closely with our hapū and iwi on.”

For those in limbo like Peter Johnstone, it was a waiting game.

“I’m really worried about what’s around the corner, what do we accept. The government should be saying this is worse than an insurance problem, this is a major and we don’t want that little town to be there any longer.”

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

New Zealand’s MetService has issued an orange warning meaning heavy rain is on the way for cyclone-hit Hawke’s Bay.

From now through until 10am on Saturday people in the region can expect 150 to 200mm of rain about the ranges and also away from the ranges north of Hastings (this includes the Esk Valley area and the Wairoa District), and 75mm to 100mm elsewhere.

The heaviest falls are likely from 3pm on Friday, with peak rates of 20 to 30mm/hr possible.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Gabrielle: Time to invest in natives in response to devastating pine consequences
• Cyclone Gabrielle: Hundreds more NZ unaccounted for now located
• Other Cyclone Gabrielle reports
• Follow RNZ News live news blog

Other areas are under a heavy rain watch and thunderstorms are possible in Coromandel Peninsula and Bay of Plenty about and west of Te Puke from 2am on Friday until 1am Saturday.

Gisborne could expect periods of heavy rain, with thunderstorms possible in the 36 hours from 2pm today. Rainfall amounts may approach warning criteria, MetService said.

Auckland could also expect to be drenched tomorrow with some heavy rain and possible thunderstorms from midday until 10pm.

Meanwhile, as of Wednesday afternoon 346 people remained listed as uncontactable in flood-affected areas.

Police have deployed four specialist victim recovery dog teams to the Eastern District to help in the search.

The death toll remains at 11 — nine people in Hawke’s Bay, and two firefighters in Auckland.

About 700 people displaced by Cyclone Gabrielle across the North Island are still seeking shelter at Civil Defence centres.

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

During Cyclones Hale and Gabrielle the poor management of exotic plantations in Aotearoa New Zealand — primarily pine — has again led to extensive damage in Tairāwhiti.

Critical public infrastructure destroyed; highly productive agricultural and horticultural land washed away or buried; houses, fences and sheds knocked over; people’s lives and dreams upended; people dead.

The impacts on natural ecosystems are still unknown, but there will have been extensive damage in terrestrial, freshwater and marine environments. Similar damage occurred during storms in June 2018 and July 2020.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Gabrielle triggers more destructive forestry ‘slash’ — NZ must change how it grows trees
• Global supply chains are devouring what’s left of Earth’s unspoilt forests

While heavy rainfall and flooded rivers are a major factor, it is sediment and slash from plantation harvesting that has been the cause of most of the damage.

Slash is the woody material (including large logs) left after clear-fell harvesting of commercial forests.

Landslides in harvested sites pick up the material and carry it downstream, causing significant damage. All the evidence from Cyclone Gabrielle shows that much of the damage was caused by radiata pine slash.

The legacy of poor land management
Sediment and slash from exotic tree harvesting sites were established as major factors in the damage that occurred during the June 2018 Tolaga Bay storm in recent court cases taken by Gisborne District Council.

Five plantation companies were found guilty and fined for breaching resource consent conditions relating to their management practices.

Multiple groups have called for an inquiry into the way plantation harvest sites are being managed in Tairāwhiti and elsewhere.

But given the severity and ongoing nature of these impacts, is it not time we move beyond focusing on management practices and address the broader underlying issues that have triggered this situation?

These ultimate causes are complex but primarily revolve around historic poor land management decision-making and human-induced climate change.

‘East Coast disaster’: Environmental group calls for inquiry into forestry practices https://t.co/pjTVIiy0Cf pic.twitter.com/MQYkVZCMAY

— nzherald (@nzherald) January 13, 2023

Among the key drivers of the current problems in Tairāwhiti are the large areas of exotic tree plantations that were established with government support after the devastation of Cyclone Bola.

But this devastation also reflects earlier poor land management decisions to clear native forest off steep, erodible hill country in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which was also encouraged by the government of the day.

Looming climate change
The other underlying driver of the disaster is human-induced climate change. Atmospheric CO2 levels are now 150 percent above pre-industrial levels and climates are changing rapidly with new and unprecedented events becoming the norm.

