expecting a roughly equivalent number of people to be vaccinated—so around about another quarter of a million people in the second quarter. Then we’ll get to the big rollout in the second half of the year, and we’re expecting that to be spread right the way through the second half of the year. There’ll be surge points, no doubt, but we’re expecting the overall demand—we will have to manage the demand relatively smoothly through the second half of the year. We’ll be releasing details of that tomorrow. One of the reasons that we have not released that prior to now is the decision about which vaccine we used, and whether we used one vaccine or four different vaccines actually has an impact on the overall sequencing framework.
Hon JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green): Thank you. In the Australian system, people go on to a website, fill out a few basic questions, it takes a very little time, and then they’re told which of, basically, five groupings they will be in, right at the very beginning of the process, and what that is able to do is to provide people with a sense of the time frame for themselves. Does the Government have any plans to replicate a similar system here in Aotearoa?
Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): It’s a relatively simple and proved tool that they have, and we could easily do something here in New Zealand as well, or people could look at the list. The list is actually a relatively simple list, and it will show people exactly where they are at in the sequencing framework and broad timetable. Just to run through the numbers: about a quarter of a million courses of the vaccine in the first quarter of the year, about a quarter of a million courses of the vaccine—so that’s the two doses—in the second, and then we move later on in the year to the big roll-out in the second part of the year.
Hon JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green): So will the schedule that gets published prioritise, for example, people who are immuno-compromised, people who live in overcrowded conditions or who have precarious jobs where they’re reluctant to get tested and take time off because they’re worried about loss of income, and so on?
Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): So I can assure the member that all of those things were considered in the sequencing framework, and when we release that tomorrow, he will see that all of those factors have been built in to the sequencing framework.
DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Well, thank you, Mr Speaker. I speak on behalf of ACT in response to the ministerial statement. I think it is worth acknowledging some of the pain that has been caused to people by this lockdown. That is not to say that the lockdown is necessarily wrong—they might be prepared to accept those costs as the price of maintaining elimination—but it’s worth putting on record the businesses who have gone under this time, because the effects of our restrictions are cumulative.
It’s worth putting on record a message I got from the principal of a local school: "Pretty dispiriting for kids with camps, sports, etc., cancelled. Lots of schools pulling out of Polyfest. It’s not worth the risk. I don’t think the rest of the country realise or cares about the effect this is having on our youth. Anyway, keep fighting the good fight." That’s a principal from the Epsom electorate.
I think it’s worth putting those on record and acknowledging that people who may have lost their businesses, missed healthcare, been dispirited by the restrictions actually probably think it’s acceptable if the Government is truly doing a good job of managing COVID-19. But the Minister told us that we should be grateful because we’ve had low levels of restriction and, according to the Oxford stringency index, low levels of restrictions on our freedoms within New Zealand. And the Minister is right about that, but I put it back to the Minister that this country has few peers that can compare to the natural advantages we have when it comes to fighting COVID. There’s a few countries that are more isolated than New Zealand—one or two. There’s a few that have a more
