You have got to be joking?
This is totally contrary to what the government has been telling us.
On 23 June 2020 the Prime Minister answered a question from Todd Muller about this:
1. TODD MULLER (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by her statement, “we had an expectation that testing was happening in day 3 and day 12 at the moment we went into alert level 1”; if so, on what factual basis was that expectation formed?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): At the beginning of June, my office sought to confirm the testing that was taking place at alert level 1, including high-risk areas. On 5 June, the Ministry of Health emailed a response stating, “Testing of people entering New Zealand will commence in the week of 8 June 2020. These people will be tested at day three and day 12 of their stay in the managed isolation facilities. Approximately 3,000 tests will be undertaken of these people, including those who are already in the facility.” On 8 June, the same advice was provided to Cabinet in an update from the Ministry of Health. On 9 June, the Ministry of Health released a press release which stated, “From today, everyone in managed isolation will be tested twice for COVID-19 and will require a negative test before they leave. Those in quarantine were already being tested as they had shown prior symptoms.”
So, the Prime Minister in answering has misled the House, along with her Health officials. Obviously the word mandatory means something different to this government than it does for everyone else.
And Shane Reti exposed that in parliament yesterday:
The government made testing compulsory at Tauranga and Auckland ports, but haven’t made it compulsory at MIQ and isolation facilities.
It was a clown show involving all three head clowns with both Megan Woods and Jacinda Ardern jumping in to help Comical Chris out.
And heaping more pain on the government, Judith Collins managed to trip up the Prime Minister over border controls.
6. Hon JUDITH COLLINS (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does she have confidence in the testing and managed isolation protocols for people coming into New Zealand, and is she confident that all MIQ and border-facing workers are now being regularly tested?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes, and yes. The Government has continuously worked to strengthen our border measures to ensure we minimise the risk of COVID-19 to New Zealand, including daily health checks, personal protective equipment (PPE) usage, appropriate cleaning, and social distancing. In fact, for managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) workers, those protocols and training go even further to include, for instance, the washing of clothes, and the way that they should behave on return home at the end of each day. In terms of testing, the most recent sweep of border and MIQ staff has been completed; a second sweep has now begun. We have used orders to mandate this testing, but in future we’ll have a regular rotation of testing with greater regularity for those at the highest risk working at our borders.
Hon Judith Collins: So how regularly does she expect the highest priority border-facing staff who were tested for COVID-19 last week to be tested in future?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: At the moment, we’re going through a blanket second wave, but, at the same time, we’ve asked the Ministry of Health to work through a protocol, a matrix, which prioritises more regular testing for those staff who are more front-facing and at higher risk. To give the member a bit of an insight—for instance, at our borders, those at Auckland Airport who are considered to be at higher risk because they are more passenger- and crew-facing are approximately 280 staff. We’ll, again, need to identify that with agencies at the ports, and those staff will have a higher frequency of testing than others. That’s the work that the Ministry of Health is undertaking, and we expect to be supported by the team that are helping support the roll-out of our testing strategy.
Hon Judith Collins: Is weekly testing of border-facing staff now occurring?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: As I’ve just outlined, we’ve already had a sweep of all staff. We’re going through the next two weeks, we’ll have another sweep of staff, and, in that time frame, the Ministry of Health is working up a matrix of the most at-risk staff being regularly tested. I expect that will be on a rotation that is regular, in the order of weekly.
Hon Dr Nick Smith: How many days?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: But, again, it will depend on whether or not those staff are front-facing or not.
SPEAKER: I’m sorry, before the member continues—if Dr Nick Smith wants to have a question, he should stand up and call; he shouldn’t take it from his seat.
Hon Judith Collins: Will stevedores who board ships and who were tested for the first time last week be tested next week and on a weekly basis in future?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I see that those port workers are part of our next sweep. And, again, we’re asking Health to work up the matrix of the frequency of testing across ports, across airports, across all sectors. What I would add, because it is slightly misleading: again, as we have always said, testing is not sufficient on its own. We have a maritime order in place, for instance, that dictates how those international freight crew must behave when they are at our ports—that includes not being able to move beyond the port side if they have not returned a negative test. They also have to have been at sea for a period of 14 days; we did have a longer period, but we added testing into that regime. They also must practise social distancing to make sure that we maintain safety for port workers, and, of course, we have a regime around surveillance testing.
Hon Judith Collins: Well, would it concern her if ports that tested priority border-facing staff last week have not yet scheduled a second round of testing?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m not sure what the member means by “scheduled”. We, of course, have made sure that we have—
Hon Louise Upston: They have an appointment.
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The idea of every single worker having an appointment—we put them on site so workers can flow through. That is the best way that we can make sure—for instance, at MIQ we put them at the worksite. We’ve been working on making sure we capture change of shift so it can be done within work hours quickly and easily. For the border, the airport staff, we’ve put them on site from July. On 10 July, 16 July we had pop-ups on site so that we weren’t relying on people having to make journeys away from their place of work to be tested. At the port, I expect we make it as easy as possible also.
Hon Judith Collins: Does it, then, concern her that a crew member of the Bahamas-registered cargo ship the Charles Island, currently moored in Tauranga Harbour, having travelled here from Mexico, flew into New Zealand from Belgium three days ago, spent just one night in Auckland’s Novotel, and was then driven two hours to the vessel by a privately contracted van driver and was allowed to board without being tested?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: There are protocols in place that allow port workers—because, essentially, freight would not be able to move internationally if international freight companies were not able to access their staff. So that has been an issue globally. We, essentially, wouldn’t have international freight coming into our ports if they were unable to access staff. So there are protocols around whether or not individuals in those circumstances can have any contact outside of being immediately on vessels or immediately departing from vessels and going home.
Hon Judith Collins: So should stevedores or other priority border-facing staff working at the port of Tauranga be socially distancing themselves from a crew member of the Charles Island who just flew in from Belgium, where there are currently over 8,000 cases of COVID-19; if so, how will they identify him?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I wouldn’t want to speak to an individual case without having details, but what I would refer the member to are maritime orders in place that have been in place for some time to supplement the other surveillance testing we have, because, as the member will well know, we need to treat ports in the same way we do airports. We need to make sure that we keep people at a distance and operating in a way that’s as safe as possible, keeping in mind their work conditions given the circumstances of international travel.
Hon Judith Collins: Is there any requirement for ships’ replacement crew members flying into New Zealand to be tested for COVID-19 at any port before boarding their vessels?
Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I wouldn’t want to speak in too much detail without reminding myself of the specific arrangements, but I do recall that, for departing individuals, they do have the ability to depart directly. And, again, much of this hinges on the ability of New Zealand to keep freight moving, but these protocols have been worked up carefully to ensure that we can ensure that there is access still to freight for our exporters and importers, but also to do it safely. Again, I would remind the member that the idea of this—simply, this is an individual who has to depart directly; they cannot be outside of the port and have contact with anyone else.
Note how the Prime Minister says we need to treat ports like we do airports, but as you can see yet again there are major gaps between what is said and what is actually happening.
The clown show continues. I’m just wondering when they will make unicycle riding mandatory.