While increasing global temperatures are the most obvious feature of human-induced climate change, it is the increasing frequency and intensity of extreme weather events that are having the biggest impacts on people and the environment.

It is essential that we hold the forestry sector accountable in Tairāwhiti and elsewhere. But we also need to urgently address the underlying causes because no matter how strict harvesting rules are, storm events are going to occur with increasing frequency and intensity.

Time for urgent action
With more than 40 years experience researching forest ecology and sustainable land management in Aotearoa, I believe there are four key areas where we need to urgently act to address these issues.

1. As a country we need to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and rapidly increase the draw-down of CO2 out of the atmosphere. These are national issues and not confined to Tairāwhiti but as a nation we seem to be sleepwalking in our response to the climate emergency.
2. We need a comprehensive catchment-by-catchment assessment across all of Tairāwhiti (and likely other areas of Aotearoa) to identify those plantations that are located in the wrong place in terms of potential harvesting impacts. There should be no further harvesting in Tairāwhiti plantations until this exercise has been completed. We also need to identify those areas that currently lack plantations but should never be planted in exotic tree crops (for any purpose).
3. The government then needs to buy out the current owners of these plantations and embark on a programme of careful conversion to native forest. This will come at a cost, but it needs to be done. We already have models for this in Tairāwhiti where the Gisborne District Council has started converting pine forests in its water supply catchment to native forests.
4. Finally, we need to establish substantially more native forests throughout all Tairāwhiti, and Aotearoa more generally, to help build resilience in our landscapes.

The consequences of short-term thinking
For too long we have been fixated in Aotearoa with maximising short-term returns from exotic tree crops without thinking about long-term consequences. The legacies of this fixation are now really starting to impact us as the climate emergency exposes the risks that poorly sited and managed exotic tree crops pose.

And we are now making the same mistakes with exotic carbon tree crops, again leaving unacceptable legacies for future generations to deal with because of a focus on short-term financial gains.

Exotic tree plantations have dominated forest policy in Aotearoa and we urgently need to shift this to a focus on diverse native forests.

Our native rainforests provide so many benefits that exotic tree crops can never provide.

They are critical for the conservation of our native biodiversity, providing habitat for a myriad of plant, animal, fungal and microbial species. They also regulate local climates, enhance water quality and reduce erosion. This helps sustain healthy freshwater and marine environments.

Native replanting initiatives championed by charities like Pure Advantage need to be the primary focus of forest policy in Aotearoa now and in the future.

Dr David Norton, emeritus professor, University of Canterbury.  This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

A further 300 people listed as “uncontactable” in New Zealand in the aftermath of Cyclone Gabrielle have been found.

About 800 people in Hawke’s Bay and Tai Rāwhiti were still registered as unaccounted for, Hawke’s Bay Urban Search and Rescue team leader Ken Cooper told RNZ Morning Report.

Cooper said police and Fire and Emergency were working closely together and a lot of detective work was going on to establish whether people listed were missing or safe.

• LISTEN TO RNZ MORNING REPORT:  Searching for unaccounted for people in Hawke’s Bay
• Other Cyclone Gabrielle reports

“Where there is a reported missing person and a location of interest, that’s where USAR can take all reasonable steps.

“The challenge we’ve got right now is that we have had people reported as unaccounted for but we haven’t got locations of interest, or we don’t know where they’ve been last reported.”

That left searchers struggling to pinpoint where they should be looking, he said.

“The important thing is, if you have reported someone missing or unaccounted for could you please get in touch with New Zealand police.

“We’d like to have more information so that we can narrow our search down and bring this to a swift conclusion.”

Update police
That included making sure to update police if a person reported missing was found.

USAR had 120 people on the ground, including Australian search teams.

The NZ Defence Force provided at least 40 people a day, there were extra police and Land Search and Rescue personnel.

He said UASR had not encountered this type of terrain before and conditions were extremely difficult for searching.

There were new challenges as the weather improved.

“As the silt and the effluent is drying and people are driving through it and the clear up is really progessing well the dust potentially contains some contaminants and pathogens that are a public health risk.

“That’s a risk to the public and obviously to our rescue workers in the field.”

Cooper said they had covered 2000 properties in a wide area search.

