10. Question No. 10—ImmigrationERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays) to the Minister of ImmigrationQuestion No. 10—ImmigrationERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): What is the total number of offshore nurses that submitted their application in April this year to come to New Zealand compared to October this year and why has the number of offshore nurses applying to come to New Zealand declined every month since he introduced the new Accredited Employer Work Visa (AEWV) on 4 July 2022?SPEAKER: Yeah; it wasn't read as written but the Minister can answer as it's written. 10. ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays) to the Minister of Immigration: What is the total number of offshore nurses that submitted their application in April this year to come to New Zealand compared to October this year and why does he think the number of offshore nurses applying to come to New Zealand has declined every month since he introduced the new Accredited Employer Work Visa on 4 July 2022?Hon MICHAEL WOOD (Minister of Immigration): I reject the premise of the member's question and I'm happy to explain that clearly and fully for the benefit of the House. I'm advised that there are 141 offshore critical purpose visa applications made up of both Competency Assessment Programme—that is CAP—and non-CAP nurses accepted for processing by Immigration New Zealand in April 2022 and 39 applications received under the Accredited Employer Work Visa in October. However as repeatedly advised to the member through written parliamentary questions CAP nurses are not recorded under this visa and now arrive on visitor visas instead. As such those figures do not give the full picture of the number of nurses who are successfully attracted to New Zealand. To get a fuller picture I note that October Nursing Council data shows 243 nurses based offshore were approved for registration in New Zealand subject to them successfully completing their CAP course.I note that this figure has trended up significantly since May of this year and is over double that month's figure of 105 nurses. Immigration New Zealand have completed 5452 job checks and approved 480 work visas for nurses since the introduction of the AEWV—a proportion of which will be for some of over 1200 nurses based offshore approved for registration in New Zealand since May of this year subject to them successfully completing the CAP course. In the end it doesn't actually matter which visa nurses from overseas have come to New Zealand in; it matters how many we're getting here registered and the trend there is positive. Erica Stanford: Can he confirm then in light of that answer that in October the number of nurses applying to come to New Zealand under a visitor visa to do their CAP course was zero?Hon MICHAEL WOOD: I wouldn't have confidence in the member's figures; in fact in the month of October the number of CAP nurses receiving registration from outside of New Zealand was 243. In terms of the total number of CAP nurses from outside of New Zealand in the May to July quarter there were 390 who were registered by the Nursing Council; that increased to 854 in the three months from August to October. Hon Carmel Sepuloni: Do your maths.Erica Stanford: Can I have another supplementary for that?SPEAKER: Yeah. Interjections while member's asking questions: out of order. Erica Stanford: Point of order Mr Speaker. Could I ask the very generous Speaker to give me another supplementary question for that interjection?SPEAKER: I'll see how this one goes first.Erica Stanford: OK thank you. Why is the Minister referring to Nursing Council data rather than his own data of nurses applying for visas that he provided to me in written parliamentary question 40233 that shows only five nurses in September applied for a visitor visa to come to New Zealand to undertake a CAP course?Hon MICHAEL WOOD: Because I'm giving an accurate number about the number of nurses from offshore who are registered to work in New Zealand. To give the full picture of that I can perhaps quote from the number of internationally qualified nurses who have been registered in New Zealand over the course of this year which include those coming in through the CAP programme and include those who are offered direct registration from overseas. In the February to April quarter that was 750; it grew to 1125 in the May to July quarter and then grew to 1655 in the August to October quarter. We are making real progress no matter how much the member tries to play with numbers to draw the opposite conclusions. SPEAKER: Go on then.Erica Stanford: Why when official advice from Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE) in February stated that a fast track to residence could lead to rapid growth of the migrant nursing workforce" did he not put nurses on this immediate pathway to encourage this rapid growth given that we are 4000 nurses short?Hon MICHAEL WOOD: Over the course of question time today at various times the Opposition has asked that the Government do exactly what officials advised and then at other times they have implied that we should ignore the advice of officials. The reality is that the Government receives advice from officials and receives advice from sectors and then makes balanced decisions. We have in fact created a fast-track residency programme for nurses which enables them to receive residency after two years in New Zealand—that is a more generous pathway than ever existed under the previous National Government—for all 13 occupational categories of nurses and as I have just demonstrated in every quarter of this year the number of internationally qualified nurses being registered in New Zealand has increased."