Craig
McCulloch, Deputy Political
Editor
Immigration Minister Erica Stanford has issued
a scathing takedown of her ministry, saying officials
“deliberately withheld” information from both her and the
previous Labour government about
a failed technology upgrade and used “creative
accounting” to avoid scrutiny.
Appearing before MPs at
a Scrutiny Week appearance on Tuesday morning, Stanford said
Public Service Commissioner Sir Brian Roche would
investigate “integrity concerns” raised by a damning
review.
Sitting alongside her, Ministry of Business,
Innovation and Employment (MBIE) chief executive Nic
Blakeley offered an apology to MPs and said he took
accountability on behalf on his department.
“I’m
committed to learning from this and implementing
change.”
In 2024, RNZ drew
attention to major problems and delays
plaguing the Biometric Capability Upgrade.
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An
independent report – released by Immigration New Zealand
(INZ) on Tuesday – identified major flaws in the
department’s handling of the project,
resulting in a waste of more than $30 million.
The
report’s author Greg James said INZ launched the project in
2018 without ministerial sign-off, then pivoted to an
“off-shelf model” in 2020 without due diligence.
He
said officials persisted despite multiple red flags,
including delays, missed milestones and significant
inadequacies.
“Despite escalating costs, the project
continued for several years before ultimately being stopped
[in 2025], having delivered no measurable benefits while
incurring significant cost overruns.”
The report found
ministerial reporting throughout had been inconsistent: “at
times overly optimistic, and occasionally misrepresenting
the true status of the project”.
Stanford said this
year’s Budget included a $31.2 million write-off of the
project.
“After seven years, MBIE somehow spent tens
of millions of dollars. Not only do we have nothing to show
for it, but we are now in a position of having to maintain
the existing aging infrastructure while a new solution is
sought.”
Stanford said the findings were “very
serious” and “almost as bad as it gets”.
“Firstly,
ministers were misled. Secondly, people were moved from the
project when they raised concerns. And thirdly, and this is
quite serious, creative accounting practices had been
undertaken to keep costs of the project below Cabinet’s
mandated limit,” she said.
“Those are extraordinarily
serious findings of the report.”
Stanford said it
appeared to her that MBIE “deliberately withheld
information” from former Labour government ministers and did
not seek ministerial approval for required cost
increases.
“It’s supposed to be signed out [by
Cabinet] every time the whole of life cost goes up, as far
as I’ve been advised, and that seemingly did not happen, and
even when it did happen, the advice was very minimal,” she
said.
“From what I’ve been told, things were done that
required Cabinet oversight in order to keep it away from
Cabinet, so splitting the project into two parts.”
She
said officials later gave her advice that turned out to be
“complete fiction” and sought more funding without declaring
that previous requests had been declined.
Stanford
spoke to the Public Service Commissioner on Friday and
requested he undertake an integrity review, she said. She
declined to say how high she believed the conduct went in
MBIE’s management hierarchy.
Blakeley said he found
the review to be a “very difficult read” and was “extremely
disappointed”.
He acknowledged serious failings in
oversight and governance and said he was prepared to
undertake employment investigations depending on the
findings of the Public Service Commissioner.
“I’ve
already apologised to ministers, and I would apologise to
New Zealanders who expect better from MBIE than this
project,” he said.
“I take integrity very
seriously.”
Stanford said her confidence in MBIE had
been knocked by the saga, pointing out that the review had
been delivered to the ministry two months ago, but only
passed on to her on Friday.
Blakeley said that delay
was due to a “wrong call” by officials who decided to
provide a reponse alongside the report.
Stanford
added: “Can I just note, though, in that preceding two
months, there was no response provided.”
In a
statement, Public Service Commissioner Sir Brian Roche said
he would appoint an independent investigator to look into
the saga and make recommendations.
“The integrity
matters highlighted by the report are serious and
concerning,” Sir Brian said.
“They go to the core of
the behaviours and ethics required of public servants, and
the ability of Ministers to have confidence in the advice
they receive from officials.”
Labour welcomes
review
Labour leader Chris Hipkins wanted more time
to look at the report before giving his verdict about
whether public servants should be held accountable.
He
has welcomed the review.
“It’s a good healthy thing in
a democracy if there has been any underhand tactics to
withhold information from ministers from whichever
government, we should get to the bottom of what’s happened
there.”
Hipkins said what he could say for sure was
that his immigration minister during the previous Labour
government decided against any further funding for the
project.
Andrew Little, who was immigration minister
for about nine months under the former Labour government,
said keeping ministers in the dark is an “absolute
no-no”.
Little recalled being concerned about the
project’s progress and refusing any additional
funding.
“It was disturbing that a programme that was
struggling to win the confidence of ministers, certainly of
me as a minister, has been allowed to progress on the basis
clearly of not fully informing Erica Stanford as a minister,
and that’s just an absolute no-no,” he said.
“That’s
never acceptable.”
However, Little was not surprised
about the revelations, saying he had trouble dealing with
immigration officials over a separate matter – the
accredited employer work visa scheme, which he eventually commissioned
a review into.
“I felt that I was misled over how
that was functioning, it was pretty clear to me that it was
not going at all well,” he said.
“So it doesn’t really
surprise me to see what Erica Stanford has discovered and
what she’s going through, it would be consistent with the
kind of relationship I had with immigration
officials.”
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