Rescue teams had carried out detailed searches of 600 properties where it was reported someone might be in the house, and had been through a further 620 properties in cases where someone was reported missing.

• The Cyclone Gabrielle death toll remains at 11.

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

The historic shot tower in Aotearoa New Zealand’s Auckland suburb of Mt Eden which caused concern that it could fall during the worst of Cyclone Gabrielle last week will be demolished from tomorrow.

Residents from about 50 housing units surrounding the former Colonial Ammunition Company Shot Tower on Normanby Road were evacuated last Monday due to the risks.

Auckland Emergency Management said the demolition would begin tomorrow.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Gabrielle: Lives ‘turned upside down . . . destroyed’, says PM
• Cyclone Gabrielle: Pasifika songs of gratitude ring out across Hawke’s Bay
• Follow RNZ live updates

It said residents who were evacuated would not be able to move back until the works were finished.

The Colonial Ammunition Company shot tower was a relic of the “Russian scares” of the late 19th and early 20th century.

It was built to drop hot balls of lead into water below to create shot pellets.

The Colonial Ammunition Company was established in 1885 by Major John Whitney and W H Hazard in response to Tsar Alexander deploying some of his naval fleet into the North Pacific to Vladivostok.

Fears were rife that he was about to expand his empire.

Fortifications were quickly built in Auckland and the need for ammunition supplies independently of Britain became urgent.

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

The number of people in Aotearoa New Zealand whose deaths have been officially linked to Cyclone Gabrielle has risen to 11, with confirmation of two further deaths today.

In a statement, police said a person who passed away in their Onekawa home on Thursday is “believed to have died in circumstances related to Cyclone Gabrielle”.

The news was soon followed by confirmation of another death in Crownthorpe, Hastings police reported last night.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Gabrielle: Pasifika songs of gratitude ring out across Hawke’s Bay
• LISTEN TO RNZ PACIFIC WAVES: Susana Suisuiki reports
  
• Cyclone Gabrielle death toll rises to 9, thousands uncontactable and landslide risk in Auckland
• Cyclone Gabrielle: Where to donate
• Follow RNZ live updates

Police said this person was also believed to have died in circumstances related to the storm.

Both deaths have been referred to the Coroner.

Meanwhile, Hawke’s Bay Civil Defence said the focus of its cyclone response efforts remains reaching isolated rural communities today, including Wairoa.

Hawke’s Bay Civil Defence said the focus of its cyclone response efforts remained reaching isolated rural communities today, including Wairoa.

Yesterday 12 civilian helicopter flights landed in cut-off communities with food, water, and generators, and to check on welfare.

Edaan Lennan said those efforts would continue daily, and some communities would need to be revisited and stocked up with supplies.

He said teams were also working to arrange temporary accommodation for those in evacuation centres whose homes had been destroyed.

Five arrested for looting
Police are stressing safety as their number one priority amid lootings in flood-stricken areas, and they also urged people affected by Cyclone Gabrielle to report if they are safe.

As of 2pm Saturday, there have been 5608 reports of uncontactable people registered and 1196 reports from people registering that they are safe.

With communications slowly returning to areas severely affected by the cyclone, police are asking for people who have been uncontactable to friends and family to report themselves as being safe online as soon as possible.

As of Saturday night, five people have been arrested after a spate of lootings across Hawke’s Bay.

More than 100 extra officers were brought into the Eastern District, including to areas that were cut off from Cyclone Gabrielle.

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

In the midst of all the destruction from Cyclone Gabrielle in Aotearoa New Zealand, Pasifika voices singing songs of praise and gratitude have rung out in church halls across Hawke’s Bay.

Pacific churches have been sanctuaries for RSE workers in the region, some of whom were clinging desperately to rooftops surrounded by raging waters during the height of the flooding.

Cyclone Gabrielle has robbed them of the few possessions they owned, but their faith remains.

• LISTEN TO RNZ PACIFIC WAVES: Susana Suisuiki reports
  
• Cyclone Gabrielle death toll rises to 9, thousands uncontactable and landslide risk in Auckland
• Cyclone Gabrielle: Where to donate
• Follow RNZ live updates

Hastings Pasifika community leader Tofilau Talalelei Taufale said that RSE workers in the region were among those worst affected by the extreme weather events.

