9. Question No. 9—Prime MinisterDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT) to the Prime MinisterQuestion No. 9—Prime Minister9. DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by her statement relating to the COVID-19 vaccine roll-out Our focus in those early days has been just getting people vaccinated rather than focusing heavily on reporting systems and dashboards"? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes. I stand by my full statement which began by noting that "We have to move to more frequent reporting as we scale up the roll-out." As the member is aware we've announced our sequencing framework and have a plan in place that will ensure all New Zealanders are offered a vaccine by the end of the year. Our initial focus—and rightfully so—has been on protecting those most at risk of being infected with COVID-19 in their workplace which is why we've focused on vaccinating border and managed isolation and quarantine workers and high-risk front-line workers. We've also begun the next phase and are vaccinating people most at risk. As I said this morning to give even more certainty we will shift towards more frequent reporting that provides additional information and builds on the weekly updates provided by Ministers. This is why the Ministry of Health has started producing a weekly dashboard the first of which has been published today. David Seymour: If the focus has been primarily on "getting people vaccinated" why is the most people vaccinated in a day still only 6000 when this Ministry of Health chart dated 17 March says there should be around 40000 people vaccinated per day now in order to finish vaccination by December? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: So with the roll-out that we're working to you can see the blue line indicates where our projected plan has us and our vaccination rates; the red demonstrating where we actually are. We're sitting at about 95 percent against our plan. At the moment it is fair to say our vaccination rates over Easter were low obviously the public holiday impacting that. We're hoping to see that catch-up occur in the coming weeks. The whole plan though has been designed to see an ongoing uptick in daily vaccination rates until you see at its peak when we get into the wider population significant numbers on a daily basis. David Seymour: If we can't rely on this chart published by the Ministry of Health last month when can we expect every New Zealander who wishes to be vaccinated to be able to be vaccinated by? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Our projections—and again this is going to still be contingent on the arrival of Pfizer vaccine against what they've given us a general indication around. But the indications we have at the moment are that we should be moving into the general population from about the middle of the year—so from about July. What we've been careful to do in sequencing our roll-out—that doesn't mean that we will have enough vaccination for the whole population from July but that we have enough stored and available that we feel confident that anyone who shows up will be able to be vaccinated and we've taken that approach for the whole roll-out. We don't want a situation where we scale up and then we have a halt on supply and we have to scale down. We want it to be a continual ramp up in the availability and vaccination of our people. David Seymour: Is the Government waiting on a supply of vaccine because it signed its first agreement with a pharmaceutical company in October compared with the US and UK in May Japan in July or Kazakhstan for example in August? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The first thing I'd say is that countries of course are working incredibly hard to vaccinate their populations so that they can get normality back in their lives. They are working very hard to get what New Zealanders for the most part already have so that means that of course when it comes to not our advanced purchase arrangements but delivery against them Australia and New Zealand have very openly acknowledged that the pressures in New Zealand are very different to other countries. People are literally not dying while they wait so that means delivery has been different. The second point I'd make is our programme is different. We're using a primary vaccination in Pfizer. We will have others available but that is our primary dose that we're using. The third point I'll make is that we have been making sure as I said that we are sequencing our roll-out so that it has a continual upward tick—that we don't open close open close—and so that has been about managing our inventory and the doses we have available on supply. Hon Chris Hipkins: Can the Prime Minister confirm that the New Zealand Government's decision to switch to a predominantly Pfizer-based vaccination campaign—relying on one of the safest and most effective vaccines on the market—is one of the reasons why we're having to wait until the second half of the year to make the vaccine available to the bulk of the New Zealand population? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes that has been part of it—our delivery schedule through that primary vaccine. One thing I would say is other countries have made other choices and they are perfectly legitimate choices and reasonable choices—you know all of those vaccines have gone through regulator-approval processes. So whilst New Zealand has made this choice it doesn't diminish the legitimacy of other countries' vaccination choices but for us it has a simplicity to it that we're operating in this way. David Seymour: Is the Prime Minister telling New Zealanders that we are second to last in the OECD for vaccination rates because that's what this Government actively chose—to be late? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: No. David Seymour: When will the national immunisation solution be ready and fully operational? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We already have our COVID immunisation register. The member might be talking about the national booking system which is separate. We're expecting that to be nationally available and utilised from about May. David Seymour: Is it that late because it was commissioned only in October? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I think just to be fair to our health service of course it is fair to say that the immunised—we have not had a national well-functioning immunisation register for years. We have that now and that is an absolutely fantastic legacy project that we now have to make sure we improve all our vaccinations. On the booking system of course DHBs and our health sector have their own booking systems. We've seen the need for something nationally. We've put in place that solution. But keep in mind we have run immunisation programmes nationally before quite successfully without that in place but this is a sensible option to enable a smoother roll-out later on down the track. David Seymour: By when will vaccine passports recognised by other countries such as Singapore be available to New Zealanders to aid them in international travel? Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Just to be clear—because I notice that there's sometimes different characterisations of this—in some countries they're using what they're calling vaccination passports to gain entry to things like large-scale events like sports games and music events. Obviously that's not something that we require here. People are able to move around freely. If you're asking about when New Zealanders will be able to carry immunisation information when they travel of course that's something that the international travel association—the agency IATA—that deals with those globally recognised pieces of data is working on so it's not a matter that New Zealand somehow owns sole responsibility for this. If it's going to have international recognition it would need to be designed in that way and we of course would look to make sure that our population is able to demonstrate internationally when they've been vaccinated. If however your question is "When will people be able to come in if they can demonstrate they've been vaccinated?" the issue will be—David Seymour: Point of order.Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I'm happy to hear the clarification of your question. David Seymour: The question was very clearly "When will New Zealanders have passports recognised by other countries that allow them to travel internationally?" The Prime Minister has attempted to answer two questions that clearly weren't asked and it seems to me it's a superfluous diversion to addressing the question. SPEAKER: Well I think the member knows that judgments as to the quality of the answer are not mine but I did happen to be listening to the answer and I would have thought that having New Zealanders offshore with vaccine passports coming into New Zealand as the Prime Minister was describing might be something that would be of interest to at least some members in the House and very much related to the question that the member asked. He asked about New Zealanders having vaccine passports. David Seymour: Point of order Mr Speaker. With the greatest of respect it was "recognised by other countries" for New Zealand to travel. Most of what the Prime Minister has said is completely and clearly unrelated and I just put it to you that it's a diversion from answering and addressing the question. Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Point of order. SPEAKER: Speaking to the point of order the right honourable Prime Minister. Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I'm happy to continue to answer the question. I appreciate the clarification from the member but as I said if the member is looking for something internationally recognised carried by New Zealanders then that would be under IATA. That is being worked on. Our Ministry of Transport is closely following that work because of course we want New Zealanders who have been vaccinated to be able to demonstrate that for the purposes of travel."