He is currently on the ground, helping the workers who have been left homeless.

Tofilau said hundreds of workers have been evacuated:

“Many of them have been displaced, many of them have lost their possessions and many of them had struggled to contact their families to let them all know that they are safe.”

“So there’s a whole multitude of issues that impacted the shock that our RSE community is going through right now.”

As far as the emergency response is concerned Tofilau said he understands there are a lot of worried people, but he calls for patience and understanding.

Another day for our Tangata Tuārangi RSE workers taking shelter at EFKS Hastings – though they’ve lost everything, their spirits remain high once again big alofa to all the support. More details to come on how you can help from afar #cyclonegabrielle #HawkesBay pic.twitter.com/LUoO4UwJzh

— Ali Leota (@ALiLeota) February 15, 2023

“We acknowledge that as a community everyone is trying their best, given their limitations so that’s when we as a community will say, okay it is what it is, we’re gonna help.”

Although the clean-up is now well underway, it’s estimated that it could take months.

“We acknowledge that as a community everyone is trying their best, given their limitations so that’s when we as a community will say, okay it is what it is, we’re gonna help.”

Although the clean-up is now well underway, it’s estimated that it could take months.

To further complicate things telecommunication and internet connectivity remain limited – the safest method to keep connected is via smartphone, with data, but even that poses a challenge.

there’s just so many emotions on the ground here in Hawke’s Bay – but the resilience of our Tangata Tuārangi RSE workers from the Pacific keeps us all motivated and hopeful #CycloneGabrielle #HawkesBay #Fiji pic.twitter.com/TSu8Ytvo2Y

— Ali Leota (@ALiLeota) February 16, 2023

Tepura Trow of SENZ Training and Employment said despite the battering it had taken, Hawke’s Bay communities stood united.

“Our community has pulled together and they’ve got such an overwhelming and overload of donations coming in so I know that our focus and a lot of the NGOs and the community — our main focus is really, how can we set them up for after this.”

The Secretary and CEO of the Ministry for Pacific Peoples, Gerardine Clifford-Lidstone, said the outpouring of support has also been felt outside the hard-hit regions.

“For us, it’s not just about the Hawke’s Bay or the Auckland region, lots of questions from our concerned communities want to help and are wanting to provide blankets and towels and all those necessities of life that our families might need,” she said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. If you have been affected by the North Island floods and Cyclone Gabrielle, go to the Ministry of Social Development website to see how you can apply for help through the community support fund.

For our Pasifika community members, you can also contact the Ministry for Pacific Peoples website. The ministry has set out an extensive list of severe weather events information and contact numbers.

The death toll from Cyclone Gabrielle in Aotearoa New Zealand is rising — now 9 — and many areas in Hawke’s Bay have been left as disaster zones with rescues, rather than recovery, still the focus.

Power, internet and phone service is still patchy for many people in the region making communication difficult.

Police are working to reconnect people with loved ones who have been reported missing.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Gabrielle triggers more destructive forestry ‘slash’ – NZ must change how it grows trees
• Other Cyclone Gabrielle reports
• Follow RNZ’s live news blog

Prime Minister Chris Hipkins was in Esk Valley on Friday — an area where homes were completely inundated with water.

Driving through Eskdale, the mud is thick and still water crosses the roads in places.

Debris is strewn across orchards, fields and fences. Parts of the road are washed away, there are dead animals, and cars are wedged against buildings.

A lone boat perches on the dross in a field.

Harrowing time
It was a harrowing time for Maureen Dorr who owns The Doggy Farmstay in Eskdale.

When the floodwaters hit her house, she had six dogs staying with them and three of her own.

“So John got one — a German shepherd — and put him in the laundry. We put another one in the bathroom — a rottweiler, and then we put four on the double bed, and then I held two of them above the pantry near the ceiling.

“They (the floodwaters) came right up to our neck, and then John smashed the kitchen window as the water below the windowsill was lower and let some of the water out.”

She spent 12 hours like this, because going outside was even worse.

Some of the dogs nearly drowned, but they managed to revive them.

An 82-year-old man in a ute found them on the road and asked them if they needed help.

Escaped the valley
They bundled the small dogs in a box and tied the larger dogs on the back, escaping the valley, and leaving behind a derelict home.

“There’s no way you could even get in the house for silt. The kitchen side of the house is just about gone, the wall’s just about out. The furniture’s all backed up inside it, and we had drawers coming down the hallway, leaning against the kitchen window.”

All of the dogs survived, and the six dogs staying at her kennels are with other families until they can be returned to their owners.

Dorr is staying in Bay View and said they were being well supported and her neighbours were OK — they were up to their waist in water before getting into the roof cavity and being evacuated.

She is insured, but thinking about the future is too hard right now.

Nearby, Bay View residents are banding together to check on and support those impacted in the Esk Valley.

Rowan Kyle was one of them.

‘An apocalypse basically’
“I’d call it an apocalypse basically … being local to the area, it’s just unrecognisable. There’s just cars upside down, stacked everywhere. It’s like a bomb has gone off.”

One of the new developments had been devastated, Kyle said.

“They’re filled to the brim with mud, silt. Yeah, they’ve just had it. They’re saying that there’s potential, they might just have to write them off completely.”

He did not understand why the NZ Defence Force had not been in to assist them, saying residents have been mostly left to organise, pick up the pieces, and “fudge their way through it”.

Prime Minister Hipkins was discouraging people from speculating over the death toll of Cyclone Gabrielle.

“It’s no good to anybody speculating about how many people have been injured or how many people may have died in this tragedy. We’ll certainly share that information as soon as we can.

‘Outlandish claims’
“But I’ve heard some outlandish claims out there at the moment that there is no evidence to support.”

The cyclone was the biggest natural disaster seen this century, he said.

Thirty-one thousand people in Napier, 6000 people in Hastings and 1000 people in Wairoa have been without power for four days.

Civil Defence in Hawke’s Bay said there are still thousands of people in hundreds of communities who have yet to be contacted.

Group Controller Ian Macdonald said there were too many uncontacted communities to list and they were prioritising those they suspected were worst affected by the flooding.

“There are literally tens and maybe hundreds of communities. Communities can be anything from a 1000 people in one community at the back of Rissington through to just tens of people or just a few people.”

Helicopters were delivering communication gear and emergency supplies to the worst affected communities, he said.

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

Cyclone Gabrielle: Thousands uncontactable, hundreds still without water or power https://t.co/PBdQjQqtmq

— RNZ News (@rnz_news) February 17, 2023

New Zealanders should be prepared for the number of fatalities in the wake of Cyclone Gabrielle to increase, says Prime Minister Chris Hipkins.

He said at a media briefing in Gisborne that every available resource was being used to help find those who are missing and to rescue those who were known about but unable to be reached.

Over the past two days the rescue coordination centre had overseen 450 rescues and all rescue requests in the 111 system had been completed, Hipkins said.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Gabrielle: Tolaga Bay farmer seething over forestry slash floods
• Follow RNZ News live blog

Overnight the death toll rose to seven but there are still people for whom the police hold grave concerns.

As of 2.30pm yesterday, 3544 reports of uncontactable people had been registered with the police. A further 450 had been reported as found.

Those included multiple reports for the same people. Police were prioritising those in the more isolated areas.

“And we do need to be prepared for the likelihood that there will be more fatalities,” Hipkins said.

The situation in Gisborne
Hipkins said the damage in Gisborne was extensive and there was “absolutely no doubt” that communities impacted were under enormous pressure.

Earlier, Hipkins flew to Gisborne for his first in-person look at the scale of destruction from the cyclone.

Hipkins said it “was a pretty moving morning”.

“Flying in over Gisborne is was clear the extent of the damage even before we’d gotten off the plane.”

It was clear there were big challenges facing the community, he said.

Communication was incredibly difficult for some people and both fibre routes in and out of Gisborne had been damaged with engineers working to repair the damage as fast as they could, Hipkins said.

Getting the water supply up and running would not be an overnight fix but was a prority, he said.

Hawke’s Bay update
The government was trying to get hotspots and other temporary measures in place and 10 more Starlinks were on their way to Gisborne. Five units have been delivered to Wairoa and Hawke’s Bay, with more on the way.

Hipkins said there was a reasonably good supply of Starlinks in NZ.

“They’re not going to provide a complete answer though, but they will provide a limited amount of connectivity in those areas that are currently cut off and that will hopefully allow us to at least establish some of those basic communication channels.

“We’ve been able to reach Wairoa and Hawke’s Bay by road today and SH2 to Gisborne has also been opened on a limited basis for convoys of emergency supplies including food, water and fuel.”

Temporary supplies were on route and more would be arriving soon, he said.

“Fresh water is clearly an issue.”

There were real concerns for the Eskdale areas, Hipkins said.

Door-to-door
Teams were there going door-to-door to identify the extent of the damage and any human harm, he said. There had not been a report back from these teams yet.

People in Hawke’s Bay were advised to be prepared.

“We’re dealing with very unpredictable weather at the moment, it is certainly likely that there will be more rain, that’s what the forecasts are suggesting.”

The damage to roads in all areas was one of the most significant challenges and people in these areas were asked to minimise their own movements so supplies could get to where they were needed, Hipkins said.

“If you can stay put, stay put, make sure you’ve got everything you need to stay put if it’s safe to do that and if you need to evacuate be prepared and be ready to evacuate as well.

“That involves your grab to go bag, making sure you’ve got something warm and dry to wear and that you’ve got a plan.”

Communities were coming together and managing the situation very well, Hipkins said.

Alert others
People may need to go door-to-door to alert others if they need to evacuate, Hipkins said.

The most recent information is that approximately 102,000 customers are without power across the upper North Island.

Hipkins said the government had released $1 million as an immediate top up to the mayoral relief fund as the first step to help get immediate support to those who need it.

A further $1 million had been released to the Hawke’s Bay.

Widespread damage has hit farms across Aotearoa New Zealand’s North Island with those in parts of Gisborne and Hawke’s Bay particularly hard hit and forestry slash is once again a huge problem.

Tolaga Bay farmer Bridget Parker told how forestry slash has caused a huge amount of damage to her farm yet again as the death toll from Cyclone Gabrielle rose to six.

“It’s enormous — there is silt all over the road. It’s so thick you can’t walk through it; there are logs as far as the eye can see,” she said.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Gabrielle: NZ death toll rises, ‘grave concerns’ for several missing
• Follow RNZ’s live blog updates

“There are so many logs all the fences are down; wherever you look it’s total carnage.”

Parker, whose farm has been destroyed by forestry slash during storms multiple times, said they can look at forecasts for rain, wind, drought and even tides but they could not predict what was going to happen when it came to the logs.

“We don’t farm logs. Their logs [the forestry companies] and their friggin’ silt needs to stay inside their friggin’ estate gates.

“It does not have the right to be spewed over the 3000ha of beautiful land that is farmed on the flats below it.”

Parker said Minister for Forestry Stuart Nash needed to visit the region within the next week to answer to farmers.

“There’s floodwaters everywhere, in our house, in our sheds. It’s far higher than last time and we are really really struggling to cope; we’re really angry.”

Hawke’s Bay area ‘smashed’
Forestry slash has also caused issues on farms in Hawke’s Bay where there was widespread flooding and slips.

Suz Bremner, who runs sheep, beef and friesian bulls along the Taihape Napier Road, said she had never seen damage like it.

“I tipped out the rain gauge this morning. It was overflowing at 170mm so we don’t know how much we’ve had.

“The power is out but from what we are hearing from people nearby is that the wider Hawke’s Bay area has just been smashed.”

Bremner said she went for a drive around her farm yesterday morning to assess the damage but roads were blocked by trees while tracks had been washed away.

“Looking at some of our neighbours who have big cliff faces on their properties the slip damage is horrendous.

“We have a road through the top end of our farm and we turned down there this morning and my husband and I could not believe our eyes. The slash that had washed down through the creeks is unreal; I’ve never seen that before.

“I think the forestry has come down and created a dam and then during the night it’s just exploded and now there’s slash everywhere,” she said.

Other farmers RNZ spoke to in Hawke’s Bay said they were hunkering down waiting for the worst of the weather to pass before getting out to assess the level of damage.

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

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